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5.12 Start of a New Life

Jun19

As it turned out, whether childbirth was better than staying pregnant was highly debatable. Sky’s labor had complications. Dr. Sebastian Hodgins, the area authority on supernatural childbirth, was called in to assist.

Leah was a flutter of worry. She dashed in and out of Sky’s hospital room, fetching coconut water, or a fan, or something to massage Sky’s feet.

The labor was long and hard, but the two of them made it through all right in the end. Dylan Sample was born big, bouncing, and healthy.

And entirely unghostlike.

As Leah drove them home, Sky couldn’t shake off the unreality of the whole thing. She was a mother. She’d sort of figured that someday she’d be a mother, but even through her pregnancy it had seemed a remote eventuality. Now the baby here in the car with her was hers.

She gazed into his face as she placed him in his crib for the first time. He slept so peacefully.

It was hard to be sure what she felt yet.

“Isn’t he amazing?” Leah whispered.

“Yeah,” Sky said, smiling distantly.

“And you’re amazing!” Leah continued. “You have made it through the greatest rite of womanhood! You gave birth to a child!”

“Well, yeah,” Sky said, unsure how to react. It hadn’t been a lot of fun, and she wasn’t so keen on doing it again any time soon.

But Leah’s appreciation did help.

“We’re parents now. It changes everything,” Leah said. “Dylan is affected by all the decisions we make in our life from here on out.”

“I suppose so,” Sky said. She wasn’t sure she wanted to think about that kind of responsibility.

“I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have with me on this journey,” Leah said.

Sky opened her mouth, but Leah raised her hand. “Don’t say anything yet.”

Leah knelt on the floor of the nursery.

Sky suddenly found it hard to breathe.

“I love you so much Sky. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Please marry me.”

Sky tried to speak, but no words came out. She held out her hand, and Leah slipped on the ring.

Leah pulled Sky into her arms, and Sky clung to her.

Running through her mind, over and over, were the words, the rest of my life.

She suddenly knew what was more terrifying than motherhood.

———-

I gotta get caught up on this blog before I finish my play session with the Wonderlands!

At last we meed Generation 6. It might not be clear from the pictures, but Dylan does have Leah’s light bronze skin.

5.11 Anticipation

Jun18

Veronica was inventing again. That made for plenty of adventures for the family.

“I call in the Routine Machine!” Veronica explained after she roped Sky into helping her test. “It uses advanced levitation and teleportation technology to get you fed, lighten your bladder, and zap you to your chosen location!”

Testing it was certainly exciting.

But the teleportation part turned out to need some work.

Hunter’s production was down for the winter, as expected.

But he could hardly spend a lot of time fretting. In addition to emails, he was exchanging letters with Eliana Baerwyn every other day.

She would be graduating soon, and he was terribly nervous. He wanted to visit her and tell her how he felt, but what if turned him down?

After the failure of his last date, Forest paid a lot more attention to Ali. One evening, he invited her out to the new western-themed club to watch a Simfest.

“I know things haven’t been great between us,” he said to Ali sincerely. “I’m hoping we can have some fun together and get past our troubles.”

Ali looked troubled, but she nodded. “I’m willing to try if you are.”

They watched a couple of performers and then made it upstairs to the lounge to get away from the noise and heat for a little while.

“How was your presentation?” Forest asked.

“It went very well!” Ali said. “I think they’re putting me up for a promotion.”

“That’s wonderful. I’m bringing in some great profits as well. We could make a good team.”

Ali gave him a hard look. “You never told me what you do,” she said.

“It’s really boring,” Forest said quickly. “You wouldn’t want to hear about it. Here, why don’t I help you relax –“

“Don’t you do that again!” Ali shouted.

She jumped to her feet and out of his reach. “I’m sick of you treated me like I’m some kind of gullible innocent! You’re involved in something you think I won’t like. I’m done with being patient. Tell me now, and we’ll see what it does to our relationship.”

Forest was suddenly terrified. “I–” he began.

Then he reached into his pocket and brought out the one thing that could end this conversation.

“Hey,” he said. “Let’s go back down and watch the rest of the performance.”

“Yeah,” Ali replied, sounding dazed. “Sure thing.”

Sky spent the tail end of her pregnancy bumming around the house. She felt too tired and too much like a whale to do any promotional work for Ghostwriter. Leah had decorated the nursery. Veronica was so eager to share intimate advice that Sky had started avoiding her. Charles was always asking her if she was warm enough or had had enough to eat.

Just to defy all of them, she took to practicing guitar on the front porch.

She also returned to painting, something she hadn’t touched since her band became a reality. First on her list was a portrait of Leah.

“I’ll start with your eyes. They’re so captivating.”

Leah enjoyed the attention, at least.

When the contractions came, Sky was more than ready for them. Childbirth couldn’t be as bad as continuing to be pregnant.

———-

Sorry to end on a cliffhanger! The second half will be posted shortly.

It turns out that the Not So Routine Machine teleportation feature conflicts with Sky and Charles’s innate teleporting, so it’ll be a while before you see it used again.

5.10 Homestead

Jun11
It didn’t take much deciding. If Sky and Leah were going to raise this child together, Leah would move in with Sky and not the other way round. Leah was from a large family herself. In addition to her parents Arthrit and Mazuki and her younger sister Miyuki, she had a teenage brother Raen and kid brother just starting elementary school. Her parents had started their family young and weren’t even sure they were done yet. The Samples, on the other hand, were all adult. Baby-on-the-way would never want for care. In fact, if anything, there was a danger the poor kid would suffocate under too much affection.

But as winter descended on Avalon with a vengeance, it became clear that the newer, larger household just couldn’t stay where they were. Charles and Veronica were already sleeping on a bedroll in the basement. Sky’s room fit a single bed with no room for expansion. And let’s just forget about a nursery.
No one wanted to bring the idea up to Veronica that they abandon the home she had designed and worked on herself. In the end, Veronica had to call the issue. “I have a lot more years of creation ahead of me,” she said. “You just see what I do with the next place.” So they started looking for a place to live that was a bit more scalable.
“We have quite a lot of money, really,” Sky suggested. “Why don’t we get a much bigger, nicer place? Not that this place isn’t nice, Mom.”
“I’d like someplace a little more rural,” Hunter said. “I need to be able to raise more produce if I’m going to expand this business.”
“Just so long as there’s a good dark basement for my research,” Forest said.
With those parameters, they cast about the island until they happened in Windemere Cottage, an agricultural estate in a less-developed area that had laid vacant for some years.
Sky was still barely showing by the time they were packing up to leave.
If Veronica felt badly about leaving her biggest creation behind, she never said anything. She did stand on the step of their new home for a while to look out at the tip of the top tower that you could see in the distance. But even then, she didn’t seem sad. More… admiring, perhaps. 
They had found a buyer for the place. Some couple named Sean and Cynthia Flynn.
“This is the master bedroom?” Leah gasped when Sky showed her the space. “It’s so elegant and cozy. And so much velvet!”
“And the bed is so soft!”
Sky beamed. “I’m so glad you like it!”
“Shall we give it a whirl?”
In light of the fact that they’d have to move their bedroom back indoors, Veronica did extra work on her bedroom.
Charles was very appreciative.
The boys set up their bedrooms in the large, comfortable basement.
Hunter began to set up his winter greenhouse in the barn.
To his surprise, Leah followed him there.
“Could you use any help?” she asked brightly. 
Hunter scuffed his foot. “Well, I can’t pay you,” he said sheepishly. “I’m barely breaking even right now.”
Leah shrugged. “I don’t need money,” she said. “I just love to work with plants.”
“Well, sure then!”
They worked together in near silence for hours. Hunter couldn’t remember when he last felt so comfortable with someone.
Sky hadn’t done too badly on her choice of baby mama.
Since there was a baby on the way, Leah bowed to Sky’s hopeful pressure and quit her job at the police academy. It was a grueling job with long hours that didn’t pay very much, and it seemed more important to have the time to spend with the baby when it arrived.

Since there was no child just yet, she found herself with a lot of spare time. When she wasn’t helping Hunter in the garden, she decorated the nursery.
“Wow,” Sky said. “It’s so pink.”
Leah clapped her handes and squealed. “I knew you’d like it!”
“But what if it’s not a girl?”
“Sky!” Leah said. “I’m surprised at you. It’s terribly sexist to think that a boy can’t appreciate pink. Pink is such a nice color.”
“Yeah,” Forest piped up. “What’s wrong with pink? It’s a great color for anyone.” That pretty much ended the discussion. Who was going to argue with Forest about manliness?

Hunter didn’t say anything. He just looked.
But he was grateful that when he stumbled over the pink mermaid doll, Enigma was there to catch his fall.
There was even something for feline family.
And canine.
And avian.
The pond had fish in it, to Charles’s delight.
All he had to do was cut a hole in the ice.

It seemed like just the right place for the Samples.
While Veronica was full of more pregnancy advice and horror stories than Sky could handle, Charles took it upon himself to take care of her. He was always near to make sure she was warm, fed, and comfortable.
Their new home was wood heated, so this often meant he trailed his daughter around and stoked the fire wherever she was.
The prospect of a grandchild was clearly on his mind a lot. On one hand, how could he not be delighted? On the other, it was a solid reminder that they were growing older. He sometimes had trouble believing he was old enough to have a child, much less a grandchild.
It turned out that the place was not quite as perfect as it first appeared. Some of it was in disrepair, and not always in obvious ways.
They discovered too late that the living room fireplace was not vented properly.
Leah was terrified when she saw the flames. She shrieked and cried.
The Samples were largely annoyed.
Charles and Forest dealt with the immediate problem.
Though the aftermath would take a lot more time for a lot less reward. 

Nobody was hurt, though, and the Samples knew better than to take that for granted.
Veronica immediately got out her tools. “All right, then,” she said. “You’re going to be harmless as a kitten when my grandbaby gets here!”
Leah threw herself into Sky’s arms, choking on tears. “I was terrified for you and the baby! I’m so glad you’re all right!”
“It’s all right, love,” Sky said. “It’s all right. We took care of it. Don’t cry.”
“I don’t want to be jerk,” Hunter said. “But could you two please go to your room?”
———-
Leah is an Artistic, Hopeless Romantic, Green Thumb, Schmoozer who Loves the Outdoors. She is quite seriously the Sample dream-in-law. I’m a bit perplexed as to why Story Progression assigned her to law enforcement, though. 
This is mostly slice of life transitional stuff to show off the new lot. I loved this place and wish it could have worked out better. But as you’ll see, not so much. Primarily, the problem was that the landscaping was so elaborate that there was almost no place you could do anything outdoors. No flat places. Too bad.
The nursery came with the lot, but Leah’s favorite color turns out to the spiceberry, which is essentially pink. I guess spiceberry would be the “bashful” in “blush and bashful.” (You foreigners can look that up :). )
Tangentially, I don’t think I ever mentioned it, but you might have noticed anyway. Forest’s favorite color is pink. I find this very entertaining and always make sure he’s wearing the color someplace.
Oh, yeah, and the Mai family is in fact large and still growing. I created the family from four anime sims I downloaded from ModtheSims, who I assembled into parents and two teenagers. The child Raen is actually the genetic product of his parents. (And he turned out very nice — I’ve seen him around town.) Then I forgot and left both parents as YA. They’re madly in love and still cranking out kids.

5.9 Escape to Reality

Jun2

After Veronica’s little freezing incident, it wasn’t a big surprise that a cold winter was coming. It descended on the Sample house almost overnight, bringing beautiful snow and ice with it.

Veronica set Charles and herself up with a bedroll in the basement, which was hardly living in the style they had become accustomed.

Veronica was spending more time at a desk processing research and less time out in the field these days, but she relished her field assignments when they came.

And there were always new discoveries to be made.

Ghostly snow prints in the kitchen….hmmm….

Eventually the nagging cold combined with Charles’s wanderlust. Charles booked tickets

And the two swinging seniors escaped to France for a long vacation.

It had been a long time since they’d had so much time to spend on each other. What to do first?

Oh, right.

The hotel had trouble with random people wandering into hotel rooms, but the elder Samples didn’t particularly care if rude people got a show.

The skies were so dark in Shang Simla that you could see the stars in a way you simply couldn’t at home.

Around the town, Charles even happened to run into his old flame.

After so many years, the spark was still there with Berthe. But they had their own lives and were too wise to do anything about it.

She did invite him back to her house, however, and they enjoyed a nice afternoon of tea and catching up on each other’s lives.

And then there were adventures.

If Charles was losing his touch, he wasn’t going to admit it to anyone, even himself.

But he did take some breaks in between scorching flame traps and sleeping gas traps to enjoy the simpler things in life.

Meanwhile, Sky tried to reconcile herself to domestic life. What was it that mothers did, anyway? They probably had to be able to cook healthy, nutritious meals for their offspring.

Oh, dear.

Wow, it probably wasn’t supposed to smoke.

All, right, her child was just going to have to live on pizza.

When the doorbell rang, Sky fully expected it to be pizza delivery. Instead, to her shock, it was Leah.

“C-come in,” Sky stammered at the door. “It’s freezing out there.”

“Yeah,” Leah said. “I think I need a heavier coat!”

She stepped inside, stomping the snow off her shoes.

“I, I thought maybe I should give you some space,” Sky ventured.

Leah nodded. “Yeah, that was probably a good idea. I had a lot to think about.”

“I swear I’m not lying to you,” Sky said. “It’s really your baby. I didn’t cheat on you.”

“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking,” Leah said. “And I’ve decided to trust you. I mean, who could make this stuff up?”

“Leah!” Sky threw herself into her girlfriend’s arms. “You’re amazing!”

“I love you so much,” Leah breathed.

“And we’re having a baby!”

———-

Not the best organized post, but what I had to work with was kind of eclectic. I couldn’t NOT post Veronica on the bannister.

5.8 Please Hold Me

May31

Forest woke late the next morning.

His mouth was dry. His head was pounding. He could only dimly recall waking up on the front lawn at dawn and dragging himself up to his bedroom.

What Flynn had done to him was only too obvious. It was clear that Flynn had some kind of supernatural powers — he was too young, too strong, too cold to the touch. Now Forest knew what kind of supernatural first hand.

As the fog cleared from his head, another frightening possibility occurred to him. He pulled on clothes and dashed to the bathroom to peer at himself in the mirror.

Not a mark or a blemish. No visual evidence at all that a creature of the night had taken a nightcap from his jugular vein. Though the skin around the puncture was tender when he touched it. He couldn’t even try to convince himself it was a dream.

As to whether Flynn had done more than just drink, there was nothing in his reflection to tell him. What else could Flynn have done? Turned him into another vampire, certainly, though Forest would like to think he would feel something if that had happened.

Flynn had played his hand. Not Forest at least knew what he was. What he didn’t know was whether last night’s display of power had been a hazing ritual for a new recruit or some kind of declaration of hostilities. What could Forest expect from now on?

One thing he did know — he was going to have to protect himself. Forest knew precious little about vampires, and he was going to have to start learning fast.

After drinking all the orange juice in the refrigerator, Forest felt a little better. But instead of heading to the Arcane Institute to look for references on vampirism, he instead grabbed his phone to call Ali.

They met at Enchanted Mirror Art Gallery in a downpour that kept most sane people at home.

“Are you all right?” Ali asked. “You sounded terrible on the phone!”

Forest beckoned her inside to mostly-vacant building to get them out of the rain. He opened his mouth to tell her everything — his plans and frustrations, his terror at coming face to face with his first dangerous supernatural creature, the nagging loneliness that followed him everywhere but when he was with her.

What would she think if she knew what kind of life he really led? Instead, his sense of self-protection won over. “I just had a bad day yesterday,” he said. “I was hoping we could hang out and you could help me relax.”

“Oh,” Ali said, her eyes searching his face for more information. “I had a really bad day too.” And she started to tell him about some sort of high-stress presentation she had to give at work.

“Never mind about that,” Forest said, reaching for her. “Let’s get to the relaxing part.”

“Hey!” Ali snapped, stepping out of reach of his arms. “I’m really not in the mood. Have you been listening to how much stress I’m under?”

Even Ali had it in for him. “You’re supposed to be the one who’s there for me!” he cried. “I called you up looking for support, and this is how you treat me!”

“How can I be a supportive girlfriend if you won’t even tell me what you’re upset about?” Ali demanded. “You don’t tell me anything about yourself. And I don’t know about you, but I expect a boyfriend to be for me too! I’m starting to wonder what I get out of this relationship.”

Forest just stared at her. “I’m sorry,” he said in a tired voice. “Tell me about your presentation.”

Ali shook her head. “I have a headache, and I’m going to be up all night writing this thing. I’m going to head home. I hope you feel better, Forest.”

Forest watched her go, and suddenly loneliness seemed as frightening as vampires.

If Sky pretended the drink had alcohol in it, it was almost as relaxing as a real cocktail.

She’d taken the test four times, and the result was the same every time. She was pregnant. That shouldn’t be possible.

At last, she nerved herself up and brought the test to her mother. She couldn’t come up with anything to say, so she just handed the pee-stick to Veronica without commentary.

Veronica started at it, her eyes widening. “Well,” she said. “Congratulations? It looks like I’m going to be a grandmother.”

“I can’t be pregnant!” Sky burst out. “I’m a virgin!”

Veronica raised her eyebrows and gave Sky That Look. “I love you, my dear,” she said. “But I’m not that gullible.”

Sky flushed. “I’m a virgin in the way that counts for babies,” she said. “I’ve never been with a guy.” She knew that she and Leah could have children someday — if they wanted them — via a medical fertilization procedure, but that wasn’t something that happened unexpectedly.

Veronica sighed. “Oh dear,” she said. “I hypothesized that this might be possible, but it just seemed too crazy.”

“What might be possible?” Sky demanded.

“Sit down,” Veronica said. “I’ll make us some coffee.”

Sky waited nervously while Veronica outlined some of her research in the spirit world. “I don’t think it’s the same for you and Charles,” she said. “I think the part of your soul connected to the Netherworld just reaches out and binds on to life wherever it finds it. I don’t know how you feel about this, but I only wanted to have one child. After Charles demonstrated his, um, alarming fertility, I had myself sterilized to prevent any more unplanned children. Not that I’d unmake any of you,” she added hastily.

Sky nodded slowly. “So I could, like, get pregnant from a really good kiss or something?”

Veronica shrugged. “I hope not. Your guess is probably better than mine because it’s your body. It’s not like we have a lot of test subject for people with partial ghost genetics.”

“It would be good to know this before,” Sky said plaintively.

Veronica gave her a hug. “We’re here for you, and I’m happy for a grandchild however I get one.”

Sky wasn’t so sure about the part where she was having the child, but it seemed she was stuck with it. The question was how to bring it up with Leah.

She, Leah, and Adam Bookabet had started jamming in clubs on off hours. The clubs got a bit of extra live entertainment, and they got a chance to play on some nice instruments. The group had decided to call themselves Ghostwriter, which fit since Sky wrote most of their songs. Folks seemed to like what they heard, or at least the ones who stuck around did.

Sky found she already had to wear loose-fitting clothes, so if she didn’t say something soon, the problem was going to start to get obvious.

“Hey,” said said to Leah as they were packing up after a nice session. “I was wondering if I could have a word with you.”

“That’s an odd way to say it,” Leah said. She saw the terrified look on Sky’s face and grew visibly alarmed. “Something’s wrong. Tell me.”

Sky opened her mouth, but her mind went blank. “I’m pregnant,” she blurted out. “I’m having your baby.”

Leah stared at her blankly. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“I’d never kid about that,” Sky said. “I’m really pregnant. And I know this is hard to believe, but it’s really your baby. Mom can explain what happened. I couldn’t follow all of it.”

Leah froze, her jaw hanging open.

Then she struggled to pull herself together. “That’s insane,” she said. “I don’t care what your mom says. Getting pregnant doesn’t work that way.”

Sky reached out to hold her girlfriend. “I love you, Leah,” she said earnestly. “You have to believe me.”

“Don’t touch me!” Leah cried.

Then, “Look, I’m sorry. You’re just not making sense. Why don’t you have a good night’s sleep. Maybe things will look different in the morning.”

Sky looked at her miserably. “It won’t be any different in the morning.”

Leah backed away from Sky, said her goodbyes, and vanished into the darkness. Sky was left to wonder if she’d just ruined the best thing that had ever happened to her.

———-

What really happened with Forest is that he asked Ali out on a date to the art museum, which was set to No Visitors for some bizarre reason (I fixed it after that scene). Ali was running pretty low on motives, and then while I was off dealing with something else, Forest autonomously used the voodoo doll to make her pee herself. GOOD GOING, Forest! Can you help me out a little here? After that, Ali was having nothing to do with affection.

It seemed like a good hint that even a love spell can wear thin after a while.

Leah was also running low on motives after the jam session. Sky tried to help by zapping her, but it failed out and took her clothes off for a few seconds. I couldn’t figure out anything to do with that in the story, so it’ll have to stay between us.

Note Nemo Hodgins and Alberto Sample-Royale in the audience. Adam Bookabet is there the whole time but manages to stand behind Sky or Leah in every shot.

5.7 Underworld

May27

Forest looked out of the old crypt shelter, scanning for Flynn.

The cemetery was filled with tall old tress. Now that frosts had come and they had lost all their leaves, they looked like old crone hands reaching out to grab him. Forest loved the creepy atmosphere. Though he had to admit that a cemetery at night was a terribly cliche place for the Emperor of Evil to arrange a meeting with one of his minions.

“I’m glad to see you’re on time,” Flynn said. He appeared as if from nowhere right in the place that Forest thought he was looking.

Clearly only minions needed to be on time to meet the master. Forest had been waiting in the cold for almost an hour.

Still, it was hard for Forest to contain his triumph. Flynn had wanted to meet him, just him, in a private place. That had to mean good things for his career.

“Have you ever been here before?” Flynn asked. His smile never seemed to look natural, but he was clearly trying.

“No, I usually don’t spend a lot of time in cemeteries,” Forest replied. “Our family keeps a private plot for our ancestors on our property.”

Flynn chuckled. “Then I have a surprise for you.”

Forest followed his boss along a winding path amongst the graves to a secluded crypt at the edge of the property.

Inside the crypt was a staircase. Forest raised his eyebrows. Flynn merely shrugged. “After you.”

It wouldn’t make a good impression to hesitate, so Forest descended into the tomb without question.

He had no idea what to expect, but even so, this wasn’t what he expected.

“Welcome to the Crypt Club!” Flynn said. “Even the underworld needs a good place to have fun.”

Forest looked around him. Music was making the walls throb. Lights flashed over a dance floor. A bartender stood behind a bar beyond the dance floor, gazing at Forest blankly.

It was a social club. On an undead theme. It was either terribly clever or terribly gauche. Forest couldn’t decide which.

Flynn’s first suggestion was a game of darts. Forest had a steady hand, but he found the game pretty boring. He just couldn’t get free of the absurd picture of playing darts with the greatest criminal overlord of all time.

Flynn caught the hint. “I like this song,” he said. “Do you enjoy dancing?”

Forest blinked. Was this a date? “Sure. I love to dance,” he said. Which was a lie. He hated it. But there had to be something he could gain from getting on Flynn’s good side.

Some day, he was going to stand in Flynn’s place, either by inheriting the empire peacefully or by overthrowing the Emperor of Evil himself. Until that time came, there was no better way to learn than from the master himself.

So, right now, he would dance.

The dance beat was hypnotic, and Forest was suddenly aware of having Flynn’s undivided attention. He gazed into the Emperor’s glittering eyes and wondered again what supernatural power lay behind those unnatural eyes. He had to learn and find some way to to turn that kind of power to his advantage.

The edges of his vision seemed to darken until he could only focus on Flynn and the rhythm of their bodies. It was exhilarating and, yes, intensely erotic. There was no denying Flynn’s desire. It was almost a magnet drawing them together.

Something is going to happen tonight, Forest realized. How far am I going to let him go? If he played this wrong, he might never get another chance. What would Flynn expect in exchange for the kinds of things Forest wanted to learn?

The music finally ended, dropping the club into sudden silence. The bartender began to pointedly clean up his bar. Forest’s vision expanded again to take in the room. They were the only ones there, and he had no idea how much time had passed.

“Come on,” Flynn said. “I’ll take you home.”

Forest followed obediently. His mind was racing.

They rode back in silence in the back of Flynn’s black limousine. He never even saw the chauffeur. The glass between the driver and the passenger cabin was smoked.

When they arrived at the Sample house, Flynn stepped out himself and held the door for Forest.

“I had a nice time,” Forest ventured, eyeing Flynn.

Flynn’s lip twitched. “I’m glad,” he said. “You’ll have to go there again.”

Odd choice of words. Did he expect for them to go again together? What?

Before Forest could come up with anything else to say, Flynn reached out to take his wrist. Forest flinched and found Flynn’s grip to be hard as stone. The Emperor was stronger than he looked — much, much stronger than Forest. Oh, Forest realized, his heart pounding. He’s going to go exactly as far as he wants to.

Flynn pulled Forest into an embrace, and it was as if an electric shock ran through his body. The touch was so cold, yet some other kind of energy passed between them that set Forest’s nerves vibrating. He’d never felt anything like this. Touching Ali had certainly never been like this.

Then he felt two spikes of burning ice pierce the flesh of his throat.

He opened his mouth, but he couldn’t even scream.

———-

Forest = not straight.

I didn’t discover this until he started rolling a crazy number of wishes for Sean Flynn. And Flynn, despite being married, is just as eager. An aspiring underworld leader and the warlord he’s planning to replace. Somehow disturbingly appropriate for Forest. And I’ll warn you now — it is not going to be pretty.

I looked up Forest’s gender preference, which I hadn’t done before — I was just going by wishes. He has that same wacky distribution as Weston in The Simmentary — something around 1000 for men and 500 for women. For comparison, Sky is like 12 for women and -3 for men. Whatever the case, it appears Forest is bisexual with a preference for men.

5.6 Chills

May26

It was morning, and Ghost was up to his favorite hobby.

The temperature dropped suddenly in the night. Avalon was setting a new low temperature record. Even Charles and Veronica, who were very good at keeping each other warm, were starting to feel it.

Sky had been out late with Leah again, but she slept poorly. She felt like her insides were tying themselves into knots. There was no point to trying to sleep longer, so she might as well take the opportunity to paint the sunrise.

“This frost chills all the way to my bones!” Veronica growled a she got up, also earlier than she had intended.

“Well, you *are* getting older,” Charles pointed out. “You bones probably chill a lot easier than they used to.” His eyes twinkled as he said it. Charles never really felt the cold himself.

“I am NOT getting older!” Veronica declared. “I can take on anything I could when I was 20. I dare you to let me prove it to yoouuueerrg.” The last word was hard to make out over the chattering of her teeth.

Then something unexpected happened. Veronica stopped shivering. In fact, she stopped moving altogether.

“What the–” she said in a strained voice.

KEEE-RUNK! Over she fell, landing on the frost-hardened ground with a thunk.

“Are you all right?” Charles asked. “Did you freeze up?”

“Will you hush up and get something to warm me up with??”

Charles smiled blandly and went to get a hair dryer.

“That did not happen,” Veronica said when she could get to her feet. “We may have to rethink our sleeping arrangement.”

Sky, watching from the garden, couldn’t help but giggle. But when she tried, it suddenly turned into a gag. She felt terrible.

Almost as if — but that was impossible. Impossible!

Right?

———–

Couple of short posts lined up because I didn’t really want to mix up the different moods.

HOPEFULLY they’ll be out quickly.

5.5 Natural Magic

May24

Enigma was most restless in the evening, and Hunter often found himself taking long walks with her starting at dusk. Now that he was in business for himself, he could set his own schedule as long as the work got done.

Avalon was a beautiful place at night. It seemed to have its own peculiar magic that never came out during the day.

Sometimes Enigma would smell something that would revert her to her wild nature, and in the blink of an eye, she’d disappear after some prey or another. She was always home by morning. Hunter hoped none of the neighbors had any missing pets.

This turned out to be one of those nights. He heard Enigma whuff, and when he turned to look at her, she was already gone. Hunter sighed quietly and started to turn home, but he heard an odd muffled clattering noise and turned toward the ocean instead.

A herd of wild horses had made its way onto the deserted beach behind old Tintagel Fortress. Hunter stepped out of the trees to the edge of the sand and stood watching them silently. They were beautiful.

Then amidst the horses, something glittering caught his eye.

Hunter gasped. Could that possibly be a horse?

It tossed his head as if to laugh at him. No, it couldn’t possibly be anything mortal.

Hunter just stood there, breathless and mesmerized, barely able to think. The creature watched him too, unafraid but keeping its distance.

The wild horses finished frolicking in the sand and moved on to better grazing land. The beach was now empty except for the two of them.

Hunter moved closer. The creature took a couple of hesitant steps in kind. And after a long moment, they were staring eye-to-eye.

It snorted. Hunter could feel its breath on his hand.

Then, without warning, it leaned down to nuzzle his outstretched hand.

Its nose felt like silk crossed with baby chick down crossed with daydreams and rainbows.

“Hello, Your Majesty,” Hunter said, keeping his voice soft and even. “It’s so nice to meet you.” He reached out a trembling hand and buried his fingers in the creature’s mane.

First, it let him stroke its neck. Then, suddenly, it threw its head in the air and let out a whinny like bells ringing.

Then it was gone.

Not like it ran away into the woods. Not like it disappeared in a poof of fairy dust. It was just gone, as if it had never existed. Even the footprints it had left in the sand were gone.

Hunter was left wondering what the heck had just happened.

After he remembered how to walk, he headed home and arrived long after midnight. Enigma was waiting for him with a quizzical look in her honey eyes. Hunter gave her a tired smile. “Sometimes I find something to chase too, you know?” he said. Then they settled down to sleep… or try. Every time Hunter closed his eyes, he saw the supernatural sparkle of that fairy tale beast.

Certainly Avalon had its own kind of magic, but this?

The next morning, he made his way to one of Forest’s old haunts, the Arcane Institute for Lore Preservation. It was a strange and kind of creepy place, but it wasn’t like you could go to the municipal library to check out books on local fantasy sightings.

He sifted through the old tomes, looking for sketches or keywords. And it actually didn’t take time to find it.

Unicorn: Old French, ‘unicorne’. Latin, ‘unicornis’. Literally, one horned: ‘unus’, one, and ‘cornu’, a horn. A fabulous animal resembling a horse with one horn. Visible only to those who search and trust, and generally mistaken for a white mare. Unicorn.

Sightings reported on clear nights on Avalon island, usually by the kind of folks people don’t take seriously.

Could he really have seen a unicorn? Touched a unicorn?

He knew he had to find it again and be sure.

Then he glanced down the page and saw something else.

“Hey,” he mused to himself. “Isn’t that the creepy doll that Forest has been carrying around?”

———-

Hey all. I’m REALLY trying to get back into the rhythm of posting.

You’ll notice that I fixed my exterior shot problem by pulling one of the promo pictures for the lot I’m using off of ModtheSims. That’s the Arcane Institute by Ye Merrye Makers, and it’s a really spiffy supernatural consignment store.

There’s been a lot going on, but there’s always a lot going on it seems. I’ve been playing like crazy, but it’s been hard to pick the story back up even though I have all sorts of things I’m eager to tell.

I’ve played WAY ahead — through the birth of the second member of Generation 6, and I’m going to call a hiatus on the Samples for a while. I’m going to call a week hiatus on simming, I think, then come back with the Wonderlands.

Of course, I also have this NIF challenge that’s poking around in my head, waiting for Island Paradise to be released. I am a sad, sad person.

5.4 Open Doors

Apr16

Things only seemed to get more intense for Sky and Leah.

They liked to keep things adventurous, and they were always sneaking away to woohoo in strange and exciting locations.

When Leah wasn’t around, Sky was usually thinking about her.

Hunter was also in a pretty good mood, though he didn’t talk much about details.

Forecasts warned that this would be a record-breaking winter in Avalon. Hunter stored most of his seeds and moved a few important plants into a makeshift greenhouse to last out the cold.

But the thing that his family noticed most was that he was suddenly spending a lot of time sending email on the computer. Sky thought she heard him say something about Eliana Baerwyn. She still had another term left in high school, so email seemed like a good place to talk.

Meanwhile, time passed for the Samples. Veronica and Forest bonded over chess — it was a good thing to fall back on when they couldn’t find much to talk about.

Charles took care of Ghost.

And one day Veronica’s phone rang. When she answered, it was the Mayor of Avalon on the line. They wanted to give her the key to the city as a tribute to all her work with the supernatural.

It took a lot to floor Veronica Krane Sample, but this definitely was it.

On the day of the ceremony, the old Motive Mobile pulled up at the gates of Camelot.

Sky took the chance to entertain the crowd before the ceremony began. If nothing else, it was a good way to increase her visibility.

Shanni made it to the ceremony. “I’m getting too old for this sort of thing,” she admitted. “But then again, I’m getting too old for a lot of things these days.” It was hard to take her seriously when she said that while she was holding her toddler daughter Holly.

Jeannette was there, along with Shanni’s elder daughter with Jeanna, Renee.

Jeanna and Shanni had shared a long and loving marriage after all, which was more than Shanni thought she was offering when they got married. They took every day as a gift.

It was a gift that couldn’t keep giving forever, unfortunately. This was the last time Shanni spent time with her extended family. She died quietly in her sleep not long after. Since she and Jeanna were married, she’d been saying, “If I die in bed with a hot younger woman, I’ll consider myself lucky.” And that’s exactly how it worked out.

As the clock struck 4pm, Veronica stepped into the Great Hall and accepted the award from the major, who she’d never met before. He shook her hand warmly and thanked her for everything she’d done for supernatural understanding within Avalon and throughout the simworld.

Veronica, who had been thinking for a long time about how she would respond, grinned and said, “Yes. About that.”

She walked out of the hall onto the lawn, held up a flask filled with colored liquid. “This is my latest invention, and I think it might help with supernatural understanding.” Then she threw it at her feet. The crowd gasped as Veronica was enveloped in glowing smoke.

When the smoke cleared, Veronica was a ghost.

“I wanted to know what it’s like,” she declared in a voice that echoed like Charles’s. Then she floated over to her bemused husband.

He seemed awfully human and solid by comparison. But neither of them was really paying attention any longer.

“You always surprise me,” Charles said breathlessly when they returned home.

Veronica chuckled. “Well, I try.”

Then she was suddenly solid again. “Oh, that’s not fair!” Veronica exclaimed. “I was hoping it would at least last long enough for me to take you to bed. Now I’ll have to make another one!”

But in the meantime, they headed to bed anyway.

[I had a picture of the key, but I can’t seem to find it. I’ll put it in a post at some point.]

———-

This was a really cute end-of-career award opportunity that got totally borked in some later expansion. I ran it about five times, and the Mayor disappeared every time without giving Veronica the key. I assumed this had something to do with the Jynx rabbithole rug I was using for City Hall, but no — when I looked it up online, this opportunity has been borked for ages. So I built a story out of it and gave Veronica the key using buydebug. 🙂

And, once again, how the heck did Hunter get to be so hot??

This is where I finally had to kill Shanni manually. She was caught in some kind of in-between glitch where half the system thought she was dead and the other half did not. I felt bed doing it; she’s a favorite of mine. But she’d already lived an unnaturally long life, so it was way past time. I didn’t even know that Renee existed until this sequence. I was only aware of Holly, who was an adoptee I replaced with a genetic child by both of them — I couldn’t figure out why Jeanna was adopting, and when I went into MasterController to fix it, I discovered Shanni listed under dead sims. Renee certainly looks like she’s a genetic child of Shanni’s though.

5.3 Haunting

Apr9

Ghost really didn’t like gnomes. With the way she treated them, you’d think she had a bad experience in her past. No gnome was safe from her wrath.

Veronica was a spiritual ambassador these days. She gave a constant stream of lectures on the nature of the spirit world, primarily focused on dispelling misconceptions and encouraging sims to approach spirits positively.

She also did a bit of outreach work.

Sometimes reality wasn’t quite as rosy as she made it sound in her speeches. Few spirits locked on the mortal plane were all that happy to be there. Most of them wanted get to back to the Netherworld. Sometimes they were pretty cranky about it.

But she was a persistent and skilled negotiator.

Usually they came around and started working with her to get home.

Then again, some spirits you just couldn’t reason with.

For those, you just had to open up the can of whoopass.

Since the Sample-Royales were such night owls, Veronica was able to take some extra time between assignments to visit her sister-in-law and nephew.

Tomas looked almost too old and wise to be a toddler.

She also took some time on her rounds to test out some fresh inventions.

“Let’s see if this helps you stop obsessing about my husband.”

It might have worked, and it probably didn’t do Ariel any harm.

One place in particular seemed to show up on her spirit reports, but the kind of activity people reported there didn’t really seem like the kind of thing that trapped spirits would do. Eventually, the reports stacked up so much that Veronica couldn’t ignore them. So she made a special trip to an old abandoned crypt on the edge of town.

Well, she’d been TOLD it was abandoned.

For an abandoned graveyard, this place seemed to have a lot of visitors.

She poked around inside for a while and found no real evidence of supernatural activity. Then she ran into a large, menacing, entirely NON-supernatural guard, who escorted her swiftly and firmly back outside.

“I poked someplace I shouldn’t, didn’t I?” Veronica asked.

The man grunted and closed the door. “Poke someplace closer to home next time,” he replied.

Well, THAT had been interesting. Not terribly useful to her work, but interesting.

It wasn’t long after that the doorbell rang at the Sample residence, and Forest opened the door. Standing on the doorstep was a figure that made him tremble just a little bit.

There was something wrong with this creature’s eyes. The longer Forest looked at them, the colder he felt.

“Who are you?” Forest asked. “Are you looking for someone?”

“Sometimes I’m called Flynn,” the figure said. “I just wanted to introduce myself to my neighbors.” The way he said it held some sort of menacing undertone. Forest could have sworn he’d heard that name before…. Wait, no. It couldn’t be could it?

Maybe it was.

Sean Flynn. The legendary lord of the underworld. Some called him the Emperor of Evil.

What on earth had attracted Flynn’s attention here?

Flynn was dangerous, and he knew it. More than that, he made it clear to everyone else just by the way he held his body. And he looked strangely young for someone who had been a legend in organized crime for decades.

His very skin radiated some kind of unreal chill. If he could feel it from here, Forest couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to reach out and touch that hand…

“Ahem,” Flynn mused. “I just came here size up the place, but perhaps I found what I was looking for after all.”

He handed Forest a slip of paper. “If you’re interested, call this number. We can teach you want you want to learn.”

Learn what Flynn knew? Flynn was arguably the most powerful man in the simworld. Of course Forest was interested!

Their hands touched briefly as Forest took the paper. The cold left a tingle on Forest’s skin long after the contact was gone.

Flynn turned immediately to leave. Forest couldn’t wait until he was off the property to make that call.

The very next night, it was Forest outside that “abandoned” crypt.

Except that they offered him a job, and he took it.

——–

So the subtext here is that in the University patch, EA FINALLY fixed the bug in the Ghost Hunter profession that was introduced in Supernatural. Veronica hasn’t been able to do the two top level jobs — Ghostly Presence and Angry Ghost Invasion — since she achieved the level to do them. I’ve mostly been getting her promotions by raising her Logic skill, which is why she spends half of her screen time blown up. Once she was actually able to do jobs again, she topped out the career and reached her LTW very quickly.

Since Forest’s LTW is Emperor of Evil, it was a foregone conclusion that he’d be joining the Criminal career. However, this little sequence played into the plan very well. Veronica got an opportunity where the police asked her to release ghosts in the criminal rabbithole. As she was leaving, Flynn came out, but he dashed away with super vampire speed before I could snap a screenshot. Then when she went home, for whatever reason he followed her, and Forest answered the door to talk to him.

This is the beginning of a truly disturbing friendship.