Karoz thinks while waiting: *I* need a mask.
20 minutes later, he’d switched over to the booths, trying again to figure out what these crazy typing style animations mean. Only one animation per booth, only one *seat* per booth. Bad designing, he thinks. A place just kind of thrown together. Baker Bloch could do much better here. Kidd Tower is a seed.
So involved was he with his animation that Karoz didn’t notice Old Grey slipping in and sitting at the front counter. “Bucket of blood,” she requests to the lone attendant. “And put some nails in it.” Karoz recognizes the voice.
She never received her drink. This wasn’t a bar. But she and Karoz caught up. They sat at the counter together.
“Baker Blinker is in Collagesity helping Baker Bloch with some apartment rentals,” he said to the old woman in disguise.
“How’s your love life,” Old Grey asked straighforwardly.
“We manage.”
“Why are you here?”
“I’m suppose to meet someone, Old Grey. Uncle Babyface. Why are *you* here?”
“I live here,” she said. “In this sim. Kidd Tower… I’m The Kidd. Billie. Here, stand back and I’ll show you. The dress could poof out in the transformation and put someone’s eye out.”
“Okay.” He hops off the chair and takes a couple of steps away from the counter accordingly, not understanding that Old Grey was joking.
“I just thought of the hair,” she said after changing. Grey to black. Young Black, hehe.”
“It’s quite appealing,” encouraged Karoz Blogger.
“If you were a boy of 10, would you ask me out for ice cream?”
“Sure.”
“You were never 10,” she joked again. “You were born old. Old and green. Old Green.”
“Just because I never had a mother doesn’t mean I wasn’t born.”
“Immaculate,” whispered The Kidd. She turned toward Karoz and looked at him squarely. “Jesus. You’re Jesus.”
But Karoz didn’t know that name and told her so.
The Kidd tested him further. “Do you know Superman? Aquaman?”
“Of course,” replied Karoz.
“Green Lantern?”
Karoz whirled around and looked at the poster behind him. “Obviously,” he said while staring at the superhero’s mask again.
“Then you are like the Green Lantern,” cooed The Kidd. She clapped her hands rapidly together and squealed in excitement. “And with a ring!”
Karoz didn’t get a mask that day but he got something else even better — from The Kidd. She just pulled it out of a secret pocket on her babydoll dress. The ring wasn’t exactly legit Green Lantern style but he thought it quite cool anyway and wore it home to Chilbo. Later that night, the town’s giant central tree caught on fire and burned to the ground. It would take weeks to grow another one.
Sunklands 