The photo above is the closest humanity has ever come to creating Medusa. If you were to look at this, you would die instantly.
The image is of a reactor core lava formation in the basement of the Chernobyl nuclear plant. It’s called the Elephant’s Foot and weighs hundreds of tons, but is only a couple meters across.
Oh, and regarding the Medusa thing, this picture was taken through a mirror around the corner of the hallway. Because the wheeled camera they sent up to take pictures of it was destroyed by the radiation. The Elephant’s Foot is almost as if it is a living creature.
Friendly reminder that this blob of core material was so hot and dense, it melted/burned through three floors of the building before coming to rest in the lowest basement.
And there’s now a unique species of black mold that feeds off the gamma radiation it produces.
Is no one else seriously freaked out by that mold? No? Just me, then?
Somewhat related but random story from when I read Fahrenheit 451 in high school.
I borrowed it from my school’s library. Somehow, and I don’t know how, I lost it. I’m
usually a very organized person, but I swear this book grew legs and walked away. I searched everywhere for this thing, I took apart my locker, asked my locker neighbors and friends to look in their lockers, looked throughout my house, searched the entire school high and low, even classrooms where I didn’t have class, went to every single lost and found bin in the building, and couldn’t find it. I did everything short of put up “lost book, if found, contact Liz” signs through the school. I never found it.
The school librarian was
a scary, strict woman, but she liked me because I always quietly did my
work during study hall. So when I finally got the courage to confess I lost the book, she was thankfully understanding and only requested that I buy a
new copy for the library (which is fair, plus I had to buy a copy to
finish reading for my class anyway).
But I’m just… haunted that that book seemingly vanished off the face of the earth forever. Of all the books in the world. It still gives me the creeps
Death and taxes. I’ve rewatched a film which is older than the
majority of my followers thus no tags or explanations needed here. Just a
reminder of why I grew up like this and with such ideals %)
Moonlit Spires 