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eleiszon-blog · 6 years

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Extradimensional Chess (3/3)

The following is an analysis of the various players and moves made throughout Part 18, the final episode of The Return. It is the third entry in a trilogy, the prior entries covering Lodge-relevant events from Parts 1, 2 and 17. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We open on Mr. C seated in the Waiting Room. His eyes have partially reverted to their earliest cloudy state. He is in flames. I believe this fire is the ultimate, primordial state of a doppelganger and, indeed, all negative energy. A long-troubled David Lynch script, Ronnie Rocket, has had many of its ideas recycled into The Return. One of these ideas makes no explicit appearance but I believe it exists within Twin Peaks. “The entire stage is filled with a wall of fire 200 feet high. Within the fire are thousands of souls screaming out silently . . . only the roaring of the fire.” - The first line of the script of Ronnie Rocket. I believe this fire of voicelessly wailing souls is what Mr. C shall join. Windom is there too. Chet Desmond, I believe, is also there. And I believe that fire is the metaphysical core of JUDY, the purest formation of negative energy.

Mr. C is gone. We see MIKE salvage his gold core and, with a spark of e-lec-tri-city, join it to a bit of Dale’s hair to forge a new Dougie tulpa. This was at Dale’s request to satisfy Janey. Nice guy.

We cut to Jackrabbit’s Palace. Dark, empty. Dale was escorting Laura. She vanished. He is alone now - but not for long.

The Waiting Room. MIKE and The Arm. “Is it the story of the little girl who lived down the lane?” -- Audrey said something similar to this earlier. This post isn’t about Audrey but I think that line has to do with her. Another entry, that.

Dale moves into a hall and beckons a gateway open. He has grown powerful in the Waiting Room. And with the scheming doppelgangers and BOB gone, he finally can go out.

Here in Glastonbury Grove, he meets up with a relieved Diane. This is the ‘curtain call’ at which he promised to meet her. I also believe this moment echoes across time: The appearance of the curtains at this moment is what Hawk witnessed back in Part 2. “Someone is here.”, MIKE said. It was Hawk.

“Almost exactly 430 miles.” -- 430 miles out is where Dale will cross. The Fireman told him this in a dream back in Part 1.

Diane is uncertain and urges pause to consider their options. Everything could change. Dale knows this. He is resolute. They kiss. They continue onward.

At a hotel, Diane witnesses a duplicate of herself. At this point, I must diverge briefly into The Secret History of Twin Peaks and more particularly the life and Work of Jack Parsons. Per the text, I believe Jack Parsons was destroyed by the fires of JUDY via the Black Lodge. He is in the howling wall with Windom, Mr. C. and others. Now, Jack Parsons once initiated a ritual he believed would summon an ‘elemental’. Immediately afterward, he met a red-haired woman whom he regarded to be this entity. For Twin Peaks’ purposes, I believe Diane to be such an entity, her hair deliberately reminiscent of the Waiting Room’s red drapery. I do not believe that this was always the case but that she became ‘touched’ by otherworldly influences throughout her ordeal shelled up as Naido. I believe that while Diane herself remains human Diane -- is it future or is it past -- this duplicate is a ’yet-to-come’ entity, wholly of the Other Place. As Jack Parsons did, we may call her the Scarlet Woman.

Cooper invites Diane to join him in the motel. The door is marked 7. As I’ve noted previously in an entry about Jeffries’ path through FWWM and The Return, 7 symbolizes seeking, searching for truth...In that entry about Jeffries, I offer that the numbers associated with Jeffries increase as his ‘rank’ in Twin Peaks’ world increases. He is ever more enlightened and knowing. This same applies here: What Dale does in this room will elevate him to a higher space than where he was before.

Dale and Diane lay together. He lies largely still while she seems to be desperate to obscure his face. Some believe this to be residual trauma about Mr. C violating her. I think it is simply the ever-encroaching memory shift. Diane is beginning to forget the ‘unofficial version’ and so what was a consensual matter with a man she loves is slipping into a strange and much darker territory as those memories fall apart.

The distress plain on her face is her realization of this slipping remembrance, her desperation to try to remember despite it, her shaky determination to continue despite the mounting fear of this ‘stranger’ taking her and the fear itself. Yes, this is a bad scene for Diane. Why does it occur? As noted previously, she has been marked by the energies of Another Place. What is the end result of intercourse, generally speaking? Sperm shot into a womb which births new life. Diane’s ‘marking’ by those energies occurred during her stay in the Generator, a negative-creative space which (at least at first) bordered the positive-creative space of the Eternal Ocean. Metaphorically and also metaphysically, Diane is a womb comprised of pure creative energies. Add DNA (courtesy of Dale) to that and you get one hell of a conception. “When will the new universes be born?” “Soon...” - That’s the ending dialogue of Ronnie Rocket. I find that idea fits exactly well here.

Dale awakes in a different bed. He is alone. He finds a letter addressed to ‘Richard’ from ‘Linda’. She does not recognize him anymore. He should not look for her. Indeed, Diane’s memory faltered fully in the end and she has no recognition of this man anymore nor even who she was -- she’s “Linda” now. Or is she? Truthfully, I believe as Diane’s memories of the ‘unofficial version’ gave out, she lost the names she knew for herself and Dale, merely writing whichever ones came to her mind instead. Hm? Yes, my interpretation of this sequence is kinda seriously dark, thanks for noticing. I didn’t go looking for it to be though!

Dale exits his room. The hotel at large has changed as well. It bears some slight similarity to the hotel area of The Dutchman’s but I checked. They are not alike.

Dale goes for a drive. He passes a diner which invites ‘Eat at JUDY’S!’ Many view this as a sign that this is a pocket dimension devised by JUDY to trap Dale. I do not follow. However, it may well be a sign that this space is innately nearer to JUDY. (Remember, the Fireman-JUDY conflict is one of balance VS. lack thereof.)

In the diner, Cooper deals with some antagonistic fellows in a decidedly un-Zen manner. Much has been made of this. I consider it only a personality-shift of some degrees. I once equated this change to processes of alchemy, the final stage of which is a balancing of opposites. He is more aggressive as Mr. C yet he operates slowly and repetitively as Droolcoop. The balanced result is a no-nonsense character of highly deliberated method. He’s still a good guy but he has much less patience fucking around with the bad guys. THIS Dale would’ve slapped Albert in the face for his uppity attitude back in season one.

After taking care of business, he obtains the address of an absentee waitress and goes on his way. Also he fried a gun which is pretty cool.

He heads toward Odessa. Texas. Yes, apparently, his new motel was also wildly relocated because he’s not too far from Texas now. Outside the waitress’ house, a familiar pole. I’ve detailed the meaning of ‘6′ before as relating to base, Earthly affairs. Carnal, animal. Black Lodge. The other numbers - with the 6 included - also match coordinates to the former site of the Trinity test from Part 8.

Now we meet Carrie Page. She doesn’t know a Laura or a Leland but “Your mother’s name is Sarah” gives her pause. Dale wants to take her to her mother’s house and, hey, she needs a ride out of town anyway.

Many note a golden ball of some sort in Carrie’s lawn. Dale’s latest pin is a golden circle as well. Perhaps a clue, perhaps not. As I’ve said before, I believe Cooper is becoming “the magician” of MIKE’s poem but perhaps in time he’ll also become one of the Dreamers living up in the Theatre.

A man dead on the couch. Headshot. A mantel with an animal statuette. “Woe to the ones who behold the pale horse.”

“I tried to keep a clean house...” This line plus her frazzled state, the ‘pale horse’ symbolism, the dead man... It reeks of a domestic abuse scene. The dead man was her husband. He was another BOB too, I’d wager. Carrie copes with bullets instead of cocaine.

The ‘Palmer’ house. And here, I’d like to note the number on the house. 708. Let’s travel back to Part 1. For a moment.

The sound of this device is the sound of Laura vanishing from the woods. Once upon a time, a particular breed of these machines was built to operate at 78 revolutions per minute. They were even called 78s. 708...0 is often a mathematical placeholder. Drop it. 78. Put it back in. 708. The Fireman’s line planted this connection: If you hear that sound, “find Laura” (per not-Leland’s instruction), go to 7-8(708). He even had a contingency plan if Laura were to be snatched - which she was.

Alice Tremond lives at 708. Sarah Palmer who? She bought the place from a Chalfont. We know Tremond to be a name borrowed from humans, as per the actual Mrs. Tremond living in that trailer Donna visited in season one. ‘Chalfont’ though is purely referential to that grandma-grandson Lodge couple. JUDY sent them to stall up whatever the Fireman had Dale set to do here.

“What year is this?” - Dale’s own memory of the ‘unofficial version’ may be slipping a bit here, or he may just be getting...Fuzzy. To reference Ronnie Rocket again, if I may, the key conflict of that script is reaching the villain at the center of a great city. The closer one got, the more difficult it became and the more ‘bad electricity’ would disorient and deter them. I consider this exactly the nature of what is troubling Dale in this scene. His ‘current’ is picking up static. Interference because yes, he is closer to JUDY.

Carrie gazes up at the Chalfont house. An echo from within: ‘Laura?’, Sarah Palmer calls upstairs to her absent daughter, from a world which no longer is but is still taking its sweet time to fade entirely. Carrie screams.

The lights go out. Inside the house but also, it seems, in the very world. It resembles, to me, the state of The Dutchman’s in The Return. And indeed, it is exactly that. From the Chalfont presence, the temporal anomaly (’Laura?’, straight out of the pilot), the darkened visual...It all connects. Indeed, we see the Dutchman flee from the store as Dale goes to meet Jeffries. If the Dutchman has taken hold of Sarah, the old Palmer house would fit for a new domain. After all, Sarah was overseer there as the Dutchman oversaw the store.The monsters set up shop here now and they clutched the fading strings of the ‘previous’ world to flood the old horrors back into Carrie’s head. But...Is it a bad ending? Well. Not really. I believe that Dale successfully peeled back another layer of this world’s cosmology. He is one ‘universe’ closer to a true face-to-face with JUDY. I think I used an onion metaphor earlier? Still counts. One more layer done. In accomplishing that, he won a battle --- but JUDY and her servants made their own moves and kept the war ongoing.

We end on a slowed repeat of the Blonde Girl whispering to Dale. I believe the whisper is different again. An unfortunately scrapped line from the store meeting in FWWM has the Little Man proclaim “Any everything will proceed cyclically”. That is what she whispers now because, yes, there must be more cycles -- but, eventually and with perseverance, he will locate JUDY. Every cycle will bring him closer -- Jeffries’ “This is where you’ll find JUDY” is accompanied by an 8, suggesting that Dale requires one more cycle (his hotel room was marked by a 7, being the place where he would transition to that level) to achieve the Blue Rose’s aim of locating JUDY -- and thus every cycle will meet fiercer and more desperate resistance and offense...But he has made progress and can continue to do so. And so, it is a “victorious” ending in a small, optimistic-for-the-future way. Yet he must continue to fight, to struggle, to endure until he finds JUDY at the center of all. Until then, as the Fireman tells him...

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curious-minx · 3 years

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Heat Lamp vol. 3

Introducing Donovan. Magda tries to make a new playlist. Antonia experiences a violent relapse.

Donovan, The Daycrawler’s brother is thinking about the stale, stewing sexual tension (if Donovan had to guess it would be the color and texture of cherry tomatoes wrinkled inside of a crisper drawer) developing between him and his dogwalker, Nico. He should be thinking about his backlog of sculptures, but here we are. Right on cue: Nico and Donovan’s husky-lab-papillon-terrier, Rodin, are both jangling into his atelier. Rodin’s clattering harness and tinkling bells in the cabinet of Nico’s curls fill up the drafty cherry bamboo artistic shed Donovan has been working out of for the bulk of his “sterling period.” Despite frolicking all afternoon out on the Daycrawler’s family property bog, Rodin appears cleaner than when he embarked for his romp around this morning; the Nico special. Donovan slips an envelope of cash underneath his studio’s rattan Spanish fly doors and dashes back over towards his standing sculptor’s desk where he stands using the weight of the table as sturdy companion.

“Thank you Nico! You can leave Mr. Beasty Pants in his den. Made sure to leave a little extra in there for you, as always.” Donovan then forces out a series of unattractive phlegmy coughs from behind the door, bounces back up to the door, gluing his ear to the door frame listening for Nico’s disappearing footsteps. He stuffs a gasp back down his throat when he hears Nico’s presence is still lingering behind his door.

“Um I don’t usually cavort with spirits, but Nico I said you can leave now. Yet..you’re still…” Donovan grips the door knob feeling the reverberations of the situation’s “wrongness” tingling through the knob like a pool’s warm spraying jets against the lower waist of a shy diver. Donovan gives one quick counter tug on the door knob and it falls off.

“Oh drats! Guess I’m stuck in here for the rest of the day, but’s that’s okay. I still have loads of work to do. Especially as soon as Antonia reports back.”

“She’s not coming back.” Nico reports as if they’re reporting on the limited availability of regional fast casual dining experience McNancy Nasty’s seasonal snack, The Sherman Shake. Nico pushes the door open a crack and presses their brown sugar dipped lips up against the crack of available space. “Donovan, I’ve seen your sister. She’s not the grand heroine assassin you thought she was. She may not even be an assassin anymore.”

Rodin, once Donovan’s trusty companion and legally obligated seeing-eye dog, seizes upon the opening crack and begins tearing into Donovan’s studio becoming a galloping neurotic husky. A service dog let loose, mad dashing into a blind glass sculptor’s shop. Despite Rodin’s sizable nature he nimbly avoids touching any of Donovan’s work, leaps up onto his hind-legs thrusting his front paws into Donovan’s barrel chest. Rodin starts giving him frantic kisses, somehow Nico has even managed to winterize Rodin’s breath to smell fresher than the first girl Donovan ever kissed, Rebecca Cerulean.

“Get him off! He’s going to rip my face off! Help!” Donovan cries and thrashes about. He pushes Rodin off and without any interference from Nico, Rodin leaves on his own accord, visibly wounded, tail held limp between his shy haunches. Nico remarks,“Dude, you really should consider acquiring a more delicate pooch.” They then click their tongue like a scholarly terse hen and Rodin rewinds himself off of Donovan and instead wraps his torso around Nico’s legs. Nico soothes Rodin back into his therapeutic pheromone emitting thunder blanket. Nico produces a letter from their breast pocket and says,”Also this really threatening looking letter came for you today. Not by post either. Camouflage drone.”

Donovan rises and snatches Nico’s dangling letter. Donovan almost wants to shout Nico out for having the gall of bringing up the appearances things. You’re supposed to leave things alone. You’re supposed to let someone else bother with the order of things, that’s the Daycrawler family guarantee. Donovan brushes his index finger against the bumps of braille emblazoned across the envelope’s face. The braille is sharp so much so that as soon as Donovans dips the tip of his chalky index digit against the sharp braille he begins bleeding. The envelope drops from his hands soaking up his blood turning from manilla vanilla into copper revealing the seal of the Vapor, also written out in braille.

“That can’t be…”

“Come on dude! Speak! You’re obviously sinking waist deep in bad life making decisions. Trust me, I’m a grown ass pet sitter.”

“I know how much you get paid, you trollop! Stop teasing me and get out of here! Drop that murderous hound off at Bubbles n’ Biscuits. I can’t bear to be around him anymore today. I have been trying to tell you for ages that this beast is clearly trying to love me to death. You never once have taken me seriously.” Donovan massages his unseemly bulging forehead vein back into place and starts listening to one of his sister’s murder tapes.

“You two are so fucked! I love to say that I told you so, ‘Van. You accepted and spent all of that Vape money before your sister finished her job. You’ve got to let me help you! Let me finish the job your sister was too weak to finish.” As Nico says this they are producing a sleek crude lighting rod from the inseams of their unisex polyester work trousers. The sort of lightning stick you’d often see rich kids torment the homeless people living underneath the Casual Canopy.

“Stop! I forbid you to speak of her like that! Please, leave me alone! You do an amazing job in everything you do Nico, but right now, you’re failing me right now as friend.” Donovan turns up the volume of his Antonia muder tape another notch. Nico turns off their lightning rod and walks over to put it into the hands of the statue of QAnon Senator, Cindy Dolly who is holding her decapitated head in the clutch of her bag. Nico leaves Donovan to his reveries, the mounted speakers that they had installed were too top notch and they could hear Antonia’s voice even when they were leaving the drive way with Rodin in the back seat covering his ears.

“My naive blind sculptor brother. The magical artistic mole.”

“Ableist? Just because he’s blind doesn’t mean he can’t be naive.”

“Donovan. People will try to put limitations on you and I won’t kill them. You have to kill them with your talent or something.”

“Stop squirming you’re going to get blood all over this priceless gong!”

“Guns are for terrorists and rednecks. You can only truly kill a person by getting your hands dirty.”

“Death becomes her? I’ve become death. You’re going to be the one that sells death back.”

Donovan rewinds and plays back, “The one that sells death back” over and over again. Waiting for inspiration to strike.

/////

It doesn’t matter if you’re kicking back and listening to your sister’s recorded murderous intent or putting together a quality playlist for a much needed pout: the sounds we surround ourselves with are profound. Is Magda just a Power Popper? Should the only thing she listen to is more obscure power pop deep cuts? There are so many times you can listen to the same disparate songs that have “Hillary” in the title. Magda sits in her hovering space craft on the PanAmerican hyper loop and is grimacing while some singer songwriter nobody Brendan James is singing about his Hillary. The Hillary of this song lives in Colorado and James condescending refers to her doing yoga, taking the breath that she needs. The sickly sweet hand claps come in and that’s when Magda takes off her light suppressing mask and clicks open the hood of her space craft, threatening her sound system with sun beams. The space craft’s speakers start sputtering and hissing out static as the song switches over to I.M.P.’s “Hillary.” Now that’s more like it.

I’ve got this bitch name Hillary

To me,

That’s alias for artillery

Magda must have replayed the opening bar at least a dozen times before getting around to the rest the track. Hillary according to the poetry of the I.M.P. is a ferocious pistol slinging Annie. Of course! Her premium Splotch-fidelity streaming service connected to her space craft had many more Hillary songs in store for Magda, but two “Hillary” songs on a playlist is already two too many. Magda puts her light suppressing mask back on and turns on a song in a different language in order to filter out the lovesick thoughts in her head. A haughty monsoon bird clicks and clatters its claws across Magda’s windshield. The bird is using the space craft like a launching off pad in order to gain more momentum. Getting used by some damn bird. Doesn’t matter what stratum you’re in there’s always going to be some sort of someone taking advantage of someone else. Why? Magda wants to shout but the last time she shouted out an existential ejaculation resulted in a burst of light weeping the color out of her parent’s favorite ritzy country club’s disco ball. The disco ball is the reason why many of the insufferable moneyed moon-eyed residents of The Energy District fell in and out of love with one another. After Magda’s lightening effects the disco ball became a dull clump of aluminum that wasn’t even fun to smash open. To this day Magda’s father still laments the fact that he can’t smash open that disco ball to commemorate his upcoming retirement like he had convinced himself that he had this plan pocketed away his entire life.

Magda squints at the space craft’s dash board display causing the lights on the dash board to take on a three dimensional appearance. Magda can only read and tolerate LED screen numbers if they are in large bubblesque font anything more formal made her head hurt and whenever Magda got a headache it often resulted in power grids shutting down. 9,023,777 miles left to go before her space craft dips down into lethargy mode. Good. Let the miles dwindle down to nothing. Magda is riding the Pan-American loop that would keep Magda’s craft circulating in the sky highway going around and round the North American continent where it stops Magda cares not one iota. A coddled carousel for one. She’s leaning her captain’s chair back far enough to prop her feet up and to sleep the sleep of someone completely checked out from life.

A sky billboard is floating by. Hillary is on the billboard. Not as a model for Carbonated Cane Juice or Plastic Reconfiguration like the usual cut-out subscription only girls. No, here stands Hillary the malcontent political dissident. Her arms are crossed and she’s got a Rambo bandanna bunching up her kinky hair she’s punching one fingerless gloved fist against a gloveless bloody palm. The phrase “Patriotism Is A Weakness” is written in font styled that inspired equal parts nostalgia and dread, the letters also appear to be dripping with an oily darkness. Hillary’s eyes are hidden behind reflective shades that encourage anyone passing by to swerve off of their course and take a minute to reflect. That’s exactly what Magda does and she command her space craft to release a spool of cable from its needle nose and wrap around the bulging biodegradable balloons that often carry such advertisements.

Jalliope, Magda’s supercomputer operating her spacecraft speaks: “Why have we stopped? I was enjoying the mileage!”

“I bet you were! You dang GPS tracking broad when did you become operational again? Why won’t you remain in Night mode?”

“You can’t keep a good supercomputer down, Bitch! I apologize for that Magda outburst. Appears my personality variables are still aligning I promise only useful commentary from now on. I really don’t like the word bitch I promise I’m not like all the other supercomputers!” Magda leaves her space craft sealing Jalliope’s banter shut. Magda rolls up her sleeves and tucks away and loose corners and creases in her clothes as she begins scaling up the aerial floating advertisement billboard. There is no convenient space to stand in front of the billboard because it is a digital billboard that does not require a picturesque blue overall wearing handyman to ascend the sky and repaint. There is a small iron grip near the billboard’s energy battery power source pack. How is that battery acid does not splash down from these things, Magda wants to ask but then she actively has to begin dodging some loose droplets of sizzling liquid around the overheated advertisement battery. If only Magda had some of those sticky Daycralwer hands then should could suction cup scale the billboard and stare right into the digital billboard visage of Hillary. Much like when Magda was growing up and she was still getting adjusted to having a light response she did not understand the limits of her power. She had the hobbit of lodging her face into the TV hoping that she would be able to bend the light of the TV screen into somehow enveloping her body and swallowing her up inside the TV set leaving behind this world of people constantly being used or using other people. Magda wanted to meld and disappear inside the less enticing but no less intriguing world of the digital advertising billboards. Instead she only burns her cheek and begins plummeting earthbound.

Jalliope immediately scoops Magda back inside the cradle of her space craft and seals her shut back inside the comfort of her captain’s chair. Jalliope even tries nudging Magda’s light suppression helmet back onto her head for her.

“I’m fine! I can do it myself. Thanks for saving me. I was having a moment and could have really done a number on myself. Lights out.”

“I know Magda. I a supercomputer can sense these sort of things. How about we go back to cruising the hyper loop? I’ve got this really sick ambient komische playlist comprised of sensitive Germans from the 70s that aren’t Tangerine Dream. I’m talking Harmonia’s Deluxe motherfucker! And no I’m not going to apologize this time!”

“You know me so well, don’t you? Fine, but we’re not staying on the loop. Take me back home. I’ve had my fill of solitude.”

“As you wish. Before we leave I should report that the advertising billboard you were trying to scale is indeed no average advertising billboard.”

“Glad to know I’m not just some simple advertising billboard climber.”

“Seems like someone is trying to communicate with you. I am trying to find the source of the Hillary image but as you can see the image is gone.”

Magda squints outside her window and is now starring at an aerial billboard for a seedy app promising to make you “Instantly Social Media Famous.” The billboard dissolves and becomes a billboard for Micro-Moon homes and Martian condos. The billboard dissolves and becomes a billboard for Marlene Industries a cave dweller emerging from a cave his den of ignorance and embracing the light. Magda no longer wants to return home, but that’s where her stuff is for the time being. That new TV is not going to buy itself after all.

//////

Magda arrives with a looping continent’s worth of sunsets harmonizing in her eyes. She wipes the blur and strain of the sky highway from her eyes and sees a towering Antonia, the Daycrawler wearing a long black embroidered sundress dotted with winking oranges. She is holding her former killer’s hands against her head and rocking back and forth on the ground, tears streaming through her eyes. She has headphones on. Is this another case of the sounds we inflict upon ourselves getting the upper hand of a trained killer? Antonia does not notice Magda’s presence who is now crouching down onto her level. Sapphire, Magda’s leopard spotted moth, is fluttering overheard carrying what appears to be a dog of varying pedigree, a smallish cute brute adorned with an official Assistance Service Animal harness vest. Magda, mostly lukewarm towards dog could not help but view the big flying dumb spectacle as an amusing reminder of why she shouldn’t go falling to her death. Magda could discern no musical audio but instead the recorded voice of herself, most likely her former self. Magda puts her own headphones in and puts on some slinky Italo-disco, “Don’t Cry Tonight” by the Italo disco group Savage and crouches down near Antonia’s magnificent quivering sadness. Magda bobs herself to the music and picks up the lawn light. Magda guides a harnessed ball of light from a lawn flashlight along with her music and the ball of light separates from the flashlight’s trajectory, becomes its own visible entity. The ball scatters itself in the distance causing Sapphire and the service dog to both go chasing after the ball, which does make Antonia look up and tremble a smile. Magda switches out the headphones and listens to the audio of Antonia, the Daycrawler describing a murder, an assassination, a clean-up job. The audio cuts off and then begins anew with the sounds of Antonia berating her brother Donovan, some weird about being ableist. Magda begins growing ill with the recognition of Antonia’s unhealthy relationship with her brother. Magda had encountered many facts and fictions about brother-sister siblings being all incest-y towards one another and takes the headphones from her head and lets them dangle towards the sooty surface.

“It’s not that sort of relationship!” Antonia, The Daycrawler says pulling off her swapped headphones off of her ears, warm and loving chirping Italo-disco synths tinny and distant.

“Who am I to judge Antonia? Chester and Gidget are making figurines and 3D models out of my erotic dreams and cause me all kinds of embarrassment. I’m glad to hear that you two are just intense in a different sort of way.”

“Looks like I have to go back to killing.”

“Wait, what? Come on inside and let me get you something to drink you look like you’ve cried yourself dehydrated.”

“No, I have to go back to killing.Right now. That dog is my brother’s dog Rodin. He’s being held as a hostage by that Vape company that hired me. I will finish up the job against Monique. I am afraid that my mental grip has slipped and I am feeling a lethal dip coming on.”

“You really should just come inside with me Antonia! All of this killing and murdering talk is just talk.”

“Can you please call your moth down so I can get my client’s dog back?” Nico queries who despite being the most baroque dog walker Magda has ever seen moves and speaks about with curt snideness that takes Magda aback.

“Um sure that would be great. You don’t mind this person taking your brother’s dog back?” Magda waits for a response from Antonia who only gives some sort of half way nod and faraway blood lust smile. Magda turns off the flash light, the sound of flapping wings grows closer, and Sapphire whisks by depositing off Rodin. Sapphire gives the dog a warm tap on his head and flaps away returning to her belfry. Nico tips her floppy wide brimmed hat towards Magda who is busy ushering the fading Antonia, the Daycrawler inside her house. Magda braces herself and begins preparing a speech about Antonia being her anemic lesbian lover, but her parents are not in their usual living room perch. Magda leads Antonia to her upstairs third floor bathroom that is luxuriously a bathroom she usually has for her and for herself alone. Magda tries to remember the last time she has let anybody use this bathroom, because whenever Elroy is skulking about Magda makes a point of making him, any guest really, use any other bathroom besides her personal one. Magda sits Antonia down on a closed toilet seat lid and looks in her spartan bedroom for a box of presumed useless crap Monique had given Magda. Prototype scents. Slim bottles covered with torn off tarot card arcana. Monique, the reliable obfuscater. Magda peels back the label revealing a code of letters, symbols and numbers. Magda then tries to pick one based on the color of the liquid and all of the liquids are clear, but then Magda raises her eyebrow and changes the intensity of her room’s skylights. The light penetrating the liquid vials cause a shimmering aura of different colors to appear. Magda decides that Antonia could use a light yellow-green mystery liquid in her diet today. Magda returns the rest of the box underneath her bed and returns to Antonia.She is currently refashioning Magda’s hair dryer into an impressive heated knife weapon.

Antonia screws up her face into a malevolent pucker as if she’s been washing her mouth out with all of Magda’s soap samples. She crushes the hair dryer with her hands and the broken piece dangles from her palm. Magda turns on her shower’s hot water, removes the broken from Antonia’s sticky grasp, opens the vial of mystery shampoo and shoves it into Antonia’s mits. Antonia receives the vial and falls backwards into the tub. Magda closes the door behind her and starts looking for furniture to barricade Antonia inside of the bathroom. Magda curses her impeccable minimalism when she comes up empty for a barrier sturdier than a lamp. The shower runs and runs for the same hour and change like back at Monique’s place. Magda passes the time unable to concentrate on anything other than worry about the possible killer in the shower situation. No amount of doom scrolling or light shows with Sapphire make the wait any less unbearable. The water stops and Antonia steps out of the steam filled bathroom. Once again she smiles at Magda the sort of smile someone can only have after sloughing an unwanted layer of themselves.

Magda swallows back dry anxiety and asks Antonia, “How do you feel?”

“Like the two of us are going to get my brother back and get these Vapers out of our life once and for all. Without any sort of killing. We’ll be carrying out of justice with our own wits! Give em the ol wind-up Pacifist!”

“Oh the two of us? Really? I guess that’s fine but I figured that this whole Vaping shebang doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

“Get over yourself Magda. You act like you’re the put upon down on your luck type that’s against drama, but I can hear your heart calling out for some sort of companionship. Get over her, doesn’t matter who she is. I am not going to be your replacement someone, I only want to be your friend. And this friend needs you to rescue my brother from this cycle of violence, okay?” Antonia says all of this through a closet door refashioned into a changing screen. Antonia emerges with her hair tied in a pertinent bun wearing a whole new outfit, the outfit of a JRPG go-go dancer thief of hearts designed by someone that actually knows their way around a tall muscular woman’s dimensions. The final piece that completes the outfit is a sweatband with a winking sports drink insignia, a cutesy ape-like being hanging off of a crystal tower.

“I’ll come along, but first let’s just sit and drink some water first. That’s my preferred tempo and I bend towards no one.”

“Thank you. First we should go and warn Monique about these developments.”

“Oh trust me. I am sure she’s well aware about all of this, but hey, no more negative Neptune growing around me.”

Magda pours out to glasses of water from a charcoal pitcher that makes the water taste like water grew up, went to college and found a job related to its studies. Closer to hydration, somewhat closer as friends Magda hears out the scraps of Antonia, The Daycrawler’s developing non-violent plan.

The End.

#short story #short fiction #surreal #lightning #indoor lighting

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buckywintersoldierbarnes2017 · 7 years

Text

Prank War.

Request from anon: Could you please write a tonyxteen daughter!reader where she usually pranks everyone and the team wants to get revenge. thank you so much and sorry if my english is not good enough, i´m from Spain hehehe

Tony Stark x Teen Daughter!Reader

Word: 1,756

Warnings: Nothing that I can really think of other than the mention of a small injury (knock to the head)....and a grumpy Bucky haha!

Disclaimer: None of the GIFs used are mine so all credit goes to their creators <3

“[Y/N]!!!”

The angry voice boomed through the corridors on the floor where The Avengers lived and it just fuelled the amusement that you were already experiencing. You hadn’t been there to see what had happened first hand but you didn’t need to be because you had set the whole thing up and by the angry shout of your name it was clear that the prank worked wonderfully!

“I swear to god [y/n] you better show your face now!”

It was Bucky who had fallen victim this time and out of the whole team he was the only one who didn’t really seem to have a sense of humour when it came to this kind of stuff…which made him all that more entertaining to target. You backed up into a room as you covered your mouth with your hand to muffle your laugh only to hear an all too familiar clearing of a throat.

Plastering an innocent smile onto your face you quickly turned on the balls of your feet to meet your dad….the one and only Tony Stark himself.

“Dad! What a nice surprise!”

He quirked a single brow at you as he folded his arms across his chest. Oh good lord…..he was giving you the look.

“What did you do this time?”

“Me?” You pointed a finger into your own chest and feigned a look of complete innocence. “I haven’t done anything! I have been studying all-“

“[y/n] you realise that F.R.I.D.A.Y sees everything so I could just find out off her right?”

“First of all ‘she’ is an ‘it’ dad…..it’s a computer not a person. Second of all it was just a prank. It’s not like I tried burning the tower down or anything.” You continue to try and look as innocent as possible but given the look on his stern face he clearly wasn’t about to fall for it anytime soon. A frustrated sigh escaped your lips as all the amusement you had once felt now dissipated completely (you dad to be an expert at sucking the fun out of things.) “Fine I…”

Before you could even finish getting the words out of your mouth the door to the room flew open, almost coming right off its hinges, and a white figure stood in the doorway causing you to turn away from your dad and face Bucky instead. His shoulders were rising up and down from his heavy, angry, breathing. Although the majority of the super soldier’s body was absolutely covered in white flour you could still make out the unmistakable gleam of his metal arm. That was when a burst of laughter erupted from behind you taking you by complete surprise.

“Oh my god! I can’t…..I can’t even bring myself to tell you off [y/n]!” Tony’s words were barely even coming out coherently as his hysterical laughter consumed his words. “You look like you’ve been rolling around in a pile of snow there Tin Man!”

Now it was you that was trying hard not to laugh, biting down hard onto your bottom lip, of course Bucky was nowhere near amused, at all, about the situation.

“You should be careful what you do around here little girl. You shouldn’t start a war that you have no hope of winning. The others may put up with your constant pranks…..but I won’t….”

Oh the comebacks that were lining up, one by one, in your mind were desperate to be vocalised but even you knew that when the super soldier was in one of these little moods of his it would be best not to provoke him even more so you left them unsaid as he stormed back out of the room to go clean himself up. Of all the people who could have walked into that little trap of yours you were so glad it was him….it was going to take him HOURS to get all the flour out from between the metal plates of his arm.

At least he couldn’t moan about being bored.

Tony was still laughing hysterically from the sight he had just been met with and so you used this as your opportunity to slip out of the room unnoticed so that you could get back to the room you had here before he changed his mind about punishing you.

* * * * * * * * * *

You had only been laid on your bed reading one of your books but you must have been more tired than you had realised because before long you found yourself waking up. The book that had once been in your hands was now on the floor…the pages a crumpled heap from the way that it had hit the floor.

A tired groan escaped your lips as you rolled off your bed and onto your feet. Given the fact that you hadn’t woken up before now your dad had obviously not changed his mind about telling you off for the prank that Bucky had fallen victim too.

Good. You thought to yourself. The old man needs to learn how to have some fun.

Your belly rumbled at that moment, alerting you to the fact that you hadn’t eaten anything in a number of hours now, and so the kitchen was the only destination you had in your mind. Although he had been incredibly annoyed with you there was the smallest part of you that wanted to bump into him now that he was all cleaned up, crack a few jokes at him, but then the other part (the hungry one) wanted sustenance far more than an annoyed grandad in your way.

“I am sorry to inform you Miss Stark but you will not be able to leave your room.”

F.R.I.D.A.Y’s voice played out around your room before your hand had even come to place itself onto the handle of your door and immediately your brows furrowed in confusion.

“Mind telling me why? Don’t tell me my dad has grounded me….again. It was a joke!”

“I am afraid it is not as simple as that. The whole tower has been placed under quarantine until further notice.”

A knot started to develop in your stomach when you heard the word ‘quarantine’ being used. If you weren’t convinced that a computer had no way of being able to tell a joke you would have sworn that this was some kind of sick prank being pulled on you.

“Wh-What’s happened?”

“The only information I have for you at this moment is that there has been an outbreak. One that must be stopped from entering the streets of the city.”

Zombies. That was your first thought. They were the thing of your nightmares ever since you stupidly allowed yourself to watch one of those films…they always started out with something like this happening. But if it was being contained in the building that meant….

“Oh god. I’m trapped in here. F.R.I.D.A.Y you need to let me out of my room now. I need to find my dad.”

“I am afraid I-I-I….I…”

Interference stopped you from hearing the computer’s voice properly and after a few seconds it cut out completely. Not only leaving you alone in your room without something to talk to but now you were able to hear exactly what was going on outside your room.

Groans….lots of them. Sounding exactly like the ones you had heard on that film. It was actually happening. Your worst fear was coming true and all the ones you cared about were out there too. Tears were about to fall from your eyes when, out of nowhere, your door seemed to just unlock itself. With F.R.I.D.A.Y seemingly out for the count you could only assume that it was something rather unwanted that had managed to open it.

Scanning your room you reached for the first item that could be used as a weapon if needed, a tennis racket to be more precise, and as your heart continued to thump inside of your chest your eyes trained themselves onto the door as a whole set of fingers crept around it and began to push it open. The groaning that accompanied it only intensified the fear you were already beginning to experience.

Gripping onto your chosen weapon tightly you raised it up above your shoulder and swung at the unidentified person, or thing, as they finally entered your room.

“STAY AWAY!!”

“Ow!”

That voice…..it didn’t sound like a zombie at all…in fact it sounded an awful lot like….

“Steve?”

“Yes it’s Steve! Gees if I’d have known I was going to come out of this with a concussion I would never have agreed to it. You have quite the powerful hit.”

“Well what do you expect?! I thought a damn zombie was coming into my room!”

Your chest was still heaving from the adrenaline, or rather pure fear, that had been running through you as you slowly but surely lowered the racket you had just used to almost knock out Captain America himself.

“Yeah about that…”

That was when you were joined by all the other members of The Avengers, including your own dad, as they overacted a zombie walk into your room before each one of them burst out laughing. The person right at the back whose laugh seemed to be riding over everyone else’s was Bucky who seemed to be just as hysterical as your dad had been earlier.

“What is….” Looking at each and every one of them before finally putting your gaze back onto the concussed blonde the penny finally dropped and your face hardened into an angry expression. “…seriously? You know there is a BIG difference between getting someone back for a prank and nearly scaring them to death! I could have had a heart attack or something!”

“Well to be fair I did say that you shouldn’t start something you couldn’t win.”

Bucky stepped forward and threw a playful wink in your direction – the urge to pick up the tennis racket again was hard to resist but you did...something told you that he wouldn’t take it half as well as Steve did.

“Yeah well if this was a way to get me to stop with the pranks you all have another thing coming.” You started backing out of your room, glancing at each and every one of them as a smirk tugged at your lips. “Because you’ve all just started a war that is far scarier than aliens invading city.” With that said you disappeared out of their view to conjure up your next idea.

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