00400601
“A partnership?! That’s, frankly, something I didn’t expect from this meeting (!). Say Golden Goddess has already signed on to all this?”
“Yeah. Said she foresaw it in her cards.”
“Nas too?”
“Right. Start of a chain. Gang, I suppose.” Marsha “Pink” Krakow, the originator of all, slightly smiles, harking back to prison days and years. Doesn’t want to go back there. Thus: this.
“They’ll try to crack down on us,” professional dancer Bun Bun warns. “The men of this town. ‘How *dare* the women try to organize,’ and so on.”
“My mother can handle that,” came the reply. “She’s still the mayor of this here meat town after all.” Marsha knew she was negotiating a deal with Utah as they speak. Revisionist historian named Roy Coy who has a big brain about his head. He’ll need it!
00400602
“I predict, Eddie, her Edward, that right in this seat Mr. Coy will appear soon and make a deal. I saw it–”
“Yeah yeah yeah, in your cards. Which apparently *I’ll* never see again.”
“*Unless…” Golden Goddess Nas pitched. 2nd date. More karma to pay but it might be worth it. Eddie looks down at lovely Marsha “Pink” Krakow, still singing away on the lime green karaoke stage inside. “Crazy Train” now, another crowd favorite since Osbourne is a local hero. Then just afterwards, her signature song. “Jackie Pink,” fully changed back to the original by this point. Her prison sentence is over. Golden Goddess speaks again as if for her.
“Are we on? Are we good to go?” “Crazy Train” was over. The belt comes off.
(to be continued)
00400603
“I cannot see at this time. The leaves are stuck together as if in an old waterlogged book found floating on the harbour. Poetically speaking,” she explains her description.
“Never mind (the whereabouts of) Ketchup Tom, then. How about this new guy, this Roy Coy. Doctor? Mister? Gaze into your scrying instruments and give me the info.”
Golden Goddess gives it another go. Tired of the cards and leaves, she pulls out the crystal ball, blue-green as Earth and an almost exact stand in. Getting closer.
“Utah Utah Utah,” she says while scanning and staring. “Aahh… *there*.”
00400604 (Roy)
“I agree human, woman,” he clipped out. “We must have peace. But now you must direct me to the balcony region with a view of the stage where young Pink Krakow, Marsha will perform once again tonight at approximately 00:22:05. I do not have to add the PM you’ll notice, because I am former military, special ops. Retired 00:23:03 but that was just last night. That is an attempt at robot humor, ha ha ha. Ha.” Golden robot Roy Coy looks down. “And you do not need that belt, expressionless human, woman, to announce your desires. You are beautiful as you are. Peace!” He flashes a sign back as best he can then does something else on a whim. Golden Goddess’ prophecy is being fulfilled.
“Up here, Roy!” calls Madam Mayor Wheeler Wilson from the balcony just above.
—–
“I enjoy sitting here being Coy. Am I suppose to be shy? I looked it up. I’m suppose to be shy.”
“That’s the archaic definition,” Wheeler opposite him helped. “Try a newer dictionary; see what comes up.”
He updated his reference files. “Ahh. I see. A *pretense* of shyness now, often to aid allure. Like that peaceful woman downstairs. I took her belt by the way. I have it here in my chest container. I will put it on myself. That way I’ll be coy in a modern sense. Sexy coy.” He attaches the belt he stole from Bridgette downstairs to his midrift.
It does something to him unexpected, but he quickly reassembles himself. “Uh oh,” he says, hardly missing a beat. “Not allowed to do that. I must return the stolen belt or else keep falling to pieces; moral chip malfunction you understand. Excuse me human, Wheeler.” He flashes a peace sign at her in brief parting, thinking it was the thing to do.
(to be continued)
00400605
“The good, God fearing people of Utah will never allow a merger with such a degraded place as the Omega continent, my dear human, Wheeler (ha). You have paid for my services for nothing except sound advice.”
“25 right,” spoke Wheeler about the cost from atop a nearby game. “I can’t believe you tricked me like that — making me believe there was such a person as Roy Coy.”
“Well the ridiculous name coupled with a ridiculous form should have been a tip off. Along with the golden color. Like me!”
“So what next?… *psychic*. Halloween is over. We’re back in Meat City for round 06.”
Golden Goddess’ Ms. Pac-Man ate a power pellet, making the ghost chasing her turn blue and be chased instead. “There’s always the library. While it’s there. Might as well use it to your advantage. Male dominated literature within, obviously, but some hidden gem could appear. Say, a book about a certain mountain (she foresees)?” The last blue ghost was overtaken and eaten, end of game.
And as well, there was the further *careful* exploration of Meat City itself. Wheeler knew not to change into her daughter or pseudo-daughter for all that.
In a newly constructed theatre across the street from the arcade, she waits alone in a guest-of-honor golden chair for a show that may never start.
Back to the library. “Aah, this must be it (!)”
warden
Some of the orange trees had leaves over there and some did not, but she didn’t have time to figure all that out. Pace rapid, she was on a mission. To find X at his Rockaway Beach mansion and tell him to release her daughter or pseudo-daughter and that she had learned her lesson well enough. She was the mayor after all. Surely he would listen to her, despite being one of those uppity upper men she so detested. Golden Goddess had taught her a valuable lesson yesterday. Surface appearances are often deceiving.
She’d heard he was tall but she couldn’t have guessed *how* tall. A true Slenderman he was during the Halloween season. Duncan Avocado was sitting with him when she entered. She thought Duncan was dead, oh well. That’s the way of characters in these here photo-novels, she realized, staring at his familiar red skeleheart necklace and red hands, as if ripe from a kill. They disappear, they reappear just as quickly sometimes. But sometimes it takes a while too. Like with Avocado. She thought back to kissing the orange on the navel — or the naval on the Orange. Navelencia, the act of.
Which one to approach first? It was as if X was expecting her and had sent for Duncan. Yes, that must be it. Maybe Golden Goddess even warned him of her visit. Or maybe Golden as Roy Coy, not remembering again what she did. One way to find out. She chooses left over right, familiar over strange.
“Duncan *Avocado*,” she cried, and even was tempted to hug the black man as he rose from the ottoman. And so she did.
(to be continued)
00400607
She couldn’t stop listening to Black Sabbath after the Big Sandy party, even though she was in Donathan in Meat City now. Orders of Wheeler Malone Wilson the mayor, probably in coordination with Dolores the likewise Big Boss of Big Sandy who lived across Big Channel from her somewhere. Go over there (Dolores said over the phone again?) and get some *info*. She said back if so: give me a new black bed, a topline new black computer, keyboard, mouse, speakers, table and we’ll talk about it. Oh, and all the manga I can read, say, One Piece. Heck, all pieces. And some Reese’s Pieces, unlimited supply. And a man, a black man. No, make that any color I don’t care. I’m not prejudice against my own race, nor others. Oh yeah, a bunny — *do* make that black so that I can sit him behind my head to watch over everything. That’ll be the substitute for my dear departed daddy, making sure everyone behaves in front of him and puts on their best behavior, including me. I’ll tell everyone up front: Daddy’s watching, judging. He sees everything.
But eventually she tired of eager Big Sandy team volunteer Sandy Beech (name a chance relationship with his origin point), and One Piece overall, and brought in fellow Big Sandy alum Alice Tart to hang around with. Alice T. was still looking for sisters Wanda and Gloria, and although she understood they most likely weren’t in Meat City or the Omega continent as a whole, she went anyway. After all, they could have Black Sabbath concerts until the wee hours of the morning, cranking up Laura’s super nifty Sony Signature Series SA-Z1 speakers to the max. It was like Ozzie Osbourne lived inside their head, bigger than life itself, 1st or 2nd or any other number. All Osbourne. But first things first when Alice arrived.
“Did you bring Reese’s Pieces? I told (Wheeler? Dolores?) I was out and to send more over. Lots more.” Alice opened her numerous travel bags to reveal only candy within. Laura knew this new roomie situation was going to work out just swell.
(to be continued)
00400608 (Dr. Mouse)
“I know files are your department, Dr. Phile, but I had to make sure this was done correct. See? Come over and look.
“I’ve created 3 files on your computer system, you’ll notice, one for Marsha ‘Pink’ Krakow — that should remain the top one — then one for Shelley Johnston Struthers — think it’s Johnston instead of Johnson… I’ll let you check on that — then a 3rd one for Frankie Beige Brown… or Frankie Brown Beige, whatever. She’s not the important one, or at least the one on top or even in the middle. Put her at the back — we probably won’t be referencing her much except to determine if she’s only *in* there for the gestures or a bit more, perhaps some kind of conscience. And — here’s the trick — we’re going to take those 3 files, front to back as I’ve specified, and then combine them into one overarching file called, I don’t know, let’s say ‘Unknown’ for now. Or maybe file it under ‘Miscellaneous’. Filing is your department and I’ll leave you with the overall labeling on this *3n1*. Yes, I said it. It’s the rarest of rare type of file, you see Dr. Phile. 3 in 1’s don’t come along but, say, every once in 3 years. Or maybe that’s 3 centuries. I’ll let you work it out again. You’re the file doctor,” he deferred for the 3rd time trying not to step on the younger doctor’s toes.
But in pivoting his chair to make a point somewhere, he realizes he’s done just that.
“Oh. *Sorry*.”
00400609 (Perch)
The slideshow they had prepared was *bore-ing*, but at least she wasn’t in Rockaway Beach Municipal Prison any longer, thanks to her mother. But it was thanks to her mother, she reminded herself, that she was in there in the *first* place. What did she do wrong except be adorable, she couldn’t help laughing at herself.
She looked out the window, at the large, altered American flag flying out there. At least they also like Obama, she thought about the face superimposed atop the stars part. But maybe this is just an older parcel and he was still the president when all this was formed, this *reform* camp. Land description does say the owner is not that involved in Our Second Lyfe any longer. Would explain why the mug of Trump isn’t around, because it sounds like the guy, from a glance at his other interests (suggested open gun carrying in Our Second Lyfe? say whaaaat?), might be a follower of *that* cult. Cults attract cults after all, refuge for the causers.
And what’s all this stuff about worshiping Venus?
This is what you get for following a Head without a Body.
00400610
“I try to meet our new, ahem, students at least once but I hope in our case we encounter each other again and again, Ms…”
“Krakow,” spoke Marsha to Dr. Paul Mouse, head of the organization and secretly working for Head, often known as Perch.
“Yes, Marsha Krakow, hmm. And with an additional name if I remember correctly. One only friends can say.”
“Correct, Dr. Paul… what was it?”
“Mouse,” said Paul Mouse.
“No. A middle name.” She smiled wryly.
“Oh yes — clever. I’ll give you mine and you’ll divulge yours. Well, mine is [delete name].”
“Never heard of that. Well mine is Pink, spelled like the color and not the cologne.”
“Not p-n-k, then. I remember from when my wife got me some a couple of Christmas’ ago. Still sitting on the shelf above the medicine cabinet, unused.”
“But other people swear by it. Man of your,” not age, she thought — *distinction*, “*distinction,*” she said aloud, “– might be handy is all I’m saying.”
“So you believe in its love potion powers. You are a true P-n-kie.”
“Look at me,” Marsha spoke about her appearance. “I use to sell it. I had a hot pink car before I traded it for a yellow. Got tired of seeing putrid yellow-green as an aftereffect all over the road on sunnier days.” So for the first time we understand the color.
“Interesting. But do you *really* believe–”
“That is for me to know and you to find out.” Could she wield her considerable powers over *him*? This is what her mother feared, why she was put into that totally colorless black and white cow costume and forced to forget. Venus power. All this, she realized, all this organization must be about her.
He realized he was staring at her uncomfortably. He pretended to organize his files about her before him, shuffled Pink on top again from the bottom. This was no time to bring up the 3-n-1 and the presence of Shelley Johnston Struthers (I was right!) and Frankie Brown Beige (or Beige Brown!) within as well. Pink on the surface; Pink she is. If only Marsha to him still, not counting as a friend. Yet.
(to be continued)
00400611
“I still have a home on Nautilus. It was a retirement gift — very pretty there. Lots of vegetation.”
Dr. Rabbid Baumbeer, still dealing primarily with bodily fluids but hoping to graduate to full blown psychiatry soon, looked at his e-machine and gauged this was true. “Describe… gift,” he decided to say.
It was the end of 31 and it was the end, period. March 1 of last year, 12:01 AM we’ll say. Eddie D’Aigle, who sometimes preferred D’Aigle, Eddie, especially if he was traveling in the Orient, had just retired from the private sector of the records management business, having made his fortune archiving the files of rock stars Ozzie Osbourne, Ozmo Daredevils, and the like. His last blog article for the latter, the last he did overall, was about how the song “Jackie Blue” was changed from “Jackie Pink,” which drew the attention of Pink, Marsha, Krakow. He had the evidence before him as he wrote: the altered lyrics, everything. “It was suppose to be about a man who peddled drugs during the day while working nights as a bartender, a very Dada affair,” he reinforced to her in a reply email, then, seeing her avid interest, invited her up to [Blue Mountain] to look at the actual, revised lyrics herself. “Come with your driver’s license or a birth certificate,” he said, “and our staff will bring the whole box out to you; I’ll put it on reserve and not reshelve. You can look at one file at a time, and just mark what you want copied with green (START) and red (STOP) paper we’ll provide.” She ended up photocopying the whole box. New 3d scanner the office just purchased did the trick in a 10th the time it would have taken the old fashioned way. Marsha’s, in fact, was the first request accomplished using that method. Boxy Marsha, she went down in office legend as. Prototype. Especially since Eddie, on his last day of work, helped her tote the (wrong?) box to her still hot pink car, soon to change to yellow. Thanks to what was inside. In many ways, she became the box she requested, a black and white facsimile of herself.
00400612 (holiday rotting away)
A homeless person in Millers Pond looks across the sim line and takes pictures of neighboring Millbank before it’s too late and all the Halloween oddity over there goes away for another 10 or 11 months or so. Specifically, he’s recording a supposed secret meeting between Dr. Mouse and Dr. Brown not far from the mortuary and mental asylum where we first saw them in this here photo-novel: 40, fast drawing to a close itself. Which will last longer might be a question to be asking, Millbank or this?
Two went in, one came out. Murder. Most foul.
—–
“Pretend you’re a woman of that type, Dr. Brown,” Dr. Mouse said within, “with alll these temptations just sitting there all around you. Would you stay on the grounds?”
“No red blooded man *or* woman could resist,” spoke Dr. Brown, knowing human psychology and physiology all too well. Convex and concave — attraction. Irresistible, especially in that overall climate. And he didn’t forget concave to concave; applies here too. The institution Dr. Mouse set up will not hold the girl, a true Venus.
“Serenity Lane, yes,” spoke Dr. Mouse about the fairer sex aspect of the situation, having studied the combined files thoroughly by now. “Drugged her, then drugged her over to the prison, the mother mayor’s magical cuffs in place. Serenity loved Marsha just as much as she loved ex-wife Shelley before; would keep her around at any cost. Shelley… Johnston — Johnston, right?”
“Yeah. Think so,” answered Brown.
“And the other?” Dr. Mouse tested.
“Brown,” answered Brown.
—–
Mouse couldn’t take a chance on the name synchronicity. He’d have to find another second hand to go along with his first in the aberrant bomb clock of time that is their story. Tick tick tick goes the sim of Millbank. Tick tick tick goes the text of photo-novel 40. Oh what the heck, let’s just start with this house to destroy the evidence.
00400613 (Yellow again!)
Marsha thought they could talk freely here during the night in the park between all the buildings of the compound. Little did she know the trees, the birds, the flowers, even the bugs: bugged. Dr. Mouse would analysis the recordings later from his various sources. Eddie looked up at the big fat full silver moon before starting his soliloquy, “I love you,” being the summary sentence.
“Run away?” she said about one of the other parts, the “plan” we’ll call it.
“Yeah,” he said at the time. “Look over there. Between the bushes. I brought you something.” Broad smile. About time to say the “love” part.
Yet another bug, seemingly a different kind this time. But it was miked up as well, along with having an attached tracker. And perhaps even another one of those explosive time bombs, but definitely the first two. And maybe even Eddy, her Edward, put them there, in cahoots with the good Dr. Mouse by this point. Maybe he knows about all the bugs here. Thanks to the mother once more.
00400614
Once Mouse started blowing up stuff in the sim he couldn’t quite seem to stop. “There, that’s gone,” he said, pushing the red button in his secret monitor room atop the Charles Village Anti-Omega Rehabilitation Center and remotely watching the incinerator snow globe explode. “Gone gone gone,” he continued, blowing up the forest cemetery, the Chthulu possessed skyscrapers, the Millbank Mortuary and Mental Asylum in rapid order, including patient 00 in the latter, drugged with darts in his eyes and formaldehyde in his veins and arteries. He finds the final target on a screen, trigger happy cane again hovering above red. Haunted Trailer Park Welcome Center. Once he blows this up… oh, he forgot the cabin more in the center, the one where Rock found his true calling with the revealing of a middle name Roll. Is rocking “Roll” Ramby still playing within, unable to unglue himself from the old upright piano, former spider occupants all scurried away to other parts of the structure? Do Toddles, Vain and Artery Boyy, Alice Farrowheart remain as well, ears and eyes and brains hypnotized by the brand new style of keyboard banging music?
Rock stopped his frantic playing mid-bang. “I sense something.”
Then just in the nick of time, arrow shooting municipal agent Prontus Archereus barges into the monitor room. “Hold it right there Mouse!” he commands in a mysteriously strong, masculine voice for such a crudely drawn cartoon. The doctor freezes, fearful that another arrow might take out his cane.
“I’ll… cooperate.”
00400615
In the morning it was all smoke and ashes anyway, the central cabin never standing a chance surrounded by a burning ring of fire. Millbank was dead, at least for another 10 or 11 months or so. Rock and his entourage found a secret portal inside the spiritually juiced piano he was playing so they’re okay. Zapppa is the key. Zapppa.
Marsha “Pink” Krakow looked up from the text she had just typed, thinking: Did all this really make sense? The reference to Zappa’s Civilization Phaze III again and people living inside a piano that he was so eager to explore toward the end of his life? And what happened to my Oz novel everyone here was so keen on? That’s it! she realized. They didn’t come out in Big Sandy but in Oz. And Alice Farrowheart the precious precocious child’s grandmother along for the ride; not being excluded this time.
In fact let’s go back in time and change something else.
Quickly twirling and catching Prontus Archereus (Archerus?) by surprise, Dr. Mouse uses the power of his cane to instead open up a portal in the wall which swiftly sucks up the bow and arrow into an oblivion of no return. De-armed, crudely drawn cartoon character Prontus was powerless before the menacing man of action.
Marsha ponders removing Prontus’ actual arms in the picture above to continue the joke but decides against it. Too late in the night to start all that.
00400616 (Dolores)
And so she was back in NWES City Big Sandy, Dr. Mouse having come through the secret door just before. “Bye Prontus!” he said before leaving his beloved Anti-Omega monitor room, following bow and arrow into oblivion. He’d have to trust the door would take him where he needed to be. And Marsha: the same with her likewise cherished yellow bug just outside with Eddie, her Edward in tow.
They were all waiting on someone or something to appear on that purple ottoman over there, including the “housesitting” little demon locally known as Wilbur holding the bowl of patriotic soup that can make one grow large or small, depending upon the situation. Suddenly, something began to form on the ottoman. A spirit.
END OF “SUNKLANDS 2023 LATER”!
Sunklands 