Maybe I can wedge my way through those yellow and blue buildings over there.
Nope. Dead end. Oh well, maybe the green and red buildings down the way.
Bingo!
Free of Stompetoren and its Tiley ways, ha.
Category Archives: Novels
00450416 (a new high and low of it all 02)
He’d manifested it from below but he didn’t know what laid inside yet. The 420 attached to the outside that had rezzed in in the meantime seemed to be a type of warning. Frank lies within, the dismantler and then rearranger of Carrcassonnee to turn her into this sign. It had happened before, he knew. On her 420th birthday, now 4 years in the past. Time enough to turn the tables of power. He had the eye, the top of the pyramid, all seeing of course. Like Carrcassonnee *use* to be when she possessed it instead. Frank was after the eye all along, eye on the prize as it were. But what about Gus the fire demon caretaker which also must be present within in order for the giant moving castle to appear here in the first place? Time to find out. He looks for a door.
Yes, just on the other side here. He enters.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0416, Frank's Moving Castle, Jeogeot, Nawt Vaya+, NVFS
00450415 (1000 words)
“Okay, Philip. Just stay – on – the – bridge. Mikie is coming over on the first plane he can catch to find you.”
earlier:
“F-ck, man. Sh—-t.” Philip holds his aching head while continuing to talk to himself. “I think that was the worst crash ever. Threw me clean 50 feet from the plane this time, arrrgh. But, whatever. I suppose I’ll just have to start walking like I *always* do, like I’m *commanded* to do, pheh. Weell… feets get moving.” While watching his feet start stepping forward one after another without his conscious volition, he marvels at the lack of real injuries any time this has happened, and it’s happened, what, *7* times before now? From signs he’s run across, he’s determined he’s walking in Holland — again, commanded to do so by some higher up forces working for that damn *Sphere*. He’s *inside* the Sphere. Anyway, he find himself marching toward the nearest house. There won’t be anyone home, he knows. There never is in whatever hell-world he’s trapped within. No people. Better try Lester again and see if I can still communicate with him, he thinks. My life line, my only hope. He whips out his phone from his back pocket — no real damage to it either as usual. The only thing he can carry from flight to flight, crash to crash. The Sphere must have allowed this, he figured. Or the plane — whatever.
“Lester?” he says into it after flipping the lid, power automatically on. “Lester Corncrib? You there? Stop wanking your meat and speak to me!”
“Look Frank,” he says from the real world. “He’s talking to me again!”
“He who?” says Frank, jumping off the table he’s sitting on behind Lester to get a better listen.
“*Philip*.”
“But… Philip’s dead,” Frank utters, scratching his head while approaching. “He died in that plane crash over in Grapeshot, dawg. Everyone knows that.”
Just then, Philip’s phone dies from the other side after one last, “Lester?!!” “Dammit!” screams Lester into the computer interface. “Lost the connection again. This one was shorter than most of the others.”
Turning toward Frank after a long, head shaking then head lowering sigh, technology savant Lester, friend to the gang, explained the situation as he understood it as best he could for the present gang member’s less nimble brain. “Yes, he died in that plane crash,” he says with animated hands. “But *now* he’s crashing that same plane over and over… and over. Something’s trapped him in an alternate reality. As far as I can tell, he seems to be in a simulation of our own world, maybe even a one to one match, hmph. Well: kind of. Pretty good for whatever technology they’re running to keep it going from other side.”
“Other side of *what*?” says Frank.
“*Our* reality. Philip may have died, yes. But the other side is eerily like our own apparently. And he has some kind of magic phone that allows communication between our world and his. Just called me up one day about 2 weeks ago — I’ve been keeping it from you because, well, because I thought you might think I’d gone batsh-t bonkers or taken one too many acid hits, you know.”
“I see.”
“You *did* hear Philip on the phone, right?” said Lester, wanting reinforcement for his sanity. “You heard him scream my name; like me, okay? Can I get an okay from you, huh?”
“Sure, dawg. I *think* I heard the voice of that rat scag hellmouth of a person. Or what appeared to be Philip.”
“Oh it’s Philip,” says Lester, turning back to the computer, hoping for a reconnection. Being the ADHD cursed person that he is, he ponders that Philip just dropped the phone on the ground in frustration and left it behind, not remembering where he lost it. And that wouldn’t be good, plans for worldly success foiled. “But there appears to be no people, according to Philip’s reporting,” he continues after another sigh. “And although there’s cars, let’s say you try to flag one down for a ride. They don’t stop. Often they turn around right when they come up on you and start heading in the opposite direction, like they’re teasing you. We know he’s in a replica of The Netherlands; he’s indicated that by the signs. So funny. He said, get this: ‘*How* can I be in Holland’; — first I had to explain The Netherlands was Holland since he’s a dufus in geography, along with a lot of other subjects…”
“Tell me about it,” chips in Frank, trying to figure out how to tell Lester that someone is doing a number on him.
“‘Anyway,’ he says, ‘How can I be in Holland when I haven’t seen one frigg’n god damn sh-tty *windmill*. And, er, what about tulips? Aren’t there suppose to be a billion tulips around here? And wooden shoes — not a hide nor hare of them either. Not a cu-clomp cu-clomp cu-clomp to be heard’.”
“That’s pretty good, Lester,” Frank said about his imitation of Philip. “But…” He just blurts it out. “You know someone is f-cking with you, pulling your strings. Someone you’ve pissed off probably. A massive joke.”
“Maybe,” admits Lester. “Maybe. But if I, we, could just pinpoint his exact location someone could go over there and see if they could reach through the veil and make contact, maybe even bring him back to *our* side.” Lester thinks of glory here again, making his mark on the world. And at a specific point in said world. He’d be famous. The first one to penetrate the veil to the other side. Was this a wise thing to do? he thought again. *Sure* it is. Fame, fortune, women, the great triumvirate. Just like he dreamed.
“Well, I’d like to help but I have that gig over in Richland. I’ll catch you later you crazy mo-fo-er.”
“Byyyyye,” says Lester, waving him off, obviously disappointed that Frank doesn’t believe the communication is real but still having Mikie to convince. Good ol’ Mikie.
(see top)
00450414 (a new high and low of it all)
Welp, there she goes again, thinks Newt, sipping on a recently procured nice cool lemonade drink courtesy of a boy named Bart. Back into the tunnel. Guess I better get back to the home base myself, start working on that skybox and maybe the rezzing of that larger version of Howl’s Moving Castle I have in my inventory. Must not forget the Yellow Guy. Or the Red Man or the Green Dude or the Blue Boy for that matter. “Frank’s Moving Mountain” which is kind of the same as “Howl’s Moving Castle” is a way to keep moving forward on that subject.
—–
On Wheeler’s (Shelley’s) part, when she’d finished with her jog, she went to visit the bar that inspired her own over at Conejo Island, which she hadn’t returned to in a while.
Things seemed different. Curious. She copies all copyable objects and brings them back home again to roost.
—–
“Yes!” she says to the bar underwater.
“Yes!” he exclaims to the castle in the sky.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0414, Bull's Bar, Frank's Moving Castle, Jeogeot, Juho, Nawt Vaya+, NVFS
00450413 (We are here (!))
Jeogeot’s only true inland sea. I’m not sure why I haven’t focused on it before, hmmm. It’s time has come I guess I’ll say presently to that thought.
Still in their matching Mr. Moon t-shirts, joint owners Newt and Wheeler ponder the meaning of milk and bread at the new location of Crooked. The TILE Manifesto is about to be studied in earnest, I feel.
A remaining question to be answered: will Wheeler’s Bulls Bar return at the place pictured above? It seems to be destiny in a way. The objects making up the bar are shared by Baker Bloch (Newt) and Wheeler, which makes it harder to store and transfer to a new location. The outside remains unfinished: just giant white and red cubes stuck together. Probably should just ditch it; go with interior alone. Especially since it’s such a scenic setting here.
part 2: parents
“Hey Newt?”
“Yes Wilson, er, Wheeler?”
“We need…”
“… to talk about Shelley, I know.” Pause. “Let’s let her finish her run first. There she is. Go Shelley!”
“Thanks!” she acknowledges through the transparent tunnel walls while continuing to motor along.
00450412
“Susan was a goner, Fink. You essentially killed her with your attack at the beach. But you were only defending Jack, who would have gotten killed himself if you hadn’t intervened. If *Fern* hadn’t intervened. You first saw him — remember? — across Susan’s sprawled out body, his green matching your flesh, his square matching your round.”
“I remember,” said Fink. “I– didn’t mean to kill her.”
“*Told* you to control that freak-ish green arm better,” reprimanded Jack, then felt bad about it. “I mean, I guess you were defending me and all still.”
“I *was*.”
“*Anyway*,” said Princess Pinky Gumm, “I knew her essence could be put to better use than keeping her alive for another day or three at best until she succumbed to those obviously fatal injuries. So I used that energy, that essence to heal myself. Remember? I was possessed by The Lich. *I* wasn’t going to get any better.” Better her than me, Princess Pinky Gumm thought but didn’t say aloud. Was she 100% sure Susan wouldn’t recover? Actually: no. She had been selfish. Susan was a renegade cyborg killer, programming triggered by an electrical shock from a giant Acid River eel. But maybe, just maybe, she would have recovered. But that left the killer part intact still, she tried to rationalize. Yes, better her than me (for death), she reinforced to herself.
“How?” says Fink.
“I’m both a physicist and psychic trained at world esteemed Cal State, Fink. The answer would be too complicated for your meager brain to comprehend. Given you just made an F minus on what I would consider the easiest test on Earth.” Princess… Pink(y)… Gum(m), she reviews the glaringly obvious three-parter, and looks over at his blank, human face. So typical. At least fellow human Susan had killer written all over hers. After the eel. Kill or be killed, she thought once more. Yes, her complicated arrangement of physical-psychical interactions used for the transfer were justified.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0412, Jeogeot, Juho, Nawt Vaya+, Oooo
00450411
It was an unusual 3n1 that kind of became another 4n1 just later.
“Okay, *why* did you bring me to this table, Jack? Cool location, though,” he said, looking around. “Interesting tunnel over there.”
“Because he needed to show you something,” answered the woman for his cohort Jack Dogg, making him turn back and look at her again. Who was this? She seemed sorta familiar, Fink thought.
She lowered the menu she was holding.
“Nifty,” said Fink. “Appears, let’s see, you’re a princess?” He continued reading the revealed print on the shirt. “And— ‘you’re not’. Which means *I’m* not. And Jack’s not. Are you? Jack?”
“And she’s *pink*,” Jack finally piped up, ignoring Fink’s silly question to him. Because he’d given up that particular gig way back in ’72 after the Bra Wars ended. He leads on in the present: “She’s wearing pink; she’s a princess…”
“Okay, that’s nice I suppose.”
“One last thing,” she said after sighing. “I didn’t want to resort to this because I don’t like the sound it makes. But… here goes.”
*POP*.
“Wow,” says Fink. “That was pretty loud. But pretty awesome. Can I have some?”
“*No*,” answers Jack, growing understandably impatient. “Okay Fink, let’s put all this together. She’s a *princess*.”
“Right right.”
“And she’s *pink*.”
“Okay. Hey that’s kind of like…”
“Yes??” says expectant Jack.
“No, sorry. Lost it.”
“Gum, silly. Gum is the third and last clue. If you don’t—”
“Bubblegum.” His eyes grow even wider. “Princess Pinky Gumm!”
“Finally,” she said, taking the gum out of her mouth and throwing it in the direction of the tunnel. “Now that’s over you can ask questions. You scored an F minus on my little quiz, btw.”
“He he,” said bragging Jack. “I had it in two, hmph. D plus.”
“But… how?” says Fink, still staring at her in disbelief. Take away the pink and this looks nothing like the Candyland ruling Princess Pinky Gumm he knows and worships.
“I’ll tell you how.” It all had to do with Fern.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0411, Jeogeot, Juho, Nawt Vaya+, Oooo
00450410 (Trevor/Philip)
Hmm, he thinks while driving toward his destination today. Lookie over there behind those silos. One of those plane shadows Frankie Boy was talking about that’s actually a bird. So they *are* real, hmph.
Welp, better get to the O’Neill’s and do what I’m going to do today. Revenge is *soo* sweet, he he he.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0410, GTA, Jeogeot, Nawt Vaya+, Oregon
00450409 (Frank Lynn (no ape))
Holy crap! Almost dead before he even gets started.
“Mo-fo-er!” he calls after the car that almost mowed him down as he was getting out of his own.
But, rounding the corner of the abandoned Boat House restaurant he parked next to, he’s now at the sea.
Let’s see, do we want him to walk counterclockwise or clockwise? Guess it doesn’t matter. Using the power of the observer still observing, I suppose we could just dive straight into the Alamo and skip ahead in the game at this point…
… but we don’t.
Let’s head his still dry self off east not west.
Good idea in terms of psychic resonance. Because soon he encounters the shadow of a giant plane that isn’t present.
Only a bird as he looks up into the sky to check where the sudden darkness came from.
He figuratively if not literally scratches his head (and his hinny?), then continues. Like Superman he feels he can accomplish anything this bright day in late April’s May — endless possibilities — with not a little help from the reefer he smoked before driving out here. Good ol’ Trevor Philip. He’ll kind of miss him when all this is said and done with.
If only the smell of dead fish wasn’t so strong.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0409, GTA, Jeogeot, Nawt Vaya+
00450408
Suddenly he was underwater again, although still staring at The Sphere. This was the center of his submerged Alamo Sea town!
Like Jack before him, he found himself staring at himself…
… as he went inside.
Further…
And…
… gone.
“What just happened here??” cried the observer of the observer from his control room far above it all. Time to send in another.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0408, GTA, Jeogeot, Nawt Vaya+, Nevada
Sunklands 