Marsha “Pink” Krakow was praying in a Mid-town church. Newt just missed her. “God bless Mama, rest her soul. And Dada. And most of all my little boy all grown up and playing with fire now. Help him not manifest the Duck any longer.”
Fat chance, he thinks simultaneously while spraying in Southside.
She releases the doves from the steeple, hoping one would poop the truth on him, just like with her.
Here he or she comes!
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0313, Gold City-, Jeogeot
The TV didn’t work but he had his computer, his game. Toilet paper dispenser right beside the bed, actually a little over top of the bed. That’s normal, right? he asked himself while automatically logging in. He left now blue haired Cloe at the bank holding a gun in one hand and 50,000 lindens in the other. Paper bag, again. He goes back back back to when he was a kid, getting take out for them while Mom was busy with, er, clients, she said. Only later of course did he understand what that meant. She had a room downtown, very much like this one. In fact… no: impossible. The old motel was torn down about ’67, he supposed, right around the time of the robot revolution (Robolution). He himself became a mechanoid for 3 years after that — whaddaya call them? A *hybrid* anyways. Anyway. Dr. Diper fixed him up in late ’70, and by ’71 he was back on the streets, peddling duck dope to the ones also fortunate enough to come through the other side of the mess. Mid-town rebuilt. *No* robots allowed. They had to move back down to Southside by the railroad and the chicken plant. *They* didn’t have any noses, the town council decided. They can handle the fowl stench.
Meeting Mom in 30 minutes, Westside Diner. Shower and general tidying up didn’t take as long as he recalled. Clothes fit perfectly and didn’t have to be rehemmed. The man remembered the boy remembered the man. Cap fit rightside up instead of upside right. He left Cloe moving quickly to the get away car with the bag, unwitting Fran at the driver’s seat. She’s as culpable as the other now. “Get the lead out!” she said while slamming the door (END). Enough of all that, he thought. I’ll read a book for 15 minutes, and maybe it will be time to start my shower again since I left the water on.
Shhh, don’t tell anyone.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0310, Gold City-, Jeogeot
She checks the graffiti portrait in the exact center of town to make sure (128/128 Yangban).
Yes this hair will do fine. 🙂
Barry DeBoy checks into the Mid-town motel of the large Jeogeot city with the Duck.
Came with the room apparently.
He figured with all the other stuff happening, it’s his now. “Excuse me, Paul,” he said while squeezing past it to wash his hands and tidy up.
Meeting Mom in 3 hours. He’s very nervous. They hadn’t seen each other in 3 hours. Just enough time to shower and get ready. Ready get and shower to time enough just.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0309, Gold City-, Jeogeot
The Wither Tree comes for all, even clockwork people like Billy, a native Iowan and thus a long way from home indeed. A rocketship brought him to the Jeogeot continent. *Not* a well pump, as some of those fantasical forest people claim. That’s just the sugar talking, as they like to say.
Safe over here directly west off Mainland, though. “I think I’ll stay,” he says into the Korean Channel reverse sunset, Ichelus at the point here, but Zebrasil and the continent’s infocenter just behind. This is where he landed; this is his original, virtual home. Before vacationing Sugar gathered up his little, cute robot body and took him to the woods, made him a kind of pet. Fate, she deemed it. “The red and the green!” she exclaimed to thong-less (daring!) companion Donald at the time while looking down at the two-toned inner tube (“TIT”, *giggle*), also a type of pet for her. Trouble is, he’s so sleepy there all the time. Dreams the horrible, scary dreams even in daylight. *Especially* daylight (thanks again, Mistress!).
Then: the Waterfall of 10000 Lions (good one, Mistress!) comes to Big Woods, washing away the gloom, at least enough to allow the mechanical boy to return and not be riddled with cryptic, undecipherable nightmares and, especially, daymares. Maybe.
07:15: Sugar and Donald, humming a happy tune, rustle up some more of those breakfast special blueberry choco chip pancakes for arriving guests. 4 waiting. Maybe up to 8 later. Breakfast at 8.
She tests one, makes a sour face. “Donald, more sweetener on the next batch please.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t make me GRROWL at you,” she joked.
“I won’t,” he said, pulling up his baggy pants. She’d stretched them almost to the verge of unwearability. And perhaps that was the point (*titter*).
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0214, Big Woods, Jeogeot
They pulled into the manor about 07:15, fresh from a trip to the west coast and toting some stolen art in the trunk, not surprisingly. But never mind that now. Benny the valet hamster rushed over and took the wheel after they got out and walked toward the gate. He asked for a job with such but this wasn’t what he expected. He’s grown into the work, though: up to about a foot and a half now, abnormally long for his species. After some on and off moments at first, he can now manage the brake and clutch together and Mr. and Mrs. Gold could switch from an automatic to a straight drive, which they prefer especially for longer trips. Like this one. They’ve been gone almost 2 weeks. *Plus* Benny helps them pawn off the stolen goods they collect here and there on their journeys across the continent to well placed black market dealers. He seemed so grateful for the position they assumed he’d never turn into a rat. A hamster he be and a hamster he is. The little stretching exercises on the rack they had handy in the basement commenced early on. Benny would not be denied.
Until today. They shouldn’t have turned their back on him so soon after a lengthy vacation. Because, as you can plainly see here as he drives the Rolls Royce Dawn convertible not to the garage, but to a pawn shop accessible from an alley downtown, Benny had been compromised.
“Monolith”, Adams or otherwise, would never make it to that perfect spot above the dining room table between the mounted bear and deer. He’d found the price that turned his head.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0212, Big Woods, Jeogeot
Before the shooting day, Wheeler explained to Sugar her motivation for running her shack out in the center of nowhere. “It’s about the citizens and denizens of these woods,” she indicated, “the fresh pies you can harvest from the pecan and apple and cherry trees about this time of year and how pleased they are that you can bring such joy into their otherwise rather empty lives by filling them with your, erm, lovingly prepared food.”
“I think I get it,” she says in her not near as deep enough voice. Wheeler tells her she needs to change it before Donald shows up and the cameras switch on. “How’s this,” she tried again almost an octave lower.
“Better. Keep practicing. We have an hour.”
—–
7 o’clock. Donald is preparing pancakes and muffins wearing only a thong; his duck costume hadn’t come back from the cleaners yet. Ace the Gopher was assigned to run over there and check on its status. Yet the cameras were rolling. “We can add the costume to this particular scene post-production,” explained CGI specialist Forrest Ferment. “The cost will be low as long as he stays perfectly still or almost so.” As the scene basically demanded, lucky for them. Sugar had just popped several of her freshly plucked pies into the pre-heated oven and took the opportunity for a break. This is where the dialog begins. Donald to her side was engrossed in recipe reading. “Stay that way,” guest director Wheeler said, filling in for a sick Baker. “Just cut the 2 places where you whisk and beat.” Baker would not be happy later when she reviewed the day’s reels in her bed. “Movement,” she complained. “Keep the eye engaged and moving. That’s what the whisking is there for, that’s what the beating is in place for.” Then Donald’s costume shows up from Clyde’s and everything is back to normal. Time for the denizens and citizens of these here woods to wake up and smell the coffee, namely Sugar’s patented cinnamon recipe with a dash of nutmeg and a pinch of coconut. Nostrils flare, bedroom slippers are slipped on. Soon all will be here, ready for their pancakes and whatnot. Center of Woods stirs to life.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0208, Big Woods, Jeogeot
He sat in that hard-to-find, tucked away cafe in Ontario, sipping his coffee and waiting for the morning fog to clear so he can safely explore more of the city. Perhaps it never will this time, story finished for now (again).
Meanwhile, over in Jeogeot…
… clear as a bell.
Let’s begin with the manor.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0206, Big Woods, Jeogeot, Wendy-Ontario-
“So here we are again, Wheeler. Took us a while.”
“The tic tac toe board.” She looks over at it, notices her missing X now. The game remains unfinished.
“Let’s talk about what’s happened so far. Kind of ironic that way back in photo-novel 03 you chose to discuss ‘Billfork’ over ‘Pumpkintwisters’ at the second Table meeting. Now the latter becomes the key to (understanding) the duck. This is the first 2-n-1 — I’m saying this for the reader or readers more than you, of course — but the movie ‘Wavetwisters’ has a weak point in the middle *perfectly* filled in by the ‘200 Motels’ animation sequence called ‘Dental Hygiene’, featuring, in part, a duck. *The* duck.”
“I agree. I wish I could go back in time to change things.”
“Mabel really enjoyed (the second Table meeting),” countered Newt, formerly Axis-Windmill. “This is obviously the same duck or same kind of duck in ‘The Point (of the Wall).'”
“Agreed.”
“And then in ‘Down and Dirty Duck.’ All three are made by the same animation company. Let’s see (checks…): Murakami-Wolf. We don’t need to go into details. The reader or readers can double-check all this for himself or herself or themselves.
“Then we have something else enter the picture. ‘Duckman’, an ahead-of-its-time animation series from the mid 1990s. The three we mentioned before are from the early to mid 1970s. What has changed? Zappa was in his prime in 1971 when (his movie) ‘200 Motels’ was released, when ‘The Point’ was shown on TV to a rather massive audience, thanks in part to participant Ringo Starr, who also, ahem, starred in ‘200 Motels’ koinkidinkally enough. ‘Down and Dirty Duck’ features a comedy musical duo named Flo and Eddie who played for Zappa during “200 Motels” (and also acted in the movie), and were most famous for being a part of rock group The Turtles before this, ‘Happy Together’ as their signature song. Anyway, Flo was the duck, the Dirty Duck of the title, who remained unnamed otherwise. Flo is Mark Volman and Eddie is Howard Kaylan. A huge Zappa head rises over the horizon behind the duck at one point in the movie.”
“Drugs,” added Wheeler. “All 3 ducks — who are the same duck, agreed — are reached through drugs. And now (our) Paul Duck: the same.”
“Correct. And ‘Duckman’ *has* to figure in here. Erik Duckman is a private dick who is basically incapable of solving cases without the help of his Joe Friday-like assistant Cornfed, a pig. And here we go: Zappa was quite involved, musically and maybe conceptually, in season one but died of cancer before the series’ first episode aired, which was dedicated to him. Zappa’s son Dweezil is the voice of one of the sons of Duckman. We must extend Dirty Duck now into this new duck through Zappa. This is his *wish*; how he can survive death itself. Incarnate into the duck.”
“Don’t forget Paul Drake, the private dick detective of ‘Perry Mason’. Most direct line to at least the name Paul Duck.”
“Raymond Burr, the actor who famously played Perry Mason, ‘wakes up’ as another character (murderer Lars Thorwald) in ‘Waits for No One,’ I mean in the movie ‘Rear Window’. He looks directly at the camera which is the same as Jimmy Stewart across the courtyard. ‘The sleeper has awoken’ — another Paul. (Frank) Herbert’s Paul (from ‘Dune’).”
“The first episode of ‘Duckman’ is key,” says Wheeler. “Can I place my X back in the corner?”
“Not until we talk to Mabel.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0203, Carrcass+03, Carrcass+08, Wendy-Ontario-
“There’s nothing in the church birth registry about a Paul Duck, Snowbob. Or any kind of duck atall. Looks like we’ve wasted our time here.”
But Snowbob thinks otherwise. He’s figured out who his *real* parents are.
They’re the same as his children.
(to be continued of course)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0202, Wendy-Ontario-
Okay what’re we looking at here?
—–
Impossible. She’s *green*(!).
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0117, Wendy-Ontario-
