Category Archives: Nautilus

“Robot Dreams” continues

“I’m looking for information on Ted Bear, his current whereabouts,” spoke Suzanna Oh 2345 out of the side of her mouth which she didn’t possess. The little robot at the bar looked knowledgeable. And, most importantly, one of her kind. He probably wasn’t stationed here like that, at a centerpoint of gossip, for nuttin. He had dirt. Spill, she requested after sliding up beside him… or her, actually. Molly OU812. Make me at least one small mound at the bottom of a hill. Bigger than ant size, maybe anteater size. Something I can really dig into. But most of this was implied.

“Ted Bear. Just checking…” the smaller robot sputtered out.

“He use to own a small island in this sim. Say: islet.”

“Islet,” the small robot complied, still checking her database with a corresponding lowering of surface functions.

“No, I mean, let’s call it an islet. Very small.”

“Smaller than… me?” Still checking behind the scenes.

“No. Ted Bear is bigger than you so that does not compute.”

“You?”

“No, you. Ted Bear is bigger than you.”

“You?”

Pause. “Oh, sizes right. I’d say between me and you. Teddy bear size, but to the max.”

“Fit (still checking) into a 3 by 3 foot box?” She was just making chit chat really at this point while computing deep down, where it counts. 02345 x 812 files counted now. Only 812 to… *done*.

“3 x 3 box,” Oh 2345 pondered aloud, but then OU812 interrupted.

“I have all the information needed. You can stop talking now while I do. Ted Bear lived here from 2020-2022 on an 20 x 22 foot islet near the center of Moomit Bay. Conditions for entering: you had to bare something, could be a small article of clothing, could be all of them. Ted Bear was clinically insane. He was quarantined. I will pause now to let you ask questions if you wish. I have all the information.”

Suzanna Oh 2345 looked around. The music was blaring — no one else could hear them. No one even at the bar presently, not even a tender. Must be on break, perhaps a big bathroom one. With her supersonic ears Suzanna detected several flushes earlier and some other noises. An upset stomach could be the problem. The tender could have, yes, tended himself, imbibed himself, didn’t cut off himself at the limit normally assigned to others. He wasn’t a good tender to himself.

OU812 waited patiently, hearing the whirring of Suzanna Oh 2345’s inner workings indicating she was thinking. Suzanna Oh’s thoughts shifted to a question, changing the sound slightly, raising it up an overall pitch or two. More focused thinking here.

“Baker Bloch, the owner of the blog–”

“Yes,” anticipated OU812. “He was there. Took off his hat so he could enter. Wheeler Wilson or Wilson Wheeler too. She had to take off more. Ted Bear set up an islet next to his islet so that Baker Bloch could be with him forever and ever. He turned into a bobblehead, top making up 9/16ths of his body’s total mass. But then he was saved.” OU812 stopped here, calculating the many possible meanings of that word. Backed up? No, that wasn’t it.

“Describe the interaction with Wheeler Wilson more,” Suzanna Oh 2345 requested.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0309, Lands End, Nautilus, Wild West

0100111-011-1000

“You already have *7*. And you want to buy more??”

“Just one, Sweetie Pie. A slither of a craft. Minnow it’s called.”

“It won’t fit. It won’t fit! Especially since you bought that jetski last month. Close the blinds, hmph. I don’t want to see them any more for a while; I want to be *blinded* to them for a while.”

“As you wish.”

And so begins the solo journey of Robert Matthew or Matthew Robert in the 8th, purchased the next day despite the wife’s protests. Intending only to take a 3 hour or so “spite” cruise, it ended up being for the rest of his natural life, which was practically infinite in scope and length. This, early on actually, really really early, brought him to Constantynople in his new “fishing vessel”.

“Where am I?” he exclaimed after landing softly on the sandy shore of the place. “I’ve got to find the person in charge!”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0308, Constantynople, Lands End, Nautilus, Rank & File, Wild West

the coming of the robots

1st: Robert Matthew. Or Matthew Robert, whichever. Like Shelley and her horse before him, came down from Beatrice, via a rowboat in his case but, later, some say a duck to match his yellow. Or a yellow horse, whatever. Anyway, here he is, arriving from the north. Invited by Constantynople Prime Minister Baker Bloch himself to solve some obvious town issues. Too much human stuff going on; it’s becoming a weakness, maybe even part of a curse. Like Robert’s old Soap swampland he fortunately sold to a gullible man from Mark Twain, Florida.

“Town hall, please.”

“Right, then left through the tree, hehe, huhu, hooo.”

He watched him walk away, then: “Did — did I do well, Tom?”

Reply in head.

“A white aggie, eh? Best one yet!”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0307, Constantynople, Nautilus, Rank & File

00390212

Not yet (*sip*).

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0212, collages 2d, Constantynople, Falmouth, Nautilus, Rank & File, Washington

00390211

“April May June passed so fast April Mae Flowers. Now it’s July…”

“And we’re resurrected, yes,” replied Herbert Glenn Gold’s wife of 47 (?) years. “Waiting for action. ‘Annnnnd…'” she attempts to joke like a director. “Remember what happened last time.”

“Um hmm,” Herbert murmured while nodding, wondering where his pudding is. How could he eat his pudding without his meat, though? Strange thought.

“So much promise over on the Jeogeot continent. So much disappointment. House *deleted* after, what was it, 1 month?”

“At that,” Herbert Gold replied, even a bit more disappointed than April Mae over the affair. Speaking of which; he should bring this up now, before we get too far into the story. “I saw Merry Hill Gouldbusk the other day. Supermarket,” he continued. “She had 2 apples and one banana and then excused herself to the cashier and got one orange and slotted it between the 2 foods before the whole thing was rung up, all the items in that order. She was trying to tell me something. She didn’t seem to recognize me, though. I was shocked.”

“Gold face still in place?” April Mae only asked with a little venom. She was use to such sidetracking. After 48 (48!) years you learn to put up with a lot. And fantasizing about a woman half your age is not at the top of the shit list, not any more.

“Yes. Red hair still too.” Herbert stopped here, thinking back, which April Mae spotted. Still worth a hundred dollars? she wanted to ask but held her tongue. Long time ago now. They had bigger worries now, like how to cope with growing old. They had to stick together on this one. She’d seen Mr. Platinum, she’d seen the future. They could not turn back the clock.

“When did you get so tall, dear?” she diverted. She looked right. “And where is our favorite painting on the wall, the Blue Panther? The one we stole from… oh, I can’t recall, hmph, I can’t recall them all.”

Herbert slouched down and then answered the second. “I believe the farmer boy is bringing it over later.”

“What farmer boy?”

Herbert reconsidered. “No, I think it was repossessed. By the Blue Panther and his, erm, agent. Back at the end of novel 36. They came huffing and puffing up the hill to the house. Hill House we wanted to name it. But not after Merry.”

“Of course not,” April Mae waved the idea off. She tried to remember the repossession.

—–

Later in his study he remembered it was a gardener and not a farmer that his wife had had an affair with.

Later on the john, April Mae remembered that the art was destroyed instead of repossessed.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0211, Apple's Orchard, Constantynople, Nautilus, NWES Island, Rank & File

00390208

Yet another pepper, a 3rd for the shirt and top covering up the exposed tank. Superseding the other two?

Big Stickout in MACAvity, another West Virginie resonance.

Meanwhile, the actual, non-merged Shelleys have started taking train rides with each other on another part of the FILE, but are kicked off before entering the water, marking passage into a different sim. Shelley, one of them, I suppose Shelley 01 which would be more appropriate, then spots a red pin on a map of Pickle 01 off the coast of the 1st Bellissaria continent, technically part of the continent itself since it was the first landmass to form there. Maybe this is our next lead, she thinks, clothes still a bit wet from the brief dunking. But she fared better than the one sitting more up front.

Pickle 01 and Pickle 02, then. Just like Shelleys 01 and 02, interesting. Also combining, and perhaps not in a good way as well.

A different location for Pickle 01’s red pin back in photo-novel 21 but too similar not to mean something, most likely.

So Shelley 01 stays put at the map while Shelley 02 checks out the actual location on Pickle 01. Real time investigating we have here. Exciting! Let me just close up some windows before actually logging on the 2nd Shelley, the now basically duplicate to the first minus some secondary cosmetic attributes along with the use of more demos to save money in the process… Okay, that should be enough.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0208, Bellisaria, Constantynople, Nautilus, NORTH, Pickle 01, Pickle 02, Rank & File, Rim Isles, West Virginia

2 I’s 02

A backup is needed in case of failure. A top is duplicated. Kind of. Close as I could get.

She approached the bar after checking out the back (noticing the tank, etc.). “I’ll have what she’s having.”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0207, Constantynople, Nautilus

X’s and

Mr. Babyface’s big mouth on his huge head forms an O. He realizes he’s been staring at perfection all this time, volcano at top, familiar green green Xilted and its now grassy fields at the bottom. All answers lie here.

Al temporarily staying over at the Temple of TILE until they get a true custodian of the place was thinking along the same lines. Paradise found. His itchy and scratchy down there has suddenly and, to him, miraculously cleared up, even though it appears to be exacerbated especially by heat and it’s now basically the middle of the summer. Subtract the bit o’ heartburn which he’s not worried about (he’ll adjust his meal again tonight to further pinpoint the issue), he realizes he hadn’t been this healthy in years. From this center of power combining present past future, he wonders what’s next for Shelley, for Arthur and Edward, for Mr. Babyface and whoever shows up to be his companion and sounding board for more Big E/Big Schwa theories in the Kidd Tower, perhaps old lover Greg Ogden (who can still change into green green Gregg Oden when provoked), or maybe nephew Peter Ladd, a cousin of Lamb’s Paul and thus from a different mother, even though they both call Babyface Uncle.

Mr. Babyface has the impression that Shelley and her boat boys will be moving out of the top of Kidd Tower soon, tired of the limited space there. Soon, then, his dining room and his staring chair will be backed by (the map of) Zebrasil not Xilted, as he moves out of W (lower) and X (upper) back to Y (lower) and Z (upper). That’s his hope.

In other locations, Mr. Z has dropped his backpack and its many masks collected over both real and virtual continents in the second floor of Crooked, determined to make it a home too, as well as a space to further the TILE study group he wishes to jump start here in town. The standing yellow ickle just below is sure to follow; another Lamb — and a needed 4th color to balance the other 3, red green blue. We’ll soon see.

But Mr. Z has a journey to make first. He additionally senses he must unite public north and private south into one to make Constantynople and Constance Island as a whole truly fulfilled; be made a *constant*. Myrtle Beech must be visited. And he needs to get the lowdown on the whereabouts of his own cousin Zimmy.

But I forget. Mary, the third member of Lamb to add to Peter (different from Peter Ladd) and Paul, is already here! And so is hubby Pitch Darkly. They’re established at Darkly Manor, their old home from Collagesity back in the days, back when it was set up right next door to the sacred Rubi Woods. Through a transparent upstairs wall they could stare directly into the many linden trees, the cypress 1’s and 2’s, the eucalyptuses, and, most mysterious of course but only occasionally, perhaps only that one time, Unch himself, the fabled 200th tree of the forest, the one that has the ability to uproot itself and go walking about the place. Being a Linden creation and thus supposedly permanent, the forest is still there. Just not Collagesity. The also sacred 97/97/97 spot that once united Collagesity directly with VHC City on the same continent of Heterocera is protected from alteration, i.e., terraforming from the outside, the thing which ruined the parallel 97/97/97 in VHC City, psychically uncoupling the 2 burgs.

And what of Shelley? *She* is from that same diagonal line crossing the continent, its very tip top in fact in Hooktip, a suburb of VHC City — 135/135/135. Another perfection, it seems. Mr. Babyface is huffing and puffing on his recently purchased Blue Pennant tobacco by way of Hana Lei which replaced inferior Red Dragon, still staring, still preparing in his mind. Won’t be long now.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0206, Constantynople, Heterocera, Jeogeot, Kidd Tower, Nautilus, Rank & File, Rubi, Temple of TILE, VHC City, Xilted

00390205

Thomasina said that whenever I need to refocus to come back to the FILE, so I’m here. In Tomasina — the center of it; without the “h” but obviously related — staring at what appears to be the ruins of a temple, and beside a shell representing Nautilus itself, my home continent for good it seems.

The beacon shows me how to walk the diagonal of the sim. Here I go!

Another oversized Nautilus shell encountered at 197/197 near the middle of this temple thing. By Shelley, mind you, once again, it appears, our heroine for the novel, especially since promising character Sarah from section 01 seems to be dead and gone from us. And also keep in mind she writes novels herself, and apparently is on the same number *I* am. We differ in content if not frequency. She’s found a pattern for writing, a system, and I have too. She is writing a different sentence as I am writing *this* sentence, for example. Parallel. Actually, in checking, she was writing the exact same sentence back there but it usually doesn’t happen that way. Moving on…

Unrendering water to look around better, we understand that that one temple, albeit the largest perhaps, is part of a complex of ruined structures spanning several sims east to west. I also found this among the ruins, although I’m not sure what happened here. Certainly makes for some interesting speculation, though.

We will probably return here.


exposed part of the ruins in Macavity


duplicate statues found just below and beneath


unrendering water again: all together now

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0205, Nautilus, NORTH, Rank & File, Rim Isles

00390203

In a cage underneath the bed he waits his turn as reality shifts back into fantasy, virtual playstuff and all. It was always going to be this way. Once they returned to the top. “How’s your novel going?” he said over, blue rose decorated suit back on. “I’m really sinking into this one,” she admitted to her hubby who was still gone a lot of the time, acting in Europe, Asia and Africa currently, Shakespeare being a world-wide phenomenon. “Sinking as… how?” “You know, really getting into character,” she replied. He rolled over, stared upward. If he’d kept rolling he would be looking right at the answer. “So you’re Jennifer Lane, the writer who *writes* Shelley. But to me you’re still Shelley, since I’m not in your books.” “Oh, you’re in them alright,” she said, which was truth. Just not the whole. 2-4 percent, like incomplete milk for a half baked, choco chip cookie. And so, on the 5th day… “Explain,” he ventured, pressing further tonight, kind of hearing the muffled cries of help from beneath him but still kind of not. He could sense an actor in peril.

So she gave him permission to come back into her life, to live in this place with them as well. Her lovely Edward, fresh from a dog park over in Pickle 02. Someone else was under the bed now. He stared at the answer. “Jem, is that you Jem?” He rolled over, all the way. “Oh it’s *you*.”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0039, 0203, Constantynople, Jeogeot, Kidd Tower, Middleton, Nautilus, Rank & File, Xilted