Monthly Archives: November 2022

November 20, 2022 · 10:16 am

over the hedge

I’m going to beat the crap out of that girl.

—–

Before taking a shower, Shelley writes in her journal.

Day 2 in The Void.
I have determined that George, formerly Debbie’s George, is the same as my own.
We are destined to be together.
I don’t know where the other is.

She pulls away from the screen, looks at what she wrote. She knows there is another but can’t recall who. It is someone dark… black, even, like the shadow side of a planet.

Her phone rings. It’s Arthur. Arthur! she thinks while trying to figure out how to answer like in a receiver. That’s who I was thinking of. And he must have been thinking of me! She figures it out, puts the correct end to her mouth. “Hallo?”

“Are you ready?”

Ready for what? she thinks. Oh. The shower. Testing water pressure and all, let’s say.

“Yes.”

“Go ahead and I’ll meet you over there.”

“Oh.” Disappointment?

“Shelley?”

“Yes… Arthur.”

“Arthur? You haven’t called me *that* in a while. Do you, erm, do you even know where you are? Where I am? Where we’re going?”

She admitted she didn’t. She was in The Void for real. And she didn’t even have the necklace this time, giving it to a repairman in the garage outside in order to pay for her car. Broke carburetor. “It’ll cost you as much as the car itself,” Ken said through the window, watching her dig dig dig in her pocketbook for cash, red or green. But alas, the only thing of value she had on her was the Venus Cage. Of course, Ken, also working for The Void, knew this. After receiving it he made the proper disposal per instructions. Far far away from The Void. Lemont Sanford must not know how to get at her this go around. She will be truly trapped forever and ever. Swapsies.

(to be continued)

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0605, Little Hell, Omega^^, Southern

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

November 20, 2022 · 9:20 am

Everyone has a darker sister.

Ooops. There go the eyes again.

Winter wonderlands (just appeared) make my peepers pop out. They bring people so much… *joy*!

I hates them. Anyway, back to forging the goat’s head.

—–

“Debbie, were you in The Void today?”

“I deny everything in that direction.”

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0604, Little Hell, Omega^^, Southern

Tagged as , , ,

November 19, 2022 · 3:40 pm

stop and go

“See the whirlybird, Tabitha? Whirl whirl,” she emphasized with a twirling finger. “Whir whir,” the toddler she was holding mimicked without the finger. The actual birds in the vicinity, doves, remained frozen between them, opposing frantic spinning with rigid stasis in protest of the “invasion”. Or so legend goes: frozen birds, later the inspiration for a frozen pie company.

Tar stepped out of the copter, followed by Guit. The experimental, guitar oriented punk-folk fusion band Tar Guit had landed in rebuilt Moray Docks Village, ready to put on a celebratory show for the ages. Trouble was, they sucked.

—–

I suck at this game, thought Liz. But I’m not going to let these bastards know it. Fiction power: on!

She expertly places the 1st black stone. Everyone had to play clean, the rules stated. So they washed them down before the match, these opposing horses or ponies. They couldn’t take a water or food break until it was over. The Watchers were going to have a good time with this. Because they knew Liz couldn’t resist. Then at the end they’d all give her a big Thumbs Down despite her seeming big win. “In reality,” they might chide, “you couldn’t beat Lichen with one hoof tied behind your midsection. White never succumbs to black!”

“Does so!” she might exclaim back, and end it all with a fall of cards, or, in this case, a shower of rocks, inharmonious black and white mixing together in a fused mish-mash all around.

Robot servant Ruttitutti shows up, ready to take food and drink orders. It was over.

—–

Thank God, most of the scattering concert goers thought.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0603, Little Hell, Nautilus, NORTH, Omega^^, Southern

Tagged as , , , , ,

November 18, 2022 · 1:56 pm

black and white

“She’s somewhere in that prison.” Lichen Roosevelt glances up. “Tall and narrow.”

“Like in the windows,” her companion Fern Stalin said for clarification, mainly to the reader of this here text. “The prison itself is rather short and squat, despite appearances from our angle.”

“Right right. Well?”

“France was a no go,” Fern said to Lichen.”Nothing in Mercury-Gemilli, or what we could detect at the time.”

“We had our Star Team tricorders,” said Lichen to this. “We should have sensed something if something was there.”

“Maybe later,” encouraged Fern.

“Maybe later,” echoed Lichen.

They begin to prepare for scaling the walls…

—–

“Liz!” Lichen exclaimed, waking her up.

“Shhhh. Keep it down!” she whispered as loud as safely possible, she felt. But she was overjoyed at the sight. At long last they meet almost eye to eye again. Get me out of here!

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0602, France, Little Hell, Omega^^, Southern

Tagged as , , , , ,

November 18, 2022 · 2:55 am

00350601

When we return to rebuilt Moray Docks Village, radiation finally dissipated after 50 millenia days, Shelley’s good friends and vacation pals George (not her George, again) and Debbie had separated from each other, her on the far bench checking the latest odds on her dogs and he in the foreground perusing the stock numbers. Shelley had taken the opportunity to move in on him, not necessarily to steal him from Debbie (although she did wear that looser fitting Pepper t-shirt no. 2 today for some reason) but just to get more information about marriage in general, what works and what doesn’t. Or at least that’s how she rationalizes it in her mind.

“George?” she starts, after another sip of tea.

“Mmmm?”

“How was your crabs? You know, I think I had something similar. I kept itching and itching and applying lotion and applying lotion and finally –.”

“Different,” he interrupted, still looking at his paper. “Ours were… (he looks up briefly, contemplating the smell, the look, the taste) delicious.” Uncle Jiffy makes the best! he thinks. Back to the figures, although he spots Shelley’s bare shoulder out of the corner of his eye, another figure he sometimes contemplates. But Debbie is right back there, he reminds himself. He hadn’t given up. George rustles his paper, reabsorbing himself in the news.  Shelley will have to be happy with her tea for pleasure today.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0601, Nautilus, NORTH

Tagged as , , ,

November 17, 2022 · 2:22 am

00350517

She’d always been a Trekkie/Star Trek fan, as far back as she can remember. She primarily identified with Ouhuru from the first series, was obsessed with her, wanted to know what she did when she was away from the bridge, out of sight of the cameras, etc. So she found out the only way she could: fiction, fan-style of course. Later she started switching the characters around. Sooloo became the captain, and even merged with Captain Crunch of breakfast cereal fame to become Cpt. Munch, with the bravado or macho posturing of the original cpt., Kirklin let’s call him, becoming even more intense and more insane. He treated his crew more like children, child laborers, and he their master at the top of it all, straddling the hill with his two powerful limbs for legs.  Pickard, the captain after Kirklin in the next series, became a “mere” redshirt, fit to be exterminated in any beam down party. Sooloo, also from the original series and who had replaced Kirklin in *form* in her imagination, developed into a love interest for Ouhuru, a way for her to gain favors from him in part. This led to the inevitable end when she got over her head in 1000 City, which the U.S.S. Ararat (taking over from the retired U.S.S. Cuthand — earlier novels I’m talking about here) was assigned to investigate because of a troubling black hole style anomaly (blurred with black horse and black ho concepts in the text) originating from that small but intense cyberpunk city in the sim of Gemini. The beam down party, sans Pickard who had been mowed down by an abominable snowman or snow tiger riding a snowmobile at its top level, its ceiling if you will, eventually discovered the time/space disturbance behind a bar tucked in the southwest corner of town. And here we are. Stuck still, black hole and black horse and black ho aspects inseparable now.

“Be careful out there Carb. And watch out for spiders!”

“Aww Maw!” he called back walking through the door under the purple marquee, beside the blank purple circle that stood in for a wall sign, behind the square, similarly blank purple standing or pavement sign below them. Bar Purple is another obvious name for the joint, but that was just more relics from the past. The new owner (The Void, we assume) had changed the name to the more innocent seeming and generic 1000 Bar, after the city. Ouhuru, due to the powers of the anomaly that might be behind the bar, but might be *where she’s standing*, forgot her Star Trek Team origin, became absorbed into it, much like actual black holes of our universe absorb light and matter; time itself.

She checked her watch and tried to think positive thought bubbles. The letter from the publisher is due today, any minute now. But she already felt she knew the answer, could feel it in her bones. Rejection.

“Another one, Ted?”

“Nah, thanks Liz. I gotta get back to the ship.” He vanished along with her hopes. In reality, the mailman arrived.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0517, Gemini, Hana Lei^^

Tagged as , , , , , ,

November 16, 2022 · 3:32 pm

Fern’s figurings

“Oh, on a more minor note I think I figured out the tiger angle, Marilyn slash Lichen. I found another picture (of one) bumming around the property, coupled with an Auburn logo on the front of a dartboard cabinet. Auburn — Tigers. The owner must be an alum.

“Cool (pause). Anything else?” Subtext: Are you ready to go to France now?

“Nah. Guess that’s it.”

“We better line our ducks up in a row then.”

“Nice.”

—–

earlier:

“Oh yeah, you know I told you I showed up in Gemini (sim) on the beach, in that capsule. But, get this, it was a *Mercury* capsule, not the 2 man Gemini one. 1 man capsule. Here’s the thing. When Major Nelson comes back to Earth in his capsule and washes up on the beach with Jeannie also in that capsule.”

“Her bottle,” clarified Marilyn

“Yeah.”

“And you set her free.”

“Yeah, but my point is that Mercury was a solo act, for one astronaut. Major Nelson arrived alone on the beach, so it also must have been a one man capsule. He must have been a part of the Mercury Project. But here’s the thing. Later on, Major *Healy* said he also was there on the beach when Jeannie’s bottle was uncorked. So that makes it Gemini instead of Mercury — two man capsule instead of one — no other way. This is the retconned aspect, as I’ve studied up on. The beginning of the show was changed, modified. Whose memories are right, Nelson or Healy?”

“That’s a major memory problem, ha.”

“Good one. So… what you think? Mercury? Gemini? Which one would *you* choose?”

“Maybe we don’t have to,” Marilyn says cryptically, thinking of another location she’d learned through her comedy act (That’s why the French don’t wash, etc.) where the 2 are effectively merged, major problem solved.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0516, France, Gemini, Hana Lei^^

Tagged as , ,

November 15, 2022 · 7:48 pm

00350515

The Musician had a plan. Play his last gig at Pink Think before returning to Nautilus and take Shelley with him, freeing her from the prison cave closest to The Void in Gemini (4006m). That’s how he can keep her from opening the door to her cage. Power. Power behind powers. He thinks she’s ready. He’s delusional. She’ll never forgive him, although she feigns acceptance to escape.

Albert and Biff sit around the wall still from the ensuing gig at their tea table, the music too deafening to their more sensitive ears. Plus they’re all too familiar with the notes and beats. They’d rather remain in the bar with at least equally-sensitive-to-sound Marilyn, a light in their darkness now. True they were were resigned to their entrapment here in Gemini, not being as blind as The Musician. But they were still trapped.

Marilyn? With Fern now, catching up — Fern said it was super hard to find her in the sim, what with all the cubic meters to cover from top to bottom, all 16 stories of 256x256x256 of it. Claude never showed up, intervention with the 3 beastly boys delayed. Or did he? Fern changes to demonstrate what happened.

She was back on top, ha — in charge. “The *clue*,” she said while nursing a red cocktail 1/2 in Claude’s body, educating Marilyn/Lichen as well as putting her back in her place, “was the receiver part. I live in a receiver, like a jeannie lives in a bottle. Get it? Like ‘Jeannie and the Tiger’. You remember? We watched that summer before last — it was just showing, by accident let’s say, on the Cartoon Network where we usually hang out. We switched over from ‘Dirty Duck’. Do you recall?”

“I remember,” said Marilyn, marveling at the brains, the brilliance, of her partner in crime once more. If only she had my humor, she thinks. Always pretty dead serious about stuff, like this. I’m not really surprised that Fern has outmaneuvered me and don’t really care. I could make 10 jokes about the situation right now, make light of it.

Yes, I suppose they made a good team, nay, a great team, especially after Marilyn/Lichen decided to ditch the horse and the association with The Void. Because this was the ultimate lesson learned for the traveling bartender in the sim of Jem– Gemini. Avoid the Duck.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0515, Gemini, Hana Lei^^

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , ,

November 15, 2022 · 1:53 pm

The redshirts are coming the redshirts are coming.

Lt. Ohura here doesn’t count. Wrong sex, although certainly the right one personally to win an all important favor from the Cpt. Car was the eventual outcome, short for Carbon, Ohura’s favorite element next to Potassium. And she didn’t want her son going around being referred to as Pot or Potty, or have his full name contain the word “ass” in it. Carbon it was. Munch didn’t need to know anything about the infant. She hid inside the black hole behind the bar, and him with her. Always from that point on. Carbon Glow Mahoney, a fake last name, as close to baloney as you can get without giving everything away, she felt: her fake life in 1000 Cy. after the U.S.S. Ararat had left the scene, taking the Cpt., Speck, all the remaining red shirts with it, along with the “inferior” females. Ohura, I mean, Liz would eventually loosen their psychological shackles as well, giving them freedoms in the mind along with the body. But first she had to deal with the boy in the harsh glare of city life. Life itself.

“Come on, Carb (as he preferred instead of Car when he reached a certain age), let’s get you to the dentist for that tooth filling party.” She lied and told him he was named after her favorite part of the car — carburetor — which she also liked because it referenced the name “car” itself. She wanted to hide the space part of herself as decorated officer Winnifried Ohura as much as possible; wanted to be absorbed inside the role of bartender/lady of the night Elizabeth Mahoney, a common girl from the proto-ghetto (progo).  Car(r), hmm. I’m starting to know who this actually is, an old old friend of the blog, almost older than time itself. Through him they are able to look into the past and see revolution, robot style. Or 1/2 robot, 1/2 biological, yes. Like Car himself as it turns out. Only 1/2 carbon, see. The other 1/2: car or carburetor. Machine. Yes, I think I’ve about got it. Earth and Space.

She came up with the 1/2 thing analyzing a minion just before she beamed down to her new life, appropriately enough, her last work as a Star Team bioscientist. Fern would be proud, I assume.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0514, Gemini, Hana Lei^^

Tagged as , , , , , ,

November 15, 2022 · 5:48 am

Black 02

He was walking down the same beach again as before, but from the right direction instead of the wrong direction, he felt, Shelley encountered *first*, with Darla and her friends Lois and the other one in the background now. “Hi,” he said, slowing down. She moved her legs out of the sun fully under the Umbrella, staring at him. “Some decision we have coming up.” He wiped his brow of pretend sweat to seem more authentic. From somewhere inside her one piece black bathing suit she pulls out a pistol and shoots him.

Albert wakes up in the room intended for first Darla and next Shelley. He’d found her, but only in his dreams. *This* was reality.

He stares out a window between butterfly curtains he’d picked out at Macy’s toward the heart of the pretend city that they both were suppose to live in. Together.

“What went wrong?” he muttered, oblivious to the truth still, and that he had reaped what he sowed. He was the prisoner now.

Leave a comment

Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0035, 0513, Crisp Sea, Gemini, Hana Lei^^, Nautilus

Tagged as , , ,