choco loni

The Mephitis

8/30/2022 10:06pm

CHOCO LONI’S NUTS

hey check out my nuts. I’m a nutseller. biggest nutseller in the tri-market area, with the biggest selection of nuts in the biggest stalls in the biggest malls in the tri-cities.

this slippery nut will escape the owner’s fingers at a moment of its choosing, when it senses where it needs to go.

the down-down nut, always dancing. if shelled, it floats.

rip-barrier nuts. plant them around your house and disconnect from the eigenstate. sail the seven seas!

now if you’ll excuse me it’s back to my numbnuts. choco loni is old and needs her balms.

The Mephitis

1/14/2022 11:58pm

the mirrors. the captain's mind. the droste fever. it was all coming back.

my memory stick.

i'd completely forgotten about my memory stick. not since i'd thrown it at @Captain Pirate's head at the height his fever.

it had been in my pocket the entire time.

i loaded it up and aimed for the pinnacle of the spiral. the origin. why were we here again? a relapse of the droste?

i pulled the trigger without thinking. it was more like remembering i pulled the trigger than actually doing it.

the bullet had already been fired.

the bullet had always been fired.

the memory stick hurtled towards the point of the sprial above us. heading closer, heading closer, deeper and deeper into entwined mirror memories of us all.

where did they end?

The Mephitis

8/18/2021 11:04pm

i had never been near a bullet so large.

the entire saucer was a bullet. i could tell. i know bullets. i sense them. i have a connection. they are sentient, and seek pairing, and companionship. they have a job, and someone to do it for.

whose bullet was this? and what had they sent it to do?

the saucer loomed above us, humming with a green magnetic throb.

the mountain spread beneath us, draped in snow.

the sky blue sky hung behind it all.

a wide door slid open in the saucer above us.

nothing but darkness inside. but immediately i felt the pull.

"Captain, it's pulling us in," said the ensign.

"Fly away!" the captain told him.

but there was no flying away.

this bullet was winning, and i wanted it to win.

The Mephitis

4/9/2021 11:23pm

the mind bullet

part of my bullet practice is to know my bullets intimately. and by practice, i mean my discipline. my bullet path. knowing each bullet by feel, being able to select and chamber and fire and retrieve bullets with my eyes closed...

the mind bullet

i practice with eyes shut. i practice with blindflolds, and in dark caves, and underwater. one must know their bullets with such intimacy that they are a part of you...

the mind bullet

through time, this becomes more than metaphor. i know the feel of each one between my fingers to the point where mere memory and real sensation are one. i know the elation they feel as they shoot from the barrel. I know their joy of the hunt. i know their warm reckoning as they return to the gun.

the mind bullet

and here, though my bullets have been taken from my and my body searched, they can not take away from me my bullet practice. my ammunition goes beyond this physical world. there is one more hidden away, one they can not take from me.

the mind bullet

i let my mind bullet fly.

The Mephitis

11/30/2020 11:51pm

arktika! sibir! rossiya!

i fired my ice breaker bullets off the port bow, chasing the ice zephyrs into the night. horrid creatures, ice zephyrs. grinding, interlocking jaws made of crystal, shrieking wings of razor sharp shards of frozen death. but they know enough to run from an Ice Breaker. Or three.

fzzzzzzwrrr... fzzzzzzwrr... fzzzzzzwrrrrrr....

it's sibir, spiraling back to the deck to land with a plop at my feet. something's the matter with his fins, they've been shredded.

fwwwoooomp

rossiya lands hard on the deck, breaking a plank. she's been sliced nearly in half, her delicate mechanisms spilling out on the floor.

ffffrreeeeeeeeeeesssssshhhhhh!

rossiya shoots past us, out of control, heading for the surface.

three of the best trained ice breakers i've ever known. chewed up and spit back at me.

"looks like you're up, yamal," i let her know as i gently slide her into the chamber. "guess it's gonna be a hot one tonight!"

The Mephitis

7/23/2020 10:38pm

i've been having bullet trouble. practicing off the bow of the ship

pull!

i keep missing the mark.

pull!

my boomerang bullet pulls to the north and refuses to return.

pull!

i send my shepard bullet after it, but it doesn't return. it keeps heading north too.

pull!

i send my eat-em-up bullet after them. i keep my eat-em-up bullet half starved so it's hungry when i need it. it always comes back. but not this time. it chases them north and doesn't return.

pull!

i send my last chance, my come home come home bullet -- a nested bullet with a recursive charge that opens up and sends another recovery bullet every time it doesn't come back. forever. and it's still heading north.

towards that big mountain in the distance.

time to let the captain know about by bullet trouble.

The Mephitis

3/25/2020 7:27pm

i've got bullets that i hide other bullets in. bullets that open up like a nest of dolls, like a tackle box, like corpse's chest at the mortuary. you can lose yourself in those spaces. they open you up.

i've got bullets you can hide other bullets in. if you shoot them off it doesn't necessarily mean both bullets hit. one may be there, one may not. they are bullets inside of bullets.

i've got bullets inside of bullets, and a change of clothes inside of bullets, and some rainy day money inside a bullet, and a fake ID inside a bullet, and hope for the future inside a bullet. i've got my whole life packed away inside of bullets.

wanna shoot 'em off?

The Mephitis

12/10/2019 9:26pm

zing! zing!

my tuning fork bullets whip around the ship, gaining speed.

ting! ting!

the baby thunderdevil has gotten mighty big. swallow an airship big. but we're hoping--

zing!

that on the inside--

ting!

it's still the little pup it used to be--

zing! ting!

TONG!

the tuning fork bullets converge roughly 400 meters off the port bow and start to resonate. the thunderdevil pauses, and lifts its whirlwind snout out of the dusty earth below and gropes its way through the sky.

"ready with that wunderbottle?" i ask the doctor.

he doesn't hear me, what with the tornado noise, and the chimes.

i pull out my tuning fork and give it a bang against the side of my gun. it's set to the exact pitch to call the bullets back, right into the barrel.

the tuning fork bullets catch the sun as they start to zoom towards us.

the thunderdevil takes the bait, releasing the mephitis from its cyclone, and starts chasing the bullets back to us.

The Mephitis

8/10/2019 10:03pm

when the captain has the japanese camera crew busy doing his lines, the doctor and i have been letting the little thunderdevil get a bit of exercise off the port bow. generally it stays near the ship, scooping up the iron-enriched dust the doctor tosses out like fish food. when it starts to stray i shoot off a whirlwind bullet that i've notched to give it a full loop trajectory. as it makes its curve, the little devil follows it all the way around back to the observation balcony where i catch the bullet back in the barrel, and the doctor gives the baby thunderdevil a treat. it's starting to get wise and takes off now and then just so it can chase the bullet round and get its reward.

sure is cute. but what happens when it gets bigger?

"no one's tamed one before," says the doctor. "but i suppose we'll need to set it free eventually."

The Mephitis

5/12/2019 10:25pm

i've been keeping whirlwind bullets behind my ears, but there's been no need for them as the @Doctor Argosa's net protocols have been sound, neatly bottling up each thunder devil he snares. nothing much else to shoot at given the civilized nature of the natives. the local authorities have nothing to fear, and we keep the tourists happy with our hourly rentals.

so instead i've been using the holiday snaps gun. here's the temple of kukulcan with the mephitis docked nearby.

*snap*

@Captain Pirate II with elote on a stick.

*snap*

me hiding behind a column at the temple of a thousand warriors.

*snap*

(the holiday snaps gun is so safe you can ask strangers to shoot you with it.)

it's a little disconcerting i can't find my memory stick though. it's not like me not to put things back in their places. i feel like i can almost remember putting it somewhere odd... but i can't quite remember. i suppose it will turn up eventually.

in the meantime, the crew has had just about enough shore leave, and the captain has mentioned getting back on the road with a coffee and kahlua run up the coast. we'll take it north and sell it. feels like it's been quite awhile since we've had some honest work.