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In reply to: Seven Twines and the Dragon Heartwoods
Glynis rose at dawn to gather herbs for her potions—it is the best time to collect the flowered herbs, just as the dew evaporates and before the heat of the day. And usually she loves the freshness of the early morning but her night had been long and restless, full of strange dreams which had left her with an uneasy feeling.
The grass is cold on her bare feet and so she treads lightly and with haste. She stops though to pat the statue of a dwarf on his small concrete head. “Hello, Mr Cutie-Pie,” she says, as she does every day when she passes by. The dwarf is the only statue in the garden and she often wonders how he came to be there; he seems a lonely little chap.
When she first came upon the house, although house is not really a grand enough word for the beautiful mansion it must once have been, she spent hours exploring its many rooms. It seemed the occupants had left in a great hurry without ever returning for their things. This seemed strange to Glynis, for only one wing was badly damaged by fire. The rest was largely intact although over the years had fallen into disrepair and now was home to all manner of small critters.
In reply to: Coma Cameleon
At first he’d stayed in the same spot. Waiting, for what he didn’t know, but for someone or something to provide a clue, or a reminder. He’d given up checking his pockets, hoping he was mistaken and that of course he had a wallet, some keys, a phone. But there was nothing. Nothing but that suitcase, lighter than it should have been for its size, because there was nothing it in except a few pairs of underpants and a couple of ties. A toiletry bag, unzipped, with nothing in it but a toothbrush.
He closed his eyes. Stay in the same spot if you’re lost. Had his mother said that once, long ago? His head hurt with the effort to try and recall.
He’d found himself sitting in an alley next to a rubbish container, sprawled on the suitcase. Squinting in the shaft of bold sunlight, he automatically reached into his shirt pocket for sunglasses. The pocket was empty. He checked his other pockets, his alarm and confusion growing. Why was he wearing socks but no shoes? He elbowed himself up to a sitting position and noticed the suitcase. A wave of relief washed over him: everything must be inside the suitcase. Relief gave way to horror. It was almost empty. I’ve been robbed! he thought. But what did they take? What did I have in there?
And then the full realization hit. He had no idea where he was. And no idea who he was.
Someone will come looking for me, he thought. But who? He weighed up his options. What could he do? Go to the police? And tell them what?
He shrank back as two women approached, looking down as they glanced at him. They walked past, continuing their conversation. Why were they speaking Spanish? He looked around, noticing a number of signs. Most of them were in Spanish, but some were in English. For a brief moment he was inordinately pleased at the realization that he was English speaking. The first puzzle piece. He was thinking in American English. Therefore, he must be an American. He rubbed his eyes. His headache was getting worse.
In reply to: Mandala of Ascensions
It has been a few days he had felt this inexplicable urge to do something about the dullness of his everyday routine.
Overall, Edward had never complained about his simple life, and the System’s technical upgrades did keep him rather busy fixing things when boredom threatened to settle in.
Usually, browsing through social media, enjoying a few cute fluffy bunnies videos (all very safe for work, no need to worry about him) was all that he needed to fill the gaps of the long shift hours.
Of course, the largest part of his days was spent monitoring the Program, and the pods. He had developed quite surreptitiously a basic visual neuronal interface that let him connect with the Virtual Reality of the pod occupants, and somehow share the progress of their Enlightenment Mission.
For a while he had even created an avatar for himself. In the Great Simulation, he would then try to have some fun with the Ascended Masters, see what they would enlighten him about.
It was all quite ironic, considering, they were considering themselves free and evolved, where in truth they were the prisoners of their own bodies in the pods, hooked to the virtual reality REYE program.
But they were accurate in a way, that he was also trapped and a prisoner of his existence within the program.In between cats and bunnies, a link attracted him. “Rich Sacks’ Online Master Program of Enlightenment”. The more he scrolled down, the more alumnis raved and extolled the Program. What was for him to lose, the first course was free.
On a whim, he decided to enroll.In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“Shall I put the kettle on, Miss Pants?” asked Ricardo. A bit melodramatic, he felt, probably best to humour her.
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“Where the devil is everyone?”
Miss Bossy Pants looked around the empty office with a mixture of disappointment and confusion. She had been anticipating the surprised looks on her colleagues’ faces at her unannounced return —she had no illusions about her popularity and knew better than to expect a joyous reunion—but the room was disconcertingly empty.
Hearing the door behind her, she spun around in relief. It was the new guy, Prout, carrying a brown paper bag and a take out coffee.
“Hello!” he said, hoping he did not sound as awkward as he felt and wondering if he could back out the door again. He had only met Bossy a couple of times and found her bluntness disconcerting. Terrifying, even. There was no reply, so, taking a sip of his steaming coffee, he bravely persevered.
“Welcome back. How are you feeling?”
“Are you the only one here? Where is everyone?” snapped Bossy Pants.
Ricardo took a deep breath and focused on a wilted pot plant on the window ledge.
God, I hope I don’t start rambling.
“Connie and the temp, Sophie, went to Iceland … something about following a lead from Santa Claus and I’ve not heard from them since. And Hilda … I don’t know where Hilda went to be honest. She emailed me a few days ago wanting to know what to feed Orangutans.”
Bossy had paled. She seemed to shudder slightly and put out a hand to steady herself on a nearby desk.
“They eat mostly fruit,” he continued, “but other stuff too of course. Insects and flowers and stuff like that. Honey I think, if they can find it I guess, and bark. And leaves. Mostly fruit though.”
That’s probably enough about the Orangutans. She is clearly not into it.
“I got a bit held up actually; there is a young boy outside drawing maps. Quite young … youngish. I am not sure how old really but he was little.They are bloody good too—there is quite a crowd out there watching him draw.”
“Iceland,” whispered Bossy, her face a deathly white colour.
“Yeah, Iceland. Keflavik … Miss Bossy, are you sure you are well enough to be back? You don’t look so good. I mean, you look good … attractive of course … I don’t mean you look bad or anything but you do look sort of pale. Are you okay?”
“Santa Claus.” Bossy sat down slowly.
“Yeah … I know, a bit crazy, right? They seemed to think it was a really hot lead.”
“Stupid idiots; the lead wasn’t from Santa Claus— I will bet my life that it was from that depraved scoundrel, Dr Bronkelhampton! I heard through the grapevine he had gone to Iceland with a new identity after the Island fiasco destroyed his reputation—we covered the story at the time and it was huge—and now he is clearly after revenge. Dear God, what have they got themselves into?”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
Miss Bossy Pants contemplated her pale and wan appearance in the bathroom mirror. She wondered if she was well enough to turn up at work today.
Don’t want anyone else to catch anything off me…
However, It was important they did not lose momentum with the competition out there chomping at their heels.
“There is too much talking about writing and not enough actual writing,” Bossy grumbled to her reflection while she dealt to the under eye circles with some concealer.
Of course, that was Hilda to a T; always yabbering on about some stupendous idea for a story but when it came to actually putting pen to paper … well that was quite another matter.
Connie had started out with some potential but was becoming increasingly aggressive and alienating her leads.
How many times must I tell her that clenching her fists and refusing to make eye contact makes her appear shifty and untrustworthy? Bossy slammed some lipstick on her mouth with unnecessary force.
And that new staff member, what’s his name?
Prout, that’s right.
Bright enough but a bit of a moaner. Bad for morale all that moaning. As for sweet old Sophie, the temp, she seemed to be losing more and more marbles by the minute.
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
Hilda woke up rubbing her jaw, recalling the odd dream about pulling a splinter of bone out of a hole in her mouth where a molar should have been. There had been a sharp point sticking out of her gum, and she pulled ~ and pulled ~ and the bone shard that appeared in her hand seemed much too big to have come out of her mouth. What does that symbolize, she wondered? She was sure miss bossy behind the scenes pants would have something wittily disparaging to say about the imagery. But then an idea struck her: perhaps it was part of the Polar Molar story that she was connecting to.
Hilda had been wanting to join the new Dream Investigation course for reporters, but felt the need to practice first before joining the class. There wasn’t much point in attending with no dream recall at all. Not much point in joining with just the bare bones, so to speak, of a rudimentary isolated snippet of recall either. Perhaps she’d go back to sleep and try to fill in some gaps. If she was late to the office, she could say she’d been following an unexpected lead on the story.
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
Connie looked at the Bossy Pants instructions, her face inscrutable.
Hilda was not up yet, probably passed out on her couch after a night of debauchery and snorting pepsain. As usual, she’d left a heap of links on her blog for Connie to choose from. Well, and of course, to sexy-bait them up. There were times she was glad she didn’t have to face all the people herself and interview them. Today was not one of them.
She gestured at the awkward new intern. He passed a head through the door. She didn’t give him the time to open his mouth. “Another chamomile tea,… thaaank you.” He disappeared hurriedly.
“At least this one gets me.”
For today, chamomile was the least of evils. Anything stronger would have her go full contact on any one daring to even look at her. If people knew the efforts she made daily.
Her self-defence instructor knew something about it. She almost sent him to the hospital last week.Glancing upon the list of notes, she noticed that Hilda had made a highlight to double check on the gouda cat-like man. That was strange. Hilda wasn’t one to come back on stuff once shared and published. Definitively not the past-dwelling profile. There must have been something more.
“Well, know what, old tart: early bird gets the worm.”
She rose from the swivel chair, taking her purse swiftly and aiming for the exit door with the path of least eye-contact when the odd guy appeared again with the damn tea. She’d forgotten about that. Again, her brains firing at full speed, she didn’t leave him time to tell or ask anything.
“You don’t know where Joel is? Of course not…” The photographer was probably on another assignment. Had not been seen for weeks it seemed. Not that she cared, he would have been more like an alibi for her to go an a follow-up mission.
Sometimes her brains would also make her do the darnedest thing. She couldn’t stop herself from telling to the hapless intern.
“You look too happy Ric. Take your coat and come with me.”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“Bird poo is good for your hair,” said Tina scathingly, once again reading Quentin’s thoughts. “When these little ones hatch… “ She trailed off, not feeling the need to elaborate further.
Meanwhile in another part of town (or possibly in another dimension … it is not clear to the writer at this point but the writer is determined to carry on regardless — the editorial staff can clean it up later), Miss Bossy Pants managed to crawl her way out of bed, just long enough to send an urgent message:
Can’t possibly write today. One of you will need to do my contribution for the story. Thanks.
She contemplated adding a smile emoticon but feeling such a strong urge to punch it in the face decided that it was extraneous.
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“I don’t know, I just feel that connecting with each other is part of the fun,” mumbled Ricardo Prout.
“We have to start somewhere!” retorted Connie in exasperation. “Do some research! Find some connecting links!”
“One should never underestimate the behind the scenes idea prompts,” remarked Hilda, somewhat cryptically. “Relax, Ric. And for heavens sake buck up a bit! Why don’t you take the rest of the day off, you’re distracting me from my work, as instructed by miss bossy behind the scenes pants.”
“But I don’t get what the others are writing, if I want to join, the safest is do my own stuff,” said Ricardo sadly. “And I thought this job was a fun team job.”
Connie and Hilda rolled their eyes in unison. “He’s a newbie, he’ll get the hang of it,” whispered Hilda.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
I was offering the plate of mince pies to Mr Cornwall, who had been coaxed out of his room for the first time in ages and was sitting next to the gum tree sapling that Aunt Idle had strung with fairy lights in lieu of a Christmas pine, when they arrived. We were all surprised to hear the taxi hooting outside, that is, except Bert. I heard him mumbling something about “She bloody meant it, the old trout,” but I didn’t remember that until later, with all the commotion at the unexpected guests.
“Here, take the lot,” I said, shoving the mince pies on the old guys lap, as I rushed to the door to see who it was. A tall autocratic looking woman swathed in beige linen garments was climbing out of the front seat of the taxi, with one hand holding the pith helmet on her head and the other hand gesticulating wildly to the others in the back seat. She was ordering the taxi driver to get the luggage out of the boot, and ushering the other occupants out of the car, before flamboyantly spinning around to face the house. With arms outstretched and a big smile she called, “Darlings! We have arrived!”
“Who the fuck it that?” I asked Clove. “Fucked if I know” she replied, adding in a disappointed tone, “Four more old farts, just what we bloody need.”
“And a baby!” I noted.
Clove snorted sarcastically, “Terrific.”
Suddenly a cloud of dust filled the hall and I started to cough. Crispin Cornwall had leaped to his feet, the plate of mince pies crashing to the floor.
“Elizabeth! Do my eyes deceive me, or is it really you?”
“Godfrey, you old coot! What on earth are you doing here, and dressed like that! You really are a hoot!”
“Why is she calling him Godfrey?” asked Prune. “That’s not his name.”
“He obviously lied when he said his name was Crispin Cornwall, Prune. We don’t know a thing about him,” I replied. “Someone had better go and fetch Aunt Idle.”
Most of the houses in Bonemarsh were uninhabited, in various stages of dust and decay. A number of them had been left with their interiors intact though, as if the occupants had just not come home from work one day. Exploring the empty houses was a wonderful game for the few children left in the town ~ full sized play houses, complete with full sized toys. No tiny prams or miniature tools were required to play pretend with, as they had the real things at their disposal.
Exploring the wardrobes and trunks under the beds had given them many strange costumes and unexplainable objects to play with. The children didn’t really wonder about all the wigs, not at the time, they were just delighted to have so many to play with. Later, in retrospect, they wondered why a mining town had quite so many wigs.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
As distance grew between the P’hope and the city, the damage to the beanstalk had seemed to diminish. Funny how insignificant it seems when you looked at it from a distance, he thought. Unfortunately storks weren’t strong enough to fly above the clouds, and he had to go through a heavy rain above the Sea of Beliefs. Even if it was over now, his already heavy P’hopal robe was soaked, yet his mount was flapping its wings bravely to fulfill its duty.
Jube could see the temple ruins. Sandwiched between the coastline and the bog, it was surrounded by wall of mist. Inside, old stones and broken columns were scattered around a lake, a stepped pyramid in its center. It looked like the mist was dissipating following a trail near the south. The P’hope squinted and saw a bright orange spot where it would open. He took his magnifier made of calcite crystals and looked through it. He clenched his teeth. The King was there, two great wings on his back. Spoiled brat, why don’t you never do as you’re told, he thought. He looked at the others and almost fell off the stork when he saw the little green one.
Despite the change of skin color, he’d recognized her. So, Gwinie was alive. There was no time to lose. He suppressed a strong desire to confront them straight away, it would be counterproductive when he still had time to weave his web. He put the magnifier back in his bag and steered his mount toward the ruins.
There didn’t seem to be any entrance on the pyramid’s faces, the P’hope tried to make his mount land on one of the step, but the animal didn’t respond to his orders. Instead, it glided over the water toward the top of one of those big columns still standing, missed it, slumped down on a patch of grass, and decided to stay there. Ranting about birds and incompetence, the P’hope managed to extricate himself from the mess of feathers and legs. He sniffed with disgust. With the humidity, a strong smell of wet fowl had impregnated his robe. Feeling stuck and heavy, he considered getting undressed, he still had his silk gown underneath.
“Happy bird day!” said a cheering voice behind him.
The P’hope felt a sudden rush of panic, the voice sounded like his aunt Ursula. He looked around, guilt on his face as if caught a hand in his pants. He had forgotten it was his birthday, he had never liked birthdays. Who could possibly know ? It took a moment to his mind to make sense of what he was looking at. It looked like a pink zebra with a melting candle on its forehead, but the form seemed yet uncertain of itself. That was disturbing.“I’m Rene, I hope we can be friends,” said the pink zebra. The creature fidgeted as if it had drank too much from the moat. “We can begin the party now, or wait for you friends to arrive. I’m so excited !”
Jube shuddered, the animal had a crazy spark in his eyes that made him feel uneasy. He looked at the stork which hadn’t moved since the crash landing. No h’ope from Heaven.In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Lazuli Galore looked back over his shoulder to make sure that the three travelers were following him. He retained his shapeshifted elephant form for the time being for high visibility purposes in the fog, and so as not to confuse the new arrivals with a sudden change of appearance. The first thing was to gain their trust and ensure that they followed him. His job was to monitor new arrivals and escort them inside the walled city of Gazalbion before they could start any more settlements in the free zone. The problem of new arrivals had escalated post 2014 as more and more people developed the art of teleporting, and the island to many was considered a promised land, a land of wine and cucumbers, attracting the world weary and the bored, the adventurous explorers, as well as the merely curious day trippers. Had they all been regular tourists of the old fashioned kind, who came for a determinate short stay and spent lavishly on the resident occupants provisions, it would not have been a problem, it would have been welcomed. But these people were staying, leaving only for brief trips back home to attend to their responsabilites there, and returning, bringing ever more people with them to settle in the free zone. They were arriving in droves, and it was of paramount importance to contain them, and shield the free zone from their incursions.
Lazuli Galore was pleased to see that the three travelers were running to catch up with him. The other one would have been more trouble, and Lazuli knew he was right to despatch him to the elsespace arrangement with a perfectly executed parachute drop. It was the first time he had tried the novel approach of a parachuting elephant and was pleased with the result. It would not be long before that guy found his way out and came looking for his companions, but Gazalbion wasn’t far and Lazuli was confident that the three would be safely locked behind it’s walls before he reappeared.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“Miss Pol ?” asked the man. His voice was full of testosterone. Linda Pol considered a moment using her doe eyes on him. Her lips parted slightly under an untimely warmth coming from her groin.
“Yes.” She swallowed. She realized she was holding her breath. “Actually, it’s Linda Pol, this is my…”, she wanted to keep it simple this time, “stage name. You can call me Linda”, she offered him a wide smiled, which he ignored.
“Who’s that ?” he asked glaring suspiciously inside the elevator.“Who ?” Linda, unsettled by her conflicting feelings towards the man’s beauty and his brusqueness, looked back. She had completely forgotten about Kevinlol who seemed oblivious to the conversation, politely waiting for his customer to get out of his elevator.
“Oh! Him ? He’s the bellboy who brought me Amber’s message”, she said with a tone she hoped casual. “Is that a gun in your pants ?” The words had escaped her mouth as if all her inhibitions had been put to sleep. Bloody sirens! More potent than I expected, she’d had to be careful.The man put his hand on his gun and grunted. “Follow me”, he said, and, without waiting, he turned around and strode into the corridor. Linda Pol gathered her wig and heels, and followed his butt.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
When Irina, with Mr R and Greenie in tow, approached the spot where the robot had detected activity, she had a lurching sense in her stomach that something strange was about to happen.
Some buzzing seemed to approach and leave, like a wobbling effect in the air around them, although she could see nothing.
Mr R, with its caterpillar boots seemed to have to trouble moving ahead, but with a silent sign of her hand, had him slow the pace down and move more silently.A cracking sound, and she turned around.
A woman with a shotgun pointed at her was there, and a guy with handsome features. Caught unaware, Irina froze, and closed her eyes, trying to reach some inner peace before the imminent gunshot.“Madam? Are you alright?” came Mr R’s soothing voice. Next to her, Greenie was drawing on her pants, with a concerned look on her face.
She opened her eyes, confused and relieved. The odd couple of hunters seemed to have vanished. Yet, she could have sworn hearing a gunshot and the blood of a giant mosquito splatter all around.
She could as well have dreamt all awake, as there were not a single trace around to back her vision.“That’s what it is then…” Irina started to realize something. “Mr R, if you will, what about those presence you detected earlier?”
“Gone Madam, it seemed to have been a glitch.”
“A glitch, yes…” she said pensively. “Or something else…”The things she’d just experience reminded Irina about some of the things she’d read in the past about the Bardo state of the Buddhists. She wasn’t a Buddhist, more a Realist ascendant Romantic. Yet, they made some interesting points about the nature of reality.
Usually, Irina was the kind of girl who liked to work up to her goals’ achievements. Building the little place for herself, even if mostly the work of Mr R, was a good example. Give her enough time, and she would always find resources to make a better life for herself. But here, it seemed beside the point. It could well be an endless loop.She wanted to pierce the veil that surrounded the place, instead of erring in the fog of her own projections. She looked at Greenie and Mr R. She wasn’t sure they were real any longer, even if she had sure grown fond of them. She would see…
Now, how to get this island to reveal its secrets… As much as she found it boring, prayer or meditation seemed to be the only solution she could come up with for now. Less fond of the first solution, she chose the second and sat cross-legged on a mossy patch of the bog, where the sound of water seemed to have the right qualities.
In reply to: Get your Drag Team Queer
Some update on the current plots and maps:
Queens Team
Our main protagonists seem to have yet to digest their past adventure…
In Marseille, 2121, contestants in a Drag Queen’s contest, they had their first mission through Time Sewer mysteriously sending them in Louis XV’s Versailles, and start a quest for mysterious ferrets with keys, helped in their travelling by their ex-judge turned chaperon Sadie, equipped with an all purpose e-zapper, and the batty Sanso always keen on providing the strangest travelling devices.
They find one of the keys in the stolen ferret left in the Chapel before they even really start on their quest. Not long after that, they are also robbed of their dance opportunity and show minutes before the attempt on the King’s life, due to the network cancelling their show (and decommissioning the Time Sewer). In a last ditch attempt from Linda Pol to provide the network with a valuable pilot material for the television show, she remembers references of a crystal (sent to her anonymously), and have the Queens propelled in year 2222, Big Island, Hawaii. On arrival, they chill and get sidetracked on a visit to a (you guessed it, mysterious) techromancer.
It all appears to be part of the plan to gain life-everlasting by transmuting gold of a (yes, mysterious) cranky old billionaire in kilts named Jonbert who is living in a time-travelling submarine with sentient robots, and who has manipulated events so that the Drag Queen show would place them in possession of a special set of keys that he could then retrieve from them.
Unsurprisingly, nothing works for him as planned.Unknown to him, the Queens had only secured one of the keys, the other being unwittingly carried away by maids of Versailles during their balloon escape, with a parrot named Huhu. Manipulated by Irina, a… err… mysterious Russian socialite with a trusty robot Mr R at her side, the parrot steals the key, but faints of exhaustion during the escape in the ocean. The parrot is however rescued by on a ghost galleon and revived by its occupants, who are on their way to a particularly momentous whale gathering in 2222. Sidetracked by a navigation tile displacement, they are in the end successful in beating the odds and arrive too in Hawaii 2222.
Equipped in breathing wetsuits, the Queens are sent in the depths of the ocean, where their clumsy and noisy explorations are carefully followed by the octopi and other inhabitants of the underwater world.
They get sidetracked and temporarily separated when some go exploring underwater caves.
Whales are gathering, and activating the giant crystal, when everyone arrives at the scene. Somehow, Mr R on Irina’s orders manages to provide to an unsuspecting Sadie the second key, which has been expertly tempered with.
Sadie, realizing this is the missing key, activates it, and unleashes a chain of events leading to a earth-shattering revelations and a breathtaking video of a St Germain hologram doing karaoke with whales and other gyrating cetaceans drunk on red algae.The network is saved, and they are safely sent back to Marseille, where they are welcomed back by Linda Pol. It earns them a contract, which turns out to be mostly for the decommissioned Time Sewer maintenance.
They plan to turn it into a bar, in a re-enactment of their minute of fame, with fat pole-dancers as whales, and St-Germain impersonators singing contests.
Not much is heard from Sadie, who had managed to get a raise and less working hours, or of Linda Pol, last seen in Maui island, Hawaii, 2121.In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Sanso was tied securely on a Louis XVI chair, inside an ornate room kept mostly in the dark by heavy embroidered curtains that smelt of celery.
He was craving for a tomato juice to go with the smell, and could hardly focus on an empty stomach.He could have easily escaped from his predicament, but he was curious about his captors, and the reason why they had him abducted after he went back to his little love nest in the R&R B&B where he’d hoped to meet again the mysterious Lady Cucumber. That was his name for her.
He was hopeless with names, and although he was sure he had heard hers before, he preferred to remember people by associations. With Irina, that was Cucumbers. There! he thought, another proof of the brilliance of this method, as I remembered her name… Iris? Eyrin?, well, Lady Cucumber.
He’d made love to many a lady in his life, a lady in Salmon, even a Lady Mermaid, a Lady Gingerale, a Lady Panty, a ladyboy even. He could go on for hours thinking about them, but the lady Cucumber had spun a spell around his head it seemed.After his last mission on a rescue with Miss Bob and her Sponges Squarepanties team, he’d run back for the 2222 B&B.
No sooner had he arrived that heaven and hell broke loose and things went to rules and “do that or else”‘s, all things he abhorred with a passion. The links, and keys for his chains, that he could suffer, so he focused on it for awhile.He was woken up by a splash of ice cold water on his pants and a raucous voice in his face. Better that than the reverse, he chuckled to himself.
“Something funny now? Tell us, where did she go?”
He knew better than to feign ignorance, so he preferred to feign knowledge, which he’d found usually worked miracles.
“Of course. She stole something from you…”
“Damn right, she steal it, and we want back it.”The accent was difficult to place, he’d known so many inter-dimensional dialects that sometimes it was hard for him to remember.
He would have said some northern Chinese dialect accent, with a bit of kiwi.He needed to know a bit more before disappearing. His curiosity was aroused by the implication that what she stole was certainly valuable. What could it be, a revolutionary hairsplitter, a butt-fluffer, a fringe freckler, ah! his head was teaming with great possibilities it was making him dizzy.
“Don’t be silly Mister Sanso, she steal it robot very precious and advance technology.”
and before he could reply:
“Yes we read your mind, I confirm… You have silly thinks Mr Sanso.”He was starting to think now was a good time to get lost, and started to confuse their mindreader with energy patterns otherwise called gibberish thoughts.
The chains and ropes gave way easily.
His next move was to phase out of the room, but instead he managed to fall on his butt, in the middle of mocking looking Chinese in tuxedos and purple bow ties.“Ah, I see, you have some antiportation technology…” Sanso was a fair player. The temptation was big to run for another exit, if only for the exhilaration of a chase in the corridors of that strange place, but his stomach was thinking otherwise.
“I see you are vely fond of kewcomber, we are no animawls, we will give you delishius kewcomber.”
Minutes after, he was thrown with a certain form of Chinese ceremony in a small cubic windowless room. On a table next to the door, was his meal apparently.
He recoiled in horror when he opened the lid covering his plate. The strong odour of garlic pricked his nose.
“No way! Fucking jokers!”
That was even worse than to eat boiled cucumber chunks in spicy sauce.
Swimming in soy sauce were slices of chewy sea cucumbers that looked more like fat juicy leeches from a filthy bog.He ate reluctantly, arguing with his stomach about the benefits of the collagen in said sea cucumbers, and at the same time realized the Chinese mobsters were probably from the Chinese Robot Incorporated Mission Eternal, a renowned corporation that had managed to free countless people from menial jobs thanks to prodigious advances in robotics.
The Lady Cucumber was suddenly more than a mysterious beauty, she was also a mysterious wanted beauty, and he couldn’t wait to… But he had to guard his thoughts for now.He looked at the bamboo chopsticks with a sly smile. He had not said his last word, and the person who could boast of having Sanso detained was not born yet.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Mirabelle and Adeline sat in the morning sun on the verandah, appreciatively nibbling the perfectly formed sliced toasted bread and marmalade.
Almost six months had passed since they’d been found on the beach, confused and soaked, babbling incoherently. An early morning beach walker had found them (she had wondered if she was dreaming or hallucinating), and had attempted to engage them in conversation. A rudimentary smattering of French acquired during a grape picking sojourn in France many years ago helped. Much of what the bizarrely clad group said was incomprehensible, but it was clear that they were lost and hungry, so Lisa invited them back home with her. They were reluctant to get into the car, fearing a trap, and when she started the engine, they panicked and scrambled to get back out until Boris calmed them down and suggested they had better trust this stranger because frankly, what were their options? She seemed kind and helpful, even if she was shockingly under dressed with her legs exposed for all to see, and had an invisible and very noisy horse pulling her carriage.
Lisa lived in a relatively new community of creative and forward thinking individuals who were in the process of renovating an abandoned village in the orange groves. They called the village the Trading Post, a name that was a loose play on words on the social media platform where they had first become acquainted and traded and shared posts. They were a diverse assortment of people from all over the world, united with the common goal of experimenting with a new type of anarchist culture, a novel creative and expansive playful approach that was becoming increasingly popular.
Pierre and Étienne’s knowledge of French had come to the rescue upon the first arrival of the group, as they unraveled their strange tale. After much confusing conversation and translations for the rest of the occupants of the village, it became clear that the group were time travelers, although somewhat accidental and clearly unprepared.
While the travelers rested after an unfamiliar but welcome meal, the villagers discussed the situation with much interest and curiosity. It was decided that they would keep the news of the travelers a secret for the time being, and gradually assist them with learning about their new timeframe, current customs and the local languages.
