Category Archives: 0201

there’s levels to it

Brngg brngg! Brngg Brngg!

Damn, she thought. And I was just starting to enjoy myself.

“Hallo?”

—–

She walks past the filing cabinets, A-M on the right, N-Z to the left. Or was A-L and M-Z? Anyway, the Big Boss said the file wasn’t in them. Check the dumpster, he said. Or was it a she?

—–

Alright I’m here, she thought. F-ck, gonna have to pay a visit to the chiropractor again after this. They knew they were dealing with an almost 67 year old woman, didn’t they?

“They” did. When she stood up out of the dumpster after finding no file there: retirement. Reassigned to inactivity on a different continent, her services needed no more. Another would have to be assigned.


new home

—–

“Hallo? Yes, Mr. (Mrs.?) Johnston. I’ll retrieve that file posthaste.” Good back, he (she?) noticed when hiring. Good legs. She’ll do swell.

(to be continued?)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0042, 0201, Back Rooms, Heterocera, Omega^^, Southern, The Cross^

00410201

The day after Thanksgiving. Normalcy returns to the small virtual village of Amiable with plenty of leftover goodies from the festival, a huge success. Corn shucked, weighed and balanced, and then baked into bread and other products; sweet roots based music produced aplenty; sweets and refreshments served all around.

—–

“Offer you a drink, Doctor?”

“Not now Victoria.” He wanted to keep his eyes glued to the front of the club, for Dr. Grayson was waiting on someone, another doctor he assumed. The place: Cass City, queen burg of Satori’s Deep South. The time: 1939 apparently. Just before the great war that never was. Thanks to the book.

Dr. Mouse walks into the Serapis Club. “Check your coat, Doctor?”

“Not now, Victor.” He had a mission to fulfill. Bring what he assumed was another doctor up to speed. And then have him take his place. Hopefully.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0041, 0201, Cass City^, Maebaleia/Satori, Teepot^^

00400201

“Say’s here in the paper there’s a 2 fer 1 special on Amazon products down at the mall. We better go snag us some more exotic rain forest flowers, boys!”

“Here here,” they said kind of jointly, kind of as one. How to differentiate?

“Stew dogs’ ready!” called the one at the grill. That was Eddie, then (00330201). Different from Edward, like D’Aigle is different from Daigle. And *that* is her chosen boyfriend. Edward was just here for the hand off, the negotiation or price. No, let’s say he’s a cousin just come for a visit. Or maybe an old lover pretending to be a cousin if Edward and Eddie are or were gay. Where did it all get started?

When it stopped; Marsha’s VW bug that is. Stuck in the sand — should have traded yellow vehicles with neighbor Mrs. Ordinary (aka Bethany, Ginger) while she had the chance. Drifts were often high on the edges of Big Sandy where beige spills over into green. Like today, a windier one thanks to the northeaster coming into shore from the west, from the direction of the USS Galaxy, duplicated both in sea and in space. Just came back from a journey to the Pleiades, which I believe is a star constellation formation (thanks Dolores!).

Eddie was grilling then as well, watched her spin her tires trying to get out of a predicament. Stew dogs done, he put down the spatula and walked over to help.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0040, 0201, Bellisaria, Sandfly, Sirens Isles

00390201

Weird she can see the lower tip of Beatrice from here, she thinks. Where she, in fact, comes from (novel 38; on a white horse). She checks the distance on the inworld map in her, um, mind. Over 200 meters away still, and her draw distance used here is only 64 to reduce lag in an urban area. She thinks again of Constantinople, the *real* thing, and her graphically talented, er, doppelganger. Here incarnated as Myrtle Beech out on the southern tip of *this* island. Another 200 meters or so in the opposite direction.

She moves to the opposite window of the upper floor of her new (!) apartment, important furniture purchase finished. It all revolves around, well, the central affair which is not an affair atall. She smiles at the irony. She can continue with her romance novel 39 and keep the marriage to Arthur intact. She can have her cake and eat it too. She came here, in effect, in 2 boats at once. But what really was this island she now exists on with her others? Constants? Close enough.

Arthur will be home soon from job hunting. Better get back to the interwebs and do some more research before he arrives (she decides). Hogs the whole living room with his applications and such. Great views, but — drawback — small apt. Barely room for the bed upstairs. And what about a kitchen? She’s *not* sharing an oven and a fridge with that big headed dude downstairs (!).

Strange, she think while staring from the couch now (*not* new). The entire Smipsons family shows up at the bottom of the store’s page but no sign of Al or Sarah’s avatar, hmm. Oh, she realizes. No adult content here; she’s not signed in to the Marketplace. And Al and Sarah are certainly adults now after what happened at the Homeless Union last night, away from Cowboy’s still drunk presence. Who cares if he chokes on his own vomit, Sarah thinks while packing her duffle bag for an overnight stay, looking down on him writhing about on the stained bed, murmuring something about Wanda and Gloria giving him 2 rides between snores and incoherent utterances. I bet they did, she thinks with vile, harking back to that afternoon and the beach and the lateness of his appearance and his *appearance* when he arrives. Drunk off his tits. “I bet they did,” she hisses aloud before stomping out, thinking this is at *least* a 2 night absence now. Maybe forever; probably so.

Back to the family…

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0039, 0201, Ashton Village, Bellisaria, Constantynople, Nautilus, Rank & File

00380201

Another ghostly Knight was showing them around. You can never completely escape the energy of The Father, the Dark Lord some call him. Red Devil in Xian terms. At his urging, they fed the function-o-meter in front of them with small copper coins — no change there — to watch TV. The ever-present ectoplasm did the work it was paid for.

“Very popular group in the 21st Century,” he rattled about the fuzzy figures on the non-machine, off by one century but only a fraction off the truth in present time, this 8008.

“Name?” tested Baker Bloch, moonburned from the larger space between the flowers. At 6’8″ he was taller than the trees. And even though bigger than birds, the bees offered minimal shade because of their speed. The present Knight again wrongly assumed he was embarrassed because of his lack of knowledge about, well, *everything*. He wasn’t embarrassed. He was just from the far far past. Like we talked about before. We apparently are still in Osse, motor dropped long ago. Like we’ve been driving around a car with no engine for forever.

Knight finally answered Beethoven, with Roll Over dropped early on from the name — even produced an early poster to prove his point. He should be the one to turn red, Baker thought.


early poster, according to Knight

Then while rolling back up the poster to put it away again, ghostly Knight, one of many in the clone hive, said he was joking and that their actual name was SODA. Another joke? Turns out: not. As Baker Bloch checked around, this SODA group seemed to manifest everything here, including the mica table (perhaps ground 00), the chairs around it, the Cavern itself, the *town* itself. Taking up the whole of a sim called Newt. Like the man, the father (of Shelley Struthers). This is, in effect, where he was born, or at least the name. And certainly the group name gives us an important clue about what happened to our society as a whole, the flip flopping of animals and plants and probably minerals as well (we’ll check the rounded mica table for more tips on that later). And the bearded and mustachioed Moon above it all. The Dark Lord. Without any possibility of escape via a satellite of its own, a Moon for a Moon. Bendy knows. He may be more than just a cameo figure in this here photo-novel, 38 in a series of a lot.

“We successfully,” continued Knight, “made the name illegal, *forbidden*, beyond any even seductive poser could get to. Even the pharmacists had the hoods pulled over their eyes, duck-like.”

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0038, 0201, Jeogeot, Michigan, Sunklands^

00370201 (and 1 other)

And so they traveled from Mountainair down to Lordsburg, Hucka Doobie’s old stomping grounds. Before she died and was reborn again anew in her old bee form. Now she’s progressed far enough back to human to also more closely examine her human past, pre-bee. She retracts her antennae for good and dives in. Would they make it? Would Duck prevent the success of the journey? The point is that they made it. And Antony at the bottom again or at least Anthony, two of ’em in fact; double the fun. Border towns both. It was not all about Anthony — unlike that other claim — but at least the first 7th was (approximation). I don’t have many friends. Let’s call him up.

“I have to take this,” he said to visiting Hucka Doobie and Barry DeBoy. The Devil, he knew, because of the timing.

“Hallo?”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0037, 0201, New Mexico

00360201

Afterwards:

“Look down there, Shelley. That’s where you’ll live; same as the color of your hair.” He dared to stroke it from behind. “That way, darling, you can come up here to the box and play any time. Anny time.”

“Shelley?” she questioned above.

—–

“Shelley,” she answered below.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0036, 0201, Collagesity Fordham, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Retirement Islands, Wild West

00350201 (2 Bakers and 2 Wheelers)

“IGNITE.”

“Now I’ve brought you all here to tell you, first of all, I’m not *better* than you. Just, um, higher.”

“Wacky, man,” says Roberts primarily for grinning partner Franklin beside her. They’d been partaking of the sacred bush just before. Now: here. Fire brought them together.

“True, Albert is lower in contrast, but we all work as a team, a TILE if you will. Blue (he points to himself), green or red, take your pick (he points to Roberts and then Franklin), and, finally, you (he points to Albert).”

“Me? I ain’t lower than anyone. I’m a prevert and I’ve accepted my role in life. It’s you guys who are in the wrong. Trying to kill me!”

Silence from the still guilty feeling women, as Claude says: “Now, now, Albert. No one is in the wrong. Each has their challenges, *including* me. That’s what I’m trying to say to you.”

They look each other over with this, one by one, realizing the truth of it all, if only subconsciously. A TILE, back and forth and across balance. Blue should have been opposite yellow and green opposite red, but Claude wasn’t in charge of setting up the chairs. Probably an intern, he thinks.

“I’ll begin,” he then says.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0035, 0201, Hana Lei^^, Nautilus, NORTH

when Aloha turns to Alpha

“Here it is, Wheeler. Another portal of some sort.”

“Looks like butterflies. Rainbow colored!”

“It’s not rainbow colored, I mean, butterflies. I checked (the description). Wisps instead. Wisp spirits to be precise.”

“Hmmm,” replied Wheeler. “I’m going to call them butterflies anyway.”

“As you wish,” conceded Newt, knowing Wheeler’s ways and her stubbornness. Besides, he’s bound to serve what with the new name and the recently revived Table at the Lebettu Castle and all. “Go ahead. Go through it.”

“*You* go through it. I’ll watch. You know I like to watch.”

Newt shakes his head slightly. Poor Wheeler. She won’t realize she’s being controlled from the other side until it’s too late. Thinks she has ultimate power now.

“Sure.” And then he walks into the multi-colored swarm, emerging on the other side about 10 meters west. Wheeler then follows him.

She turns in her purple sock hop dress. “Fascinating. I feel revived, reinvigorated.” Then she realized the secret of the Other Side. Her brain is not the boss!

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0034, 0201, Blue Mountain, City Park, Wendy-Ontario

00330201

“”What’s wrong, honey? (no answer) Oh dear, are you channeling again? (no answer) Is it… the triangles?”

She sat there all glassy eyed for a while like 2 marbles were planted in her head in place of eyes. Then…

—–

“What you cooking today Eddy?!” shouted the runny man, passing by.

“Hot dogs!” he called back. “But made with veggie stew!”

“Cool! Catch you later, then!” Tom shouted, his voice receding in the distance as he headed toward the far corner of the strange, rectangular green pool that centered the apartment complex they both lived in, this Paradise Town as it liked to call itself. The pool begs to differ, because it also has a name, usually unspoken. Tried to be forgotten.

—–

Common denominator: umbrellas.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0033, 0201, ENIGMA, Nautilus, NORTH, Wild West