“‘sunburn by noon, clammy at night, cracks in the earth, pavers delight'” She stopped quoting the poem she’d spontaneously made just 15 minutes ago while studying the damaged cement before her out of boredom; paid attention to a potentially paying customer approaching on same. We’ll see how this goes, she thinks.
“Yelloo!” Stu Umbriel said in greeting.
—–
Earlier/later:
“Yelloo!”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0505, Paper Soap+, Soap
“New bar in town, Chief.”
“Don’t call me that. I’m not an Indian any more. I’m an *American*, dammit.”
“Sure you are Chief. Anyway, Gus and I…”
“Gus? Since when did you start calling yourself Gus, Ben?”
“Since, I don’t know, yesterday?” Distant but distinct.
“*Forever*,” countered Stan, formerly Stu. “You’ve always been Gus.” He turns to Chief. “He’s *always* been Gus.”
—–
Slowly but surely, they traced all the confusion back to that birthday party where they summoned The Devil.
“Oh yeah,” spoke Ben at the time. “Guess that could have done it.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0504, Paper Soap+, Soap
“Ahem. Gentlemen… and women. As you can see. We have a problem. With the Portal.”
“Why is it called *Moster*… sir?” Officer Jetski in back. He’d just checked the description, which most of the others sitting around the conference table had already done and came up with the answers themselves.
Chef-inspector Petty was trying not to turn around. The effect could be blinding. “Typo I suspect. Someone probably drunk when creating it. Or possibly a misleading name… can’t be traced back that way.”
Silence for a second except for the steady humm of the… well I think it called itself Dinah earlier on, or that’s what several of them thought they heard upon its appearance. Like an announcement: “Dinah: front and center.”
“I can’t get through.” Agent 47 up front.
“Me neither.” Agent 23 across from him. “It’s jammed…”
“… the system.”
Whatever followed Petty through the Portal to this sheriff’s office was taking over the whole of Soap.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0503, Paper Soap+, Soap
Center. Peace.
He has found Home. Paperweight. Paperville but different. Root word: Paper. And Soap.
And then there he was. Soap National Park. In Paper.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0502, Collagesity Fordham-, Crisp Sea, Lower Austra, Nautilus, Paper, Paper Soap+, Wild West
It was time for a longer post else we get off track. Wendy had her man, strapped to the Big Wheel, a prisoner in other words. In his own pirate ship: trapped by a woman of all things. But he suspected a man-woman because of the strength, the speed. He was wrong… kind of. “Gotcha!” she exclaimed as the tire iron came down on the knees and then the head. If she was truly a man he might be dead. As it was, he almost bled out, but was brought back by her powers of the mind. Hidalgo — but enough said of that (magic practice) which also gained her many more years than her immortal contemporaries. Only Mummy Suisan out in Swannanowhere had outlasted her. How many years now? She decided to count them out tonight (again) while — whatshisname listened in, helpless to turn off his ears by plugging them with his fingers or something. That was another point to this. She decided to use the base 12 way of counting just to prolong the agony a bit more for him. She stopped at 143Z to see if his head had started to bleed again (only a little). At 1Y876, she thought of the 765 Village and the hidden green grey alien there and how Brut or Burt or Brutus had turned all traitor on her and taken over the Fortress for himself in its two locations to bind the magic more tightly. She hit (whatshisname) on the noggin again simply because she was frustrated now. And, heck, she’d lost her count. She’d have to start over again. At 765 she spaced out and lost count a second time. “One,” she began once more, “twooooooo (*yawn*).” Finally getting sleeepy. She lets him hold her in his arms but just one trick and he’s back on the wheel. She uses the rest of her daily brain power to heal his head completely.
Out like a light now, but this was a test. She knew he could twist her head off if he desired — she had given him her superpowers as well. But if he still had the *mistletoe* somewhere upon his body — and she knew he did — then: no. That small sprig of evergreen would take them both a long long ways.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0311, HANA LEI
She looked down at her, this Winnie, but obviously Wendy again. As she was Wendy. We’re all Wendy in this Second Lyfe of ours, a Wendy City of sorts through and through. Cub Run. Centerpoint. “Release the Pooh!” she wanted to command from afar with voice so loud you could hear it clear over to Heterocera. “Allow Winnie to become Wendy!”
Someone asked once why she wasn’t herself in Our Second Lyfe and instead always in disguise, a strange question at the time but perhaps starting to make some sense. The man-woman uttering it was obviously kind of insane, though. She suspected a sea monster because of the seaweed hair, despite the pink tutu. Release the Pooh, she also mentioned. The famous toy bear rolled the wagon with the honey pot down the cobblestone street of town, pausing in front of Perch to peer in at the past. Spaced Ghost turned back into Space. The honey pot was suddenly something else; the held red umbrella was both inside and outside at once…
The pirates were coming and she didn’t know what to do. Directly over the throne now, they had stolen her mistletoe. She wasn’t jovial about it.
They’d make landfall by nightfall. The clock kept ticking, tick tick tick.
I should strike first, she suddenly realized, thinking of the Big Wheel and the 12 at the top. Everyone was scared of her, after all.
“Gotcha!” she exclaimed at 12:37.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0310, HANA LEI
She spoke down to him, hoping he would complement her shoes. “No, this is the Pearl Throne, not Pear. I’m afraid you have the wrong location.”
“I’m sorry mum.” He begins to take his leave. Seems he’d journeyed a long way for nutt’n.
“WAIT.” Sally suddenly recognized him. “You’re… the man under the mistletoe. I know you from that portrait.” He was in disguise but the pointy ears he tried to hide under his antique slouch cap gave him away. This was a man of Jupiter — another planet.
“Lose the old skin,” she commanded from her perch, with mistletoe just behind. “Lose the cap as well. Heck just put on your birthday hat and come here.”
—–
“I swear it’s here somewhere. Eddy,” she spoke to the sea turtle floating before her. “Do you know?”
“I’m sorry mum,” and took his leave.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0309, HANA LEI
“Black and *gray*?” Alysha could hear Officer Brownstone yell from outside after absorbing Officer Taylorville’s correction. “Not black and *gay*?”
She had to act fast, as they would be all over new alien intrusion like flies on, um, honey. She could, she could steal this police motorcycle to delay their cause. No, she realized. Too extreme. She could, um, set boobietraps in the catacombs so they couldn’t use the shortcuts. No: too sexist. Deep inside she was a woman after all as well as an Asian. She’d just have to use the catacombs herself to get to the Fortress quickly and warn Ruby.
—–
She took a deep breath. All she had is 15 seconds to find Ruby, convince her that she was in danger, and then teleport the hell outta there to somewhere else, perhaps Collagesity but perhaps not. Anywhere safe for the time being. She decided any beige mountain ridge would do, because about all of it is abandoned land. Aah heck, let’s make it Collagesity, since that’s her home base. She begins dashing again, puff puff puff.
—–
“We have (*huff*), *three* seconds to get out of here to safety. “Two… one… too late.” But Alysha stayed where she was and wasn’t ejected from the property, potentially all the way back to home base. Ruby the green tinted gray grey nonchalantly rolled over in her sunlounge beside the heated pool and began to explain in her watery, alien voice. “We… turned off the security system as soon as we saw you run through the gate, young Alysha.”
“Young?” She couldn’t help herself. The woman deep inside demanded respect.
“The police have no power over us here. Do you even know where you are? I’ve… been searching for the Fortress for several weeks. Luckily my legs are very long and I made good time. Burt, also known as Brutus or Brut, met me at the gate, took me in. Just like we’re now taking *you* in. It’s been a long journey for you, hasn’t it? Fellow alien.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0217, Eveningwood, Nautilus, NORTH
“It’s the Fortress all right,” he im’ed Alysha remotely. “I’m standing directly beside 300 over in Eveningwood.” This is where Duncan A. entered the Sphere through Fieldon, he thinks to himself. This is where Marty probably followed him. All the way to Borneo which wasn’t Borneo any longer. The Oracle — predicted this.
“I tried to get through the gates,” Alysha im’ed back, still in the northern Nautilus village with the one black and the one rumored gay. “15 sec ejection period.” She then leaned back against the cool stone of the well also pondering the next move but along different lines. The buildings were duplicates but — what did this mean?
Eveningwood
Northern Nautilus
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0216, Eveningwood, Nautilus, NORTH
She’d *been* here before, this Sugar O’Cotton, a sultry singer during the 1919 Kentucky Prohibition period. But the setlist has changed, the *colors* had changed. Strawberry wine/ blueberry tart. Red light, green light. Traffic light: stop, go. Did we need this addition?
Monday, this venue will be packed to the brim with screaming fans. But she will not be she. Someone different.
Ruby Alien wakes up, or switches sides (realities), first to second. The inferior one comes into focus. Again the good-bad doctor with the prodding, the poking and rubbing. “Come back to me,” he says. “Don’t die, don’t die!”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0026, 0610, Angel's Rest, Lower Austra, Nautilus
Sunklands 