Ye Better Believe in Fairy Tales..

'Ere I am, sick and stripped down to me clay wit' a pair of wings stuck in me back! An' I can't even speak like me old self! It's bloody Toxia all over again!

Here's wot I remember:



There I go patrollin' an' I ran into some friends at th' Anvil. I sit meself down and have a pint o' hot oil to loosen up me gears. It starts rainin' so we all scramble inside before I get to rust. In comes Miss McAllister in the new dress me Daddy bought for her birthday! (I pitched in for it, really I did!)

So the piano's playin' and we're having a bonnie time so I say "slip me another pint of WD40 if you please!" Well I've had sweet crude before but never THIS sweet! I shrug an' keep drinkin. One minute I'm talkin' wit' Christine..

An' then I woke up! People thought I was just down for maintenance so nobody tried t' wake me! Me whole body was wracked wit' pain, me gears screamin' full o' grit! I saw the black stain on my uniform and the grainy mess in it...SUGAR!

SOMEBODY SPIKED ME BLOODY OIL WITH SUGAR CUBES!!

I was so sick I couldn't walk a straight line! I'm wanderin' about in circles an' Lady Darkling yanks me into Tanglewood where I collapse. She trues to pick me up, but honest, love.. she's a Fae and I'm half metal!





So I'm ready to burn up from this treacle in me and I'm worried about spoilin' Lady D's labyrinth on her lawn! She whips up a metal bowl for me to tear out me wares and talk to Ralph and Earl on the big white telephone.

Now 'ere's where thing get a bit weird..

I dunno if it's from all the faefolk livin in' Tanglewood or the trees or wot but this island is HIGH MAGICK. I take out me metal and oil and expect to go comatose and wait around for Daddy to take me home and clean me out again. But instead..




I turned FAE, just like I did back in LUMINDOR!

There must be enough fae blood in me from my creation to take on this guise. (And no Lady D, me Daddy would NEVER kill a Fae for her blood! That would ruin me formula!) An' since I'm adjustin' to this new template..and Darkling's the only Fae in sight..me voice takes on her liltin' tones! OH she thought I was mockin' 'er!

So Darkling's lettin' me live in her tree until all this sugar passes. I still feel a bit shaky tell the truth.

Miss Emilly took some time off from her new dancin' job to talk with me after Darkling goes off to attend business. We talked a long time. About the House..about Daddy..about work...about how me poor later self..what happened to her life the first time and the second time she rewrote it. It's only gonna get worse from 'ere for her if she don't stop.

It HAD to be her! Who else would know much treacle to slip in me oil wit' me not noticin' ta spit it out! Well ya FAILED ya crazy bucket o' bolts! I'm still here! So if ya see a Qli walkin' about Caledon the next few days IT AIN'T ME!

~Qli

As if things weren't bad enough..

My evil duplicate has been seen sneaking around Caledon again. I warned you Miss Steel, this is my home and I will protect it, Paradox or no! For the last time..

*unsheathes DCS Talons*

Stay..away.

Oh My..

My Father has started his own aether journal. Isn't that..nice?

*turns her emergency release valve on her pressure guage with a trembling hand until it falls to the floor with a clatter, still smiling sweetly*

Bunnies, Eggs, and my Peeps

In Caledon Tanglewood, there was a huge gathering of tiny sentients.. including small woodland creatures, dragon hatchlings (and pre-hatchlings!)and plush toy golems. Along with the anklebiter crowd and some token humanoids were two larger draconians and a colossal stuffed bear. I stood on guard nervously, fire extinguisher at the ready.







Fire-breathing dragons and a huge, floating sack of cotton and cloth. In Tanglewood.

I need to ask the Governor for a stipend.

Afterwards I was summoned to Steelhead to host an impromptu party. Apparently the citizens take great joy in recolouring large eggs, and my Aunt Lumina and Miss Tensai won first and second place. I think it has something to do with ancient Spring fertility rites, but the behaviour still confounds me.




And Tensai has hidden eggs of temporal energy about the sim, primed for engineering as stargates. Perhaps Miss Orr can find one as a replacement for her broken Time Key.

Afterwards I traveled to Silverscreen to see the fruits of Miss Orr's collaboration with a corporate entity for the film 300. A little searching and you can find some wonderful free weapons, armour, and clothing! We really should have a Toga Party in Steelhead!


My Father and I had just seen the film. I had to ask him hold his tongue several times as he started telling me how different the film was from the actual battle as he remembered it.





But he was adamant that the King Xerxes of Persia did not look like RuPaul.

~Qli

In an Octopus's Garden

Steelhead decided to throw an encore of the first Underwater Ball I threw during the previous management. Sadly, my hermit crab shell was not as waterproof as I had hoped..and honestly very uncomfortable even for a being made mostly of clay! So I graciously left the hosting dutied to my father, who was in spectacular form.

Which brings me to my next point.. It seems during my evil twin's stay in Steelhead she sabotaged the oxygen compressor in father's pressure suit, requiring him to make an emergency surface just before the female contest winner was annnounced.

Luckily since father is not restricting himself as a human anymore, he simply allowed the water to fill his lungs, since demons do not need to breathe.

Tonight is Fairy Tale Night at the Ballroom, so I am told. I was never a child to be raised on such stories so I do not see the appeal.

Father is also accepting the Marshal badge in Tombstone again, but House Bloodwing will stay in Steelhead. He hopes that since Tombstone has changed hands relations can be restored between former sister cities.

~Qli

Give Peace a Chance!

Just as I feared,a good-natured rivalry has spiraled out of control. To paraphrase, declaring war for charity is like copulating for virginity!

Will these humans never learn?

~Qli

The Society that Writes and the One that Doesn't

I found this parchment on the dining room table of House Bloodwing

~Qli

Of Sharing and Silence

From the smallest mouse to the mighty sky-city
From conspiracy's schemes to the warmest welcomes
From the pain of shattered loves
To the wonders of love awakened
From shameless promotion to selfless charity
From celebration to mourning
From absurdity to profundity
United in narrative

Save the one who excuses himself
But the infrequent interjection
Always a smile and eyes aglow
When the music blares and bodies writhe
But thinks his thoughts not safe for mortal eyes
Regrets raking flesh in shadowed silence
Blackblood prince by father disowned
Mother brother sister son and daughters lost
Precious diamond and dweomer discarded
Whispers of betrayal by the betrayed
Fumbling for fireflies of hope in the darkness
Only to float from his grasp
Semblance of man forgotten
Enlightenment's drawings on pale skin dimmed
Royal red robes worn on hidden throne
As amber eyes burn cold
And a sad hand scrawls to reveal
What eons sought to bury

~Darien

The Doom that Came to Caledon (And Left Just as Quickly!)

Last night I was exploring the remains of the extraterrestrial craft unearthed in Caledon Moors. This "vertikon" as it calls itself is a fascinating device..and such bizarre cosmic flotsam it carried me to! The Caledonians have already wheedled the secret of cavorite from this insectoid husk, what other djinni shall the NeoVictorians unleash? And will their paradigm survive?

Most shocking I saw small tiny replicas of the mothercraft scuttling aimlessly about the crash site. Self-replicating technology..reactiviating after a crash-landing when unearthed after who knows how long. I looked up at the massive unearthed manipulators an wondered..was this a sentient construct, or something so alien that the terms "organism" and "machine" simply did not apply? Will these grubs grow to the size of the mothership to threaten us? Could the mothership itself..reactivate? Worse, is there a hive of these behemoths swarming through the cosmos looking for their lost companion? Is the catalyst for Caledon's anachronistic leap into antigravity flight indeed the origin of her undoing?

As I pondered, gazing down from the site into the greater landscape, I heard an alarm from my fellow Firefighter, the Baroness Dimsum. She announced that a presence of the Chtulhu Mythos had come through a dimensional gate and ordered all residents of the Moors to evacuate. I did see an unusual swirling mist below me, but perhaps luckily for my sanity I could not make out the source. After I herded half a dozen or so bystanders away from the anomaly into the Cay the Baroness used mysterious powers granted by the Guvna and the Lindens to phase the entire Moors out of our dimension, shake it like a rug to flick away the Cthulhoid parasites back into netherspace, then phase it back in with a little tuck around the sides.

Well done, Your Grace! Many lives were spared and Sanity Checks avoided by your diligent wizardry!

(You don't think it followed me back from the vertikon distortion do you? Maybe I'll just stay silent at this point..)

~Qli

Entangling Alliances

ADDENDUM: Mt. Sprocket, the Governor of New Babbage, has sworn that his nation will not ally with Neualtenburg in this conflict. At least for now..

I picked the latest copy of the New Babbage Cog and it says New Babbage and Neualtenburg are now..Sister Cities?

That means Caledon is now at war against New Babbage and Neualtenburg!

This is absolutely DREADFUL! But what am I to do, wear tie-dye and carry a placard outside the Guvna's Mansion?

I must form a Colonies Peace Commitee immediately! Profits made will go to the same charity as the warmongerers of course. Fellow Citizens! Let us show our Guvna that Caledon's talents are best used for PEACE!

~Qli

Why Is This Night..

I didn't see any practical jokes last night in Steelhead, though the giant coelacanth in the harbour serenely gnawing on a rowboat was charming.

Of greater concern was the Xeno I spotted perched on the roof of Beauty & the Beast. I had glimpsed the creature in the sky before during an event at Kokopelli Square, but it diappeared before I could pursue. It was at least four metres tall, and twice that long counting the tail. Numerous spines..I would even call them blades..extruded from all areas of its coal-black exoskeleton. From the safety of one of the shops in Caledon Row I observed the beast. I dismissed the idea that it might be a construct as I saw it feeding on the remains of something..or someone.

I was unsure of what action to take..trying to establish contact carried its risk, and there was always the chance this was some guard-beast Mister meQal had sentried over his store while he recovered from his illness. I took a daguerrotype of the creature for further analysis. But after I snapped the photo, it seemed agitated, turning its head back and forth, searching for the source of the noise. It must have finely honed hearing indeed..I was at least two blocks away!

The beast soon vanished. I flew to where it had been. The beast has left the head of a large saurian on the roof. Did it pull this creature from Steelhead Harbour? If our waterway could support the coelacanth, then there must be other large creatures in the deep for it and the xeno to hunt.

Note to Father: I have SERIOUS reservations about hosting our next Ballon Friday, underwater in the bottom of the Harbour! And this time I cannot be there to protect you..not in my watertight hermit crab body at least.

I returned to Caledon, strolling through the Cay looking for another of those special roses that grow from ime to time. I did meet a new neighbour from the Zombie household. (She did not appear to be undead..I will have to ask discreetly at a later time.) She mentioned in passing that the prior landowner had left Caledon..was this the "pompous blowhard" Captain Pearse had referred to before?

I grew tired of searching and returned to the firehouse to enter a sleep cycle. Androids do indeed dream..at last night I had a nightmare..

I was in full armour, standing on the pier of what my best guess was the Hobo Station. From across the sea an enormous creature, obscured from my sensors by billowing smoke, dove towards me with a roar that shook the island. Sensors could not penetrats the smoke, but this beast was easily the size of Sky City! I immediately began to retreat. Bricks and splintered lumber scattered around me as it smashed buildings in my wake. Somehow I managed to double back to the pier..I felt my systems shorting out as my guages burst. Tesseraction Systems: Offline..Flight Systems: Offline..nowhere left to go but into the water..where all systems would flood and short out..but I had no choice. Just as I leapt, the darkness enveloped me..

And I awoke.

This morning I returned to House Bloodwing to ask Father about the dream. As I enetered I saw my brother Vortex was crouched on the sofa with a nervous expression. He told me that he had the same sort of dream. Furthermore, every time this year in Heliopolis where he was raised, the Immortals would shut their gates and cower for eight days. It was the only time he ever saw his mother, the fearsome Sekhmet herslef, tremble.

Darien arrived, standing in the doorway with a bucket and a brush. He stirred the bucket and then daubed the doorframe in red. Setting the bucket down outside, he entered. He sat down across from us and explained.

"Vortex..your Mother's kin shut their gates this time of year for long ago the God of Hebrews cast judgement upon the Egyptian pantheon, for Pharoah..the avatar of Ra in the First Life..refused to release the Hebrew slaves at the behest of their Prophet. Did you not notice the cracks in every pyramid and pylon in that Eternal City? No stone was left standing upon another stone. Even still they have never recovered to the glory of what they were before the Ten Plagues were unleashed up and down the Nile."

"And my dear daughter..the dream was even more vivid for you because of the Hebrew magic I used to create you. The Tree of Death is still connected to the Tree of Life, and that is how, to my surprise, you were imbued with a soul. Because of this mysterious favor from Him, even I, a Demon Prince, must honor Him on these nights."

"What you saw was the Angel of Death who slew the first born in every household in Egypt. By marking our doors we mark House Bloodwing as safe from that dark angel. I know him by reputation and trust me, you don't want to tangle with him. I don't know if First Created counts as First Born..whether you or Vortex or even Ari are in danger. But after losing your brother Alan, I'm not going to take that chance."

Father then ordered me to mark the balcony door with blood, and Vortex to mark the gates to the service bay in the basement.

~Qli

I Hope I Didn't Scorch the Carpet

I spent the day recalibrating my galvanic tesseractor..it kept spontaneously pulling me in and out of Steelhead in the middle of the International Ball! I was malfunctioning in front of my Father, my friends..everyone! I was so mortified I decided to stand in an alcove adjacent to the Grid and watch the affair from there.

I grow even more melancholy when I read the journal of a dear friend and see what indignities she endures. Even if she is masquerading as something else in that pocket dimension, would I not come to her aid, guns blazing, if she would but ask? Would all of House Bloodwing not come to the aid of a family member in distress?

And sadly, Caledon My Home did not become the new state anthem. My congratulations to Miss Jamie. I did receive a consolation prize at least.

The one highlight is I found a copy of the soundtrack to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. Origa sings like a Russian angel!

Now I will re-enter the Grid and be watchful of some sim-wide practical joke..

~Qli