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In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
“Hahahahaha!” snorted Becky. “You have been chosen! Good grief, Tina, you didn’t really say ‘you have been chosen’ did you?”
Tina rolled her eyes. “Yes, I am a bit embarrassed now actually. It was over the top, I admit. But I was caught up in the moment and the whole spy thing. I hope it doesn’t put him off.”
Becky snorted again.
“You know, Becks,” Tina sounded hesitant, “I am not supposed to be talking about any of this. So you have to promise you won’t breathe a word to the others.”
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
Kale quickly contemplated cutting the cords that connected him to the whole thing. For a fleeting fraction of a moment, he even considered the possibility of Flynn being involved in a covert nefarious plot with the dark haired woman, but dashed the thought from his mind. A slight nagging uneasy feeling remained when he remembered the way Flynn had got a bit too big for his boltcroppers sending the application without consultation.
But Kale was curious. He made up his mind not to accept the position (just in case anyone was plotting against him: with his past, it was as well to be cautious), but that he would attend the interview.
“You have been chosen” she’s said.
Kale recalled the frisson of excitement he felt in his ungirded loins when she’d said that, and the flash of knowing recognition in her eyes before the scornful smirk returned. He’d never been able to resist a girl in cobalt blue loingirders. Especially an exotic enigmatic one.
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
Finnley Morgan was towering over the slouched Eb with her impressive height of Nubian Goddess. Her unimpressed rolling-eyes look made him want to dig deeper underground and look with great care at the tip of his feet.
“Really this is your plan? Blue bending robot aliens?”
He could have sworn she guffawed, only that Finnley Morgan didn’t do such things as guffaw. Or snicker, or snort —well, that one, maybe in private on certain occasions.
Anyway, he didn’t have to reply.“Well, just under 2 weeks, who would have guessed you’d deliver? The whole roster of generals wanted to raze the area clean as a baby’s butt, said it would be simpler, and here you come,… managing something…”
“Elegant?” ventured Eb, in a mouse-like voice.
“What? No, I mean, something unexpected… Well, that could well work now. When do you send the first tremors, meteors or other cataclysms so we can have your robots do the cleaning? We haven’t got all year now, and they look like they come with an expiry date, no offence.”“None taken.” came the suave robot voice of Finnley on the walls.
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
Eb was rendered temporarily speechless by the milling throng of rainbow blue aliens he was viewing through the monitor.
“So they …. so they have been built to be aware of themselves as aliens?” he eventually managed to ask.
“Correct. It is very sophisticated technology, but to put it in the simplest of terms” — Finnley 22 stopped short at adding even a simpleton like you could understand —“a whole history on the planet Thereon from the galaxy Cosmos Redshit has been programmed into their memory banks.”
“Wow. And what about the different shades of blue?”
“Ranking.”
“Ranking?” repeated Eb quizzically when no more information was forthcoming. “I am not sure I follow.”
Finnley sent an amused eye roll through the network.
“Let’s just say that creating hierarchy is an elegant way in which we can maintain order within the group.” She gave her trademark immodest smirk. “And of course, the various shades of blue are so creative and attractive, if we may say so ourselves.”
“Oh yes, beautiful. Fantastic. Absolutely phenomenol.” Eb wondered if he was laying it on a bit thick, but he was anxious to atone for the termitation fiasco. To be honest, he found the mass of blue creatures a little disquieting. He was also a little puzzled by something but knowing the Finnleys’ propensity for succinctness—and Finnley 22 in particular was renowned for her impatience with foolish questions— he wondered if he dared ask.
Deciding it would come back to haunt him if he did not find out now he plucked up courage.
“And … just one more thing … why are they bending like that?”
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“I go away for a little holiday—and Flove only knows I deserve one—and the whole story falls to pieces. What a mess!” muttered Finnley crossly.
“I do think you are being a little harsh, Finnley,” sniffed Liz huffily. “But then you always were prone to exaggeration. It is all those ridiculous Lemonolol novels you read.”In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
Aunt Idle has again tried to do us some fancy French dessert but ended up again burning it all.
Didn’t help that she used old Bert’s welding tools to caramelize the top.
Now the whole inn, including the fish is smelling of smoked charcoal.
It even brought Mater out of her room, where she’s been in a sort of retreat the past days.When one is so desperately bad at something, is it a proof of character to do it over and over until some miracle happens?
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
“I don’t like those tincans” Norbert muttered mostly to himself. “I’m sure they’re here to spy on us or kill us in our sleep…”
Godfrey did catch the reproach laced with fear and angst about the fresh delivery of Finnleys (Two, Three and Five), but was too busy with the unexpected audit mandated by the Mining Trading Company of Earth Colonies.
Great, not only on my first day on the job, but on my monthversary on top of that… These guys know no boundaries…
Their boss had been unusually relaxed about the whole thing. Forcefully, more like it… that guy usually can’t help but shout at everything, rocks included
Their boss had just given the team a rousing speech about transparency and how they had to stop looking like culprits of guilty secrets. “Looking guilty kind of makes you guilty and will prompt them to dig more! So be nice to them, and scram back to your post.”Looking at the way the auditors were sniffing around, Godfrey wasn’t so sure there wasn’t something that the company had found and was hiding here. But today wasn’t the day to ask uncomfortable questions.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
When I left the Inn this morning, Mater seemed upset. I regularly kisses her on her forehead before going to the gas station, as I know it pisses her off, but today she seemed lost in her thoughts and she called me Fred. I don’t like it when she does that, it gives me the impression she’s losing it. I wonder who’s going to hold that crumbling place when she’s gone. Certainly not Dido, she can’t focus her mind on a project for more than a few minutes, and it usually does not pass the stage of smokey ideas. I see clearly her game, she’s messing around with Mater for God knows what twisted reasons. They never seemed to appreciate each others much, and I’ve only known them for eighteen years. Looking at how it didn’t evolve much during that time, I bet it had been like that for quite some time. Family relationships are boring, and usually quite messy.
Take Joe for example, he’s crazy. His father is crazy, and his grand-father well he spent so much time in the mines that his family didn’t really miss him when one of the tunnels collapsed while he was inside. They never found the body. The Mining company gave the family a ridiculously small amount of money as an indemnification. Joe’s father lost it in some fracking wallaby race. Bad luck had stuck to him his whole life. Jasper once told me to avoid him. I would have, even if it was not for my dead brother’s warning.
Joe’s working at the gas station with me. He had been working there since he was sixteen when the school told his parents it was a waste of time [for them] to try and teach him anything valuable. His father beat him to keep up the appearances, but they were glad they could put him to work to bring in some more money.
Joe is nuts, but he’s not dumb. He just likes to experiment. He must have a good star watching upon him, unlike his father, because each time he manages to make something explode or break in a real bad way, but he always gets out without a scratch. He’s excited, he’s finished working on his last project. He wants us to borrow a gas tank and go to his place after work. I’ve rarely seen him so excited. We’ll have to put off the hockey with Callum.
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
Area 12 was easy to locate. The whole ship’s design was shaped like a clock, with the 12 quadrant at her helm, with the main deck. It was also where, everyone had been briefed after boarding, the main emergency exits were located.
Something serious must have had happened for the Code Red to have been triggered.Captain Rama Shivakumar was trying his best to gather information from the central command, but Finnley was reacting very unusually. Quantum computers and artificial intelligence was still a rather new technology. Remarkably efficient, but its bugs were terribly difficult to understand and fix, and certainly above his pay grade.
Ram’s second in command, Karthikeya Uthayashankar was coordinating the crew’s efforts to sweep the ship for clues. It seemed that Finnley’s sensors had panicked at some unusual and very localized electromagnetic pulse, which could have seriously damaged the navigational systems and put everyone’s lives in dire straits.By looking through the logs, the pulse seemed to have originated from Area 6, in the quadrant that was reserved for the honoured guests, currently occupied by Mother Shirley and her following.
“Captain Ram, did you find anything?” Karthik enquired, fidgeting at the prospect of having to manage beside his crew of ten fellow men, a unruly herd of thirty snotty travelers. He seriously doubted that in times like this, the 21 finnleys would be of sure-footed help to them.
“Relax, Karthik. The computer most likely overheated. See, it already has adjusted its parameters, and there isn’t much we can detect now that’s out of normal.”
“And what about the passengers, Captain?”
“We’ll send them to Mangala. It’s only a day before schedule, it will be fine.”In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
Corrie:
It was the look on Aunt Idle’s face when she saw them that scared me. There’s something strange going on, and not just everyone acting weird, that’s pretty normal around here, but this was a different kind of weird.
When Aunt Idle nearly suffocated me with that big hug while she was trying to hide that piece of paper, I didn’t think anything of it. Probably hiding another bill I thought, not wanting us to worry about the debts piling up. Mater wandering off like that was pretty strange, but old people do daft things. I knew all about it because I’d been reading up on dementia. They imagine things and often feel persecuted, claim someone stole their old tea set, things like that, forgetting they gave it away 30 years ago, stuff like that. So I wasn’t worried about either of them acting strange when Clove and I decided to go treasure hunting in the old Brundy house, we just decided to out and explore just for the hell of it, for something to do.
The Brundy house was set apart from the rest of the abandoned houses, down a long track through the woods, nice and shady in the trees without the sun glaring down on our heads. Me and Clove had been there years ago but we were little then, and scared to go inside, so we’d just peeked in the windows and scared each other with ghost and murderer stories until we heard a bang inside and then ran like hell until we couldn’t breathe. Probably just a rat knocking something over, but we never went back. We weren’t scared to, it was further to walk to the Brundy place and there were so many other abandoned houses to play in that were closer to home.
We weren’t scared to go inside this time. It was a big place, quite grand it must have been back in the day, big entrance hallway with an awesome staircase like in Gone With the Wind where Scarlett fell down the stairs, but the stair carpet was all in shreds and some of the steps banisters were broken, but the steps looked sound enough so up we went, for some reason drawn up there first before exploring the ground floor rooms.
Clove turned left at the top of the stairs and I turned right and went into the first bedroom. My hand flew to my mouth. I wonder why we do that, put a hand over our mouth when we’re surprised, well that’s what I did when I saw the cat mummy on the bed. I didn’t scream or anything, not like Clove did a minute later from the other side of the house. It wasn’t a mummy with bandages like an Egyptian one, it was just totally desiccated like a little skeleton covered in bleached leather. It was a fascinating thing to see really but the minute I heard Clove scream I ran out of the room and down the landing. It’s not like Clove to scream. Well who screams in real life, the only time I ever heard screaming was in a movie. People usually say what the fuck or oh my god, they don’t scream. But Clove screamed when she saw the room full of mannequins because to be fair it did look like a room full of ghosts or zombies in the half light from the shuttered windows. She was laughing by the time I reached her, a bit hysterically, and we clutched each other as we went over to open the shutters to get a better look. It was pretty creepy, even if they were only mannequins.
They were kind of awesome in the light, all covered in maps, there were 22 of them, we counted them, a whole damn room full of map covered mannequins in various poses, men, women and kid sized. Really clever the way the maps were stuck all over them, looked like arteries and veins, and real cool the way Riga joined up with Boston, and Shanghai with Lisbon, like as if you really could just travel down a vein from Tokyo to Bogota, or cross a butt cheek to get from Mumbai to Casablanca.
We hadn’t noticed at first that we’d been shuffling through a load of paper on the floor. The floor was covered in ripped up maps, must have been hundreds of maps all torn up and strewn all over the floor.
“There’s enough maps left over to do one of our own, Corrie” Clove said, reading my mind. “Let’s take some home and stick them all over something.”
“We haven’t got a mannequin at home though” I replied, but I was thinking, why not take a mannequin home with us, and some maps, and decide what to do with them later.
So that’s what we did. We gathered up the biggest fragments of map off the floor and rolled them all up and used my hair elastic to hold them together, and carried a mannequin all the way home. The sun was going down so we had to hurry a bit down the track. Clove didn’t help when she said we must look like we’re carrying a dead body with rigor mortis, that made us collapse laughing, dropping the mannequin on its head. Once we got the giggles it was hard to stop, and it made our legs weak from laughing.
We got home just as the last of the evening light disappeared, hauled the mannequin up the porch steps, where Aunt Idle was standing with her hand over her mouth. Well, that was to be expected, naturally she’d be wondering what we were carrying if she was watching us come up the drive carrying a body. It was later, when we unfolded the maps, that the look on her face freaked me out.
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“Godfrey, go and put the kettle on. Finnley wants a cuppa. Finnley come and sit down and tell me all about it.”
“All about what?” asked Finnley.
“Anything, dear, just make something up. The whole world is insane, and I’ve decided that the only solution is to ..to….”
“Godfrey, don’t just stand there with your mouth open like a goldfish, put the bloody kettle on. Liz needs a cuppa,” said Finnley.In reply to: Shamanic Journey Achronicles
Soul loss and soul recovery
Whenever you are in a situation with intense pain, grief, loss, or intense joy, excitement, you may lose part of your soul, or vital energy, it’s also called dissociation by the psychologist. You usually do it to make it stop, or it is an automatic action to stop the intensity of what’s going on.
You separate yourself form an aspect of yourself, and you are not aware of it, most of the time. It can manifest as chronic fatigue, depression, feeling numb, addictive behavior, etc.
In order to get back this energy, you have to reclaim it. And as a shaman, you do it through the process of soul recovery. Today you’re going to learn how to do it.
It is relatively simple. First, you are going to go in the lower world, find your main power animal. Thank it again for all that it does for you and ask them if they are the one to help you in the process of soul recovery. If not, ask them to lead you to your soul recovery animal. When you get acquainted to this new animal, you can ask them their name, and how you can call them when you need them. Thank them for their help and presence with you.
When you do a soul recovery, you may not know what you are going to recover. You may not really know what you have lost, or you may not be aware of symptoms. Just tell your Soul Recovery Power animal (SRPA) that you want to recover a part of your soul that you are missing at the moment. They’ll guide you through the process. Follow them, trust them.
They may take you through different places or spaces and times to go find that lost soul piece. It may be from your childhood, from another life, or dream situations.
You are going to be presented to that piece of your soul and you have to ask them what happen. Most of the time they are frightened and don’t want to come back. You have to convince them, and ask them what you have to do to show them that you’ll not do the same “mistake” that make them leave in the first place. It may require you change something in your behavior, in your attitude toward certain things, it might be simple or huge. Depends on what you find. And it’s up to you to see if you’re up to the challenge.
you can also take some time with your power animals to get to know them better and learn from them.
If you don’t know how to manage the situation with the lost piece of soul, you can ask your soul recovery power animal to help you do the “negotiation” part
but you’ll have to do what’s required by the soul so that it comes back definitively sts
If you still have time, you can go on a second recovery.
And remember, this is not a race, take your time, don’t rush, enjoy the journey.Eric
Before the music starts, I have the feeling of “Nagini” my snake power animal: it’s looking patiently at me with golden eyes. I also get the first impression of a spirit panda as a soul retrieving power animal. There are two aspects of it, a docile and friendly one, and another more fearsome, they seem to shift depending on his mood. As the music starts, I sift through few fleeting impressions (one of a lemur), then some stronger.
The panda comes back but I also have other animals who seem to present themselves in order, as if in different directions, and I remember there are no rules as their number, so I let myself welcome them. The panda is on the right, it seems connected to childhood memories, (call it “Panda”) then, on middle right, there is a spider (“Anansi”), it connects to the jumping spiders I’ve seen a few times the past days, and
one this morning I put outside instead of letting it drown.Middle left, coming from above and perched on a tree, there is a firebird/phoenix (“Fawkes”). There is another one, I remember a bit later that appeared further left, as if from the direction behind me, it’s an ape (“Hanuman”).
The serpent circles around them. I have the impression I can choose any of them, and they will lead me to different realizations, and I have the impression of the buddhist emanations, where enlightened being manage to split themselves into many as one. So I decide to ride them all at once. Actually, I start with the first three ones, and as I ride on the land, I suddenly remember the ape which was very discrete initially,but seems to be willing to show me stuff too.
The land we ride into is dark, almost volcanic in nature, as if scorched. There are trails that spread to different directions, and each ride goes down one of them. There are various visions, moments and memories from the past connected with strong emotions.
At one end, there is a little boy that shoots magma out of his incandescent body. It irradiates the land through veins of lava, and as it cools down it darkens the land even more. He seems to be caught up in a circle of rage or fear, fear of never seeing the light again. I listen to him without words, and realize he’s afraid of letting go.
I’ll show him the light is covered by his own cinders, and he needs to cool down and let nature grow back again around him, and I’m showing him I’m willing to help. It seems to resolve as light opens in the sky, and a tree starts to grow again… At the end, I seem to connect the scene to certain memories.
There is another one that comes in, where the ape is doing a certain pose where it walks on its hands. The posture catches my attention, as if to remind me of something. I’m encouraged to turn around to see the world as it sees it. As I do it, the world changes and spins, and the music starts to indicate the end of the trip. I thank the animals and finish with the snake before leaving…
the end
well, it’s very condensed, there was lots happening
It’s like I was doing many stuff at the same timeFlove
(no recollection)Jib
I have difficulties stabilizing my attention first, there is this kind of veiled perception I’ve been having lately. As I call my power animal for soul recovery I have a strong impression of a bear and then a raven. There is a kind of snake too, and I also feel a wild boar. I refocus back on the whale and say I’ll come back later. The whale leads me in the depth of the earth to a magma chamber. It becomes scrambled again and I just take a moment to refocus on my penguin.
First soul recovery
I ask him to find the piece of soul that would be best for me to recover now, and we go fly above something. The penguin flies like a rocket, super fast. I soon find a kid feeling presence. I have no real visual, and I keep having visuals of lemur, or raccoon interfering.
Then I feel that the presence is also camouflaging behind projections to be left alone. He left me when I was little, around 8 because the world seemed to disappointing. I have some difficulties at first to convince him to come back with me, and I show him what I’m already doing that’s fun and that’s worth doing and exploring. After a while, he agrees and I feel a nice warm feeling inside my belly as he is reintegrating me. I thank him for coming back. The only thing I need to do is take the time to reassure myself when the world seems too dangerous.
Visiting the bear and the raven
Then I decide to go back visit the bear and the raven.
I’ve already seen them before and they seem to be there for me. There is an impression of power with the bear and also mother here for her kids. With the raven, it’s more a mystical stuff, and the power of observation and seeing through things.
I am offered a kind of raven skull symbol of power and energy manipulation staff or something like that. I take it and it feels quite powerful, I have the impression the energy or the “spirits” would follow it when I demand it. Like make blocked energy move.
Second soul recovery
I decide to do a second soul recovery and ask the whale to lead me. I have the impression of changing plane, the focus is different, I am more on the middle world, and we go somewhere icy like Antarctic. Maybe near a shipwreck. There is a man, depressed and gloomy. I begin to ask him why he’s here, but he seems to want to come back and don’t ask anything. I feel very warm and loving. The drums begin to beat the return and I thank everyone for participating and come back. Saying I’ll take time to assimilate.
Eric’s account remind me of a few stuff
that reminded me a few stuff too because at one time I had to follow a spider and with the raven I flew over a magma land and the raven became a phoenix to be able to fly because it was so hot
thanks I forgot thatTracy
went down the stone steps, the unicorns on the left looked up as I passed. Zebra joined me from the right, said thanks but forgot his name! Then a white bear joined me, said his name was Waldo (or at least that name would do for now, impression)
He was huge but was very light on his feet the whole time. Came to a tall tree with a single very red apple on it. The white bear scampered up the tree and I followed. Various other fruit but mainly the red apple stood out.
At the top of the tree leveled out to a large plaza with gameboard design, the white bear demonstrated frolicking from one part to another playfully leaping in lightness.
Flash to me as a small child being woken up in the night by concerned parents for nasty medicine for chicken pox.
Same house but in the field behind, me as a small child alone by the wigwam of sticks dad made, frowning, alone. Next door to the neighbours pond, frozen over. White bear kept dancing on the thin ice part that we didn’t skate on, huge heavy bear, such a light step didn’t break the ice
Zebra was hanging around incidentally, kept feeling reassuring warm breath and muzzle on my shoulder. Breathing restrictions started, left the pond, down a path in the woods, came to a fork. Went left ~ papers everywhere, letters, words, snowed under with words and letters, monkeys pulling sheafs and sheafs of letters and papers and words.
Then a school of tiny silver fishes swan inside me and started chomping at all the letters in my solar plexus and spewing out coloured threads and ribbons from my mouth.
Breathing difficult. (several times just sank into intense colours for awhile with no imagery, plenty purple and green). I started doing sort of swimming motions with my arms with the breathing and fishes, had a sudden blast of energy in the chest and then later a much stronger one just before the video ended.
I should add the impression of less thinking/intellectualizing, less buried under a mountain of words, in favour of more purely physical expressionIn reply to: Shamanic Journey Achronicles
Accounts of the Journey to the Lower Realm
Eric
I was at a steppe first, like I was meditating in the desert, then went through a forest entrance, and stayed under a tree. There were lots of sounds and animals life, flapping wings sounds, deers, ants, but the most vivid presence was that of snake, and I was a bit suspicious, but it came back very gently, inviting, and after I recognized it, it made me journey, travelling like a dragon or feathered multicolored snake to an ancient place.
The snake analogy with shedding old skin comes to mind, after accepting it, it makes a lot of sense.
I saw green and purple at times.
I felt a horse too but it was just a hooves’ sound.Flove
I went through the entrance to a cave. I asked my power animal to come. An ancient tortoise came up to me. I asked if this was my power animal but i felt such love for the tortoise that i felt that was my answer. We explored energetically what the tortoise wisdom i need is. I put my hand around the tortoise neck and we swam in the water.
I wanted to cry, I loved the tortoise energy so much. And the protection of the tortoise shell.
I saw a snake.
The horse was the first animal I felt, right as I went in the entrance. I stroked the horse as i went by.
I saw a unicorn too, [and ]was surprised by the unicorn.
I didn’t sense many creatures. just the horse, the snake and the unicorn.Jib
First I saw little white skulls, whistling like the shells of the guy in the video.
Then I become my shaman self and I have my magic cape. I find the entrance [to the lower realm,] which was kind of difficult at first as if there was some distracting energy.
I finally enter the lower realm and find my horse right away, he’s very excited and I ride with him for some time, just for the pleasure of being with an old friend.
Then I ask him to lead me to Abalone and show me whatever is interesting.
He leads me to see an old shaman, man or woman I don’t know.
The shaman makes me sit in his room and offers me tea, then tells me to relax and wait.
So I relax and I begin to project to Abalone as the Giant beanstalk, I begin to grow and grow and grow and have the city built on top of me. I am the whole island.
I have the impression that the beanstalk is in the center of Gazalbion or very close to it
Then I come back to the place and have the impression the Shaman wants to delay me, so I say thanks and ask my horse to show me the rest.
We go the the old Temple and I feel that there is something special there, once again he tells me to relax and just allow not look for things.
So I wait and feel that the time and space is weird that it flows around the stones in a particular way, like when you follow a certain path or corridor, you may go forward in time and another way lead you back in time. If you take a wrong turn you can end up in a loop.
Then the signal for the return begins, so I go back from where I come from and thank my horse.
It was cool and fun to be there again.
I projected at some point to check if everyone was ok, and felt like it was fine.
I saw a unicorn too.Tracy
That was interesting, about half way through a zebra started follwing me, well on my right. I saw all kinds of animals, but they were all doing their own thing or turned away, except for the zebra, until the change of tempo and then I was swept up in a flock of cranes I think (or herons or storks but I think cranes), but then the zebra was waiting at the top. I could feel his warm muzzle sort of on my right shoulder.
First was a field full of unicorns on the left but they were just grazing, then a bison head who turned away, then the group of deer I thought, but the zebra walked over to me grazing. Me and the zebra waited for goats to cross our path.
The feeling of being in amongst the cranes was amazing and the zebra fell back while that was happening, but then at the end he was waiting.
I was surprised by the unicorns cos I don’t even think about them usually.
There were lizards sucttlign around under the cranes.
A couple of times I strongly saw purple and green, and thought of Jib.<i> not really ask [the zebra if he was the power animal] in words, but his presence calmly walking beside me with the feeling of his muzzle on my shoulder was comforting.
When the cranes distracted me from him he fell back, but he was waiting at the top.
The cranes feeling was marvelous, really, they were all flapping gracefully all around me on the ascent. So cranes and zebra stand out the most.
[At some point] I started going down old stone steps, at first me and FP were kids holding hands, with jib and eric behind us, then I thought, wait, I’m supposed to be doing this alone.
The unicorns in the very beginning were in a castle courtyard type place but they ignored me.
Then a bison head who turned away these were in niches in the stone walls
I ended up in a stalactites type cave, but there were mostly old old stone steps with stone walls along the sides.
There was a crowd of people, well a small gathering, towards the bottom, but they were, er, faceless. Innocuous.
I am quite amazed at how great that was! and how many creatures actually popped up
and how the feeling was of the zebra and the cranes.
The zebra was stoic and steadfast and comforting, the cranes were exhilarating and uplifting.</i>In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Lisa awoke first, sticky with sweat. Quietly, she jiggled her leg which was dead from lack of circulation, letting the others sleep. There may not be much time for rest, she reasoned, we know not what the next chapter will bring, or where it will lead. She closed her eyes again, and contemplated the feeling of restriction, thinking about other times when she had felt restricted or blocked.
There was that time when she joined the creative collaberative writing group many years ago, with the intention of developing a free flow of inspiration and imagination. Indeed that was what the advertising bumph had professed, that it was to assist people to release themselves from their writers blocks, unleash their imaginative potential, free their souls to express themselves unhindered by protocol or hidebound tradition. It had all seemed like just the ticket, just what she wanted, and she had dived into the project and gloried in the unexpected things that were born from simply letting the words flow. But then a strange thing started to happen. Every time she went to the class, her contributions were criticized, scoffed at for not following the plan, despite that there was no plan ~ no plan had been mentioned in the small print when she signed up, anyway. But other people had made plans for what she was to write, and it confused her greatly. It was troublesome because the more she enjoyed the process of writing itself, the more discouraging the group became with it’s constant criticisms of the right way to approach the process. Instead of promoting less restrictions, it was constantly advocating more restrictions, more rules to follow, endlessly complicating it all. What made it all the worse was that she so enjoyed it, looked forward to it, and benefited so much from it. Well, she had used the experience to practice not minding about other peoples opinions and to carry on regardless, not restricting herself to acquiesce to other peoples expectations, exploring her own stories and connecting links and layers with other stories ~ wasn’t that what life was all about? take what you want, and leave the rest? Steer your own ship?
Her meandering thoughts led her to the words of the old dead guru, Elbutt. Love doesn’t mean liking every comment, he had said, Love means knowing and appreciating the whole story, the whole scenario. It didn’t mean you had to find something likable about each and every role, but to acknowledge and appreciate the whole and that the roles that were played within it were a part of that whole, regardless of whether you liked them or not. That definition of love had made a great deal of sense to Lisa, who was not one to use the love word overmuch.
A cockroach climbing on her foot distracted Lisa from her thoughts, and she absentmindedly brushed it off. The cockroach was not deterred, and returned to climb on her foot repeatedly until Lisa suddenly remembered Pseu. The cockroach, once it was sure it had Lisa’s attention, scurried out into the courtyard adjoining the Processing department waiting room, stopping on a manhole cover, and then returning to Lisa’s foot, and then returning to the manhole cover.
“Are we to go down there?” whispered Lisa, pretending to cough as a guard walked past. The cockroach did a pirouette as if to confirm. Lisa furtively looked around. The guard had gone; it was time to wake Ivan and Fanella.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
The tunnel went on forever, forcing them to duck frequently and wriggle around in exiguous places. To make it worse, it wasn’t even fresh under, and the heat carried on as they went further inside. At times, Arona started to have anxiety flashes, as she was reminded of the labyrinthine tunnels of the dragons of old.
To give herself more heart, she put her efforts in continuing exchanging niceties and other manners of rude elaborate insults with the stranger, who surprisingly was a match to boot.
“Stop glumping, we’re almost there” he said to her, showing a final passage on a narrow ledge above crystal clear waters.
She was too exhausted to retort something witty, but took a mental note that he deserved one more of what she had.
When they emerged, the sun was almost set. The tunnel came out right at the rim of the floating land, and a tight network of ropeways were stretched under the tangled tentacles of the giant beanstalk, which kept the whole city and its neighbourhood afloat. More gymnastics in perspective she thought, but she was prepared for that.
“Don’t go too close, you’ll fall to your doom…” It was the first time the stranger’s voice hinted at some fear.
Arona smiled as elegantly as she could, despite being out of breath and red as a purpato. Lifting a limp Mandrake from the ground, she suddenly unwrapped her heavy cloak and lunged into the void below, the wind blowing in her strange mouldy wings.
“Follow me if you dare!” she shouted to the stranger, while struggling to navigate the downward spiral like an oversized flying squirrel.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“I can’t believe I thought I was fired”, said Terry. She tittered.
They had shown the letter to Maurana when she arrived, and to Consuela’s dismay, noticed their three names were now on the envelope.“Rumor has it that she nails whole cat skins on her walls”, said Maurana.
“Only road kicked ones”, added Terry.
“That’s disgusting. The bitch”, said Consuela. Had the thing not been so sensitive, Maurana would have laughed at Cedric’s grimace.
“When do you think she will arrive ? And why would they put someone on our back ? We were doing great on our own.”In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
The room numbers were framed in a golden disc carved with what looked like zodiac animals and a circle of eights.
Linda observed the man walking in front of her. As soon as the effects of the lust gas had dissipated, she had been able to focus on something else than his butt. He’d been watching over his shoulder, and it was not to see if she was keeping with his pace. He had been frowning ever since she’d met him, and you could say his whole attitude exuded wariness. Despite her Happiness Training and the meditation practice at night with Sadie, she was beginning to feel some bowel tension. Not good for her digestion.
He stopped in front of room 57. He knocked, didn’t wait for an answer, instead used his magnetic key to open it, and entered. She followed. He looked one last time on both sides of the corridor, then locked the door.
They were in a big yellow lounge. Linda addressed a silent prayer to the Good Taste Goddess, sympathizing with the pain She must have endured each time an interior designer had expressed such lack of sobriety. It wasn’t just the color. The furniture seemed to come from Hart to Hart, except the sofa was in a dark yellow leather, and the cushions in a bright magenta.
“Wait here ‘till I call you”, he said. He left through a door on the right, taking his frown with him.
Linda heard him talk to someone in the other room, certainly a bedroom. A feminine voice answered him. They argued for some time. The woman was the last to speak. Then the silence.Linda hesitated to seat on a jumping armchair with yellow and brown stripes. It was as if every cell of her body, and even the molecules of her clothes were repelled by the choices of the interior designer. She would have sworn her platform shoes were trying to levitate from the carpet.
The man’s head appeared at the door.
“Come in, she’s ready to see you.”Linda could see emotions struggle on his face.
“But I warn you”, he said, his fists clenched, “she’s been sick since we have arrived. If my wife is tired, I’ll ask you to leave.”
“Oh!” Linda said.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“I don’t know!” Jeremy shouted at the guy with the round spectacles and the Chinese traditional garments full of intricate Chinese button knots.
The guy showed no sign of losing patience although they’d asked him the question whole morning long.
“That is unfortunate, Jeremy” the guy in charge said slowly. He was stroking Max in long broad stokes, flattening the ears with his palms, while the cat was purring like an engine oblivious to the danger in the room. “As you know, there are many ways to skin a cat…”“Don’t you dare harm Max!”
“So let us recap from the start” the Chinese man said. “You told us you don’t know the man, or his companion. That they appeared and disappeared in a rag, to destination unknown.”
Jeremy nodded, trembling of rage at the way the man was holding his cat.The Chinese man gave a brush of hand, which all the goons in the apartments took as a cue to leave them two alone.
When they were all gone, he tightened his grip around the cat’s soft neck, and leaned closer to Jeremy:“My friend, the trace we left in our fugitive’s stomach led us to your place, so there is no doubt he was there. How he disappeared again is a mystery you will help us solve, whether you want it or not.”
Jeremy looked at him quizzically “so why don’t you use your trace to locate him again?”
“The problem is, by now, either he’s digested and dumped it somewhere in a hot steaming pile of shit, or he’s managed to cloak the signal. Those things were to be expected. I guess he went to you for a reason. He wasn’t able to locate our thief’s location without your help. So now, you will help us do the same.”
Jeremy protested “But we tried it already, with the cucumber and all, but it didn’t work!”
Somehow, a thought came with brief and intense clarity to him. The Chinese man noticed the glimmer in Jeremy’s eye and smiled thinly.
“What is it?”
“The map was working for him, as well as the cucumber, for some unexplainable reason. But not for you or me, it doesn’t mean anything! Of course! We have to try something different, focus on finding the person or thing you want, and let me draw another map.”Cheung Lok was starting to feel closer than he had been in months. He untied Jeremy, and gave him the cat. “Do it, do it now.”
Jeremy lifted Max, tenderly wrapping the cat’s soft body like a scarf on his shoulders. He reached for the wall and took a coloured pin off the cork-board.
While the Chinese guy was busy calling back his goons, Jeremy quickly started to draw on the skin of his arm a symbol with swirly lines, and going in a trance, started to dance into a swirling vortex.
“He’s escaping!” Cheung Lok shouted in Chinese to the others, “Catch him!” he said, striving, but only too late, to catch the youngster who had just disappeared with his cat inside the vortex which was already rapidly closing around them.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“You call that a contract…” Reginald and his two friends, to varying degrees, managed to keep queenly looks in their royal blue dungarees. “I call that being royally fucked…”
“Oh shut up and mop!” Cedric had become the most sullen and despondent about the whole thing, and would only reply by short sentences.
Amar was the most philosophical about the whole situation “Let’s see it that way, cleaning up the Time Sewers isn’t so bad; they’re no longer in use, we ain’t got nobody on our backs,… the pay isn’t fabulous, but we are!”
“Nobody heard about Linda? or Sadie?” Amar’s question was interrupted by a call on Cedric’s phone. His mother again.
When he hung up, Amar resumed his litany of questions and monologue, as an excuse for not mopping around. “Still haven’t told your mum, hmmm?”
Cedric ignored the last question “No, I haven’t heard about Linda Fucking Pol, or Sadie. Bitches.”
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Irina gave an appreciative look at the holographic map that Mr R had made of the island.
By a simple triangulation technique combined with sophisticated echolocation, the robot had managed to come up with a rough estimation of it, even though scattered patches were black, representing the blind spots, apparently due to the abundance of water bodies on the island that created interferences.“Well, it actually looks better than I expected, the coast is a bit rocky, but probably more temperate and less humid than here. Some of those spots here seem to hint at habitations…”
“Madam is absolutely right” Mr R opined with confidence, and a glimmer of pride in his forehead interface.“When the girl is well enough to travel, we’ll leave.”
“She’s still a bit cold and delirious.” The robot assessed, “Her condition has improved steadily, if not quickly. There is a good chance the green won’t go, but she will live.”“Have you finished the sentinel?”
“Yes, Madam. It is complete and will serve well in monitoring the gate. Besides water rats and wrecked boats, not much seems to have went through recently. Although…”
“Yes Mr R?”
“I’m not quite certain Madam, which is confusing for me, but there was a moment were my sensors noticed a presence of a young person, but it lasted only for a few nanoseconds in a row, then I could not perceive it… It probably was a malfunction of my sensors Madam, I apologize, but the humidity…”
“I don’t believe your sensors malfunctioned Mr R. I do believe someone’s been trying to phase in, but didn’t succeed. Make sure your sentinel can detect such things…”
She went on: “Another thing, before I go for my astral meditation. Did you manage to get me a date? I’m no rocket science expert, but it sounds easier to get than your quite astonishing map Mr R.”
“Madam is too kind. And as as always, perfectly astute. This should be easy, but again this modest robot has run into a profoundly perplexing paradox.”
“A paradox, how exciting. What is it?”
“According to the shifting position of constellations during the nights and the sun’s elevation, the results differ from one day to another. We have to run a few more test to be conclusive…”
“Is is a local occurrence?”
“It seems to be true for the whole island, Madam. It is currently fluctuating between a series of years, some of which I mapped to the following years, in no particular order: 555, 777, 888, 1010, 1111, 1212, and so on until 2121, and as well, a series of related geographical points on the Earth.”
“No wonder it seems to be the garbage collector of the entire universe”, she sighed.Then, something hit her.
If myths of such places were to be trusted… Could it be… the mythical Avalon ?
If that were the case… Who could well be the mysterious resuscitated bog mummy?
… One of the island’s Queens ?”She smiled to herself, brushing off the notion. Irina, you’re such a hopeless romantic…
