Category Archives: Novels

January 7, 2019 · 8:02 am

rat tales

Dr. Brown knew a thing or two about sniffing out mysteries. He’d been doing so most of his life, especially a particular one involving the Cult of the Three Suns. Clues had been flying in from all directions recently. And now another had fallen in his lap: a pregnant Pat or Patrick Starr, connected with *North Yd* of all places (pronounced like “North Wide” just so you’ll know). Tilers, he thought from his secret underground lair, far far away (spatially and temporally) from the simpletons at Eotia Village. Squid people. Opposite sides of the circle, one dead and stuffed, the other living and breathing and… preaching. Vicious cycle — no, not vicious — *natural*, a comes around, goes around sort of idea. But now he had to find Tessa. She was the key.

Less than a half year ago; North Yd:

“The tile here indicates safety, however,” her grandpa reinforced. “Safe to split up, then. You examine the buildings that way,” — Grandpa Gold points behind Tessa — “and I’ll work my way around from this end — counterclockwise — until we meet up somewhere in the middle. Is that okay?”

—–

—–

I could spend the rest of my life staring at these walls and learning nothing else. I can’t believe all of the months from my past I did so. Nascera, he thought bitterly. Turns out nothing’s here. Nothing atall.

Even Reginald appears to be gone.

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January 6, 2019 · 9:03 am

clinic (Eotia Village)

“*Axis*, Zoidboro. That’s who *we’re* trying to defeat. We must make sure we don’t get this VD person to help us. Let’s see, V could stand for Val, Valerie, Valentine…”

“It’s *not* someone’s initials, Pat. Stop looking around. And don’t touch *anything* you don’t have to. Let’s just get you checked up and get outta here.”

After a pause, Pat whispers in Zoidboro’s ear. “I wonder if *he’s* hiding out from Axis too,” indicating the man sitting on the far seat from them.

“Stop — with the Axis talk,” Zoidboro reprimands out of the side of his tentacle covered mouth.

“Patrick!?” a suddenly appearing nurse shrills, making them both jump a bit.

“Um, that’s me.” Pat raises his hand. Zoidboro grabs it and shoves it back down.

“Right this way sir.” She looks at Zoidboro. “Are you his… guardian?”

“Yeah, we can go with that,” Zoidboro grumbles, and gets up to follow.

—–

“Say you come from a, quote unquote, mutanty place, huh?”

“Hambone, sir. That’s right. Zoidboro here lives in North Yd…”

“… but part of the same micro-continent,” Zoidboro further explained.

“Hmmm…” Doctor Brown taps his pen crisply against the report several times. “Well, sorry to break this to you Patrick — *Pat* — but it looks like you’re pregnant. 8 months so, in fact.” He stares at the dumbfounded Patrick, then at Zoidboro. “I, um, don’t reckon you’re the father?”

“N-n-no. No!”

But was he?

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January 6, 2019 · 7:29 am

Camouflage (new character?)

—–

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January 5, 2019 · 11:49 am

Jungle

“I’m telling you, Baker. This trees has eyes (!).” Ruby Fantasie turns. “And what is that ridiculous outfit of yours suppose to be?”

“I’m cold,” Baker states plainly, then fakes a shiver.

“Cold?? It must be 95 here! Take that silly thing off.”

“I… I haven’t got any underwear beneath it.” Baker blushes slightly.

“Well. I’ll turn my head until you find another outfit. We must talk!”

—–

“You scared Bob, Baker. That’s not a good sign.”

“Maybe I just took too long to change and he got bored.”

“No, there’s something more. I have other things to show you now.” She points down the clearing. “Geraldine. Counterpart to Bob. Let’s see what she does with you.”

—–

“Easy going fellow, eh?”

“But she’s not heading toward you still. Sideways at best.”

“What does that mean?”

“Let’s go to the waterfall,” Ruby Fantasie then declares. “Beyond the pool which is sort of a decoy, I suppose. You think: there can’t be another, hidden pool this close to an exposed pool. That kind of thing.”

“Lead the way.”

“We have to backtrack a bit.”

—–

There she is, Baker thinks. I feared I lost her again.”

—–

“The exposed pool,” Ruby Fantasie explains. She turns. “Then over there, behind some rocks: the hidden one.”

—–

“What now, Ruby?”

“We go down.”

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January 4, 2019 · 10:32 am

missing 03

“So both women were missing,” spoke Parasol as they walked through the snowy landscape.

“Good and evil, yeah.”

“Like me, then.”

They walked a bit further, then Monsieur Gold realized he had to say something: choose. “No, we’re good, we’re good,” he finally reinforced.

—–

Monsieur Gold woke up in his mansion, wife April Mae surprisingly by his side. She was propped up, staring at him. “Dreaming again?” He nodded. “Which was it this time, jungle, snow or desert?”

“All three,” he admitted while stretching. “What time is it?”

“5:15.”

He looks around the room. “Where’s the tv?”

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January 4, 2019 · 8:54 am

missing 02

He didn’t want to, but Monsieur Gold really had no other choice but the fuel up at Widow’s Lair since Sparky (Sally Spark O Naut, again) was nowhere to be found and there was no self service at her station. He’d been here once before. He didn’t like the scene. But the Lying Widow was gone as well. Thank God in Brown Heaven.

He had pumped his gas and was about to leave…

… when he noticed the hole across the road. Let’s see, he realized, that would be just beyond the southwest corner of Burnt Oak… like Sparky’s is just beyond the northeast corner of same. I wonder if the two gas station owners — good and evil — planned it that way, Monsieur Gold pondered. Almost a perfect opposition. And both are *missing* now.

—–

Meanwhile… inside…

“Tell us what happened Lying Widow,” demanded Axis the Tin Tin Soldier Man, Clubby by his side as usual. “You must have seen them go in. You see *everything* with those big peepers of yours.”

“I’m not saying anything,” she barked gruffly while struggling with the ropes. “You can burn me like a witch and I’ll cook to my grave without speaking. Talk is cheap. Go ahead and kill me.”

Axis TTSM smiled toward his demonic sidekick. “We’re going to do better than that, Lying Widow. We’re going to seal you in here. You’ll be trapped as much as the two traitors whose identity we have yet to learn. Thanks to your uncooperation.”

“Kill me,” Lying Widow demanded. “Kill me!” she pleaded as they exited The Bar at the End of Time, laughing maniacally. “Kill me!!” she screamed as their footsteps died down the corridor.

—–

Later:

“Add a couple of trees, some chairs, half an old car, and noone will be the wiser this was *ever* opened up, Clubby. Case *closed*.”

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January 4, 2019 · 7:09 am

missing

I’ve looked everywhere on God’s beige earth for them. But I’m not going down there to North Yd to check. Not after what I saw last year with Tessa. Gold to Platinum.

Better head back home in the narrow boat-plane. Maybe refuel first over at Sparky’s since it’s nearby.

—–

Ooops! Knocked over a couple of gas pumps again. Oh well. Nothing scars this old babe. Except that cursed dune of April Mae’s. Must be some kind of magic dune, and in the wrong way, hmph. Probably some voodoo connected to the aberrant Omega continent itself. “Sparky!” Monsieur Gold calls through the station’s open door while honking his horn. “Sparky! It’s happened again!”

Now where is *she*?

“Zoidboro!” cries little Raphaelia Jenkinson from a nearby garage bay, flickering merrily in her red dress beside similarly wind-blow, yellow cat Ziggy Dustbowl. “Zoidboro!” she repeats.

In the basin immediately below…

… Sally the Spark O Naut (“Sparky”) has waited a long time for Reverend Zoidboro to start preaching. Two days, in fact, since this is Tuesday. But she’s decked up in her Sunday best and dearly hates to needlessly change clothes.

5 more minutes, she thinks. Maybe 5 hours.

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January 3, 2019 · 10:49 am

The left side now takes control…

“They wouldn’t let me in, Parasol. At least not with my mansion I so love. And I *wasn’t* coming here without it, dammit.” He paused, wiped his mouth. “April Mae said ‘come, come, come’. The house meant less to her than the neighborhood, the land. And now we are split, Parasol. She with her version of you and me with mine.”

In her strangely compressing Victorian chair, Parasol said nothing, soaking it all in. She’d like to talk to the woman involved before making a final decision, but it would be difficult to pull her here through the density. Monsieur Gold can only stay for short spells, and that is only because he is closer to the border. It would be logical to choose him — the easy way out. Granddaughter Tessa saw it coming, after all. Gold to Platinum.

“Walk with me,” she said. They often walked during visits. Monsieur Gold came prepared with an extra layer of insulated underwear this time.

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January 3, 2019 · 8:56 am

Photos from Rosehaven

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January 2, 2019 · 7:27 am

The Bar at the End of Time 02

“Says it’s right here,” the demonic card creature slurped. “But I don’t see’s no bar.”

“Coordinates don’t lie, Clubby. Let’s proceed forward. With caution.”

—–

“Another level below us, Clubby. Looks like we’ll have to jump this time. How are your knees?”

“They’ll have’s to do.”

—–

“How you feel?” asked a truly concerned Axis after the leap. Clubby was his right hand man in all things demonic. He dare not have him out of action for any length of time.

“Been better.”

“Well. We’ll get you some knee braces when we get back to base.”

“Okay’s.”

“That could be it down there, Clubby. Wouldn’t you say that would be about right under where we were?”

“Sure’s.”

“What did I tell you about the misplaced plurals, Clubby,” Axis finally scolded. “We have to prepare for the *big* leap. The ‘going outside’. You can’t *talk’s* like that out there.”

“Okay’s.”

Axis then figuratively bore another hole through him with a riveting stare.

“‘Okay,’ I mean,” the evil Clubby acquiesced.

“Good.” Axis looked down the corridor again. “Let’s go ahead and turn invisible at this point. I know it will be a drain on our energy, but we probably shouldn’t take any chances in case of ambush.”

“I double checked,” Clubby held firm. “No ambush.”

“But you didn’t *triple* check.”

Clubby backed down again. “No,” he admitted.

“True soldiers — warriors — always triple check, Clubby. At a minimum.”

“Alright.”

“We’ll move into invisibility mode… now.”

Axis winked out of view in front of Clubby. Clubby then also shifted into invisibility mode. He looked down and couldn’t see his hands, his feet, his hole pierced torso. What a relief to get rid of that horrid body!

—–

“We’re here,” whispered Axis to Clubby as low as possible at the entrance to the bar. But no one was inside. They checked every corner while still being transparent. Axis then ended invisibility mode; winked into view in front of Clubby. The demonic card creature reluctantly did likewise.

“We’ve been had!” cried Axis, realizing an escape hatch was used.

Turns out, The End of Time extended beyond the bar.

—–

“Hi, Freddy. Just passing through.” But The Fredinator was too deep in meditation to acknowledge Patrick and Zoidboro’s sudden appearance.

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