“I see… you have the answer.”
“Truth,” he shot back. And then he asked his name.
“I see… you have the answer.”
“Truth,” he shot back. And then he asked his name.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0515, Apple's Orchard, Heterocera, Iris, NWES Island
“Well, the apartment’s ours again, Wendy. We have a new start here at Bigfoot.”
“Wonderful.” She was truly happy about the situation. She was truly Wendy in the moment, mediocre actress Alice Frame a far away dream for both of them. It was just like with Breeze before. Sandy should have known by the names — Wendy; Breeze. Together: Breezy, the archetype thereof.
“But I do insist you change into the other dress as soon as possible. The Twins are still out there… somewhere. The Cub Run consignment store is a thing to be reckoned with.”
“I know.” She smooths her present dress’ puffed out nature, not ready to show Sandy too much too soon. She knew how he was. But she was ready to take the gamble that she could change him. She’s betting that he’s ready to settle down with one woman and one woman only. For more than a week’s stretch. The search for All Orange: over. She knew she was the one. The right dress will come soon enough. Then he can see what he wants to.
“Let’s run away, Wendy,” Sandy then tries. “Forget about The Twins. We’ll hide out in one of the suburb cities away from town, maybe this Meat City I’ve been studying up on. There’s a place there you can dance. My new friend Francis can probably get you a job. Then I can run the slot machines next door or something. Maybe work at a newspaper office like I did before in Tinseltown–”
“Stop,” she demanded. Both knew the impossibility of it all. They were stuck in Town, formerly the City before the council told everyone otherwise. Their new landlord MAT is fighting it — wrote a strong guest editorial in the well respected Meat City Post, a true up and coming rival to the NWES City Gazette which I guess will have to be changed to the NWES Town Gazette now, perhaps weakening its position as top dog further. Collagesity be damned, Sandy thinks. But MAT makes some persuasive arguments.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0514, Apple's Orchard, NWES Island
“I’ve been mean-ing to ask you,” coos Marilyn, washing her hands before exiting the joint just as she did when entering. “How’s Di-nah doing? I never see her around any more.”
“Oh, pheh,” Moe waved off the poster behind the wash basin. “That old thing? That’s just an expression. You can do it by yourself if needed. Right Zapppa?”
Zapppa continued to look at the counter, obviously uncomfortable in the moment. “I’m not here for small talk, Moe,” he said in a big voice. He then stared straight into his eyes, determined to get it over. “You’re fired.”
Moe picks up a beer glass, wipes it, sets it down again. “It’s — it’s that girl, isn’t it? She’s *helping* you.”
“No, I didn’t say that.” He gets up to leave; reaches into Cassandra’s brain container first.
“Hey! Where you going with Homer’s head?? And, hey, what’s, er, this here at the bottom of his jar?”
“Retirement pension!” Zapppa shouted back before disappearing over the Montana horizon, knowing that egg would take him far.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0513, Apple's Orchard, Montana, NWES Island
“It didn’t work out for us in Cassandra City, Moe.” Man About Time (MAT) looks over at revolving Homer. “But maybe it will work out here. In another city: NWES City. The City.”
“Town,” Moe gruffed back at sitting Man About Time (MAT). “Check the latest *town* council meeting notes. Here, I’ll send you a notecard.” The bartender was clearly miffed about the decision.
Man About Town checks the notecard; then: “I see.”
“Diamondfyre was the deciding vote,” Moe went on. “East and West decided nay, and North and South decided yea. So it was up to Diamondfyre to tip the balance — the, er, unofficial 5th sim of the town. Northwest if you will.”
MAT was still staring at the notecard in his inventory. “I’ll fight it,” he declares mildly but firmly.
“It’s partly *your* lot’s fault, see. You Collagesity people, moving in here and renting here and there and there and there. Like this joint. Does Moe’s really belong in this town?”
“Yes,” issues MAT promptly. He stares at the revolving head again. But perhaps not Homer, he thinks. Maybe that’s the key. One of them. Removal of the head. But Moe already said he wouldn’t travel without the head. So here we are.
“Moe,” MAT decides to venture after a sip of American beer. So insipid. “How close are you to retirement?”
“I don’t know,” he returned roughly. “5 years?”
More like 5 days, Man About Time then thought. Maybe even 5 hours. The head spins ’round for one of its last times here.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0512, Apple's Orchard, NWES Island
“They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul, Kick Ass 02.” He seems to stare up at the old ruined house that is kind of box shaped like his head, but perhaps he is actually looking beyond it at the woman with the “straw.”
Kick Ass 02 had no reply for Kick Ass 01 because he had no lines in this scene. More perhaps later on the Kick Asses, who live in, let’s see, that would be Black Ice. Its Deep South. That must mean they know…
—–
“Elberta, do you remember the Kick Asses?”
“Of course. I use to date Boos! And Bogota, she admitted for the first time to her brother, her fiancee.”
“Bogota too? I thought you said he was a loser, a nobody.”
“Bogota was just… unformed.” She grabbed one of her floppy pigtails reflexively, a nervous action.
“Unformed? You always said uninformed, as in stoopid.” But Toothpick drew back here since he considered himself rather dimwitted. Calling the Black Ice pot kettle green or something.
“No, I said, or use to say, *uniformed*. He was a pilot in the 1st World Wide Web War. WWWWI. Fought for Amazonia…”
“I’m going to cut you short there, Elberta, future wife of mine, present sister of mine. He *didn’t* fight for no war. He *didn’t* fly around that tiger plane he bragged about all the time. He was a braggart, a bag headed braggart. And a liar. And a thief.”
“The only thing he stole was green from Black,” his fiancee/sister countered. “And that was only because…
“Jiminy,” Toothpick realized. “You’re talking about Black Ice itself!” They both realized it at the same time, in fact, minds — and probably bodies — still synchronized. We better leave them to it again.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0510, Black Ice, Neptune, NWES Island
“We call him Torch but I believe his first name is Glenn. I try to stay a certain distance from the fellow understandably, me being both Snowy and Frosty at once.” He looks over. “Still not talking to me, Old Grey?” He turns back, sighs. “This NWES Island, Old Grey. I don’t think we can ever leave now. Collagesity has been fully assimilated.” He pries his eyes off the hypnotic dancing fireman again, looks at his watch. “Speaking of the City I think I’ll take a walk; getting a little hot in here. Cool off, you know.” He was thinking of a certain seat in town shaded green and blue formerly across the street from a fire station. Just south and east of Diamondfyre, but not far enough to forget how to come home to mother.
—–
“I was born there, in that dresser,” spoke Snowmanster to no one now, not even one who doesn’t listen, doesn’t know. “I became someone that day, way back in photo-novel 3. You were there, Old Grey. Even at the beginning. We talked of, well, we discussed a lot of stuff while walking to Purden and meeting Core-Alena for the first time. You weren’t impressed. I recall you mimicking me through a ‘Star Wars’ character. But now you’re paying the price.” He looks over at Old Grey that isn’t there but he pretends she is anyway, cane still in hand. He notices the ill fitting wig again, the cracked grey skin. Old. Dead, even. Death itself. She was beginning to smell.
Wee person Aloha climbed out of the picture before him and introduced herself by saying goodbye, pheh. Green lantern carrying Fern will have to do.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0508, Apple's Orchard, Marwood, NWES Island
One day I’m going to get this boat of mine fixed and row row row all the way around this island, like it was (in) a stream.” Dimmy Gene then takes another sip of his homemade Sumatran blend, further pondering about a hill full of phantoms he’s heard about on its opposite side. He involuntarily shudders and winces at once.
He recalls his old girlfriend Little Oakley Annie coming for a visit in the Fall of ’26, just before the end. “I’m going back home to Green River after this,” she spoke to him, pistol waving around haphazardly in her right hand as usual. It would do her in; Oakley was no more after that, no more visits. Buried at Green River on that hill overlooking the vale. Dimmy then ponders about Teepot, which he hadn’t thought of for a long long time. Maybe he should switch from coffee to tea for a while, he segued, starting with green. No: red. This rogue Sumatran is starting to taste like Raid, like something you’d set out to get rid of pests or something. Darn hurricanes: cutting me off from the real coffee I love. He sips again, looking out at the wavy water and wondering if yet another would hit the west coast this Fall. Clouds were darkening again…
An island surrounded by a River. He ruminated where he got the idea while sipping and then wincing once more. But he dare not pull this tarp up and look at the damning holes again. The Phantom Hill trip won’t be happening anytime soon.
(to be continued?)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0504, Neptune, NWES Island, Teepot+
“I’m tired of all these books, Ross C. Go into the future and get me some clean ones, without the virus that’s going all around the place.”
Ross C. bleeped and blipped and estimated that it would take 5 man-hours to return from the future with the equivalent amount of books currently in Andy Warhole’s library, 1/2 of art and 1/2 of other. He never reads them, however. He just likes their appearance in this room when visitors come around. Which should be tonight for Marilyn, Hilter, and the rest. The party starts in 3 hours. Not enough time, Ross C. realizes. She tells her master this.
“Then just get rid of the lot of ’em,” Warhole waves off. “Build me a big aquarium and fill it full of colorful and exotic fish. Get the color pattern from my Marilyn screenprint, the one from Niagara (movie).” Ross C. does the blipping and bleeping thing again and now estimates this will take 10 hours to create, or twice as long as the new library of books. She tells him this.
“Then let’s just, I don’t know, *move*. What are we doing here anyway? This is not my apartment; these are not my books. I don’t have an apartment in the City. I live on the east coast, next to the clean, refreshing Korean Channel full of war ships and war planes and flags and explosions. So exciting. Move our asses, yes. That’s what we should do. That other art fellow lives here instead, Barry or Barren or something or other.” Warhole looks out the window. “Why he’s just painted that Super Building over there, turned it into a *Supper* Building to make Dinner Girl and her lot happy.” Warhole sighs. Ross C. waits patiently for more orders. They always come. She knew they didn’t have to move since they don’t live here in the first place. Or do they?
Warhole settles back into the plastic pink couch, resigned to host the party since everyone is already invited. “Destroy the bookshelf, yes. Just destroy the wall. Why do we have 2 rooms in this City apartment? Studio apartments are where it’s at. I am an artist after all, Jesus. Destroy the wall.”
Ross C. estimates that it will take 2 1/2 hours to destroy the bookshelf and the wall between the 2 rooms of the apartment, fusing them into one. But that doesn’t include the cleaning up, which will take an additional 1/2 hour. “It will be close, master,” she offers in her metallic way.
—–
“I loove what you’ve done to the place, Andy. It’s so — open!”
“Thank you, Marilyn.” Ross C. hides in the corner behind the door with the filled dustpan, unable to escape when the first wave of guests arrived.
—–
“PERfect!”
Party over.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0022, 0503, Black Ice, NWES Island