Tag Archive | gamora

7.39 Against the Waves

The morning of the wedding dawned gray and drizzly, leaving the beach sand a bit damp was the Samples set up for the event.

“Please don’t rain, please don’t rain, please don’t rain,” Victoria wished fiercely, decked out in her bridal sundress with her makeup just so.

And just like that, the sky cleared. She wondered if her mom had anything to do with it. She was pretty sure Andria was nowhere near that powerful.

Uncle Chaim was one of the first to arrive.

And he brought with him a surprise plus one, one Benjamin Mai, who he nervously introduced as his date.

Everyone still missed Aunt Abby, but it was good to know that Uncle Chaim was moving toward a life after her.

Uncle Sawyer arrived right on time with Gamora and her new husband Emmett in tow.

And Maya Ocean, who couldn’t hide her smirk at the whole event. “I told you so,” she whispered when she came close.

Edmund with Joy.

“It’s about tiiiime!” Vickie’s best friend Judith James cheered to anyone who would listen. “My girl is finally getting herself the right man!”

Jonah and Victoria walked together to the water’s edge. The guests gathered around and conversation slowed to a murmur. They could hear the rush of the gentle waves reaching up onto the shore and pulling back into the sea.

“I guess it’s time to do this thing,” Victoria whispered.

“Any time you’re ready,” Jonah agreed.

They exchanged rings on the sand, under the bright sun, with short, simple vows.

As they sealed their vows with a kiss, the guests erupted into cheers and throw confetti.

Uncle Sawyer really got into the confetti throwing.

“And not a moment too soon,” Victoria said.

“You’ve been living in the same house as that guy,” Edmund said. “What do you think of him? They had one quick courtship. That doesn’t really seem like Vickie’s style.”

“Well, he’s crazy about her,” Winston said. “That part’s pretty obvious. Maybe she just met the one and knew it.”

“We can hope so,” Edmund said.

“Trust you to see the dark side of things,” Winston said. “How are you and Joy, anyway? You thinking about tying the knot? I never thought of you as the kind of guy to live so long with a girlfriend before making yourselves an honest couple.”

“Um,” Edmund said. “Joy takes commitment slowly. I think it’s time to cut the cake.

Andria had really outdone herself on that baking.

Out of the corner of her eye, Vickie did notice that Joy always seemed to be on the opposite side of the beach from Edmund. She hoped everything was all right.

“Gamora Sample-Relevart?” Judith squealed. “The astrophysicist philanthropist? I just read about you in the Avalon Times! You built the new stellar observatory. Could I have your autograph?”

“Uncle Sawyer!” Vickie said. “It’s wonderful to see you! How is the new house and, um, new family?”

“We’re coexisting just fine,” Dr Sawyer Sample said. “It’s a big house. You should make an appointment with me for a pregnancy health check.”

“Oh! I never really thought about that,” Vickie said.

“You’d be surprised what modern medicine can tell us,” Sawyer said. “Your baby is a boy, by the way.”

“It’s, uh, thanks?” Vickie said. She wasn’t totally sure she wanted to know that.

“So there’s a little nephew in there?” said Edmund.

Jonah took a bit of a break from the press of the crowd to play catch in the surf with Connery.

Winston caught up with his cousin, who was certainly older and wiser and more content. He’d never been sure what she did in that lab she kept under Andria’s greenhouse, but apparently it was pretty lucrative.

A distant cousin, one of the Sample-Bookabets, captivated a crowd with some story about her travels.

Uncle Chaim took a moment to think about Abby.

“Take a look at that!” Gamora pointed. Judith had stripped to a swimsuit and was splashing in the surf.

She waved to Edmund. He took off his shoes, rolled up his pants, and started dancing with her.

Judith’s husband Mason didn’t seem particularly threatened.

“That’s a great idea! I’m in!” shouted Danial Ibari.

“I hear that it’s customary for the couple to dance together at their wedding,” Jonah said. “Would you join me?”

“I’d be delighted,” Vickie answered.

“Aren’t they adorable!” cried the cousin. “I’ll be sure to send them the pictures.”

Winston drifted over to Emilie. “Hey, do you like to dance? Would you like to dance with me?”

Emilie beamed at him. “Sure! I’m not a great dancer just to warn you.”

“It’ll be ok,” Winston said. He took her hand and pulled her close.

“Hey you’re not bad at this!” Emilie cried, laughing, as he twirled her.

“Quick moves are part of the job,” Winston said.

“Do you think your date can spare a dance for me?” Andria asked Chaim.

“Oh, of course!” Chaim said.

“Sometimes we geezers just have to stick together,” Andria said. And they were both Sample widows now, which went without saying.

Soon everyone was dancing together on the beach.

“I guess this is it,” Vickie whispered to Jonah. “Mister and Missus Sample. And soon baby makes three.”

Jonah smiled. “I think we’ll be ready,” he said.


One of my more successful wedding parties, if I do say so myself. Even if it did start out raining. I might have had someone back at the house use the weather machine before coming. I don’t actually remember.

Finding an even vaguely wedding-like dress that had a pregnancy morph was a huge pain. After this, went and downloaded a bunch of cc for future needs. Considering how much this game is about making babies, EA sure doesn’t think pregnant ladies need much to wear.

 

7.37 Somewhere in time

In the tech cave beneath the garden in the Sample house, the time machine exploded with light. Gamora emerged and landed lightly on her feet. Finally she could travel through that thing with style.

“Are you all right?” she asked Emmett. “Wait, where’s Fenton? Why is he on the floor?”

“Dunno,” Emmett answered, staring at the baby. “Time distortion? He’s fine, though. Didn’t even wake up.”

It was just minutes after she had left — over a year of subjective time ago. The paradox of time travel made her feel a little dizzy.

So much had happened since she last stood in this lab….

Oasis Landing erected a statue to commemorate her funding of generations of planetary conservationists.

(“I think I like it,” Gamora said.

“Somehow, I thought you would,” Emmett said.)

She filled her days cataloguing life forms that had evolved in this clean, safe, environmentally responsible timeline and comparing them to the flora and fauna of the less-hopeful timelines. She was in the unique position of being able to remember the branching of the timeline. Emit almost certainly could do this too, but they never spoke much after the Cloning Incident.

Here, there were luminescent caterpillars that chirped out encouraging messages when you picked them up.

And enormous flowers that gave off a nectar with amazing psychedelic effects. No wonder the people here seemed to be perpetually high.

In due time, Emmet proposed marriage at just the right moment.

And soon after they had a sunset wedding….

…at her absolute favorite place in the city.

Gamora’s new research direction in genetic splicing…

Resulted in little Fenton, a plantsim baby blended from genetic material she collected from herself and Emmett.

(“Are you using my genes or the Time Traveler’s?” Emmett demanded.

“You want the truth?” Gamora asked. “I don’t know, and I don’t really care. It’s all the same genes.”)

At first, she thought she would never return. Life could have been perfect in the future for the rest of their lives. But as time wore on, she thought about Sawyer more and more. She’d never told him goodbye. He didn’t know where she had gone. Without her, her dad would finish his life all alone. And… she missed him.

Emmett didn’t turn out to be as difficult to convince as she’d expected. “Life’s easy here,” he admitted. “I could use a challenge. Plus, everyone looks at me and thinks I’m that other Relevart guy.”

Gamora looked over the time machine one last time. “You sure you’re ready to do this?” she asked.

“I said I was ready,” Emmett said. “You don’t have to ask again.”

She took a deep breath and flipped the switch at the base of the time machine.

It erupted in a fountain of light that continued up into the heavens. Then it went dark forever.

“Here we go,” she said. “I hope you love my dad, because now we can’t go back. I did enough messing with downstream time by accident. The future’s in a good place. Let’s be sure it stays that way.”

Emmett shrugged. “I’m up with it. Let’s go meet this old man of yours.”

Gamora’s all-terrain hovercar was parked outside the Sample estate, just where she left it. The quick drive to her father’s new house on familiar Avalon roads finally made it feel real that she was finally home.

She burst through the door. “Dad! You won’t believe everything that’s happened since I last saw you. The whole family’s moving in with you, so get ready for company. And come meet your grandson!”

———-

Ugh. I assembled this post about a dozen different ways, and this was the best I could come up with. The gameplay was fairly straightforward, but for some reason nothing I did made a coherent narrative.

So this is the best I can do, but I hope at least I’m out of writer’s purgatory.

This is Gamora’s farewell post. She has triumphantly left the active household.

7.36 Everything’s coming up rainbows

The Time Machine lit up with an incoming signal…

…and dumped Gamora out onto the roof of the Oasis Landing time traveler’s center.

She was just never going to get that landing right.

She stepped to the edge of the roof and looked out over Oasis Landing.

Not bad, if she did say so herself.

She headed down the stairs and out into the town to explore.

No piles of trash? Check.

Crisp clean air? Check.

Happy residents? Probably check, but she didn’t really want to learn enough about anyone’s life to find out.

The rainbows absolutely everywhere were a bit much, but she wasn’t going to complain.

The wind smelled sweet. Her skin drank it in like nectar.

Gamora tried out a kite she had built a long time ago with her dad.

All right then. There was one person she needed to see. It wasn’t difficult to look up the Sample family’s address. It didn’t look like they was doing badly in this reality. Then again, she didn’t know how successful they’d been in the other one.

She was wandering around the grounds of the expansive house when JC Sample conveniently arrived.

“Hello, who are you?” he said. “If you’re from the Orphaned Flowers Association, I gave at the office.”

Gamora blinked. She’d been rather hoping that their time together at the time traveler’s center would have preserved his memory of her in his new time stream. Well, there was no help for it. “Nothing like that,” she said and reached out to take his hand. “I’m here as a representative of Simshare’s Clearinghouse Lottery.”

“A lottery?” JC said. “I don’t know why you’d be here to talk to me. I never buy lottery tickets.”

“We’re the lottery of the next generation,” Gamora said. “You don’t need to buy tickets to win. We can look into the future to see what tickets you will buy.”

“Are you saying I won something?” JC asked, “In a lottery I never entered?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Gamora told him. “I’m here to present you with a check for one million simoleons.”

“What!” JC cried. “Is this real?”

“Completely real,” Gamora said. “Don’t spend it all in one place.”

“I don’t know what to say!” JC cried. “This is what lottery? I’ve never heard of Simshare’s Clearinghouse. What’s your name?”

Instead of answering, Gamora blew him a pollen-laced kiss.

His hand flew to his face, and he stared at her. “Who are you?”

“It’s not important,” Gamora said. “Have a nice life. Oh, and actually don’t to worry too much about buying a lottery ticket.”

Then she jumped on her hoverboard and sped away.

Back at the time travel center, she set about tracking down Emit Relevart.

As usual, he wasn’t hard to find.

“So, that problem with the timestream,” she said. “Fixed it for you.”

Emit stared at her for a second. She couldn’t see his eyes behind the visor, but she got the impression his look was positive. “You did,” he said slowly. “Impressive.”

“I can’t say that I approve of using future knowledge to cheat on a lottery,” he said, “but seeing that you used the seed money to found nonprofit dedicated to the protection of the planet, I think we can let that part slide. You may be reckless, but you’re incredibly intelligent, and you care about doing the right thing. I admire that about you.”

“Thank you,” Gamora said. “I think we’ve found a lot to admire in each other.”

Emit frowned. “I’m not sure I know how to take that.”

Gamora rolled her eyes. “We’ve been dancing around each other through three time streams now. You’ve been sneaking into my dream capsule at night. That’s not creepy at all, by the way.”

It seemed impossible for Emit Relevart’s skin to get any paler, and yet the color drained out of his face. “Ms. Gamora,” he stammered. “I’m sorry if there’s been a misunderstanding, but ah… I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but…”

Gamora just waited for him to finish a sentence.

At last he sighed, and his body looked ten years older. “I am the Custodian of the Time Stream,” he said. “I live outside of causality. I keep time travelers from destroying reality. In exchange, I cannot… engage in any romantic relationships of any kind.”

“You’re lonely,” Gamora said bluntly.

He nodded. “It’s a lonely job.”

“And your vow of celibacy exists why….?”

“Children born outside the time stream are a problem. Let’s leave it at that.”

“That’s convenient,” Gamora said. “I can’t get pregnant.”

Emit shook his head. “You’re right. I like your company. But that’s as far as I can let it go.”

Gamora sighed. “I’m sorry too. I guessed you would say that, but I had to try.”

“Thank you,” Emit said. “It’s good to know you are thinking of me. You are lonely too.”

Gamora nodded. “I’m very lonely. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how to fix that.”

Then she started to laugh. “I think I figured it out. I might be a good time stream guardian, but I had to break the rules somewhere.”

She walked past Emit into the corridor where two time tourists were flirting, and she held up a glass orb in her hand. Her eyes glinted wickedly.

The male tourist’s eyes went wide, and he jumped in front of his date. “What are you doing?”

“Don’t worry,” Gamora said. “It’s not about you.” And he threw the glass onto the ground and watched it shatter.

Where the glass fell, a new person seemed to coalesce out of of the air.

Emit stared at the new sim, who stared back at him.

“Whoa,” said the time tourists, “You could be brothers!”

“He’s you,” Gamora said, “or at least as close as my dad and I could get with cutting edge timestream cloning. I gathered the DNA sample from you a couple of time-shifts ago. You might not remember.”

“You shouldn’t be able to do that,” Emit said.

“I know,” Gamora said.

“Hi,” Emit Relevart’s clone said. “This is a lot to take in. You’re the person who created me? I hope it was for a good reason?”

“I hope it’s a great reason,” Gamora admitted. “But you’ll have to be the one to tell me.”

“Whoa!” the clone exclaimed, his voice muffled against her skin.

Gamora stepped back. “Entirely up to you,” she said. “No pressure. You have a lot of options.”

“Actually, why don’t we do that gain while I figure out what I want?”

“I think this is going to take a lot of research.”

Gamora relaxed for the first time in days and gazed into his face. “I didn’t know you’d feel that way, but I was hoping,” she admitted.

“You have a lot to explain to me,” he said.

“We have all the time we need,” Gamora said. “And if we don’t, we can make some.”

“It’s crowded out here, don’t you think?” Emit’s clone said. “What do you think about getting a room?”

Emit Relevart watched for a while in silence.

Then he moved on.

He had important things to do. Important time things. Somewhere else.

“We could start with a name,” Gamora said. “Do you have any thoughts on what you’d like to be called?”

“I’d like to hear some suggestions,” Emit’s clone said.

“I did have something in mind,” Gamora admitted. “How do you feel about Emmett?”

“Ok, I see what you did there,” Emmett said. “That’s not bad.”

“I’m dying to see your eyes underneath that visor,” Gamora said.

“As you wish,” Emmett said.


The exact moment of Emmett’s creation got messed up, so I did the best I could. It was actually a clone drone potion brewed by Andria, though Gamora did (or should have) collected that DNA sample much earlier in the storyline.

My plan was to clone Emit, but it turns out you can’t clone him either. Can’t woohoo him OR clone him. Good grief. I have no idea why that guy is so locked down. Don’t want him to make babies? No problem. But making a sim you can’t woohoo just seems against the whole philosophy of The Sims.

So she used the potion on the random guy in the room, and I transferred Emit’s genetics over using NRaas Mastercontroller.

7.35 New Frontiers

Jonah set himself to exploring the ocean around the island.  The bays and sea caves around Avalon were fascinating and very different from the scenery he was used to.

The land was beautiful too. There were so many colors and types of plants — grass, flowers, bushes, and trees. Mountains above the sea could reach up to the sky and even have snow on the top. The air changed temperature much more than the sea as well. It could swing from cold to hot and back to cold in the span of a day.

And then there were horses.

Avalon was home to a small herd of wild horses. The first time Jonah saw them, they took his breath away. They were huge and majestic. Calling the sea-critters seahorses was just a joke.

He slowly worked his way on land to try to get close to them. His first attempts were an instant failure.

Jonah was a thoughtful and determined merman, and he couldn’t get them out of his mind. He watched the horses for hours and approached them much more gradually.

That attempt was ultimately a failure too.

Winston had developed a fan base. A little fan club had even sprung up on the Internet. He lurked there every once in a while just for the ego boost.

He started seeing familiar faces show up at his performances.

One name started showing up over and over again on the fan club forum — Emilie Weaver. Eventually Winston got a chance to meet her face-to-face.

“I can’t believe we’re finally talking!” she enthused. “You look amazing on the stage, but you’re even more attractive up close.”

“I’m not sure what to say to that,” Winston said. “Thanks?”

“I enjoy watching your show, but I’m not a mindless fangirl,” Emilie said. “Well, not just a mindless fangirl.” She laughed.

The longer Winston talked to Emilie, the longer he wanted to. The chemistry between them was hard to deny. Were there rules about dating fans? Were there rules about having fans? This was new territory. A huge was probably all right.

But his mind was on other things.

Gamora activated the time machine. It was ready for one more whirl through the continuum. This was the moment where she learned whether all her carefully laid groundwork was built on the correct assumptions about the time stream.

There was no way to know without going there to see. And if it didn’t work, well… she’d just have to come up with a new plan. Everything was fixable with time?

She took a deep breath and jumped.

7.34 Causality

Victoria and Jonah had a lifetime to catch up on. They spent almost all their time together. It helped that Vickie’s income came from selling her diving discoveries and had no particular schedule.

Indeed, diving was one thing they could do together. They shared a passion for the sea, and that did a lot to bridge the chasm of their life experience. Vickie was conscious that this was much more time than Jonah had ever spent out of the water. She tried not to keep him away so long that it became painful for him.

After plenty of landwalker woohoo, Jonah was eager to show Vickie the pleasures of aquatic life.

Vickie found the idea exciting.

Woohoo and the sea, two of her favorite things together? What could be better?

Jonah was certainly thrilled.

It was certainly fun, but Vickie had to admit that her dive equipment made everything a bit awkward.

In the end, they found a compromise.

It worked pretty well for them.

Edmund called.

He and Joy had found a perfect cottage. They were just starting to unpack, but he hoped to invite the family for a housewarming gathering as soon as possible.

Edmund had just had a birthday, so this would be a chance to celebrate two parts of his new life at the same time.

At around the same time, Gamora got a very different call from her father.

It was about her stepmother.

Gamora hung and immediately went go find her father. He wasn’t exactly a people person, and he wouldn’t expect to talk to anyone about Emily’s loss. Gamora knew Sawyer well enough to know he’d be wrong.

When his shift ended at the hospital, Gamora was waiting for him. “Hey Dad,” she said. “I thought tonight would be a good time to take you to dinner.”

Sawyer scowled at her. “You don’t eat,” he said. “We’ve been over that before.”

“I’ll watch you eat,” Gamora said. “That’s entertaining enough.”

The fact that he didn’t argue further was a sign of how bleak he was feeling.

Sawyer focused on his food and said very little. Gamora told him about her progress at the astronomy center. Their current focus was clearing space debris which, combined with environmentalist initiatives she was also funding, promised to keep the planet healthy for hundreds of years to come.

“You’re making good use of all that money you cheated from the future,” Sawyer said. “I hope there isn’t some causality loop that unravels all your planning.”

“I specialize in time causality, Dad,” Gamora said. “Give me a little credit here.”

Sawyer finished his meal, sat back, and looked at her. He was lost in thought, and a half smile tugged at his mouth.

Gamora smiled back and waited for him to say something.

He exploded.

“We did everything!” he cried. “Cardiac enhancement drugs. Reinforcement surgery. Experimental treatments. She had the best that medical science could offer, and her heart still failed. I couldn’t do anything because I’m a neuroscientist, not a cardiologist. The cardiologist was an idiot!”

“Dad, I think–” Gamora began.

“I could have saved her life,” Sawyer said. “I’m a world-famous neurosurgeon. I’ve saved hundreds of lives, but I didn’t get to save my own wife!”

“Dad, you did all you could,” Gamora said. “You haven’t saved everyone who came to you either. It doesn’t have to be anyone’s fault.”

“She died in the operating room,” Sawyer said. “I couldn’t do anything. I hate being helpless. I shouldn’t ever be helpless.”

“Emily was my lead nurse and research associate,” he said. “She worked with me on all my recent research. How can I got back without her?”

Gamora didn’t say anything. She just hugged him. He broke down and cried on her shoulder, and she held him tight. Then she took him home and stayed there so he wouldn’t be alone.

After some long talks with his daughter, Sawyer decided to retire. He purchased a new, nicer house. The two of them set to upgrading the interior with bits of technology Gamora had gleaned from the future. Sawyer didn’t seem nearly as bothered by tangling the timeline when the result cooked and cleaned for him.

Gamora wondered where all this compassion came from. Since when was she the kind of person to hold someone, even her dad, while he cried?

Maybe she was now.

7.29 Build a new narrative

One afternoon, while she was placing some of her diving discoveries for sale at the consignment store, Vickie heard a familiar voice call her name. “Victoria Sample, is that you?”

She turned around to find Danial Ibari.

“There you are!” he exclaimed when their eyes met. “How the heck are you? It’s been too long.”

Vickie took a half-step back. Was this really Danial. He was grinning from ear to ear. When they’d last spoken, he was a shell of a man after his wife Sandra died. She’d been giving him space. “Wow,” she managed. “You look amazing.”

“It’s great to hear that because I feel amazing,” Danial said. “Life is really looking up. I still miss Sasha, but there’s so much living still to do.”

“I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear that,” Vickie said. “I was really worried about you. You deserve the very best in life.”

She remembered how Danial had felt crying on her shoulder as she held him at Sasha’s funeral. They’d really had a connection then. Then she’d let Roderick monopolize her time. What a mistake that turned out to be.

“You were with me when I hit bottom,” Danial said. “I never got a chance to thank you.”

Vickie flushed. “I didn’t think about it that way,” she said. “You’re just… you’re a great guy, Danial.”

“I know you understand that part of me died with Sasha. I feel like I’m on my second life now. I have my beautiful daughter with Sasha. You have to meet her, Vickie! And now I’m getting married again!”

“I’m so glad–” Vickie began. “You’re what?”

“I know it’s kind of sudden,” Danial said. His eyes were alight, and the words came out in a rush. “I met Devon Marmalade right after my little girl was born, and we just clicked. She has a huge family, and they adopted me. It’s like all the loneliness was the price I had to pay for this moment.”

“Wow…” Vickie said. “I’m so happy for you.”

After she escaped from the consignment store, Vickie spent the rest of the afternoon with Connery. At least their love for each other was simple and easy to understand.

“You don’t think I missed out with Danial, do you boy? Of course not! I don’t need a guy right now. When I want a boyfriend, there are plenty of single guys out there to find.”

Connery was very supportive.

Was she ready, though? Vickie could never really remember feeling lonely. Attention from boys always ended up awkward. They seemed to want something she couldn’t give. But she could imagine what it would be like to have a partner — a real partner — and it was nice. It just seemed like such a remote fantasy.

The next day dawned bright and beautiful.

“When is the last time I took you out sailing?” she asked Andria.

“I think the last time was never,” Andria said.

“Well, that’s a mistake I plan to fix right now,” Vickie said. “Bring your fishing rods. There’s a lot more I want to learn.”

Edmund rang the doorbell at Marisela’s Flynn’s house and tapped his foot as he waited. She had invited him here, but he couldn’t help feeling nervous anyway.

The door opened, and a scowling man walked out onto the front step. He didn’t say anything.

“I’m looking for… Marisela?” Edmund said nervously.

The man nodded his head and stepped aside.

“Edmund!” Marisela said. “I’m so glad you could come! I see you met my partner Brock.”

Edmund’s eyes darted over to Brock, looming at them just out of reach. “I guess I have now,” he said.

“Things happened so fast when you… turned me back,” Marisela said. “I didn’t really thank you the way I should have.”

“The look on your face was all the thanks I needed,” Edmund said. “The truth is that I didn’t know if I could do it. The Fae Council didn’t know if it could be done. The whole thing might have come to nothing. I hope I could have avoided hurting you.”

“I was ready to take the risk,” Marisela said. “You’re the first sim who ever tried to release me from my undead cage.”

“Was it really a cage to you?” Edmund asked. “I have revived other vampires now, and they all seem relieved. I did not expect that.” He didn’t exactly say that he had been reviving them without their consent, but that understanding hung between them.

“You don’t know what it feels like to be a creature of the night,” Marisela said. Her face looked haunted.” Old sims who sought it out for immortality have had time to regret. I had given up hope.”

“I’m forever grateful for your trust,” Edmund said. “And, uh, Brock, can I help you?”

Brock pushed his way into the conversation. “Hey, did you hear the one about the sim who went to the park and put his car in his pocket?” he rumbled.

“It’s… a joke?” Edmund said.

“Oh dear,” Marisela said. “Don’t let my husband bother you. He has a strange sense of humor.”

“No, really,” Brock insisted. “I have a million of ’em.”

Edmund couldn’t remember when he’d laughed so hard. Some of it was relief, but the guy really was funny. “You’re a great guy, Brock,” he said.

“Because of you, we’re going to have a baby!” Marisela said. “We’ve wanted a family for so long. Please come visit when she’s born. If you’re willing, we’d like you to be our child’s godfather.”

“Wow,” Edmund said. “I’d be honored.”

[Brock’s face! He looked so scary, but all he wanted to do was tell jokes.]

After their house was destroyed, Manisha and her husband Ash had a messy divorce. They now shared custody of their adopted daughter and lived on opposite sides of Avalon — as far apart as they could manage on the island. Manisha reverted to her maiden name of Kapoor.

Ash Sample-Baerwyn wasn’t as easy to track down as she has expected. He had an active Internet life of conspiracy theories about asteroid threats, but when he left his house, his behavior was fairly random.

On evening after work, Gamora finally found him out dancing at a local beach club.

He and his date seemed to be getting on well, and that was inconvenient.

Gamora needed to get rid of her, and she wasn’t entirely sure what to do about it. While she was scheming, Ash’s date seemed to remember something and dashed away.

Well, that was much more convenient.

She remembered the disguise as if she’d used it yesterday. It was strange to pull this identity back on. She’d never expected to use it again.

“Mr. Sample-Baerwyn!” she called out. “I’m so surprised to see you here!”

Ash turned and stared at her. “Wow,” he said. “You’re the one who started it all. Where did you disappear to? What is your name?”

“I found your asteroid apocalypse page online,” Gamora said. “I never imaged so many people would believe that an asteroid was coming to destroy our planet!”

“You opened my eyes,” Ash said. “Did you know that my house was destroyed by a meteor a few days after I spoke to you?”

Gamora managed a believable gasp. “Oh no! Was everyone all right?”

“Nobody was injured,” he said. “I knew then that we are all doomed. We have to enjoy our last days as much as we can, and to heck with the future.”

Yup… that’s definitely how he ended up divorced.

Gamora grimaced. “Well, about that….” she said.

Ash looked alarmed. “Is it coming?” he demanded. “What do you know?”

She looked down and cranked up her pheromone release as much ash she could. Breathe out, breathe in, hope he would be suggestible enough…. “The asteroid has changed course. We’re all saved.”

“What!” Ash said. “How could that happen? We’re all doomed!”

“It’s the new Astrophysics research facility,” Gamora said. “Did you hear about it?”

“That place?” he said. “I heard about it. Great big deep space telescope by the science facility. Built from a grant from some rich science snob named Sample. We’re probably related. What about it?”

“It was founded because astrophysicists read your website,” Gamora said. “They believed you and went looking for a way to solve the planet. A new probe just reached the asteroid and pushed it on a course to the sun instead.”

“You’re a hero, Mr. Sample-Baerwyn.”

Ash was dumbfounded. “You. What. That can’t be right.”

“It is! You saved the planet! If you don’t believe me, send your followers to read the records at the Astrophysics lab.” If they looked, and Gamora wasn’t entirely sure they would, she’d left plenty of clues for good conspiracy-theorists to find.

“We’re not all going to die,” he said mechanically.

“We’re not going to die,” Gamora repeated. “Thank you for everything you’ve done. You gave us hope again.”

Ash blinked, as if the entire world was too confusing for him to understand anymore. “My wife and daughter…” he murmured.

“You should give them a call, Mr. Sample-Baerwyn,” Gamora said. “I’m sure they want to hear from you.”

“But, who are you?” Ash asked again.

“Don’t worry about me,” Gamora said. “I’m nobody. Just a concerned astrophysicist.”


Woo, this one wasn’t easy to write either, but a lot happened!

If anyone is curious about the Flynns….

7.28 Moving on

The next days were hard.

Every time someone walked into the house, they could feel the void of Dylan’s absence.

Andria threw herself into holding her children together. Whenever she saw them, she had a hug to offer or a kind word.

“You’ve been staying out so late,” she told Edmund. “You need to take care of yourself. It’s going to be all right.”

“I’m all right, Mum,” Edmund assured her. “It’s not really about Dad. I miss him, but there’s work I just have to do.”

“I hope it’s good work,” Andria said. “You’re looking so haggard.”

“It is good,” Edmund said, but he didn’t take the hint to tell her what he was doing.

Edmund was focused on cleaning up Avalon’s night. It was the most powerful affirmation of life he could think of.

He found Anton Pierce’s brother William at the beach house at midnight.

When Edmund walked into the building, he and William stared at each other for a long moment.

“Are you all right,” he companion Monica asked, looking frightened. “Should we leave? William?”

William suddenly nodded. “Anton said you’d come for me,” he said. “I’ve had enough. I’m ready.”

“I”m ready to sleep for the first time in many lifetimes,” he said. “Stand back, Monica.”

“William!” Monica said, her voice rising, “What are you doing? Are you sure?”

“I’m ready,” Williams said. He covered his eyes and waited.

Edmund called the magic to his fingers and whispered the words.

“It’s done,” he said. The one-time-vampire took a deep, shuddering breath — the first in a long time.

William said nothing more. He looked to Monica, who was watching wide-eyed from across the room.

They walked out of the beach house together, leaving Edmund alone.

Winston threw himself into his work.

The pub Fiddler’s Green offered him a contract for a series of Friday night performances.

He accumulated a few devoted fans, though he didn’t fill up the pub the way the proprietor was hoping.

Gamora didn’t consider herself terribly close to Uncle Dylan. She was buried in research in her new lab, and she didn’t learn of his passing until days later.

She emerged triumphantly, her eyes wild, holding a vial of glowing liquid.

“Now I just need to test it!” she declared. And who better to test it on than herself.

It felt good.

Aunt Abby found her standing on the grounds of the science complex. “We’ve been looking for you,” she said without preamble. “Why haven’t you been answering your phone? Wait — what did you do to yourself?”

“You look like in you’re in a bad mood,” Gamora said with a fiendish grin. “I can help with that.”

“Of course I’m in a bad mood. If you’d just answer your phone– Wait!”

It was too late. Gamora wasn’t really listening.

Abby stood for a moment, disoriented, as the effect washed over her.

“Does it feel good?” Gamora demanded. “I need to know. For science!”

“Groovy,” Abby said slowly. “Except there was something I needed to tell you about your uncle…”

Afterward, Gamora had some other ideas about what to do with her concoction.

“I bet I can blow the biggest bubble!”

“Whoa. I didn’t see that coming…”

Vickie escaped to the place she felt most at home. But she also was not quite herself. She knew what to do when she found a shark circling in the water — swim away slowly and nonthreateningly.

But just that moment, everything seemed pointless.

The shark swam away with a bruised nose, and Vickie with a few scrapes and a valuable shark tooth she sold in consignment.

It could easily have gone the other way, though. While her heart was still pounding from the fight, she stopped for a moment to take stock. She missed her dad, but she intended to live a good long time still.

She’d been locked inside her own grief for too long. It was time to think about someone else’s needs.

Vickie found her mom standing outside, fishing in a downpour.

“Hey mom,” she said. “You’re soaked to the bone. Come inside you catch cold, and I’ll make you some hot tea.”

“It’s all right,” Andria said. “The rain feels good, and the fish are biting. Look at this catch!”

“If you’re sure you want to stay out, would you like some company?” Vickie asked.

“You’ve never fished before,” Andria said.

“Could you teach me?” Vickie asked.

They returned home in the evening, soaked to the bone, and dried off over a warm dinner.

“You don’t have to be alone without Dad,” Vickie told her. “You’ve always been here for us, but we can be here for you too.”

“I know,” Andria said. “Thank you.”


Bummer of a post, but at least I’m through it.

Avalon gossip column:

Hunter’s unicorn pal has been kicking around in Avalon for generations, but all things come to and end in this game, even unicorns apparently.

Winston missed out on Paulette Callender. She got over her crush on him and married Java Weaver, my simself’s bastard kid with Tewl Langurd. I’m sure THAT will go well….

Java is in the Education career, and he sucks at it. I keep seeing him get promoted and then demoted. Paulette is in sports, and I haven’t seen anything about her in ages.

Townie adventures were all about the Langurds, it turns out. Sam’s simself also said goodbye in the most melodramatic way possible. She kicked her on-again, off-again boy-toy Stephan out of the house while she was on her deathbed.

And immediately after:

Sam has two young kids — a teen Claudia and a child Tammie. I think they were conceived by Sam’s male partner(s) at the time —  who might or might not have been Stephan. They both seem to be yellow hair and gold skin, which I’m pretty sure was Sam’s combination, so I’m not going to get visuals to tell me who their dad was.

At any rate, both got a nice nest egg.

As the simworld turns.

7.26 A different kind of person

Andria was waiting on the steps when Winston and Vickie returned from Barnacle Bay. “How was your vacation?” she asked, a sly look in her eye.

“The diving there was beautiful,” Vickie said. “I’ve never seen crystal caves like that…”

“And what about that boy of yours? Roderick is his name? Did you have fun with him?”

“Yeeeess… What are you getting at, Mom?”

“I just think he seems like a nice boy,” Andria said. “Maybe the kind of boy to settle down with and, you know, give me some grandkids.”

“Mom!” Vickie said. “That is way too personal!”

“I’m just not getting any younger,” Andria said. “I thought you could use a reminder.”

Vickie decided to go sailing for the rest of the day.

On the spur of the moment, Gamora called her dad and invited him to dinner. She and Sawyer didn’t see each other nearly as much as they used to.

“It’s nice to see you, but you don’t have to eat food to keep me company,” Sawyer said.

Gamora shrugged. “I like the irony of a plant chewing on meat.”

Gamora caught up on Sawyer’s genetic research, and she shared some carefully curated insights from the future. Neither of them brought up Gamora’s mother Manisha or the asteroid that had strangely hit her house. Gamora had to admit that it felt good. Her father was the closest she really had to a loved one, and she was aware of that in a way she’d never been before.

“We should do this more often,” she said as they got up to leave. “I want to know what the rainbow radiation does to your siminovium bacteria cultures.”

Sawyer opened his mouth to share more bacteria trivia when a fanfare erupted on the patio.

“You played the lottery,” Sawyer said. “And won?”

“I did!” Gamora crowed. “Isn’t it amazing?” She looked very pleased with herself and not nearly surprised enough.

Sawyer, on the other hand, didn’t look pleased at all.

“You did this with knowledge from the future!” he shouted at her. “Do you know what this could do to the space-time continuum? We could all dissolve into our component molecules? How dare you take that risk for some extra funding!”

“Oh that’s just great!” Gamora shouted back. “Can you give me a little credit? How stupid do you think I am? When is the last time you solved a tachyon combustion equation anyway?”

“I don’t do research that could blow up human lives,” Sawyer snarled.

“You did with me!”

They stood there for a long moment, staring at each other. Gamora could tell that underneath Sawyer’s scowl, her barb had hit home.

“I didn’t grow you to hurt anyone,” he said quietly. “I grew you because I wanted a child. A child who was just as special as I could make with science.”

“Wait,” she said. “I don’t want to fight. It’s not what you think.”

Sawyer let out his breath with a whoosh. “If you give me more data, I can think something else.”

“The future has already been contaminated,” Gamora said. She couldn’t bring herself to admit that it might be her fault. “I want to fix things, and the lottery is the first step. I wasn’t even sure that I’d be able to use information from the current future to inform this present. This experiment proves that the rest of my plans should work.”

Sawyer pondered this for a moment. “If what you say is true, it has enormous consequences to the Theory of the Immutability of Time Travel,” he said. “I won’t interfere with your scientific work, but I’d appreciate it if none of us die of time paradox.”

“You won’t,” Gamora said. “I’m going to make sure of it.”

Sawyer nodded. “1.5 million simoleons is a lot of money,” he said.

Gamora grinned. “Yes. It’s a lot more than I was expecting. With this kind of funding, I can expand my project.”

She bade her father goodbye and jumped on her hoverboard to return to her lab. She thought about Sawyer and Manisha and Manisha’s husband and their adopted kid. She heard Emit’s accusatory voice and remembered the trash piled up in the polluted haze of the future. She wondered which exact choices she had made were the most important to this time stream.

If she’d been a different kind of person, perhaps one who placed more value on her impact on others, what might have gone differently?

She wondered.

Vickie ventured back to the house around dinnertime. She found Winston in the living room, ready to leave for an evening performance. He looked anything but psyched to perform.

“Still no word from Luisa?” she asked?

Winston shook his head. “She’s not going to call,” he said. “I don’t know how I misread that whole situation. Why didn’t she just say she wasn’t into me? I thought… wow, I thought we really connected. I wish I knew what I did that drove her away.”

“Maybe she didn’t want to fight for your attention from all the other girls,” Vickie tried to tease him, but the look on his face told her that was a bad call.

Winston scowled. “I’m not that much of a player,” he said.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with you. I know you’ll find someone, and she’ll be lucky to have you for a boyfriend. Maybe… Luisa didn’t think she could handle something long-distance, but she didn’t want to wreck the moment when you were both having a such a good time. …Maybe she couldn’t facing hurting you when she could see what a great guy you were.”

Winston gave her a probing look. “Things are not going well with Rod, are they?” he asked.

Vickie cringed. “I didn’t mean to make this conversation all about me.”

“Here’s to two wrecks on the love train.”

Edmund waited patiently at the market until nearly midnight. The plaza was nearly deserted, save for a few sims who drifted in and out according to the theater’s schedule.

Finally his quarry arrived.

Edmund placed a bookmark in his book and rose deliberately. “Anton Pierce!” he called across the plaza.

The other man looked around to see who was calling him. “That’s my name,” he growled. “Or so they tell me.”

“You’ve troubled Avalon for more than three generations,” Edmund said. “Your time is up.”

Anton met Edmund’s gaze with unnerving, luminescent eyes. “Oh. Now I understand. I heard of you and what you did to Marisella Flynn. I wondered when I would see you.”

“I’m going to clean up this town, one vampire at a time,” Edmund said. “Now is your turn.”

Before Anton could react, he raised his hands.

Anton was caught mid-strike. Terror flashed across a face that had not shown fear in a very long time.

As the magic enveloped him, color returned to his deathly skin, and the glow in his eyes faded. He let out a surprised sound, half-grunt, half-growl.  “Yarrrrgh… that–”

“This feels amazing…”

“I– I never thought I’d be saying this,” Anton stammered. “But thank you. I had forgotten what it was like to be alive. It’s wonderful.”

Edmund smiled. “I didn’t expect to say this either, but you’re welcome.”

Anton took a deep breath, clearly relishing the air in his lungs.

Without another word, he got back into his car and drove away.


Andria met Victoria at the front steps after her return from vacation travel to ask her for grandchildren. Way to go, mom. LOL.

The whole winning the lottery animation is bizzarre. You get showered with confetti and a gigantic check appears from nowhere. There are no other sims involved. There wasn’t much of a way to build a story around that, so I just hung a lampshade on it.

Edmund is actually using the strong cure elixirs made by Andria to cure vampirism. Cure elixirs are supposed to apply to his Healer LTW. Unfortunately, it appears that the ONLY thing that applies to this wish is reversing transformation curses. Too bad. So out-of-story his doing a lot of transforming sims in and out of frog state.

7.25 All the romance

Dawn in Oasis Landing was pretty much the same as dusk – orange-gray hazy and the stink of pollution.

Gamora was ready to put this place behind her. Permanently.

Gamora rose early, not that early and late looked all that different. She had one more place to go before she returned to the time machine — the Oasis Landing Library.

She needed to now a lot more about the future history that brought her here.

That errand finished, she found herself on the roof of the visitor’s center, staring again at the enigmatic glow of Emit Relevart’s little holiday project.

“All right,” she said to herself. “I hope this works.”

And then she was home, with a backache this time.

“Are you here for the Simfeset?” the asked the proprietor of Coffee Under the Sea. “What name should I put on the list?”

“Twisted Tiberious,” Winston said brightly. “Maybe you’ve heard of me.”

The proprietress chuckled as she pocketed his entry fee. “Nope, and I never heard of that guy either. You’re up after the magic act.”

Winston had to admit that Josie Sample-Ursine’s performance was getting pretty polished these days.

The vanishing cabinet routine still could use some work, though.

Winston hated to admit it, but watching Josie screw up made him feel more confident. If the vanishing-cabinet-that-wasn’t was the best he was up against, this contest was his to lose.

Which he did.

The prize went to Daniel Ibari.

When Winston trudged home for a shower, he found Gamora and Victoria’s boyfriend having a shouting match on the porch.

“I don’t care who you’re sleeping with, you step on my flowers, I will cut you!”

“So, you live her too? Vickie didn’t say anything about a wicked — is your hair made out of leaves?”

“None of your business!”

Winston shoved his way between them. “Pardon me, I actually do live here.”

When he made it through the door, he found Victoria standing in the middle of the living room, glowering at her phone. “I have got to get out of here for a while,” she declared.

“I’m coming with you,” said Winston.

“Did someone say vacation?” Roderick chimed in. “I’ve heard you plan some truly amazing vacations.”

So she took them to Barnacle Bay, a lovely seaside village turned resort town.

Gamora was not invited, but she made it clear she had other plans anyway.

Victoria found them rooms at The Blue Bridle Inn, a cozy bed and breakfast that had been renovated in recent years and now billed itself as a luxury hotel.

“Let’s drop our bags behind the counter and get out on the water!” Vickie exclaimed as they burst through the front doors.

Rod grabbed hold of her hand. “Let’s check out our rooms first,” he said. Vickie shrugged and allowed him to lead her up the stairs, hauling her rollerbag behind her.

He opened the door with a flourish, and Vickie looked around. Rod puffed out his chest. “I slipped the receptionist a 20 and got us the honeymoon suite,” he said.

“This is our first trip away as a couple. I want us to have all the romance.” He pulled her into his arms.

Victoria fumbled with her bag. “Um, just give me a sec,” she said, finding a corner to stash it behind her. “Now I’m ready.” Roderick grinned a pulled her in for a kiss.

“You sure you want to go back outside?” he murmured in her ear. “The bed looks so comfortable.”

Vickie hesitated, processing what he said. Sure, the room looked nice, and the bed might be more comfortable that the one she had at home, but it wasn’t SO different. Why would she go on vacation just to stay inside?

“A bit later?” she asked sheepishly. “We can’t go sailing after the sun goes down.”

Rod’s smile didn’t falter, but his eyes showed his disappointment. “Sure, make me wait,” he teased.

They changed quickly and ran out the back deck to the semi-private beach. Victoria’s face lit up. “They have windsurfing!” She dashed down into the stand where the resort offered complimentary surfboards. Ankle deep in the water, she looked back to Roderick. “Join me?”

“I’ve never windsurfed,” he admitted.

“I could give you some pointers,” Vickie suggested.

“That’s all right. I’m still a bit jetlagged. I’ll just watch you.”

She was on the sea with the wind in her hair within minutes, feeling free as she never did on the shore.

Rod grabbed a cocktail from the bar and sat down to sun himself. As he sipped his drink, his eyes drank in Victoria’s expert movements too and fro across the waves. “She’s amazing,” he whispered to himself. “I’m so lucky.”

Edmund settled for some lower-key swimming.

Winston, on the other hand, was distracted before he made it out the door.

“Hey there,” the hot blonde called as she caught him as he walked past the bar. “New to Barnacle Bay?”

He took in her face and body in a glance and moved closer. “Never been here before in my life. Do you have advice?”

She smirked. “My friend and I were just heading to the hot tub.”

“You know?” that sounds like a great idea to me too.

The rest of the family never really missed him.

The sun was well below the horizon when Vickie returned to the short, and Rod was waiting for her.

“Did you have a nice time?” she asked. “You didn’t have to stay sitting around the whole time.”

Rod waved her worries away. “Not at all. The sun felt wonderful.”

“Well, I’m famished,” Vickie continued. “I wonder what’s at the buffet.”

“So… I was thinking,” Rod said with a twinkle in his eye. “What say we call room service? It’d be nice to get some time alone together on our first night.”

That didn’t seem like such a bad idea. Vickie met his seductive glance with one of her own.

“All right then,” she said. “I think I can be persuaded.” She blew him a kiss.

“Is it getting hot in here?” Rod asked, fanning himself. He took her hand, and she could barely get up the stairs fast enough.

At the top of the stairs, Roderick held the door to the honeymoon suite open for her. “Ladies first.”

Vickie laughed. “Don’t be full of such crap.”

He looked into her eyes, the teasing crinkle smoothing from the edges of his to show the longing he tried to keep hidden. He adored to the depths of his soul, and she could feel it. He drew close to her, and she nestled into his arms. “Is it all right?” he asked in a small voice. “I don’t mean to be a jerk.”

She rested her head on his shoulder and breathed in the scent of him. “No,” she said. “You’re being sweet.

She pulled away and drew them to the bed.

This part, this part felt good. They fit together so well.

Vickie had to admit that Rod had been right. This place, and this bed, were a very nice place to spend part of her vacation.

As they came up for air, Roderick drew back and gazed into her eyes. “Oh, Victoria,” he whispered. “I love you.”

She froze. “You… I mean I…”

“Shh,” Rod said, “You don’t have to say anything.”

So she didn’t. She let her mind shut off and fell back into the easy part, the part that always felt right.

But she lay awake, curled against him, long after she could feel the gentle rise and fall of his breath as he slept.

He loved her. What did it mean? What should she do? What was she supposed to feel?

Was this what love felt like?

She rose at dawn. Rod murmured muzzy nonsense against her lips as she kissed him.

Then she grabbed her gear and made out to the beach for an early dive.

The air was chill, and thick mist rolled in from the sea.

But the fabled undersea crystal canyon glittered with its own light.

It was just as beautiful as she’d been led to believe.

Back at the hotel, Winston made it downstairs as far as the masseur.

Then he spent some time at the bar, which was hosting a karaoke night…. well, karaoke afternoon.

After a few drinks, he teamed up with a local sim to sing a few ballads.

He thought she’d said her name was Luisa Libros. She was pretty hot. Oh, and she had a pretty good voice.

At least he thought so. The peanut gallery wasn’t so sure.

He thought he felt a connection, but there had been so MANY hot women at the resort he’d connected with. She headed out before he could ask for her number.

Edmund took in the view from his room and pondered the meaning of life.

When Victoria returned from diving, she found Roderick in an alcove off of the dining room.

“Did you realize they have a  screening theater here?” he told Vickie excitedly. “The proprietress says they host a film festival in the fall. We should totally come back then! Here, you should really see this. This director uses light like I’ve never seen. It’s almost film noire, except not really.”

“Oh, wow,” Vickie said. “I’m so glad you had a good time. But did you go outside at all?”

Rod blushed. “Well, I… no, no I didn’t. Their film collection has some classics I’ve never seen before.”

“Wow,” she said.

He patted the seat beside him. “You should sit down and rest. I’d love to share this film with you.”

“Thanks,” she said, “But I’m pretty tired after diving, and I’m crusted with salt. I’ll see you at dinner.”

They called an early night.

Which was a good thing because a couple of drunk regulars woke everyone up with a loud pillow fight at one AM.

Winston was back in the hot tub for the evening when he was met with a surprise.

“Luisa? I thought you went home!”

“I did go home silly. It wasn’t far away. I thought I’d come back and see if you were still around.”

“I’m still around,” Winston said. “Definitely still here!”

She turned out to be just as fun as she was hot. They were up late, laughing and talking.

He couldn’t imagine the vacation could go better.

In the morning, Vickie caught Winston at breakfast. “How was the night?” she asked slyly. “You sure seemed to be having a great time when I went to bed. Who was the girl?”

“Luisa,” Winston said, “And… I think I need to spend more time in this town. Maybe a lot more time.”

“My wild and crazy brother couldn’t be taking some girl seriously?” she asked.

“Come on,” Winston wheedled. “I’m not that wild and crazy.”

“Says you.”

“I’m really not feeling so hot,” Rod admitted. “I think I’m coming down with something. Air travel, the hotel, you just never know what you might be exposed to.”

“Don’t worry about me, though. There’s a special screening this afternoon, and I hear they booked the mayor.”

Vickie leaned in to kiss him, then thought the better of it. “Just so long as you’re having a good time,” she said.

“Don’t worry about me,” Rod said. “Everything your brothers told me about your vacationing is true. I’m having a fabulous time.”

So she left him watching a science fiction robot thriller

and went cave diving.

Winston spent his last evening in Barnacle Bay out under the stars with Luisa.

“I’d really like to see more of you,” he told her earnestly.

She gave him a secretive smile. “Well, you have my number.”

“I’ll call as soon as I get home.”

“I’ll be here.”

He did call as soon as he was back in his room. The phone number she gave him connected to a local restaurant.

He never saw her again, and he never found out why.


I wrote a post! I wrote a post!

Yeah… so Winston and Luisa REALLY hit it off. I thought he’d finally found The One and was going to get into a serious relationship.

The NRaas Traveler erased their entire relationship when he returned home. Sadly, the whole travel process was glitchy going and coming.

I’m sure that if I sent him back, the whole romance would have been right there waiting for him, but I took it as a sign that the story was going somewhere else.

7.24 What trust is worth

Gamora fell out of the time machine onto her butt. Again. She was never going to figure out how to handle that thing gracefully.

She stood, rubbing her backside, and took in the view from the Oasis Landing traveler’s center.

“Maybe it’s sunrise,” she thought to herself, squinting at the orange haze. “Or sunset? The air can’t be that bad.” But the truth was she knew better. Her photosynthetic skin was already absorbing the polluted air, and it tasted terrible.

She walked down out of the traveler’s center to the grubby street. It was dotted with empty buildings and huge mounds of twisted metal. She watched a local sim walk up to a mound and drop some old clothes onto what looked like a protruding chrome bedframe, then walk away looking satisfied at a job well done.

Unable to help herself, she bent down to examine what the Oasis Landing sims were throwing away.

The answer shouldn’t have been surprising. Everything. Disposable food cartons. Broken digital viewscreens. Old plumbing.

While she was digging, cautiously, in the detritus, a plumbot ran up and threw an arm onto the pile — presumably she’d just had it replaced. Watching a being of metal littering bits of herself just seemed impossibly ironic. Gamora stifled an appalled giggle.

Appalled giggle? Was that even a real thing? Apparently so.

She wandered back to the travelers’ center at dusk. It was unchanged from what Gamora remembered from previous visits, which now made it an island of cleanliness and repair in a sea of yuck.

Emit Relevart was standing just inside the door, waiting for her.

Gamora looked at him nervously. “I can’t possibly be responsible for this,” she said.

“You’re certain?” Emit asked.

He went on to recite what sounded like a history text. “After a mysterious asteroid destroyed the home of the Sample-Baerwyn family of Avalon, the couple divorced over disagreement stemming from the cause of the explosion. Husband Ash Sample-Baerwyn went on to found the Smashed Earth Society, a community of sims who believed that the destruction of the planet by asteroid strike was inevitable. The Smashed Earth Society was the beginning of generations of destructive behavior toward our planet.”

“Still think this has nothing to do with you?”

The more Gamora heard, the more she felt herself shrinking into herself. “You’re going to blame me for generations of bad decisions made by other sims?” she shouted defensively. “Sims don’t need my help to ruin their lives!”

“I invite you to find me something else from Oasis Landing that contaminated the past since your last visit,” Emit said.

“Watch me,” Gamora retorted.

She stormed into an empty bedroom, then stood staring at the dream pod for a long time, trying to sort her thoughts. This mess of a future couldn’t possibly be her fault, could it? All she’d wanted to do was make Manisha’s life hell. She hadn’t intended to make everyone’s life hell.

She lay down in the pod, her thoughts racing far too fast for sleep. But dream pods have one job, and they’re very good at it. Sleep came to her much faster than she expected.

Much later, someone else walked into her bedroom.

In the morning, such as it was in the haze, she drifted into the common room to listen to the other time tourists gossiping over breakfast. She didn’t eat human food, but the thought of photosynthesizing in the polluted soil made her queasy.

“Have you been to the hot springs yet?” she heard one traveler ask her companion. “I hear they’re the best part of Oasis Landing.”

“This is my third trip,” the other said loftily. “The hot springs no longer hold much magic for me.”

“So everything isn’t bad here,” Gamora thought to herself. Maybe this “new” future was really a benefit in disguise.

It was bad.

The water was a nice temperature, but Gamora had to be skeptical of the “natural” claim as she swam between one trash heap and the other. The water had an oily feeling. She didn’t want to think about what her skin might be absorbing.

Things got worse when she climbed out of the water, only to stumble into a glowing hole in the ground only a few feet away.

That wasn’t a radioactive rift in the space time continuum…. right?

“Human sims are disgusting pigs,” she murmured to herself as she scrambled back to the surface. If she thought the oily water was bad, the residue of the rift was horrifying. She danced around, trying to brush the unknown glowing dust off her skin. She felt queasy.

She returned to the traveler’s center on the antigrav monorail, which mostly worked. It only sent them into free-fall once during the trip, and it recovered just fine.

She slept, but her dreams were troubled, and she had late-night company once again.

The next day, the polluted haze had receded somewhat. She climbed on her overboard and went to explore the dry ocean bed that bordered Oasis Landing.

That, at least, seemed much the same. She collected some lovely rogue nanites.

On the edge of the dusty sea was a decaying boardwalk that stood as if it still overlooked the water. Gamora drifted in that direction and was surprised to find that it was actually in use as a hangout. Perhaps there was nothing more aesthetic in this dystopian vision of Oasis Landing.

Two of the locals caught her eye immediately. She knew immediately who they must be.

“Hello!” she said. “I’m Gamora Sample. I’m pretty sure we’re related.”

“You’re one of those time travelers, aren’t you?” the woman exclaimed, abandoning her chess game. “I’m Marcella Sample, and I’m sure you’re right! When are you from! I want to hear all about what my ancestors were doing.”

Gamora made her story interesting. She might have embellished just a little bit. It hardly mattered, since none of her cousins were likely to go time-traveling.

As they spoke, Marcella’s companion wandered over to examine some flowers. It was nice to know that flowers could grow in this polluted climate. Gamora wondered who took care of them and how many extra chemicals it took to keep them healthy.

There was something about him that kept catching her eye. “Your brother’s quite the florist,” she said to Marcella.

“J.C.?” Marcella said, laughing. “He’s not my brother. He’s my husband. He’s not partial to flowers. He’s just like that about everything aesthetic. He tried to be a professional art critic, but he we never able to make it pay.”

Husband? Ooof. J.C. was clearly a descendant of Edmund, and Marcella just had to be carrying the genes of Edmund’s girlfriend Jean. So either the Sample family tree looped, which she had to admit was possible, or things weren’t looking good for Edmund.

Gamora drifted over to speak to him, and his face lit up as she approached.

“Do you see the contrast of the flowers to the landscape behind them? Such use of color!”

Since the flowers were the only color she could see on any of the landscape for miles around that wasn’t a dirty yellow-gray, Gamora hadn’t to admit that the flowers were striking.

“It looks great,” she agreed. “And it makes you smile, which is even better.”

She just said what?

There was just something about this guy…

“That was a lousy line,” she amended lamely. “Not sure what got into me.”

JC grinned. “It was kind of adorable,” he said.

They stood there, staring at each other for a while.

Gamora felt uncomfortable with his gaze on her, something she’d never felt before.

“I’m Gamora…” she began. “Uh, just Gamora. I’m just a time traveler passing through.”

“Really?” JC exclaimed with that smile that lit up the smog. “Are you staying at the time visitor’s center? I’ve always wanted look around inside. It’s much nicer than any other place in Oasis Landing. The Time Tourist Board really takes care of that place and makes sure it has all the best our time has to offer.”

Gamora thought of the grime that covered every surface in this horrible version of Oasis Landing. Once you got used to the advanced tech, the visitor’s center wasn’t that impressive, but she could believe it was the best this timeline had to offer.

“I’d be glad to give you a tour,” she said, aware that her voice sounded entirely too hopeful.

“You’d do that for someone you just met?” JC said. “You’re such a good person. Thank you!”

They took the rickety grav-rail back to the center. Gamora escorted JC through the entrance, past a time traveler hanging out in their underwear, as they were prone to do. JC didn’t react as if it were strange at all.

“Here you are,” she said. “Does the place live up to your expectations?”

“It’s gorgeous!” JC said, though Gamora could see it was anything but.

“I’m glad it makes you happy,” Gamora said. She started to step closer, but of course a journalism-bot showed up at that moment to take their picture. The center was lousy with those things.

“Will you go away?” Gamora demanded.

“My entire programming is to record visitors to the time center,” the bot said without remorse. “What else do you propose I photograph?”

“Someone has to be doing something anywhere else,” Gamora snarled.

“Hey!” JC called from the lounge. “There’s free food!”

“Join me for a meal?” he asked.

Gamora grimaced. “I don’t eat,” she said. “It’s not personal. I’m a plant.”

“Oh, I thought there was something leafy about you. I don’t mean to offend.”

“No,” she said. “It’s fine. You eat and I’ll chat. I’m used to it.”

“The food tastes amazing,” JC said. “You can never get anything this fine from the replicator at home.”

“I’m sure it’s the best that science can buy,” Gamora said.

JC stood up to drop his plate in the recycler, and they stood there staring into each other’s eyes once more. Gamora felt a longing she couldn’t describe.

In the fresher air of the time center, Gamora’s nose caught the unpleasant odor of his skin. It hadn’t been detectable outside because everything outside smelled unpleasant. The entire planet stank.

“I’ll let you in on a secret,” she said.

JC’s eye widened. “What’s that?” he asked.

“There’s a hottub in the basement that’s almost never used,” she said. “It’s the best place to get clean and have fun.”

JC stepped back, looking perplexed. “I didn’t bring a swimsuit or anything,” he said.

“I don’t have one either,” Gamora said. Desire made her voice breathy. “We wouldn’t need one. Just you and me, in our skin down there alone. Nobody would see us. I, uh, am sure you look great under that jacket.”

JC’s face fell. “Oh, I’m so sorry Ms Gamora,” he said. “I didn’t mean to give you the wrong impression. I have a wife and kids at home.”

“I can keep a secret,” Gamora insisted. “I can’t believe I’m the only one who feels this connection.”

JC sighed. “Ms Gamora, you are the most beautiful, desirable creature I have ever met,” he said. “If we’d met before, I would have gone to the ends of the earth for just one frolic with you. I was stupid to come here now, knowing how you make me feel.”

Gamora felt anger and incomprehension rise, burning, in her throat. She glared at him. “Then why not do something about it? I’m not asking you to leave your wife. This might be the only time we see each other. You know we’d be great.”

JC looked at her sadly, almost with pity. “Of course we would. I’ll always be sorry I missed it. But Marcella trusts me, and her trust is worth everything to me. Is there nobody in your life whose trust you value?”

Gamora looked away. “No,” she said. She wasn’t even sure what it felt like to be trusted.

“I’m sorry,” JC said. “I better go.”

“Yeah,” Gamora said, feeling hollow. “I’m sorry.”

He gave her one last, said, longing look and left.

Gamora stood there in silence after he left, trying to collect her thoughts. What had just happened to her? Who was this guy to challenge the standards she lived by? What did it matter about his wife anyway if she was never going to know? It all sounded like a load of preachy crap.

So why did she feel dirty? It wasn’t the pollution.

She went downstairs alone and sat in the hot tub for a while, her skin drinking in the cleanest water source she could find in this place. That made her feel a little better.

Then, close to midnight, she went looking for a dream pod.

She found Emit Relevart’s pod. It’s not like she didn’t know she’d been sharing her dream pod for the entire trip. Turnabout was fair play.

Now she just needed the pod to do its job.

She looked out again at the orange haze burning under the city lights.

“I can fix this,” she said.

Then she slept.


I fully intended Evil Gamora to take a quasi-incestuous spin with her first cousin a bajillion-times removed. She went to all the work of talking him up and inviting him back with her without his family. Then, even with her high charisma and a good conversation level, he rejected her not once but three times.

So her story is off in a different direction.