“I’m afraid we have no power to control the theft of the haunted VW, town owner Baker Bloch,” responds Keat Owens Librarian beside the marked up Nautilus City map. “The Oracle has spoken; it will continue to be X-ed out.”
—–
“All right. Time to move.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0007, 0502, Heterocera, Nautilus, Nautilus City, Rubi
Rocky was walking around town just after 2am the next night, pondering over the hard choice he had to make, when he came upon it to his right. The structure most like the one he was renting in town, suddenly filled. Musaks was the name. He remembered the establishment use to be beside Baker Bloch’s rental in Tenement Square. Within still were a number of orchestrions and gramaphones, all powered up and producing a kind of spooky cacaphony in toto. And then in back, a steam calliope; he didn’t remember that from before.
But what is the lilting tune he automatically finds himself playing to add to those already thick in the air. Checking the object’s description, he sees it’s something called “Girls Just Require Amusement” by a C. Lauper, who he doesn’t know. He stands up.
The Librarian had just appeared out of nowhere at the lone desk of the room, reading a book as usual. Rocky decided just to stay calm and take the manifestation in stride.
“What are you reading — Librarian isn’t it?” The figure didn’t answer but just kept on studying the book in his hands. Rocky takes a look.
“Oh, it’s *my* book, hmmm. ‘Bible Truth.’ But I don’t remember a hardback edition being published yet. You must have one of the first copies.” Still nothing from The Librarian. “Is that the one where Nancy dies at the end?”
The Librarian closes the book and puts it on the desk while standing. He backs up a little bit and, hands together, begins to stare at the wall. Rocky gazes with him in silence.
A red door appears.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0702, Heterocera, Lapara
Rocky Racco was in the middle of rehearing his piano solo in Story Room’s “Fire Ants” legacy single when Baker Bloch rezzed a chair beside him and broke the news.
“You’re leaving?” he uttered while still tinkering with the solo a bit. Baker answers affirmatively. “How many are you taking?”
“We can take *you* if you wish. But, otherwise, Wheeler Wilson I assume. Maybe Buster, maybe others. Unsure still.”
“And who is already in Collagesity?” queries the anthropomorphic raccoon.
“Well, Pitch Darkly is there, kind of a new alter-ego I suppose you could call it. He comes from VHC City. Also: Woody Woodmanson, formerly of Snowlands. Now see, this is a trick — *our* Mary use to be engaged to Pitch, and maybe still is. Somehow realities have split apart by us — me — being here. If Mary goes back to Collagesity with Wheeler and the others, say, she may not even remember her life with Paul here, both black and white versions of him.”
“You have more stories to tell (in this town),” countered Rocky. “How about my cousin Tealie from the underground?”
“Tealie can show up in another book, another place,” answered Baker Bloch, standing by his resolution.
“Just because your last two — graphic novels is it?” Baker Bloch nods here. “… these graphic novels of yours end in 6 sections doesn’t mean that the situation can’t change now. You can extend to 7. Think how much more story could be told in another 20 or so posts? My story, for instance. Who made me? Do you even know who made me? I was merely an ordinary raccoon at one time far in the past.”
“My guess would be Paul, if Paul resonates with Paul McCartney strongly enough.”
“Oh. Well, you knew that, then.”
“But you could be a nuclear mutation caused by that explosion which was winnowed down just to your mushroom house thanks to the quick actions of All Nancy’s.”
“Could be that too.” Rocky looks directly into Baker Bloch’s eyes. “Please stay. I don’t want you to go. I want to…”
“Live?” Baker offered. “Then come with me… us.”
Rocky abruptly slammed down the lid to the grand piano’s keyboard. Chef/Inspector Petty turned around from interviewing Mary and Paul in another part of the theatre room.
Rocky gets up and brushes by Baker on the way to the teleporter. They soon find him in Audrey’s below, drinking and talking with his new best bud Terry.
“They want to end me. They want to end *us*,” he says, trying to ignore their presence.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0616, Heterocera, Lapara
“Next month??” Paul was incredulous. Peter SoSo and Tronesisia had paused their dart game to listen in. Mary Tyler began sobbing a bit.
“Yup,” states Terry the fire-ickle bartender. “The blue dude — Improvio I think — came in himself and booked the upstairs for October, same deal they have at Clownski’s. Levi wouldn’t give ’em any more than that at one time over there. But you can bet the bang on my belt there’s more deals to come. Mr. R. — Rocky — likes ’em, likes their music. Bang bang bang bang. More bang for the bucks, he said. Oops. I guess that’s a little insensitive.” But Terry was at least sensitive enough not to repeat the exact sentiment Rocky issued about their group, which was, “f-ck folk.”
“We… have nowhere to go,” Mary exclaimed. “We’ll have to leave Olde Lapara Towne! And I was really beginning to like it here. They’re forcing our hand.”
“Lamb must live,” agreed Peter SoSo. “There’s no killing it now, no going back to where we came from as Peter, Paul and Mary, separate and alone.” Tronesisia tried to nod in agreement but ended up just having a belly laugh. She excused herself by saying her gestures module needs rebooting.
“I think I might have an answer,” Terry said slyly. “Jacob… you know the groovy lawnmower…”
“Of course,” states Peter SoSo. “He’s what keeps us high as the sky.”
“Well… he found a portal right underneath this bar. It’s those sand dunes… sand castle. They lead to a cool and hip and far out place. Said it was called Melancholy Island. I tried it out myself. I think we — or you’s guys anyway — can help them with their problem.”
“What do you mean?” asks a sniffing Mary. Paul offered her his handkerchief.
“You have grass, right? Lots of it, thanks to those magical seeds you bought from New Lynne, Paul.” Mary blew her nose long and loud.
“Correct,” replies Paul, taking a fully loaded handerchief back from Mary.
“Well,” continues Terry, “turns out they *need* grass. They have the stubby version, the stuff that doesn’t really need to be mowed, but you people have the real deal, the weedy grass. The high version.”
Peter has a belly laugh with this as well. He quickly clears his throat and says, “catching,” while looking at Tronesisia. Paul couldn’t help sharing a small smile with Mary in the moment, each thinking that those two, forward looking robot and backward peering merman, were simply made for each other. Just like they were. Paul and Mary held hands.
“Alright, we’ll check it out,” Paul said. Everyone had forgotten about the secret weapon Buster set up, but were quickly reminded when Chef/Inspector Petty (not Pety — he’s different) burst into the bar through the red door and instantly began grilling.
“What all this about Renaldo O’Donnell springing back to life and then dying again??”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0614, Heterocera, Lapara
He doesn’t exactly know how, but Rocky is very pleased that Hucka Doobie’s gift of a media player (“tivi screen”) from Collagesity works in Baker Bloch’s Olde Lapara Towne apartment as well. He can’t stop staring into it…
Hucka has returned to Collagesity, but The Librarian remains, similarly absorbed in “Floydodo”.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0313, Heterocera, Lapara
“It’s a magic book,” states Hucka Doobie to the visiting Librarian, who stopped by for the day. “Just open it to any page and start reading.”
The Librarian does so and reads aloud.
“‘Martha: Our son does not have blue hair… or blue eyes, for that matter. He has green eyes… like me. George: He has blue eyes Martha.'” He looks up.
“See?” explains Hucka Doobie. “There, George and Martha, our Washingtons, our first couple — Adam and Eve — use the illusion of their son as a battlefield for dominance. Ickles.”
“Sonny-Jim?” asks The Librarian, reading further.
“Yeah. I think that’s the name. Unifying factor. Blue-green.”
The Librarian looks on the opposite page. “Who’s Audrey?”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0312, Heterocera, Lapara
Upon waking, Danny has a great urge to clean the back room.
Instead he heads to the bar where he knows his mate will be. Audrey Helen Ginger.
Police car! They must be on to him. He goes gingerly outside. Audrey’s the name. Yes, Audrey. Or is it Helen?
The inspector is still there in his window.
He inspects the inspector.
He seems to be preoccupied with his own thoughts. Good. Now to the bar.
Wait. A knife. Sandwiches.
And those mounds. Are people buried beneath? Perhaps his beloved Helen and Audrey?
There’s Ginger.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0005, 0301, Heterocera, Lapara
It was somewhat before sunrise when Allen Martin began writing to his deceased wife Carol again.
Dearest Muffin,
I hope you had a peaceful night. Me… not so good. I have some news for you. I don’t want to hide anything. You know my devotion to you my sweetest will never be over. Marriage is not, until death do you part. It is forever in another, special way. Yet, things do happen in physical life. Time moves forward. I’ve met someone else. I don’t know if it will work out but I just wanted to be straighforward and honest with you. This is not a usurpal of our love. Not atall. It is a continuation in a strange way.
He paused; peered over at his now ordinary looking son Doogie snoozing away after another tough night of transmogrified grilling on the part of possessor Petty. Victim this time: Allen Martin’s landlord Summerhill Nova. Emerald tablets? What’s that mad inspector on about now?? He returned to his scribing.
I know my feelings are real in this case, but we are the rock, the foundation. This is just a new branch sprouting on an old, old tree.
He paused again as Doogie let out a loud snort.
I want to reassure you our son is fine. Do not hate me for what I, we, did. The gas station was about to be repossessed. I had to provide for Doogie. Irony, eh? Possession for possession. I hope and pray it will be over soon. But Petty is going off onto so many tangents. How about the actual *killing*, sir. Address that for a change.
He put his pen down on the desk. It was no good today. A proper letter to his wife would have to wait. He sat up on its top, looking east this time instead of west.
Wheeler. What demon are you as well?
She also snorts.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0004, 0214, Heterocera, VHC City
In his newly rented, creepy basement apartment, Baker Bloch rezzed the entire “Wall of Ass.” created a number of years back now for the Biggie Gallery in Sunklands, only to delete most of it in favor of Salvador Dali’s last painting, “(The) Swallow’s Tail”. Seemed appropriate.
A knock at the door, then. Strange, Baker Bloch thought. No one knows I’m here yet except the landlord. Should I even answer it? It’s the dead of night. Vampires most likely. Fresh blood smelled. The knocks resumed, then a voice. “Baker, it’s me. Martin. Allen Martin. And Wheeler.”
—–
“Nice hat, Martin,” Baker Bloch spoke.
“It’s Allen, actually. Martin is a last name.”
“Oh right. Like the bird.”
“I suppose. Have we even met? I know your sister Baker Blinker, of course. She was my landlord over in Collagesity North.”
Baker Bloch ignored the sister misnomer re Baker Blinker. “I don’t think we have. But there’s a lot of characters in the Collagesity stories now. Perhaps our paths have crossed already and we’ve forgotten. Yes — come to think of it, I believe I saw you eating alone in Perch one night.”
“I did that sometimes, yeah.”
“I understand you have a son.”
“Doogie, yeah.”
“Something has happened to him?” He looks over to Wheeler for help. “See, I was over at your apartment just last night, Martin, er, Allen. Sorry. I was called over there by Petty.”
“I see,” states Allen Martin, repositioning himself in his chair. “How’s the investigation going?”
“Queerly,” answers Baker. “Odd accusations being tossed about. Stuff that doesn’t seem possible.”
“Like what?” Wheeler remained queerly silent. Then she was gone. Baker Bloch turned to Allen Martin, who just shrugged.
“She’ll get back here,” he said. “Go ahead… continue.”
As Baker spoke, the rest of the “Wall of Ass.” disappeared behind him, leaving Dali’s paintings alone in the apartment.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0004, 0208, Heterocera, VHC City
“Tell me more about this OD… oops, I think I’m making a full transition now.” Chef-inspector Petty was no longer Doogie Martin in any part.
Baker Bloch answered. “Like I said, we contacted him, it, through wegee. He, or she, or it, didn’t identify a sex, but it has male clothing on as it turns out.”
“Who’s ‘we’?”
“Hucka Doobie and I. She’s a member of my avatar family. She’s versed in spiritual matters — why I got her involved.”
“Tell me more about this avatar family of yours. Any criminal records?” His pace was crisp.
“None that I know about. Spongeberg is a destroyer by trade. Does that count?”
Petty became cryptic. “Glad you brought him up. Spongeberg is not a member of your family. He is a member of *our* family.”
Baker Bloch scratched his head at this. “Well,” he began again, “we admittedly don’t know much about him. Are you saying, I don’t know, that he’s from *here*?”
“That is precisely what I’m saying. We also believe there is a link between Spongeberg and OD — know it, in fact. You’re aware of the former property called Pitch Black?”
“Somewhat,” answered Bloch.
“In November of 2016, the property was taken over by the town, with the oft deemed “noxious” or “poisonous” temple derezzed. The FTI gallery expanded into its former space. It was through this incorporation that the town split into two separate realities. Or, better, we became *aware* of this second town overlapping the first. It was always there. But the portal had been opened.” He turned around and looked directly at Baker Bloch. “In the *big* picture, the owner of the FTI is the same as Wheeler. Assimilate *that*.”
To Baker Bloch, Petty was spouting gibberish now. He didn’t think Spongeberg was from VHC City (but he did want to find out more of his background now). Wheeler as the FTI owner? That didn’t make any sense.
“And I’ll give you one more,” Petty continued. “See the innocent looking Musician sitting on the couch between us?”
“Who… me?” uttered The Musician, sitting up a bit and wiping his nose on his sleeve. He had half nodded off during the discussion.
“Yes, you,” Petty answers. “I don’t guess you remember anything at all about creating *VHC City itself?*”
Nope. No he did not.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0004, 0206, Heterocera, VHC City
Sunklands 