A Cast Of Characters

[dng]

there's supposed to be a cat hidden in the dark at the bottom of that picture, but you can't see it really, spoiling the joke somewhat

[dng]

not that it was much of a joke in the first place but still

[blombluss]

Delightful, Davuss!

Also, is the cat bottom left?

Also, also - An Alphabet Of Absences is most clever. I r impressed!

[dng]

hooray. than

[dng]

k you

[dng]

well i have no idea why it did that

[dng]

also that alphabet one is probably almost the closest i've ever got to writing puns

[dng]

but they were sort of the opposite of puns

[dng]

also yes the cats in the murk at the bottom of the page. when it gets scanned it becomes less obvious unfortunately

[dng]

actually the weirdest scanner thing is that the cherry blossom tree picture on the original post is actually painted pink in real life but for some reason the scanner ignored all the pink paint entirely

[dng]

a ghost!

[dng]

Tales From The Town #16: Broadcast Media



They had it all set up. They were going to make a video and upload it to youtube.

Daniel pressed record.

There were thirty seconds of silence.

“What’s wrong?” Tina whispered from off camera.

“I can’t think of anything to say,” said Ethel.

“Good,” said Claire. This hadn’t been her idea at all.

“Shut up!”

“You shut up!”

“I will!” said Ethel.

“Good!”

There were thirty seconds of silence.

“Why don’t you say something, Claire?” Tina suggested.

“I don’t want to say anything!”

Good,” said Ethel.

“Shut up!”

“You shut up!”

“I already have!” Claire said.

“Good!”

There were thirty seconds of silence.

Daniel pressed stop.

They did not upload it to youtube.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #17: Emergency Repairs



“There, there, little one,” the witch said. “All done now.”

The doll slowly raised her stiff little arm up and touched her stiff little face with her stiff little hand. She blinked and winked and chuckled. She had a new eye! Now she wouldn’t look so creepy at all!

“It suits you,” the witch said, as the doll fluttered those stiff little eyelids at her. She leaned down and wiped a droplet of blood from the doll’s cheek. “I don’t know where the crows find them. And still fresh too. I bet you could cry now if you wanted to.”

The doll shook her head and gave an eerie little giggle instead. She was too happy to cry.

“Now, let’s talk about my fee,” the witch said. “I hope you’ve got a good secret for me, dearie?”

The doll nodded her stiff little head and then stood up on her stiff little legs and tottered over to the edge of the table and whispered her secret into the witch’s ear.

“Ooh, that is a good little secret,” the witch said. “A good little secret indeed!”

In the queue by the door, the other broken little dolls all strained to hear what their sister said. They hoped her secret wasn’t the same as theirs. The last thing a doll wanted was to be in debt to a witch.

[endar]

Excellent quality quality quality quality quality quality quality quality

[blombluss]

These are jolly good, Davo.

That is all.

[dng]

thank ye

[dng]

Tales From The Town #18: The Eggs



“Mum! Mum! The eggs hatched!”

“The eggs?” Agnes said.

“The eggs at school!”

“They were in an incubator!” The way Ethel said this she made it sound like four separate words rather than one whole one – ‘ink you bay tor’.

“There were three chicks!”

“And two ducks!”

“And an alligator!”

“And a shark!”

“There wasn’t a shark?!” Agnes said.

“There was!”

“It drowned!”

“But in the air!”

“It was so sad!”

“It wasn’t that sad,” said Claire.

“It was.”

“It really was.”

“It was the saddest thing ever.”

“It does sound quite sad.”,” Agnes said.

“It wasn’t sad at all,” Claire insisted.

She looked out the window at the graves in the garden. She couldn’t understand why she wanted to cry.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #19: Go



Jonathan sped out of the car park.
He sped down the street.
He sped along the bypass.
He sped past the beach.
He sped down the hill and round the roundabout and back up the hill.
He sped past the beach.
He sped along the bypass.
He sped up the street.
She sped into the car park.
Hand brake turn.
Full stop.
Engine off.

Pause.

Wind down the window.
Nod to the adjacent driver.
Cigarette butt out the window.
Smile.
Give them the eyes.
Engine on.
Wait.
Wait..
Wait…

There was no one in town who did not hear him go.

[dng]

my attempt at drawing a screenshot from chase hq there

[endar]

Spectrum version, obviously

[dng]

the best version

[dng]

(i never played any otehr versions)

[dng]

though spent many an hour staring longingly at the arcade screens

[blombluss]

(i never played any otehr versions)

Never play, or even look at, the C64 version. The Amstrad version, on the other hand, is rather spiffing.

[blombluss]

my attempt at drawing a screenshot from chase hq there

It reminds me a bit of Pitstop, also.

[blombluss]

Also - 'The Eggs' and 'Go' = huzzah-ness!

[dng]

thank ye homfrus

[dng]

i'm not sure i like go actually but its too late now

[dng]

Tales From The Town #20: Dimensional Perception



The goldfish swam about in their tank. Round and around and around. There was nowhere else for them to go.

“Do you think they can see us?” Daniel asked, as he peered in at them through the glass.

“I hope not,” Tina said. “How would you like it if you looked out the window and some strange giant was staring in at you?”

“Like David!”

“Or Simon!”

“That’d be so weird,” Daniel agreed.

“Anyway, of course they can see us,” Claire said. “They’re goldfish no blindfish!”

But what if their brains can’t even perceive our existence?” Tina said. “Like those frogs that can only see flies if they’re flying around like flies?”

“Those frogs are stupid!” Claire said. “My goldfish aren’t stupid.”

“You’re stupid!” Ethel said.

“I am not stupid!”

“Imagine if there’s things out there watching us right now that we can’t perceive,” Daniel said, as he peered slowly out the window. “Just because they don’t move like people!”

“Like David!”

“And Simon!”

“That’d be so weird!”

The goldfish swam about in their tank. Round and around and around. There was nowhere else for them to go.

[dng]

this is basically that bit where picard turns to the screen and winks at us all at the end of that moriarty episode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=107&v=0 ... e=youtu.be

[dng]

Tales From The Town #21: The Bookshop



The books on the shelves changed every time you turned away. The words dripped from the pages like venom. By the time you got them home you did not know what you were going to find inside.

[dng]

from my worst illustration (goldfish bowl) to my best (cat on a bookshelf)

[blombluss]

Excellente!

[endar]

this is basically that bit where picard turns to the screen and winks at us all at the end of that moriarty episode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=107&v=0 ... e=youtu.be

[dng]

I'm not sure I know what those little faces mean, but yes

[endar]

I can't quite put into words how i feel when star trek does that sort of thing

but it's kind of like a combination of disgust, cringe, and suicidal depression

[endar]

or maybe something akin to this

picard-meme-facepalm.jpg (18.72 KiB) Viewed 26834 times

[dng]

yes

[dng]

I can't quite put into words how i feel when star trek does that sort of thing

but it's kind of like a combination of disgust, cringe, and suicidal depression

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWInKxbgUjU

[dng]

the greatest bit of dialogue in all of the world ever there

[endar]

No, please no.

David are you trying to kill me?

[dng]

I am trying to kill myself

[dng]

imagine how pleased they all were with themselves at that point

[Bruce Sato]

Barclay redeems things a bit by saying 'progrum'.

[blombluss]

I thought it was both fun and thought-provoking.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #22: The Slide



There was a slide under the stairs. They didn’t know where it went. They didn’t have a cellar or a basement. Or, at least, they hadn’t before.

“I’m not going down that slide,” Ethel said. “Not ever!”

“You’re scared!” Claire said triumphantly. “I’m not scared.”

“You are!” Ethel said. “You’re just pretending you aren’t.”

“I’m not!” Look! I’ll show you!”

And with that Claire sat down on the slide and slid off into the dark. It took a while, but eventually her screams faded out to nothingness.

No-one spoke for a very long time. They thought they could hear Claire calling, but it was just Anna and Oya having tea in the kitchen.

“Well, I’m not going down there to find out where’s gone,” Tina said.

“No am I,” Ethel agreed. “Not ever.”

“Daniel?” Tina asked.

“Nah.”

The three of them went off to play in the garden.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #23: David



The days of his unemployment stretched out behind and before him like a line of pebbles across a vast plain, each one essentially the same as every other, and exactly as unremarkable. You could move them all around and no one would notice.

To David, time was an abstract concept untethered from narrative concerns.

[blombluss]

re: The Slide

Sweet and unsettling - just like I like my women. Also teacakes.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #24: Hell



At the bottom of the slide was a darkness so complete Claire knew she was in hell. Hell was probably pretty dark and also it was underground. There was no other explanation at all.

“I can’t believe I’m dead,” Claire said. “I can’t wait to tell the others. They better hurry up and get down here!”

She waited and waited but the didn’t arrive. She was furious.

“Where are they?!” Claire said. “ What a bunch of scaredy cats! I knew they were frightened! Well, now I’m dead, I’m going to and haunt them all. Forever! Then we’ll see how scared they are!”

The idea of haunting her siblings filled her with so much glee she did some cartwheels in the dark. She wasn’t worried at all about falling over or crashing into something because she was dead and being dead meant you couldn’t hurt yourself at all. And even if you could, you couldn’t die. Not again.

Being dead was brilliant.

[dng]

Tales From The Town #25: Beneath The Boat, On The Top Of The Hill



Above the town, at the top of the hill, in the copse of trees where nobody goes, there’s an old wooden boat, upside down and abandoned about as far from the sea as you can get round here.

Eleonora has no idea how it got there, or whose it is, or how old it is, or how long its been there. It can’t have been too long, in that though the paint’s all peeled away, the wood hasn’t rotted through, and it’s not sunk down so deep into the mud yet that it can’t be moved.

Yet still it looks to Eleonora as though its been there forever. An ancient tomb of kings and queens, buried beneath their ships at the high point of the town.

On days like today, when there’s nothing she wants to do but cry, and nowhere she can bear to be without screaming, she climbs up here, and crawls under there, and lies down in the dark, her eyes closed now as she listens to the sound of the wind and the sound of the rain and the sound of the world going on perfectly well without her.

And by mechanisms she does not know, using powers she cannot understand, as she lies there in the dark, beneath the boat, in the copse of trees, on the top of the hill, as far away from anywhere and everywhere as she can get round here, the cat always finds here, and joins her, and sleeps on her chest for as long as she pleases, for as long as she needs.

They don’t need anybody else. Together they will live forever.