S5, E9 | A Town Called Revelstoke

Cautiously leading the charge over the pile of snow that coats the ground beneath a thin layer of ice from the rain that had fallen hours earlier in the day, the Silverado draws nearer to its destination. Both Terry and Darnell having pinned a tarp against the shattered windows on the driver’s side of the Wrangler, it too slowly crunches the wintery mix beneath its all terrain tires, the woman in control of its wheel remaining persistent in fighting to keep it on course.

Wrapped in a pair of blankets- one having belonged to the mentor who’d willingly surrendered it to her- Marta defies the rocky terrain and rests her head against a suitcase, her closed eyes affording her the luxury of sleeping through the challenging journey. Remaining wide awake and shielded from the winter by only a sweater he’d pulled from a bag in one of the crates across the flatbed from him, Lou watches as the snow-covered mountains pass him by, the day beginning to fall into night.

With the fortune of being protected from the harsh elements by the windows of the truck’s cabin, Jenn stares through the window of her passenger’s side as the sun begins to dip below the horizon. Lowering from its undisturbed and content visage, the woman’s eyes catch a glimpse of the green street sign that her ride drives beyond, quietly reading the name “Halston Avenue” inside of her head before letting her sights fall disappointedly.

Pulling off of the main road, the collection of vehicles descend upon streets no longer covered by asphalt, their dirt surfaces covered by the same snow that the British Columbia streets hide beneath. “I can take over whenever you need” Sonya remarks, watching as the Wrangler’s navigator lets out a prolonged yawn, shaking her head before her lips can return to the warmth of each other.

“I’ll be good” Josie rebuttals, reaching into the centre console to retrieve a transparent, orange bottle that she proceeds to rattle, “I snatched some caffeine pills from whoever owned the condo we stayed in.” With a smirk, Sonya shakes her head in dismissal before returning her stare toward the open road ahead, impressed with the ease her fellow survivor had managed to lift the medications through.

“Alright, we’re closing in on the tracks!” Jules remarks, looking toward Ally through the rear-view mirror whilst taking notice of the Wrangler’s headlights a few metres behind. Aware of what the warning entails, the rifle-wielding brunette looks over her shoulder and gently taps the back window with her knuckles, gaining her boyfriend’s attention. Quietly thrusting her open palm forward, the woman gestures toward the man in the flatbed before silently setting her eyes back upon the path ahead.

Holding onto the shake of the vehicle as it climbs over the abandoned metal tracks, Lou replicates the same gesture his girlfriend had directed him a few times over. Only ceasing his efforts once Josie flashes the headlights a handful of times, the man sinks back into his place along the vehicle’s back. Having spent nearly the last hour zoning out to bypass the chill, the stalwart is watched by Adrian as he settles back in for the what’s left of the ride, both men nodding to each other.

As the hours pass, the slow crawl that both vehicles make through the Canadian wilderness leads them to a bridge that crosses the Columbia River just as Christmas day comes to a close. Putting their faith in the elevated passageway’s structural integrity, the survivors hold onto whatever aspects of their vehicle are enforced enough to withstand their grip, the arduous march finding them safely led across just as the clock rolls past midnight.

Having stopped for a brief moment to syphon whatever abandoned vehicles line the roads of a town called Revelstoke, the survivors wander through the area with their guard raised, eyes kept out for both the undead and any survivors that may linger. “Let’s give ourselves about an hour to get what we need. We’ll travel in groups of four or five. One will syphon, the others keep a lookout” Sebastian proclaims, looking throughout the collected group and awaiting their breakaway unions.

“Alright, fine. I’ll go first” Terry remarks, having watched on as the various survivors look toward each other without wishing to be the first to speak, “I’ll run with Jules, Josie, and Elsie.” Finding no argument from anyone, the man takes it upon himself to divide what remains into their own pairs, wanting to not waste more time than they have. “Lou can go with Ally, Marta, Adrian, and Jenn” he continues, pointing out each, “Sebastian, the Goldens, and Ally’s friends will stay together.”

“That works for me” Sebastian replies, retaining possession of one jerrycan before handing off another to Terry. “No, no, no. You’ve only got one hand and you’re one of our best fighters” Terry interrupts, extending his hand toward Lou, who’d approached the pair of leaders to take ownership over the third canister, “Adrian, you’ll take the last can.”

Seeing no issue in the matter, Marta’s father steps forward as Lou passes him by, their shoulders briefly colliding as they cross paths. “Ah, shit!” the well-travelled wanderer grimaces, dropping to his knee as he immediately reaches for his neck, the sudden shift sending a sharp pain travelling down his back. 

“Woah, woah! Are you alright!?” Marta hurriedly questions, immediately hurrying away from Jenn’s side to attend toward her mentor, accidentally stepping ahead of Ally, who’d initially set out to set her issues with the man aside and come to his aid. “Yeah, I’m good. I’m good” Lou reassures, the remark being one that immediately fails to convince Terry, who walks up to the survivor’s side and gently takes him by the arm.

“Are you sure you’re alright, Lou? I don’t want you going out there and running into trouble you can’t handle” the American side’s leader comments, only to be politely brushed off by the man. “I’ll be fine. I’ve made it this far without two hands, a little stinger isn’t gonna do anything losing an arm hasn’t” Lou defiantly proclaims, punching the snow that his pointed staff had fallen into as he retrieves the weapon, carrying himself back the way he came.

“Alright then” Terry begrudgingly retorts, hesitant to believe the man that’s followed after by Marta whilst Ally quietly surveys the pair from afar, left with little choice but to accept the slayer’s answer. “I don’t know what fucking time it is, so we’ll all meet back here at sunrise” the American shot-caller proclaims, waving off the split crowd of survivors and sending them off in different directions, looking to salvage what they can from the quiet town that no longer utters a word.

= RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 =

Dropping like a sack of potatoes as the sharpened end of a rebar staff rips through the eye socket it had entered through, an ice-covered and surprisingly-fresh zombie’s corpse plummets into the snow just beyond a coffee chain store. “We’re all clear. Check the doors!” Lou proclaims, walking away from the chain restaurant that both Ally and Marta approach calmly, returning to the parking lot that the remaining members remain in.

Slamming their closed fists against the front doors before pulling at the handle that refuses to budge, the women await whatever response inside they are unsure of whether or not they’ll receive. Spitting fuel into the snow that’s risen to halfway up the tires of a mid-nineties era Subaru, Adrian waits for the trickling of gasoline to fall from the tube he’s buried deep within the vehicle’s tank, hoping as the others do for as quick of a fill as they can manage.

“We’ve got zombies!” Ally calls out, prompting both Jenn and Lou to centre their attention upon the coffee shop’s entrance, their readied stances facing the dead that press against the door. Joining the brunette in retreating from the building’s entrance, Marta steps away as the fight-ready survivors square up.

Hurling a stone through the windows of the building’s front, Jenn frees the corpses a way to spill into the parking lot, a pair of black railings stretching down a ramp that lead to the pair. Much fresher than most stragglers are around this time of the year, the trio of wandering biters speed walk down the concrete slope and hurry for what they approach just as they would with any other meal.

Crushing the first corpse over the head with his rebar post, Lou steps aside to allow his fellow survivor a chance at swinging for the fences. “You’re turn, buddy!” Jenn proclaims, having bludgeoned the second traipsing roamer with such force that her baseball bat rings within her palms as if having made contact with a ball outright.

Launching himself forward as if throwing a javelin, Lou leaps off the ground for a brief moment as his staff drives through the throat of the final zombie, taking it toward the ground without actually finishing it off. “Make it count, Jenn!” the one-armed man proclaims, holding the corpse steady as the sharpened end of his staff rests in the concrete, the roamer positioned as if it were laying down just an inch off the ground.

Shaking the cramp from her hand, Jenn swirls her bat around by her side with confidence as she approaches, throwing herself forward as she swings the weapon at the ground, disfiguring the corpse’s already putrid-looking skull beyond what could be considered human-looking. With ease, Lou rips his staff free before bumping fists with his zombie-slaying friend, their approach carrying them in the direction of the girls who had purposefully taken positions off to the side.

“I didn’t get much, but it’s still better than nothing” Adrian remarks, stepping through the coffee shop’s front doors whilst swirling the slight amount of gasoline in the jerry can he soon leaves atop one of the booth’s tables. “We’ll have plenty of time before the sun comes up” Marta responds, walking around the store’s front counter before checking the various cabinets and drawers kept from public view.

“So this is what you Canadians lose your mind over, huh?” Jenn queries, spinning her bat in loops as she traipses through the commons area of the shop, looking around the room with an unimpressed visage. “The only reason Tim Horton’s is considered as uniquely-Canadian is because it failed every time it tried to go somewhere else” Adrian retorts, pulling out a chair he soon occupies with his feet atop the accompanying table, “I always preferred the McDonald’s coffee anyway.”

Passing the conversation by, Lou follows his protege around the counter before noticing his girlfriend wander off a few paces ahead. “You need any help?” the man inquires, watching Marta look up to him as she kneels upon the floor, digging through whatever cupboards lend themselves to her eyes. “I’m all good, how about you?” she questions back, watching her mentor gently shake his head in refusal before walking by.

“No issues here. Let me know if you need anything” he answers, passing a glance toward the baseball bat-swinging woman and the resting, jerry can-carrying man in the dining room before following the trail of his lover.

|

“No, no! Avoid that one!” Josie proclaims, pointing at the truck parked in front of the motel they travel around as Terry sets his gas canister down beside it. “That can you’ve got is carrying strictly-diesel fuel” the woman explains, watching her friend’s confused expression look toward her at first, “the Silverado consumes a different gas than the Wrangler. The truck you’re at doesn’t take diesel and you don’t want to start mixing the gases.”

Lifting his hands in surrender whilst his peers break into yet another private room, Terry reclaims possession of his mostly-empty canister before following after those he travels alongside. Immediately checking the bathrooms and closet for any would-be threats, Elsie and Jules assure the other half of their crew that the coast is clear. “The last room’s all good!” the latter of the two proclaims, retreating for the room’s entrance whilst the blonde beside him sparks a smile.

“That’s perfect! Josie and Jules... get some sleep” Elsie proclaims, catching the ears of the figures that approach. “I’m all good. I’ve got-” Josie attempts to rebuttal, only for her explanation to be refused by the woman, who remains adamant in the demand she’d made. “I don’t care what you have or what you need. The two of you are driving, so the two of you will get some rest while you can” the woman, whose hair has been newly re-braided, doubles down.

“We’ll be back for you when the sun starts to rise. Until then, settle in and close your eyes for a bit” the blonde woman declares, having spent the last ten minutes trying to convince the pair of drivers to do as instructed. Having finally succeeded, Elsie shuts off the room’s entrance and smiles toward Terry, every other unoccupied flat’s front door having been left open.

“I guess it’s time for us to find some fuel, huh?” she quips, jutting her chin toward the direction they had initially entered from, setting the pair’s destination toward the gas station she’d purposefully ensured they would pass in order to settle the others into a brief nap.

|

Dropping a fifth corpse atop a pile of bodies they’d stacked upon each other on the front yard, Sebastian and Darnell stand upright once more and gather their breaths. “That’s fucking tragic, man” the latter survivor remarks, dropping to a knee whilst the leader of the group’s Canadian half watches on.

“At least peace can be made knowing they made the decision themselves” Sebastian responds, looking toward the front of the residential home’s wooden exterior, white paint having purposefully stained its brown finish to warn those travelling beyond it of what lies inside.

“FAMILY SUICIDE. 5 DEAD INSIDE. SHOTGUN. HEAD. DON’T ENTER” the scrawling’s read, the list of comments stacking on top of each other, forming five lines that read from top to bottom, each as grim and discomforting as the last.

“I hope they did” Darnell rejoinders, pointing toward a pair of faces that appear much younger than the ones piled on top of them, “the only people that’ll ever know for sure are at our feet.” Finding it difficult to argue against the conclusion that the man comes to, Sebastian nods agreeingly before letting out a sigh, his eyes taking in the direction of the home’s carport, finding Christina’s watchful eye holding upon them from the patio just above it.

“Hey, Sebastian?” the old community-based survivor wonders aloud, reclaiming the Canadian leader’s attention from the home itself. “I just wanted to apologise for what happened with Dawn” Darnell confesses, holding a disheartened look on his face as the man opposite him looks on, “we didn’t know what she was planning. If we did, we would’ve tried to talk her out of it.”

“Woah, man. I don’t blame you” Sebastian quickly counters, shaking his head in the man’s direction as he assures him of such a claim to be the truth. “I know you don’t, but that doesn’t mean that some others do” Darnell responds, an argument that the man he speaks with finds more difficulty debating, “you seem more willing to hear us out, though. I get why the others don’t trust us, and I don’t have a problem with it. I just want to make it clear that we didn’t want that anymore than you guys.”

“Darnell, I believe you” Sebastian reassures, watching the man hang his head and nod, relief appearing through the breath that leaves the man’s nose. Turning back toward the home, the Canadian watches as the woman with a much less pleased expression turns back for the home, retreating from the patio with a scowl.

|

“Knock, knock” Lou murmurs, watching his girlfriend turn back to face him, her attention caught by the man’s voice. “Hi” she answers simply and without enthusiasm, acknowledging her boyfriend’s presence before looking back toward the abundance of things left behind in the office she assumes had belonged to the coffee shop’s manager.

Aware of the standing that he resides within at this moment, Lou remains quiet for a moment as he watches his girlfriend sift through the things stationed across the work-covered desk. “I deeply regret what I said to you back at the lodge” the man confesses, looking at the woman’s back as it remains facing him, “you know that, right?”

“Not necessarily” Ally answers without much hesitation, picking up a ceramic ‘World’s Best Boss’ mug before tossing it into the corner of the wall-leant workspace, surprised to find it not shatter. “Ally, I was just-” Lou attempts to rebuttal, calmly proceeding to present his point before finding the woman’s interruption preventing him from doing so.

“I don’t know the other people” she confesses, turning back to look at her boyfriend with a disheartened look in her eyes. Closing his mouth as the words he’d attempted to offer evade him, Lou watches his girlfriend’s eyes wander toward the corner of the room as she clarifies her statement.

“All of them. Darnell, Christina, and Dawn. I’ve had a handful of conversations with them for the last few weeks, but that’s about it” Ally doubles down, looking into the eyes of the man that stands across from her, his curiosity having peaked. “The only reason we’ve been grouping together is because you and your friends are joined at the hip. It’s more of a defence strategy than anything else” she admits, leaning against the workspace she’d inspected for the last minute.

“Dawn isn’t my friend anymore than the others are. She didn’t tell us she was running off because none of us really know each other” Ally continues, watching as her boyfriend approaches with a look of loss in his visage. “Why did you tell me that they were your friends the other day?” Lou inquires, finding the woman’s confession to be odd for someone who’d argued otherwise days before.

“What did you expect me to do? I just found you all of sudden, out of the blue, and here you are with this new group of people I’d never met before” Ally responds, keeping her voice low enough to prevent the others they’d momentarily left behind from listening in. “I don’t know them. I don’t know how long you’ve known them. I’d never met them in my life” she continues, extending her arm toward the dining room’s direction, “and the second I find you, it’s like you’ve lived an entirely new life.”

“I don’t understand. Is.. is it a bad thing that I found new people?” Lou wonders aloud, a puzzled squint carried in his eyes as he struggles to understand the point his girlfriend seemingly attempts to make. “I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, I’m just saying that it’s a bit jarring” Ally rejoinders, allowed to speak through the silence that her boyfriend purposefully offers.

Hanging her head, the woman responsible for ending Dawn’s life just one night prior allows her thoughts to settle, an effort that Lou takes notice of and tries his best to stay quiet through. “I lost a lot of hope that I’d ever see you again after we all made it to Vancouver” Ally concedes, redirecting her line of sight from the ground and toward the face of the man standing in the doorway between herself and the restaurant’s working station.

“I couldn’t stop reminding myself of how hard it was to just find a boat. When we got to land, everyone made the call that we were just going to settle in until Jenn and Halston caught up with us” she recalls, tightly wrapping her palm around the desk’s edge as she sits atop it. 

“I knew there wasn’t any other way off that island. I kept thinking to myself that there was almost no chance they were gonna get as lucky as we did the first time around” Ally explains with a shame-filled smile, shaking her head with disgust in the memory of how strong her doubts had grown, “eventually, I thought about how grim the whole situation was. I at least knew that Jenn and Halston were on the island, and I still figured there was no chance in hell I’d ever see them again.”

Shaken and sorrowful in the recollection that’s brought to the forefront of her mind, Ally allows her fingertips to touch the underside of the desk, feeling the cork-like material its underbelly is composed of. “Then I got to thinking about what that meant for you” she moves on, watching Lou’s head fall slowly, disappointed in the trajectory the comments appear to head in, “I didn’t even know if you were still alive. I was just hoping you were out there somewhere, but it...”

Again coming short of finishing her thought, Ally feels the salt of tears begin to form in her distressed eyes, the sombre defeat that grips her the way she grasps the desk becoming impossible to avoid. “I figured there was nowhere else you could’ve washed up if you’d made it off the Euronam. And if I had figured it was nearly impossible for Jenn and Halston to ever make it to us...” she draws further, locking eyes with Lou as he looks up toward her, “...I figured I’d never see you again.”

“But you did” Lou quickly reassures, watching as the tears begin falling down his girlfriend’s face, her laughter and smile replying to him despite its influence not being of the pleasant variety. “Yeah, I did. I figured if Jenn and Halston ever made it back, and if they’d ever found you and brought you along with them, you’d go back to the hotel the others made the call to wait for them in” Ally chuckles, wiping the tears that stream down her face, “maybe you’d find the note I left.”

“And I did!” Lou replies, leaning his staff against the wall before resting his arm upon his girlfriend’s side, his reassurance again bringing a joyous-appearing visage over the woman. “You did! You did, and you came east, and you found me!” Ally explains, nodding along with the man, his bobbing head motivated by the odds-defying lengths they’d successfully navigated whilst hers is driven by a depressing recognition, “...and so did your new friends.”

“Why does that matter!?” Lou whispers in a hiss-like pitch, shaking his head at a loss for why any of what his girlfriend says would be considered a bad thing. “Because they’re a part of someone that, until a few days ago, I have never met!” Ally responds with a smile, her teary eyes only growing more watery the longer she speaks, trying her best to present a chipper and positive visage despite being stricken with a self-torment that she just can’t manage to shake.

“Don’t get me wrong, they seem like great people! I’m happy that you found a group that you can love like family! A group that you can love like us!” Ally doubles down, assuring the man of the pleasure she takes in the company the man has accrued, “but they’re also a never-ending reminder that we’ve become new people since that ship went under.”

“Why is that a bad thing?” Lou inquires, continuing to hear good things be spoken by the woman without being able to understand how she can say them from such a place of defeat. “It’s not a bad thing” Ally answers, pausing to regain her composure as best as she can whilst looking the man in the eyes, swiping at the trail of tears down her face as she forces herself to muster a smile.

Lowering her voice to a near whisper, the woman places her hands against each side of her boyfriend’s face, looking him in the eyes as she tries to keep her emotion under check. “I ran off from Terry and the others because I didn’t want to be stuck waiting like them” Ally confesses, offering an explanation that the man had already begun coming toward by the remarks she’s paid in the seconds leading up to now.

“I went on for some time until I ran into Val. He and the others took me in, and I felt like I finally had a chance to become someone new” she continues, pulling in a deep breath amidst another pause before letting it free in one, large exhale. “I did not get anywhere near as far as you did, baby” Ally declares as another tear runs down her face, “you have become a completely new person, and I feel like the same old Ally. That’s not a bad thing, it just means that I feel like...”

Freezing in time as her lips come together only to pull apart again without a reply, the woman finds herself growing silent as the words she hoped to find throughout her speech appear to have never been discovered. Shaking her head, the sorrowful brunette tries to smile past the pain that roots itself deep within herself before looking back toward her boyfriend’s face.

“I feel like I know myself as much as I know you, Lou...” Ally concludes, the grin she’d made her best effort toward putting on officially proving to be as unconvincing as the idea of their longed-for reunion had been, “...and I don’t really feel like I know you that well anymore.”

“I’m no different today than I was before you and the others got in that damn lifeboat, Ally” Lou reassures, watching the remaining tears squeeze through the eyelids that his girlfriend presses together, her head shaking in refusal to the claim that he makes. “I met new people. That’s it. The only thing that’s different is the fucking facial hair and the cramps in my damn neck...” the man reassures, softening his voice to as close to a silent whisper as it can reach, “...that’s it.”

“No, no. It’s not. It’s more... than just the facial hair, or the arm, or the metal stick you’ve got, it’s... more...” Ally argues back, refusing to fall from the stance she’s taken. “You’re a leader. Not just because you’re the most-fitting out of a group of high schoolers, but because you’re a real fucking man now. You make the hard calls, and you do the messy jobs” she proceeds, having found her verbal stride as she leaps from one point to the next in quick and confident succession.

“Those people out there respect you. They value you, and they look up to you. You are a made man in their eyes, and that’s not to say you weren’t to us, but you are so much more than you were when we were getting drunk in the music room a few months ago” Ally hurries, defiantly holding her opinion in the face of her boyfriend’s adamant refusal.

“I would love to get to know that man, Lou. I look forward to getting to know you all over again, but the point... is that... I don’t know you, Lou” she concludes, pulling the man’s face back toward him as it attempts to veer away, not wanting to go along with the woman’s conclusion. 

“I don’t know you like I used to. And even though I haven’t changed nearly as much as you have, I feel like you don’t know me like you used to either” Ally reassures, forcing the man to look her in the eyes, “I don’t think it’s fair to keep trying to pretend like that’s not true.”

“It isn’t true” Lou declares, standing as firm in his judgement as Ally abides by her own, shaking his head from one side to the other as his girlfriend bobs hers up and down. “It is. The good thing about it is that we have all the time in the world to get reacquainted with each other” the woman remarks, doing all that she can to not leave her side of the defence riddled with the feeling of open-ended sorrow.

“But we shouldn’t try our hand at that with the idea that there isn’t much ground to cover. We shouldn’t try and pretend like just a few days will make all things right” Ally continues, running her hands through the lengthy locks that her boyfriend sports. “I don’t understand what you’re suggesting then” Lou responds, clearing his throat as he lets free a sigh, “do you want us to just pretend like we’re strangers? Meet up for coffee in the morning and reintroduce ourselves all over again?”

Laughing at the man’s proposal, the woman loses herself in the man’s eyes without outright declining the man’s suggestion, watching as his face sways with his shaking head. “We don’t have to be strangers in order to get to know each other again” Ally speaks in a whisper, again swiping at the tears that run down her face as she frees a heavy sigh, “let’s just agree to do this as if we were really old friends who got in contact again and decided to ease back into things.”

“Like what? Like we’ve been apart for three years instead of three months?” Lou rebukes, still unwavering in his disinterest in abiding by the proposition presented to him, his disregard for it doing nothing to change the decision his girlfriend had made to start from scratch at a peaceful crossroads. “We’re just gonna go back to being, what, acquaintances?” he queries, starting to find himself coming to a realisation over what such an overture entails.

“Does that mean...” Lou wonders, coming around to the specifics of what’s to unfold in the new approach he and the woman opposite him have seemingly set themselves up for, “...does that mean we’re breaking up?” Still forcing herself to wear as reassuring of a smile as she can manage, Ally looks into the confused and genuinely hurt face that her now seemingly ex-boyfriend adorns, unable to do much more than extend her hand as if to shake that of the man’s.

Saying nothing, the woman sets aside her words in knowing that she likes their deal just as little as Lou does, unable to say anything without feeling like she’ll burst into tears. Left with only the gesture to receive his answers from, the survivor stares at the palm before pressing his lips together, slowly and begrudgingly lifting his fingers toward Ally’s.

Briefly shaking on the arrangement, the pair allow their grasp to fall from each other’s, letting the woman step past her friend and exit the office she’d initially stepped into for space. Looking at the now-empty space that his ex-girlfriend had occupied just seconds ago, Lou sits with his thoughts for a few seconds as Ally traipses through the coffee shop, walking beyond the dining room and stepping into the larger expanse of the quiet town, holding her emotions back until she can be alone.

In shock, Lou gradually turns back the way he’d entered, placing one foot in front of the other and re-entering the hallway with the strongest look of disbelief on his face. Before long, his eyes lift from the red tiled floor and toward the woman who stands by, an equally uncomfortable visage held in her eyes.

Not needing to say a word in order to show that she’d heard most, if not all, of the conversation that had been endured, Marta stares at her mentor just as he looks toward her, their saddened expression holding firmly upon each other’s. Unable to move at first, Lou reaches into the office and depressingly retrieves his rebar staff, taking another few seconds before walking beyond his protege and into the larger coffee shop, carrying on with the day without much of another choice.

== RISE and REVOLT ==