How can a path be so straight, he thought, and be aligned with that old rusty object. In his mind he was picturing something else, something woodsy. Not this; not the apocalypse. But there was resonance. He continues backwards…
North Yd. He must be heading to North Yd. He’d heard about the place. Bad things. Rotted out Tilers for one.
But he was facing the wrong way.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0216, The Waste^^
“Here come the rest,” says John the Mind Reader to his character supervisor Al. “Better wrap this up.”
“Beans,” Al says to this, which encapsulated everything they just spoke about in a word.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0215, The Waste^^
“Is it really you, Mother?” he called from across the court. “Alive and in the flesh again?” Ted, aka Stitches, couldn’t believe his ever-wide peepers.
“Come to Mama,” she said to this, and he flew into her open arms, micronized in a flash. Microcosm. She had a subject after all.
And a new character. Ratcatcher of the Fracture. *Not* the Fissure. She extended the story backwards and forwards to give it solidity. Two caught rats in a backpack cage — *not* pets, even though she’d given them names by now: Billy and Corgan. Story about that too. “Pumpkintwisters.” And, come to think of it, two more subjects I suppose, if she wishes.
Noise from the “cafe”. Two people she’d missed before, making a plan Stitches told her in her mind. She couldn’t make out the conversation herself but she knew the ever-aware, lime green teddy would give details later if she’d just hold her position without being disturbed. Physically, not mentally, because it was too late for the latter. Better add another scar or three and maybe the same with the rats, she thought, looking at what was coming her way. Al and John the Mind Reader (aka Jed aka Incognito we think) were only the first to arrive. Weekly meeting of the Last Drop Gossipers we have here. Including long forgotten Jackson Bloch, no kin to Baker. And apparently Ted numbered among them too. How could she explain the micronization? Was that even a word?
“Don’t worry,” she heard him say, still one through it all. “They can’t see you while I’m with you. Just sit over there in the center and *listen*. Takes two to know.”
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0214, The Waste^^
I think we have a new candidate for an alchemical experiment going wrong that you originally assigned to Bart Smipson here in photo-novel 09.” They were in the past. Which was also the present.
“Lemongrab, yes. I’ve heard,” the female Baker replies to the male Baker. She reads the blog even if she hadn’t appeared in it for a while. “Sink into Sunklands”. It’s taped to her bathroom mirror so she’ll remember at night. Just before bed. She understands they, the Baker family of avatars and friends, are struggling to establish Lemon Free State in the middle of Nautilus. Thus Lemongrab, who here goes by Mike. And Lemongrab 2 is his now female (?) mate Pat. Both found quickly on the Our Second Lyfe marketplace through a search for complete avatars using keyword “Duke.”
“Does that make you Princess Bubblegum?” He pivots his head, takes her overarching pinkness in. “You always wanted to be a mother, Baker Blinker. You always wanted… *boys*.”
“Not *those* kind of boys,” she shot back.
“Oh sure you do. You were jealous of Wheeler from the beginning.” He knew to let the matter drop after that. They’d been through the transference a 1000 times now, reviewed every aspect. In the early days of such analysis Baker Blinker was trying to assert herself as the queen ruler again, with Baker Bloch by her ever-side as Prime Minister. Like in the UK as opposed to the US, which had just gone to hell. Wheeler, early on again, was kind of like 2016 Trump happening at the same time, the new ruler, the wannabe *dictator* — obvious to them if not a big chunk of the country still surrounding their safe patch of virtual irreality up in the main world. Where Mike and Pat originally come from in Missouri, North Carolina and Tennessee respectively. This was all fate.
And she’s still married to original “king” Karoz Blogger — that hadn’t changed, despite all the other stuff that has occurred since they tied the knot in photo-novel 02 and originally started dating in 01. It seems to be one constant of the blog and attached photo-novels. Perhaps the ultimate one. The ability of two to manifest at once and live and interact together as husband and wife. Then: Wheeler.
—–
She ditched the remainder of the crazy blue outfit, made the scars in her face deeper and more off-putting to fit into this world better.
“Last Drop, good,” she said, staring at the the sign of the place on the edge of the Fissure, which some call the Fracture just to be ornery about established protocol. “I have a place to eavesdrop on new gossip.” In particular, she was looking for Jed, who now seems to go by John (the Mind Reader) or perhaps Incognito, obvious enough nod to a disguise, a covering up of an origin rooted in one of those complicated North-South type disputes. And *Stitches.* “Ted,” she mouths his own new name aloud while thinking about all this.
“Yes?”
She twirls in her tracks.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0213, Oooo, The Waste^^
“Nah, I think you boys have it backwards. Go back and check. Pull Ted in with you this time, John, since he has the better peepers. Go up the stairs or down the stairs or however you do it — together.”
“Down,” said John to this. “I always head down.”
“Well there you go.” And Al was finished with the story for now and waved them outta his palatial office. Tom showing up in 1/2 an hour, one the more uppity uppers. He had to prepare, emotionally as well as mentally. Brace himself for what is coming.
The truck that had turned lime green in the meantime arrived at the Dorr’s house in Tyrone, New Mexico just south of mural filled Silver City where it was rented day before yesterday’s last week by the Horns.
Finally united for a common cause, they cautiously made their way up to the azure blue front door, Horns of Hatton activated. They paused at the bushes; peered around the corner to see what Good they were up against. The portal opened creakily from the other side. They turned away just in the nick of time. They noticed one of the angels was sight challenged — in shadow — while the other with his big, lidless eyes definitely could see the truck if not them. They had made a huge mistake in driving it here.
“Dude,” read that one to the other in the doorway. “Not Dud. Al was right. It wasn’t the *past*. It’s the *future*.”
The Devil couldn’t get away with it this time. He’d have to exit Grant. He took depossession of the body. Grant was saved by the powers of the door. Of the Dorrs.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0209, Illinois, New Mexico, The Waste^^
While Ted went to get help, I watched her start jumping up and down on the thing, the alien object — whatever it was.
At the same time nearby:
I tried to turn off the noise of the bouncing bed springs but couldn’t. Something was coming to a peak. Grant!, she shouted. Grant!!!
We were back.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0208, New Mexico, The Waste^^
It was so cold in here you could see your breath. But people didn’t mind. Celebrities in the audience!
“Good morning afternoon evening everybody!” Her standard opening line. “Welcome to the klub that’s going to put Kedas back on the map!” And then the requisite plug. “Brought to you by Sprite lemon-lime drink. The drink soo clean…” and here she paused to pull one of their sodas from her dress somewhere and chug. She retreats the can from her mouth, aaahs loudly, then: “…Grant *Hill* recommends it!” Cheers from the audience. Grant Hill is in attendance. He makes eye contact with me from where he’s sitting across the reflected green floor. Just briefly, enough to make me know he’s aware of what’s going on, if only in an unconscious way right now. Two Hills, PHEH, he may be saying internally. If he could only turn over the blueprint to his life he could see.
—–
“Dreaming again on that plank, Ted.”
“Just leave her this time. No need to tell Al.”
“I agree.”
“Got us into a lot of trouble before.”
“I remember.”
“Lot of paperwork.”
“I recall.”
“Anyway. Why don’t you enter her mind and see what’s going on.” So John the Mind Reader did. After a pause:
“Soo, what’s happening?”
“Apparently,” John surmised, “the past. Or a version thereof.”
“In-teresting.” They both had changed their minds about Al. The uppity higher up needed to be informed of this. New development!
(to be continued)
—–
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0207, Hana Lei^^, Nightsity, The Waste^^
I was told to meet him at the end of a long and dusty road. I said the name of the plant that appeared to be burning in front of me instead of the man.
“Nooooo,” he rasped. “I’mmm just *talllking* through thisss. Loookkk cloooosssser. Commme herrree.”
It was the voice of the father this time. I knew I was in deep doo doo trouble.
—–
“I remember how I got brain damage,” he said to her afterwards. “It was a fire; I got too close.”
“Good good,” she replied. “Now maybe those old wounds will heal — Can.” Only those quite close to him called him by that name, he remembered. She edged closer and gently touched the holey hair. Soon maybe no one else can get inside.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0026, 0109, The Waste^^
The tiles behind the stove were falling off. And she’d left the burner on again.
“Oh Mom,” he complains. “What are we going to do with you?” He turns the knob to the off position and starts clearing the air.
—–
“We have to fix TILE,” Man About Time urges, making his pitch. “Carrcassonnee has become Sepisexton, the 7 and the 6 at once, and is roaming the metaverse unchecked, freeing demons right and left that she can use at her disposal. We’ve already clocked 4 with the same name of Jenny.”
“Jenny is *not* a demon,” countered Mabel, present for the debate. “She’s just… very orange.”
“Aldebaronian,” clarified likewise alien Roger Pine Ridge, who also made a window in his busy schedule for this important discussion.
“No, like I said, there are *4*.” Man About Time remained fixed about the unfixed nature of the town’s chief religion, the one it is known for through the temple and some other stuff.
“Boat,” Baker Bloch piped in. “I recall a boat. Didn’t that crash over in Wallytown, though?”
“*Wallytown*,” stepped in Wheeler, “is something we’re *not* suppose to talk about. Not after the shower.”
“Counter that,” uttered Carrcassonnee propped up in a corner, unable to walk still or talk very much. She was basically limited to things that belong in a kitchen. “Spachula,” she offered further. “Scrape up eggs off counter. Will stick if not scraped. Spachula.”
The rest tried to figure out what that translated to in the latest Carrcassonnee limited language issuances. Probably something to do with eyes again. Or “I”s. Despite the split, MAT had gotten her this far, which was something, they agreed.
“Danny. What say you?” Danny was, once more, Man About Time’s right hand man, just like in the past. Pickleland in the sideways world, his trusty plunger turned back in time. Tiger.
“Radar.” Another simplistic issuance but followed up by 176 more sentences that I won’t write out but explained very well what the lack of radar meant to the Schuman without the N. Because there was Sector R to deal with now. “… mustard,” came the end of his last sentence of the 176, describing the color of the entity most responsible for the confusion. Earlier words in this sentence and the 175 preceding it elucidated a robot from a sideways world, probably Oz, who wormed their way into susceptible people’s lives disguised as a “best friend”, as he had called it. This was the case with Barry.
“Very good, thank you Danny. I will close then, for now, by saying that every state of the US is also a state of mind. Think about that.” MAT stares them down from his position in front, on top. For the moment and, hopefully, for the future.
Of the 10 people in the meeting, only 2 thought about bordering states with this, and that is only because they shared some of the same static, been out in the same snowstorm and not made it back in time for supper and a movie that one instance. And suffered the consequences.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0025, 0701, Collagesity Fordham, Hana Lei^^, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, The Waste^^
Of course I got lost in the maze that is my home. This happened even in childhood when I was more familiar with the place. But when I spotted the dummy with the red tie in the middle of the road I knew I was close. Me! They made me a martyr, just because I was special. The 5 were still inside of me all right, all taking orderly turns now, no fighting or jostling for top position. They’ve learned to cooperate. I’ve taught them well. Along with Miss Graham of course. I wonder where *she* is now?
Onward to the motel.
—–
The door was open. “Mom?” I called in.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0025, 0617, Hana Lei^^, The Waste^^
Sunklands 