Adventure Gamers - Forums

>put pearl on pedestal
We put the pearl on the pedestal.

The mirror revolves for a moment, without changing the pearl, though the word “lraep” appears in startling green on the mirror’s surface.

>i
We are equipped with the following essentials: a backpack, your D-remover, a flash drive, a monocle, a pan (really the smuggled plans in disguise), a roll, and a tub of restoration gel.

We are also carrying an apple, an arm, some asparagus, a clock, Guidebook to Anglophone Atlantis, a jotter, a letter, a lime, some members, and a yam.

The flash drive is in the backpack, which is gaping wide open so everyone can see what’s inside.

We are wearing the monocle.

>get pearl
We get the pearl.

>put yam on pedestal
We put the yam on the pedestal.

The mirror rotates in leisurely fashion, and when it is done there is a May.

This is the sheet for the month of May, torn from a calendar. Someone has put a gold star on the 21st, and “Dinner with the Shaplys” is penciled onto the 30th.

There is a dismissive blatt from the monocle, and transposed over the May is a faint, greenish image of a yam.

The gate clicks open.

[Your score has gone up by one point and is now eighteen.]
>n
We slip between the houses and down a path that looks as though it might lead to someone’s back yard. No one has ever put up signage to correct this misapprehension because no one who lives around here is eager to encourage strangers on the private beach.

Soon, however, the footpath begins to descend purposefully towards the level of the ocean.

Winding Footpath
The footpath winds between the villas, sloping steeply downward. It is narrow, and bushes left and right conceal it even from the windows of the people living nearby.

>x bushes
Some variety I’m not familiar with: dark glossy green leaves, thick stems. In the right season, and I can’t even remember what season that is, they also grow gaudy pink flowers. But not now. Lots of kudzu grows through and over the bushes — this is one of the few spots on the island where it hasn’t been eradicated, it seems.

At one point along the path the bushes stick out especially far, as though there’s something behind them.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the bushes with the crosshairs.

>d
We continue down until there is a chink of a view of the sea. Then the path descends through a few last hairpin twists among rocks, and comes out suddenly on a little beach.

Private Beach
This is little more than a strip of fine yellow sand, perhaps twenty meters from side to side, and five from the hillside to the waterline. A little sage grows on the hillside, escaped from some garden, along with wilder plants. Above, at the top of that slope, are houses with balconies overlooking the sea, but from this angle it’s impossible to see much of them, or for them (you’ll have to take my word on this) to see us.

It’s tempting to look for crabs among the rocks, but the tide is high just now, and even at the best of times this is not an area rich in sealife.

Something green and plastic just barely pokes out of the sand.

Pegbiter - 20 March 2021 03:35 PM

We should examine the point along the path on our way back.

Exactly.

But also:

> wave e-remover at sage
> put sag on pedestal
> take gas

Or maybe put sage on pedestal and only then remove the e because I’m not entirely sure sag can be presented as an item (but then again, May shouldn’t have been either).

>x sand
It’s baking hot.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the sand with the crosshairs.

>x sage
Dark green leaves furred with silver prickles.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the sage with the crosshairs.

>x plastic
All that’s visible from here is the tip of something green.

>get all
funnel: We pick up the funnel. A gaudy green plastic toy suitable for funneling water and shaping conical sand-turrets. It’s all sandy.

Smart Timovieman! 

get sage
We pick up the sage

I noticed that “get all” is an unreliable command in this game.

>x funnel
A gaudy green plastic toy suitable for funneling water and shaping conical sand-turrets. A few grains of sand still cling to it.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the funnel with the crosshairs.

You have a fleeting thought of your austere childhood.

>remember austere childhood
Your Childhood Bedroom
You hung your newly ironed clothes in the wardrobe. Your clothes were frumpy foolish things. But they were made for you by your parents with great care. Your father made the wardrobe himself. Your mother sewed all your clothes. She had an eye for color and detail. It shows in the neatness of the hems, the crisp piping on a pocket, the surprising yellow buttons on a pale blue cuff.

Every day you wore those clothes was like being armored in love.

Then we’re back in the present.

>u

Winding Footpath
The footpath winds between the villas, sloping steeply downward. It is narrow, and bushes left and right conceal it even from the windows of the people living nearby.

>l behind bushes
It’s hard to get a good look under the bushes with all this kudzu in the way.

>x kudzu
An invasive vine grown through and over the bushes.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the kudzu with the crosshairs.

>get kudzu
That seems to be a part of the bushes.

>u

Roget Close
A pleasantly sheltered lane in which I learned to ride a bicycle, and where my friend Lucy used to live, before she and her parents moved off-island. Restrictions were looser even twenty years ago. Our old schoolhouse is just west of here.

If you look just north between the houses, you’ll notice also the footpath down to an almost-private beach. It used to be open, but it’s now gated off, and built into the gate is a chic modern sculpture.

On the pedestal, the May revolves idly. After the mirror does its work, there is a yam.

The monocle pings happily as we sight the yam with the crosshairs.

You are reminded of your crew’s skill.

>remember crew’s skill
A Room in a Villa
The bed was draped with sheer salmon-colored fabric. The bedroom opened without doors straight onto the bathroom with a full view of the spotlit bathtub. The toilet was hidden by a frosted glass panel etched with leaping fish. It was the swankest place you’d ever seen, and it made you uncomfortable.

“Belongs to a seafood magnate,” your crew-mate Brock was explaining. He was in the middle of setting up a directional mike pointed out the window. The head of R&D at Sibilant Solutions lived right across the way. What you learned from his pillow-talk was enough to recover three missing marquesses.

Then we’re back in the present.

>get yam
We take the yam.

>wave e-remover at sage
We reset the device to e. There is a lavender cloud, and the sage turns into a sag. The sag comes in the form of a doll-sized house with a distinct dip in the roof.

There is a dismissive blatt from the monocle, and transposed over the sag is a faint, greenish image of some sage.

>put sag on pedestal
We put the sag on the pedestal.

The mirror rotates in leisurely fashion, and when it is done there is some gas.

It looks like a generic canister of unleaded gasoline.

There is a dismissive blatt from the monocle, and transposed over the gas is a faint, greenish image of some sage.

>get gas
We get the gas.

>go to high street

Webster Court
A broad and plainly-paved court, named for the statue of Noah Webster.

The large, pale pink building north of us is my parents’ home.

The streets continue south, east, and west; and just to the northeast is my parents’ side garden.

The door to my parents’ house opens and my father comes out. He’s talking over his shoulder: “Sorry, dear, but someone has to be on call.”

My mother answers from inside, but we can’t make out what she’s saying.

“Surge on the grid,” Father replies. “Could be an unauthorized synthesizer, but more likely… yes, exactly. I’ll try to be home before the fireworks.”

He closes the door behind him.

Hastily I take off our monocle and palm it. Father shouldn’t recognize us in our current body, but wearing expensive Bureau equipment in his presence would be a terrible idea.

We put the monocle into the backpack.

>x father
He looks put out. Serial Comma Day is supposed to be a day off, even for him.

My father sees us from a distance and gives a neighborly wave. “Happy Punctuating!” he shouts.

I wave back rather weakly.

He gets on his small red scooter, checks his helmet, and revs off to the south. Off, apparently, to investigate the synthesizer that put us together. That will go slowly because of the holiday, but I’m guessing there will be Bureau investigators crawling all over the south side of old town in an hour or two.

>go to high street
We walk out of the cocooning silence of the wealthy streets and back among the fair booths.

High Street
Hustle, bustle, dirt; ugly American chain shops; lots and lots of people. There seems to be a large organized protest in progress: protesters completely cram the sidewalk to the southeast.

A garage has sprung into being between two high-end boutiques. In the garage is a mechanic.

Our car — which might better be described as a covered bicycle — is parked nearby.

To the west, the street turns into a monumental staircase leading to the old fortified area; a cross street heads southeast towards the main roundabout.

The mechanic nods at us.

>open tank
That’s already open.

>pour gas in tank
I deeply fear automotive maintenance, but I can (just) manage to pour in the fuel… and I think that’s done it.

[Your score has gone up by three points and is now twenty-one.]

>enter car
We get into the car.

>se
We switch on the ignition and the car comes to life. Smelly, trembling, putt-putting life, but still, not bad for something we conjured out of a vegetable picked outside my parents’ place.

Roundabout (jammed into the car)
We are jammed into the car with our knees almost at our chin, looking out through the bulbous little windshield. The motor is growling like a housecat with pneumonia.

The traffic flows in a tight circle around a statue which we can never see clearly.

The hundreds of people are carrying angry signs and wearing slogans.

Confusing signs point in various directions: northeast to Deep Street, northwest to High Street, south to Long Street, east to Tall Street.

The car is making an unpleasant raspy growl.

I hate to backseat-drive, but I think you were supposed to yield just there.

[Your score has gone up by five points and is now twenty-six.]