January 6, 2018 · 8:37 am

continuation

Philip continued to read his book for hours. Afterwards it described him looking through the telescope at hand and seeing Spica, bright as a bell, like he was back in the northern hemisphere and far away from that dreaded Southern Cross. Back to studying the Spica variable star and the precession of the equinoxes, similar to one of his major heroes Copernicus did before him. Our Second Lyfe’s sun, hmm, he then ponders, wondering if it could possibly be reachable by rocket ship. What is in the centre?

—–

By this time, Marion Harding was back down on the ground — grounded — and seeing Capitol City straight and for what it really was again. Bland and boring. The others of his gang were suppose to meet him in Raven Manor’s main dining room at 7:00 (more leftovers from the great spread he had prepared 2 nights back now), but since they both were usually a little late, he decided to drag his feet this time as well. He takes a detour to that recently found ice fishing shed over in Horizons-Spica, part of the sci-fi retro sub-continent where land can be rented so cheaply (thanks Veyot!). Ahh, vacation, he thinks. Could it be possible soon? Perhaps after the one last big bank heist in Farmington. Or was it Bennington?

He teleports to the shack using the landmark created last night. An angler is positioned just a bit down the bank from him, seemingly of the female variety. “Hello?” he says. No answer — but this might be problematic. He wanted to be alone and smoke his grass and talk to his fantasy creations: Peanut Cop, Golden Josephine, and the rest. Away from that nonsense babbling Kid and tough talking Philip, somehow the best of buds now despite their different natures. He doesn’t want other fishermen — or fisherwomen — in his way. Who does own the shack? He desires it for his own, his own centre of the universe, he realizes, at least for a little while.

He decides just to ignore the problem for now and poke around inside again. Chess, he remembers…

He finds himself laying down on the far couch against the colorful throw pillows.

“Fishing,” he murmurs, relaxing, letting it all go. “Fishing for fish. Fishing for answers. Fishing for…”

“Pitch,” the fisher lady then calls from outside, puzzling him. “Pitch. Time to wake up. Wake up.”

—–

“It was awful, Mary. I dreamed I was back in Buster and I’s killing shack, but I was the victim set up this time. I was to be sacrificed!”

“There, there,” Mary comforted, stroking his white forehead. “Only a dream.” Then they laid together. It was like old times.

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January 6, 2018 · 8:05 am

up and down

“Why do you kill me, hwwww?” wheezed the peanut shaped flattie cop to Marion Harding. Sometimes he had these kind of visions up here in Capitol City’s giant tree: all alone and high as a kite. “Over,” wheezed the cop figure, also smoking, “and over… and over and over and over and over, hwwww?” He paused. “I mean, am I still alive? Because I think I’m falling from this tree.” Pause, then another laughy wheeze.

“Then he falls out of the tree?” Philip concurrently reads down on the ground in Raven Annex. “What the hell’s bells does that mean?”

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January 5, 2018 · 8:54 am

congelato

“Honey? Are you coming?” a prepared Tronesisia called from the bedroom.

“Ich bin eingefroren,” Tin S. Man squeaked back after a pause from the bathroom in his squeaky clean state.

—–

“Aww, babydoll. Not again!”

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January 5, 2018 · 7:13 am

present and past

He paused in reading his little red book to call to her. “Time to go home, kid.” For that’s what he already was nicknaming Heidi Hunt Ives, appropriately; she couldn’t help but snicker a little inside every time he used it. “5:00. *Lord* Marion will have laid out what he considers dinner back at the manor in about 15, swee…” Philip Strevor bit his tongue. He almost called her sweetie! She certainly is some kind of bewitching child, he considers, staring in her direction through jungle gym bars welded together with red, yellow, and blue pentagons. Marion had that part right.

“I’m coming,” she complied, finishing up her last dangle of the day.

Philip then turned again to watch the only other kid in the small playground. Unsupervised, but he seemed a little bigger than Heidi and a boy as well — probably all right to fend for himself, he deduced. It reminded him of his days growing up in South Yankton. Snow 9 months out of the year. Playing in the cold with Tommy Fox, Archie Hound, and the rest of the gang. He was use to cold, yes. Craved it, in fact. But he had to leave when he was 6 years old, his family cast out of the village after he attempted an armed robbery of its lone bank, pheh. Yeah, the prison guard families there were a bad influence, but he got away from crime. For a while. Turned to science; turned to the stars. B.A. in Physics at Cambridge. M.A. in Applied Astronomy from Oxford Shoe. That’s where he met Jimmy and became buds. Jimmy said there was another position at the observatory in Australia that he had just earned a job at himself. “Southern skies,” Jimmy lured. “Whole new realms to explore. And you can still see your precious Spica from that hemisphere *almost* as well,” he tacked on. Ah yes, *Spica*, Philip thought bitterly. He paid for that small loss of brightness indeed.


Philip Strevor decked up at Cambridge in better days.

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January 5, 2018 · 2:14 am

where they are…

Gaeta 5 is the only finished continent of the Gaeta series. The initial project was to build 5 continents (named from Gaeta 1 to Gaeta 5), then to unite them into a single block of sims. Today, only Gaeta 5 is complete and a part of Gaeta 1 was built. Gaeta 5 is the most compact continent, with no gulfs or estuaries. On map, [it] has a [peanut shape]. This continent is an endless plain. It is linked to Corsica by a two-sim large passage (see Transcontinental Channels).

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Gaeta_5

where they *aren’t* (any more):

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January 4, 2018 · 9:38 am

Home Orange

“It *is* this place, Broken Heart Jackie.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Anyway, it’s time to get to work.”

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January 4, 2018 · 8:32 am

more Raven Manor

I’ve been here before, Marion ruminates. But a smaller version, a *tiny* version.

Something about orange.

—–

Heidi Hunt Ives giggles from within again. “Here, Philip Dilip, point me in the opposite direction and see if that will work better. Toward the falls. Whatsaname? Anyway, to the northeast this time instead of the southwest. Let’s see what this baby has got!”

So Phlip Strevor helps Heidi point the bulky cannon atop Raven Manor the opposite way from whence they just shot it. Heidi merely got stuck around the tower spire he stares at in the above snapshot, unable to enter banned property in that direction. Checking the inworld map, Philip agrees a northeast trajectory may prove more fruitful.

“So *next* time you have a go in it, old man. Alright? I’ll do this round and then you get to choose. Okay, let’s do it! Ready… are you ready Philip?”

“Yes,” he calls from behind, touching the cannon and getting prepared for the munchkin’s countdown. He had to admit to himself this was fun. But he wouldn’t dare tell the kid. They weren’t that good of friends… yet.

“One, two…”

And off she flies again, a cannonball with raven black hair. He immediately lost sight of her. She tumbled and tumbled through space, her puffed up little skirt blocking most of the view.

Then she was home again, sent there by a land security orb.

Drat! she thinks. She looks through her friend list and finds Philip, then requests a teleport back to Capitol City. No good pics of her journey through the air. She’ll have to try it again.

—–

“Ready, set…”

Although pointed in the exact same direction, for some reason she wasn’t spotted by the security orb this time and sent home. Dusting herself off from the hard landing, Heidi checked the map. Maybe 300 meters she had gone! Not even in Babablacksheep any longer. But where was this?

Home?

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January 3, 2018 · 9:22 am

HHI Again

Philip Strevor became bored waiting for Marion Harding to show up with the new recruit to their gang, and started poking around the upper floor of Raven Manor, one of the largest buildings of Capitol City and located in the sim of Babablacksheep.

Hmm, he pondered. Wonder why this big office has a map of Terra Aurca on the wall instead of Gaeta V or Capitol City or sumtin?

He sits down in the centre of the room and thinks: One day I will be a big shot in this town and command from a posh desk like this. He pretends that people are seated opposite him, asking for favors.

“I see, Mrs. Brighton,” he says calmly for the set up. “But *no*, we cannot lend you 10,000 lindens so that your little boy can get out of jail. You can see him in 10 years!” He slams his hand down on the desk to punctuate the idea and then laughs heartily, head tilted backwards. He laughs so hard his sides start to ache. He must be careful.

Marion opens the room’s large oak doors with the fresh recruit in tow. “There you are. Playing like you’re important again?”

Laughter died down, Philip merely grunts.

“I haven’t seen you in about a week, Philip. You’re wearing short sleeves. But where’s your cybernetic arms? What’s happened?”

Philip doesn’t answer but instead stands up stiffly and goes over to the recruit and starts looking her over — he even sniffs her several times during the process. He turns toward Marion. “A *kid*? You said there was a twist, but… a *child*?”

“First off, introductions,” Marion replies, steady in the face of fury. “Philip Strevor, this is Heidi Hunt Ives. Heidi: Philip.”

Heidi Hunt Ives, who is of course Billy Jean Kidd again, extends a hand. “Please to meet you Philip.”

Philip doesn’t shake her hand. He instead roughly takes Marion’s arm and leads him to a far corner of the room. “A word, please,” he says as they walk.

Chance? Heidi thinks with amusement while watching them recede from her. Chants?

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December 31, 2017 · 8:52 am

monochrome

“Well, Wheeler. What’s next for you… us?”

“Call me Kidd here. Billy Jean Kidd. Chroma who is Jimmy has fused with Wheeler and The Musician. The great 3-n-1. Norris.”

“Norris?” the great vampire Pitch Darkly questions. He did not know this name. “Do you mean Morris?”

“I do not,” replies The Kidd firmly, sitting forward with hands on knees now. She stares toward him.

Pitch decides to enter mouseview to get a better look at her.

Such an interesting simulation. Simulacrum. He takes up the thread again. “So, who is this Norris, then?”

“You know. 3-n-1,” she states once more.

“Humm, Sandusky,” Pitch says, nodding. Nodding off, that is.

—–

Blackness again.

Then falling. He recalls a brief glimpse of a large, many windowed building.

Something was lost. Not just eyesight. Earsight; speechsight. He falls and falls, then lands, upright, in the midst of animals.

Solid water. He thinks: ark. But then intuitively realizes this is more simulation and there is a door out of what is actually a small globe. Like a door from Earth to Heaven. He thinks of “The Truman Show” and going beyond “The Wall”. True man.

He finds the door in a logical seam, and faces a different, greener water. Atoll style.

He makes his way to a distant shore via an inflatable mattress.

On the beach, he looks back at the globe with the animals within, but knows the animals cannot see him. He thinks to check the owner of the globe, the inflatable mattress, the water itself and the beach and the rocks. All belong to The Kidd again. He is in her realm, he realizes.

—–

Pitch wakes up. A brief nap, but meaningful. Billy Jean Kidd is still staring at him, wide awake all the time.

“I have removed your cardboard eyes and given you back your sights, all 3 of ’em. All I do for this is to ask a small favor. Only one. Find Norris the Father. Look in Beaver City, Nebraska. Find him and tell him that the time has come to firewalk between Republicans and Democrats. He’ll understand. He’ll come here, then. I know you can pull this off. Else: darkness again. You have all the resources of this island at your disposal. And other entities will be dropping by to help.

“But…” he implores.

“Mary?” Billy Jean Kidd guesses correctly about what is foremost in his mind. “Yes. Her too.” Mary manifests beside The Kidd. Pitch Darkly wonders if she’s grown taller since they last met about a week back.

“One chance out between two words,” she chants.

“Worlds,” Billy Jean Kidd corrects. “You meant worlds there.” Mary turns toward her but doesn’t respond. Pitch blows out air in resignation before shutting his eyes and falling asleep again.

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December 29, 2017 · 10:20 am

Falmouth Visit, Top

Jacob I. understands that collages exhibited in Falmouth gallery’s top 3 floors don’t apply to the present situation, so he quickly moves through them to this perch on floor 6, offering a great view into the Rubi Woods.

Through his increased draw distance, he realizes he can *just* make out the large tree at his user’s friend Pearl Grey’s property in Rosieri, the sim southwest of Rubi. It reminds him that Baker Bloch needs to go over to her Wanderlust Art Gallery on the Sansara continent and change the texture out on his displayed collage there for the Jan./Feb. exhibit. The recently completed “SpicA” comes immediately to mind as a candidate. Here’s a link describing Pearl’s Nov./Dec. exhibit that’s wrapping up.

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