“Okay. But it was definitely Smelly Santy. You remember — from the Mission. The eggs, Bill. They must have killed him (!). The Bennington experiments.”
“Nasty place. Even I would admit that.”
“Dwayne, a complaint from the customer at Table D.”
Category Archives: Novels
daydream
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0607, Rubi
fired
Angus Nuffin was happy. He knew this would be his last night as a chef at Perch Restaurant. Last piece of tuna in the fridge — everything was set up. Yes, there’s his supervisor Dwayne coming round the corner after taking The Bill’s order.
“Nuffin, this is a *very* special customer. One grilled tuna for the new queen of Collagesity, *lightly* cooked.”
“Coming up boss.”
“And *don’t* sit around on the appliances if you’re not cooking. *Clean* or something.”
“Right you are boss.” Nuffin nimbly hops off the dishwasher and heads to the fridge.
—–
“All right Dwayne you bastard,” Angus mutters under his breath. “Just move along so that I can burn this baby to an utter crisp.”
“I recognized him immediately, The Bill.”
“Bill will do. We’ll think about the royal appellation later.”
—–
There you go.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0606, Rubi
Middle House
“Who are you?”
Tessa suddenly understood. “Um. This is not good, Grandpa.”
“Don’t get up sir.”
Too late.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0605, New Island, The Waste+
slenderman
“How long has it been, Tessa?” an older Grandpa wheezed. He was the more valuable platinum through and through now.”
“4 years. You’re old, Grandpa. You need to rest here a while.”
“Is my tie on straight? Can you tell my teeth from my face still?”
“You look great,” his grand niece lied.
“Send her in, then. We must get the pricing over with.”
Liana the owner enters her heavily windowed coffee shop and immediately begins hanging tapestry. This was not who they were expecting. Where’s Sally?
Looks like Grandpa will live to see another day.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0604, New Island, The Waste+
giraffe
She was leaning so far over that I’m surprised her head wasn’t hitting the window pane in the back. But Nataly was doing a good job explaining the story so far. Let’s take a listen…
“Pen is the evolution of The Pencil, Dear Reader. And so our saga continues, just 4 long, long years later. New Island has become post-apocalyptic. What is the disaster that caused this? you should ask. Increase of sand, increase of terrain and elevation; increase of *The Wastelands*. The Tilers moved in first, took over the Fries with Cheese property downtown and destroyed the church. Hopefully we’ll get to the continuing challenges of basement dwellers Mrs. Fogg and Ms. Frame soon, thrown together for protection, food, and liberty. Young Shirley Boot ceases to be 12, but has progressed no further than the first day of her 13th year, frozen in time because of the… catastrophe — we’ll certainly get to that shortly. Not-so-young Ruby also remains middle-of-15, unable to transverse the ages 16 17 18 to reach the 19 she should be by this point. And Mabel: Mabel remains old but child-like. She’s taken to wearing her Hannah Montana outfit 24/7, and this is most likely the effects of the radiation as well — affecting her brains and not what. She’s remodeled Robot Derak Jones to become Robert Drake Johns, probably another symptom since he’s as lime green as her now. Ahh, now we get to Sally. For Sally is perhaps an even stranger one. Founder of New Yd, evolution of the Tilers, she now keeps watch on the Deep Dunes for sign of The Monster, who continues to roam New Island and where aging *is* effected. The Man in the High Castle makes sure of that. Perhaps we should join him and his current crew next for more answers. Thank you for listening, and have a super night!”
Nataly removed the mike from her long, long neck and stood up. “How was that David?”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0603, Fries with Cheese, New Island, The Waste+
absorption
“I should be finished with journal 9 in 2 weeks or less, Robert Drake Johns. Then we will reassess the situation.”
“That’s great, Older Mabel,” spoke the tall, lime green robot seated beside her. His voice was nasal compared to most mechanoids of his type — Mabel designed him this way to appear slightly comical to her and help lighten the mood sometimes. Because the mood was dire in many instances. The Wastelands held nothing back.
“I’m wondering when The Monster will return,” started RDJ again. “Sally lives on the edge of the Deep Dunes but hasn’t seen or smelled anything in 2 weeks or more. The Axis powers may have won the war, but they haven’t been especially active conquerors… let us do what we please, when we please.”
“Oh they’re around.” She scribbles quickly once more. “Right now I’m seeing a narrow boat, mired deep in the high sands. Two children — no, a child and a man, actually an older man. Then another, observing man. No, sorry again, a woman but with many eyes, some which could be masculine. Actors and Observers again, Robert Drake Johns.”
“I miss my cousin,” said RDJ out of the blue. “I miss Cardboard. The character and not the substance, although that has disappeared too. All metal and rust now; little plastic as well.”
“And parchment,” added Mabel brightly. “Thank Gods for parchment.”
“And Ink!”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0602, New Island, The Waste+
chance upon
He approached the other bush cautiously. “Are you my son?” He waited. “I’m looking for my son.”
The wind continued to blow.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0601, New Island, The Waste+
N. Yd
“Tilers, Tessa. It marks this place as safe after all, despite the surface malignancy.
“But we can’t take a chance anyway this time — fog rolling in; darkness too. We better ascent that tall ladder over there to higher ground for the night.”
“I’m *more* than ready to get out of these lowlands,” Tessa offered, staring back at the pirate ship from whence they came. Shark references everywhere. And not in a good and beneficial way. *Those* signs are there too, and in much more profusion. Tessa thinks that her Grandpa Gold puts way too much stock in these Tilers he goes on about at times. Left their signets here, dropped their talismans there. Sanctified grounds, he states and walks forward. Nothing malicious has happened… *yet*. And this is just the kind of place to break the lucky streak.
“We’ll come back in the morning if possible,” he says. “If Tilers were here then there is surely more to look at and study.”
“Whatever.”
—–
The next morning, on the same spot:
“Oh the weather is *much* better now,” Tessa voiced sarcastically. “I can barely see 20 feet in front of me.”
“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?”
“If you say it’s safe, then I suppose it’s safe,” says Tessa, doubting the words coming out of her mouth but also putting her trust in who she assumes is a wiser and older being.
“Saves time that way,” he adds without verification from the child. “See you in the middle.” He turns away from her and walks toward the first structure in his direction. Tessa begins on her side.
—–
“Freak show eh?” Tessa speaks aloud at one of the westernmost structures of the compound, thinking back to something called the Elephant Man, she believes. Nothing to make fun of! But is this an octopus who has the features of a man or visa versa? Anyway — not alive. Taking a picture and moving on…
—–
“Nothing in there either.”
“Oh, there you are already, Grandpa. We meet in the middle, I suppose. Anything on your side?”
“A church,” he states.
“Tilers?”
“I think so. The right colors. They were indeed here. But first: let’s look in the last house of all. Together.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0518, New Island, The Waste+
futures
He looks down at the Orion’s Vale sinkhole and dreams of a Corsica continent that could have been.
But perhaps the dream contains pathways of possibilities yet.
Back to future Yd Bay:
Yes it got worse for Grandpa Gold and Tessa Fish. Especially Tessa. North Yd: a post-apocalyptic town not to be played around with.
“No. Uh-uh.”
Grandpa Gold knew that if they didn’t get out of there by sunset there may be no escape from the darkness.
“Grandpa. Get *down* from there. No playing around!”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0517, Corsica, New Island, The Waste+
“Let’s go visit that small town over there.”
“What do you think Baker Bloch?”
“It’s really interesting. Really is. Soooo… Bart Smipson is invisible now? Is, er, that the alchemical experiment gone wrong?”
Baker Blinker put her hands behind her head. “I suppose. We don’t really have to explain it. Things are implied.”
“I suppose,” echoed the male Baker, irking the female Baker with the implied language. “We can write it over,” he then suggests. She was thinking: I’m *definitely* not writing that over. Took me 4 hours as is! “Nah, it’s fine Baker Blinker. It really is,” he says to reassure, looking at her pained reaction to this. “I get it. Bart Smipson is invisible on New Island and that’s why his sister Lisa couldn’t find him. He’s probably a fugitive of the law, and that’s why these Silver and Gold people decided they had the leeway to experiment on him — not registered, perhaps.”
“Baker Bloch, I’m not sure if you get the basic gist. Bart was suppose to be a companion for Tessa, to get her mind off the killer sharks, ahem, whales and such. Like earlier in these Collagesity novels, Toyna Two Egg created robot Arale from a kid her parents gave her when she was just a kit.”
“Kit… kid. I recall. But why invisible?”
“That’s the ‘wrong’ part about it.”
Baker Bloch rolled up the paper in the typewriter a little more. “And this part below the line…” He turned to Baker Blinker in her hanging chair. “Ready to read yet?” he queried.
She blew out air. “Go ahead,” she relented, steeling herself for more veiled criticism.
—–
Future times. July 11, 2022. Yd Bay again. Much much more has washed ashore.
Through the peculiar odor from what was cooking (stench, to her), East Bennington refuge Tessa Fish issued a declaration. “I don’t like this place, Grandpa Gold. I don’t like this place *one bite*.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0009, 0516, Heterocera, New Island, The Waste+
Sunklands 