Jeffrey Phillips couldn’t help himself. “Now the other way,” he said to no one in particular. We wouldn’t see him again for a while.
But maybe in the long run such “weaknesses” would kind of be his saving grace. Because he avoided that bridge, that levy. He’d given up his chevy.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0317, Lands End, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Wild West
“*You* are Taylor,” she exclaimed excitedly across from him, wearing her standard green shirt with the lantern symbol, one from a Golden Age long forgotten by most. But not by Fern.
“And… you are?” Jeffrey Phillips remains confused. He had crossed the line from This Sim 01 into This Sim 02 and found himself here. On this couch. Speaking to this… woman. Stranger. Her eyes were brilliantly alert. She was always thinking, he realized, always spinning around something in her head. He thought back to the rainbow Ferris wheel.
“Orange,” she proclaimed, then seeing his continued blank look, said, “no not the color, the number. You are looking for VI. Ruby,” she furthered. She saw recognition in the eyes. “A… purple car, not blue not red, merges with orange to exit in you: Taylor.”
What was she *on* about? he thought. He briefly contemplated that he had died, had drove his red 57 Chevy into that levy between sims and all this, all that followed, was his dream in the afterlife. Taylor? Was that his new post-death name? And this person: some kind of angel? Or maybe: devil. Half and half. He slapped himself in the face. Didn’t work. He was still dreaming in this reality, wherever he was.
“What do you mean I’m Taylor?” A series of images formed on the couch across from him in place of Fern. He hadn’t yet realized this was his old gal pal Charlene the Punk, come back from the future after her dissertation on Bigfoot had been completed, turned into a book which was turned into a movie which was turned into a franchise, toys, cookbooks, the lot. There was even a brand of kitchen sink named after it. Bigfoot went from backwoods legend to front and center superhero. All the children knew who Gene Fade was and that his birthplace was at Jupiter Rock and that he spent his formative years in Mocksity and that he lived to be over 400 years of age. Children wanted to *be* Bigfoot now. Children wanted to live relatively forever too, where a childhood would last one of our present lifetimes. Fern knew a lot, had seen a lot. Fern had been augmented, just because she could afford it due to the franchise and all. And she had created 2 others just as tag along friends, one a ditzy blonde and the other, the other…
She changed back. “You were in that wagon,” Fern started again, like a well oiled machine, a purring car, a cat pouncing on a bat. Lee Meriwether had nothing on her.
Ruby, he remembered. The witch had said the same thing: that he was Taylor. The spirit she had summoned faded back into the netherworld it had come from. No: there! Outside the wagon now, floating across the landscape, heading toward a bridge of interesting design.
Another sim crossing. There! That’s where he had died. But not Taylor; the other. 2nd in command.
Man About Time woke up. Strangest dream, he though, and picked up his pen and pad beside his bed to jot it down before he forgot most of the details.
He puts back on his investigating shoes as he teleports into the sim. Wall hydrant at the very epicenter, he ponders, pacing back and forth around it.
Redd, just like where he came from, this Alysha “Redd” Fox, who of course he bought dinner for, having almost *killed* her with his 57 Chevy just after he darn near drove it into that levy just minutes before on the border of Dennis and Harwich. He wasn’t drunk — it was just the mechanics of the car combined with the wonky physics of the virtual reality itself. But at least there was bounce, although he couldn’t say more about this for now. Maybe later, when the psychics arrive. Because they would.
Redd would be seen, like a bright, blooming rose. Who’s on first!?
—–
We next find him staring at an octagon shaped trampoline, a combo of 9 and 8 actually, since nine is purple as 8 is orange. But mixed up here.
He investigates remotedly.
Rainbow wheel, with rainbow sphere implied. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 reduced to 1 2 3 4, or red green blue yellow but not necessarily in that order. TILE of course. Clare should know by now. We never found her new hiding spot in the northern mountains of Snowland, though. Maybe he’ll look there next.
More remote viewing here, first…
Oh, he notes that the cars are, in order, red yellow green blue *purple* red on that Ferris wheel, purple then emphasized again seemingly. He’s taking notes in his head. He’ll write them down later. Investigating feet (and eyes) first.
Ah ha. Roses (again). Reinforcement.
Dare he?
Enigma (machine). Orange revealed. 6th. VI.
Freefall.
But he keeps landing at the same spot. Endless loop!
Must be something about VI.
Pretty good, huh, Ruby?
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0315, Hills of Bill^, Maebaleia/Satori, Virgin Islands
Back in Collagesity, observing Mr. Babyface became concerned about the lack of focus. For starter, going back to the very beginning, it’s Man About *Town*, not Time. The errors started at the conception, he realized, thinking about earlier observed images. “Big Red Machine”, now where was that book? Not the blue one over there: that’s “Urantia.” An opera that never ends. Think, Babyface, think! He’s as bad as MAT right now in this magic window, laying dazed in front of a waterfall he doesn’t know the location of. Could be center, could be fringe. “*Car*, MAT, *car*,” Mr. Babyface wanted to shout at the screen to remind the bumbler and stumbler through time the central dilemma the town faced. Jeffrey Phillips was inside, and it wasn’t pretty.
“Woops! Sorry miss!”
“I’m okay I think.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0314, Bay City/Nova Albion^, Collagesity Fordham, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Sansara
He ignored Baker’s invitation to teleport back to Collagesity with him and roamed around this most central of Nautilus burgs instead. He waved at the monkeys and beavers in this pool near its southeast corner but did it the wrong way…
… and they became confused and thus didn’t respond. “Hmph,” he said in his mild, innocent way, not really insulted by the supposed snub but also not not insulted. Both ways (don’t say 1/2 and 1/2). In his wandering haze, he’d already forgotten about Baker, about Collagesity, about the invitation.
Baker tried again just as Man About Time walked into a waterfall on the southern wall and missed once more. Error!
—–
He lay there in front of the solid backed falls for the longest time, rubbing his aching head. Where was he? Who was he?
And so it goes…
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0313, Nautilus, Perch-Mistletoe, Upper Austra^
Like any child, Duncan realizes he is neither one nor the other. He is himself. Yet he must honor the dead.
What *now*, mother, father? I am a mere black child with red on his hands from doing wrong deeds. Continuously! Tell me how I made my error.
Could it have been… conception itself?
—–
Neighboring Perch-Mistletoe now:
I’m doing what Wendy did before, he thinks while rubbing down a counter in a local sushi bar with his bare hands. I killed her (!).
The Man About Time showed up.
“Sorry about the lateness,” he apologized in his mild manner, too embarrassed to say he’d forgotten how to put on his clothes and had to be reminded by those around him. “Just change your wardrobe,” they collectively scolded. “Oh,” he said in return, turning as red as Duncan’s sinful mitts, another error filled story.
“Wellll?”
“Carrcassonnee?” Man About Time said, knowing what was foremost in Duncan’s mind even if he didn’t. Did it work this time? Was he able to merge the 7th back into the 6 and start the, er, *car*? It was a thing to ponder and he did. Remember, MAT, remember! Where *was* he? He looked around. I was there and now I’m here which was there before, but…
Duncan repeated his original one word question to Man About Time, refocusing him to the present. Center. He recalls: center.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0312, Nautilus, Perch-Mistletoe, Upper Austra^
—–
Gold face? he thinks.
“AVOCADO,” came the booming voice back, reading his mind. Everything was out in the open here, nothing hidden. She addressed Baker as Mountain Man. Or maybe it was Duncan.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0311, Lands End, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Wild West
Baker suddenly finds himself behind plants again, bobblehead no more. Thank the Gods! But how?
He remembers the islet, the beach beyond, the so called friends of his work, of his life even. All becoming distant to him. Who’s left? Well, the core, Our Real Life and Our Second Lyfe. In real life I am Baker B., maker of (audiovisual) synchs and some other stuff. In virtual reality: this guy. He seems indestructible, ha.
*Ruby*, in Fantasie form, he recalls also standing across the water. Summoner of drawing Waldrop. Waldrip. Drup? Maybe all of them. Fe fi fo fum. Waldrop (whatever) lives in Fio Fum immediately below Spirit Witch. Another island, only a bit larger than the one he just, er, transferred from. He checks the elevation: 1000 even. He checks the coordinates: still in Moomit.
He moves around the plants and encounters this.
Was he dead? he had to ask himself. Only one way to find out. Proceed forward.
But it doesn’t look good.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0310, Lands End, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Wild West
She became his most regular visitor afterwards. “Tell me more about the Merry Go Round people,” she requested in her cool, silky way while remotely animating the pair again and making them spin around a common axis. Axis, she thinks. Her *husband*.
“Crack and Whack, police agents, or so they claimed. More prisoners to this small isle,” he said in his toy bear voice, just made for a loving child who was far far away now, in a different plane of existence actually. “Punished because of a bust. Broken into pieces they said he was. Took them forever to put the guy back together, the chief-inspector said, Petty I believe, unless it was Ketty — can’t recall which, actually. Usually my memory is excellent, like an elephant’s.” Should have *been* an elephant he laments here, daring to glance past Alysha’s tall, sprawled out body beside him at the Ella Phanta ride across the water to their right. Still fully on dry land. Unlike him.
“Hmm,” she replied, and sat up or rolled over, take your pick. But then she switched everything around and enacted the unexpected, turning toward the bear instead and starting to apply suntan lotion to his smiling head. New!
“So, Mr. Teddy (squirt). Tell me (squirt apply) how Baker Bloch got off that island over there? (apply apply)” She’d taken off her hat as well. Didn’t get her anywhere. He hadn’t requested she turn into a bobblehead, like Baker. After all this time. You think it would happen already if it was going to happen. She was tired of talking about the beach toys. She’d gotten their story now a half dozen times apiece. Always the Ketty-Petty confusion, and he doesn’t even know he’s repeating himself.
“Jen-nny,” he said, completely falling under her spell and revealing stuff he would never do otherwise. “Paii-d.” He meant bail here.
The next time she kept her hat on while still fulfilling his sentence. You can say their relationship changed.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0309, Lands End, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Wild West
We start again not at Ruby’s left leaning wagon in Spirit Witch where Waldrop was summoned but instead at the nearby community of Bear occupying a tiny island in Moomit Bay directly below Monevole. Baker Bloch bares his head in deference to the great King of the island: Ted, of course. Ted Bear. You had to bare something, he gathered, to have an audience with him. The hat would do, Ted indicated to the newest visitor to his islet kingdom. Thank you, he added. He was glad of visitors and wished them 24/7. He was an extreme extrovert, thus his isolation in the bay as everyone around him tired of his constant visiting and hovering. We’ll come to you now, they all said around him, wishing him well on his new venture. He didn’t understand at first, cried a lot, but then came to accept his “imprisonment.” *Selective* extroversion, that’s the key, they said, still gathered around him on the shoreline but shortly to leave, back to their spouses and siblings to heave a big collective sigh of relief that Ted wouldn’t come a knocking on their door tonight or tomorrow night or hopefully ever again. Something is not right with you, they said, almost at the end. This is the only way. And then they were gone. Ted turned on the radio. Storm a brewing. More tears fell. The lighthouse blinked on and off at his bidding but there was no way to go inside. The toys down at the beach played on. His only companions now except for the occasional visitor, the ones who cared. Ted foresaw in the palm leaves the coming of a tall, white eyed stranger, a cowboy, no a spaceman. Half and half, although he wasn’t suppose to use that phrase in front of anyone else. Keep it to yourself, they also said that day they left him on that islet, never to return again to normal existence.
So he was not surprised at the appearance of me, Baker Bloch or Baker B., who fit the description of the prophecy. “You have to bare…” he said to me because it was part of his sentence on the islet. Like I said. “… something,” he completed, looking me over good, picking me apart even. I took off my hat. It seemed to do the trick, like I also said before.
Looking at my shiny dead dome, he decided I should go one or two or five steps further and turn into a bobblehead of myself. “This is so we don’t feel you are talking *down* to us,” he says in his bear voice, tamed from years playing with human children. He hasn’t eaten anybody since ’62. Not since he was an actual bear, himself shot in ’65 and stuffed into a toy. He was soo happy at first! A toy! he cried. I can do *anything*, play with anyone, *be* with anyone. Humans watch out! And they did. And so he was here.
So *I* did, and he promptly gave me what he declared was my own island as a reward… just right over here within close earshot; they could talk all the time, he said, trying not to show too much excitement. I had successfully become one of them, whatever that actually meant.
The wrong Ruby suddenly appeared on the beach across the water. I realized I had been trapped as well. I believe she may have been cackling but it could have been the sound of a sudden gush of cold wind blowing across my bare head atop my now diminutive body. Then the others appeared…
I was no extrovert but it was the same with me. They were irritated and they decided to isolate. I counted at least 7 people on the shoreline who I thought were true friends.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0308, Lands End, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Wild West
Sunklands 