by

Aquillae

Copyright April 12, 2001

A Day @ ASSD

It was nine o’clock on a Saturday. The regular crowd was already gathered in the great hall enjoying each other’s company and a frosty mug of Foster’s Beer.

Through the double doors a singular figure walked in to the room, a trail of soapsuds and water left in his wake. With a rubber duck and soap bar clutched in his hands the tall, wet man, covered only by a few sporadic groupings of bubbles, scanned the gathering as he continued across the floor. In his eyes one could see the fear of a young child lost and alone.

"Who’s that?" Bonnie Downey asked as she tapped Denny’s shoulder.

Looking up from the long list of questions he was compiling, Denny glanced at the lone figure. "Aquillae."

Bonnie watched as the young man continued his frightened journey across the room. A thought crossed her mind as she noticed his state of dress, and she asked, "Is he harmless?"

"Him?" Denny considered the fellow for a brief moment, then answered, "Well 3;mostly harmless."

Having made his way deep into the room, Aquillae stopped and looked around in fear clutching his rubber duck closer to him.

From the bar behind him, two men walked over to Aquillae. The man on his right walked up and placed his hand on the frightened young man’s shoulder. Aquillae jumped at the touch.

"Easy, boy," Rui Jorge spoke in a claming tone, "you’re among friends here."

Aquillae gazed long and hard into the face of the other man. Slowly, with recognition, the fear began to fade from his eyes, and he began to smile. "Rui. Is that you?"

"Who else would it be?" came a voice from Aquillae’s left.

Quickly Aquillae turned to see another man to his left. Recognition was not as quick in coming for the second man, and fear slowly started to build in Aquillae’s expression.

"That’s Rey," Rui pointed to the man on Aquillae’s left.

Aquillae looked from one man to the other, as a question played across his face. He looked to Rey and spoke in an unsure tone, "Rey del Sexo?"

"That’s me," Rey replied.

A small smile briefly flashed across Aquillae’s face.

"Ah, I don’t know how to put this Aquillae," said Rui, "but you seem to be naked."

"And wet too," added Rey.

"Any problems with the tubs we should know about?"

"They’re gone," Aquillae said quickly in a frightened voice. "They’re all gone. They’ve all left me."

"Who’s gone?" Rui asked. "Who’s left?"

"Everyone!" Aquillae cried. "Dr. Spin, Mr. Slot, Hecate, Souvie. They’re all gone."

"No, they’re not gone," Rui tried to calm Aquillae.

"Yes," Aquillae was emphatic, "Yes they are! I read it in a post. They’re all gone."

"Now calm down. What post was this?"

"It was a listing of active members," Aquillae replied. "It said there were only four people left in the group. And the only one I knew was Katie. And I can’t find her. She’s not here."

"Of course Katie’s here," Rui said as he searched around the room with his eyes. "Katie!" he called out.

From behind a newspaper, a blonde head popped up. "What’d you want?" She was busy studying the latest reports from the Australian Football League.

"There," Rui said in a reassuring tone, "Katie’s still here. Aren’t you Katie?"

Katie poked herself in the arm with a finger. "Yep! I’m still here."

"And the others?" Aquillae asked.

"They’re still here as well." Rui patted him on the shoulder, and then motioned for Rey to hold off on revealing the whole truth just yet.

Reassured by the two men, Aquillae turned and spoke to his rubber duck. "Did you hear that, Mr. Squeaks," Aquillae said as he gave the duck a squeeze and it squeaked, "everyone’s still here. We’re all still together."

"I’ll handle it from here guys," Hecate said as she walked up to the group.

The two men nodded and walked back to their bar stools.

Glancing up from his duck, Aquillae was so shocked to see the beautiful red head standing before him dressed in leather and holding a riding crop in her hand that the bar of soap shot out of his hand and sailed across the room. With a wet splat it hit the floor and skidded to a stop a few feet from the door to the men’s bathroom. Tentatively, Aquillae leaned close to the beautiful vixen and addressing her breasts, asked, "Is that you, Hecate?"

"You were expecting Shirley Temple?" She placed the tip of the riding crop under his chin and slowly lifted his head so she could speak to him eye to eye.

Mr. Squeaks gave a squeak.

"Boy! You look even better than that picture Nat has for you."

"Of course I do," she replied in an unassuming manner. "It’s all just part of VRI."

"VRI?"

"Virtual Reality Imagery."

"What’s Virtual Reality Imagery?" Aquillae asked.

But before Hecate could answer, there came a loud scream from the outer corridor. The two, along with everyone else in the great room looked to the doors. With a crash the doors were flung open and Frank McCoy ran franticly into the room waving his arms and screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Help!" Frank McCoy, not to be confused with that other Frank, who was busy sitting at the bar resting from his most recent exertions in the literary pursuits and eating Nachos, ran across the room screaming bloody murder, "For God’s sake, somebody stop the Spam!" With a loud meaty thud, he ran straight into the far wall and slid slowly to the floor where he mumbling softly to himself, "The horror."

"As I was saying," Hecate returned to her conversation, just as everyone else returned to the things they were doing, "Virtual Reality Imagery relates to the images we create to represent our individual representation of the virtual world of the Internet."

Aquillae gazed at her with the puzzled expression of a WWF Wrestler who has just been called upon to describe Newton’s Laws of Gravity. "Ugh 3;"

"It means that you see things in the Internet world the way you wish to see them. Not as they truly exist in the real world."

"Ah 3;," Aquillae scratched his head.

"People and things look the way you want them to look," Hecate tried making it as simple as possible for him. Clearly it wasn’t working too well. "Look, you have a perception of how you think I should appear based on the photo you saw on Nat’s web site. Understand so far?"

Aquillae slowly nodded.

"Good." Hecate braced herself for the hard part of the explanation. "In the virtual world of the internet 3;you do realize that the world of the Internet is not real in a physical sense?"

"Yes."

"Good. Well, in this virtual world, each person, each surfer, has their own reality, which is based loosely on the real world." Hecate felt that her explanation was beginning to penetrate into Aquillae’s thick skull and slowly trickle down into something resembling a brain. "You have an image in your mind of me as a very sexy red head who likes to wear leather, so 3;"

"So 3;," Aquillae slowly began to grasp the direction that Hecate was heading, "you *are* a sexy red head who likes to wear leather in my virtual world."

"Yes." Hecate patted him on the head. "Very good."

"So, people and places I visualize on the Internet might look different to someone else?"

"Exactly," Hecate smiled, relieved that she had finally broken through.

Aquillae stepped closer and in a sidelong glance, asked, "So, what do I look like to you?"

Hecate took a moment to look him over, and then holding back a smile, she answered, "I think, in this case, ignorance is truly bliss."

Aquillae nodded, then paused to think over the comment.

"Now, Aquillae," she tapped him on the chest with her riding crop to get his attention, "Aquillae, are you listening to me?"

Aquillae turned and gave her a smile.

"Good. Now, what we need to do is get you active again so you’ll stop worrying about who’s coming and going. Okay?"

Aquillae nodded.

"And the best way to get you active is to have you start writing again."

Again Aquillae nodded.

"So," Hecate said with a smile, "what story do you want to write?"

Aquillae shrugged his shoulders.

"Oh, come now. Surely you must have a couple of stories you can think of off the top of your head. Pick one from your hopper."

"Hopper?" Aquillae looked puzzled. "What’s a hopper?"

"You don’t know what a hopper is?" Hecate could hardly believe the man had spent nearly two years at assd and had never learned the meaning or purpose of a hopper. "You’re joking, right?"

Aquillae shook his head.

"Well, a hopper is a collection of story ideas, or outlines, or partially completed stories, that you keep in a 3;well, a hopper. And they stay there until you write the story."

"Then where do they go?" Aquillae asked.

"Then they go to Assm, of course."

"Oh."

"So," Hecate asked, "do you have any stories in your hopper?"

"Oh yes," Aquillae replied with a happy nod, then showing four fingers he added, "I’ve got four stories to complete."

From somewhere in the midst of the great room a deep voice bellowed out, "Good God man! Four stories! You call that pathetic grouping a hopper." The voice belonged to Dr. Spin, the grand high Pooh-Bah of all hoppers in Assd. "Come back and claim you’ve got a hopper when you’ve tacked on another forty stories, boy." Satisfied that he had upheld the dignity of the hopper brigand, Dr. Spin reached for his newspaper, the Sun, opened it to page three, and then cursed. Apparently some militant feminist had defaced the young page three beauty by gluing a photo of Margaret Thatcher over her.

"Don’t mind him," Hecate reassured Aquillae. "Now, you’ve got a story to write?"

Aquillae smiled and nodded.

"Good. Then go and write."

"Yes, but 3;"

"No buts," Hecate held up her riding crop to silence him. "Writing. I want writing. Lots of it. Now go."

Aquillae tried to raise his hand again to interject something, but Hecate quickly hushed him up.

"No time for chit-chat." She tapped him lightly on the chest in a quick staccato with her riding crop, "Pound those keys, damn it." And to end the discussion there, she gave him a quick slap on the ass with her riding crop.

Aquillae jumped. Mr. Squeaks gave a very quick, high-pitched squeak. Rubbing his ass, Aquillae slowly began to walk away toward the doors.

Feeling that she had accomplished her good deed for the day, Hecate turned to survey the rest of the great room. Someone tapped her on the shoulder from behind. She turned, and was surprised to see Aquillae standing next to her.

"Could you do that just one more time?" he quietly asked, still rubbing his cheek.

"Get going!" she ordered as she stomped her foot down and pointed toward the doors. She watched as Aquillae made his way to the doors. "And no more silly satires!" she shouted, "I want some hot, juicy sex action in that story!"

Just as Aquillae exited the great hall, Kenny Gramra was exiting the men’s bathroom. Stepping carelessly into the outside world of Assd, while humming a little bathroom ditty he had just composed, Kenny was unaware of the innocent looking bar of soap that lay in wait just in front of him.

He stepped down on the bar and quickly began to lose his balance. In an effort to keep his balance, Kenny began to twirl and flap his arms about wildly. Soon he was lifting and kicking out his free leg to help in the balancing act. It was slowly working. Kenny was slowly, but steadily, regaining control of his balance. The embarrassment of falling on his face was apparently fading.

Mr. Slot, seated to the right of Kenny, having watched the dance of his friend in amusement, and now sorry to see it ending so quickly, gave Kenny a quick shove in the back that propelled him across the room on the bar of soap.

"Wah!" Kenny cried as he went sailing through the room on the bar of soap, with his hands and leg flying wildly in the air to try and keep his balance.

As he would come near a table, someone would always reach out and, grabbing him by an arm or leg, whip him around and help build up his speed. The last of these whips sent Kenny sailing back toward the men’s bathroom. With a quick rush of air he flew through the door and disappeared from sight.

As Kenny’s cries faded in the great room, Souvie burst in through the main doors. She was slightly out of breath as she quickly scanned the room. Seeing the trail of soap left from Kenny’s ‘joy’ ride around the room, she frowned, and slowly walked over to a chair and sat, folding her arms over her chest in a disheartened way.

Alexis looked up from her writing at the young Texan, and asked, "Hey, what’s wrong, Souvie?"

Souvie slumped back in her chair. "I missed the soap surfing turtle scene," she replied in a dejected tone.

At that moment, a cry began to build from the area of the bathrooms. With a crash Kenny burst through the bathroom door, and at about five hundred times the speed of a normal turtle, he flew across the room and out the main doors.

Alexis looked to Souvie. "So what did you think?"

"It’s not as much fun the second time."

Alexis nodded her agreement, and then went back to her writing.

Souvie looked over at the pile of papers spread in front of Alexis. "So, what are you writing? A story?"

"Nope. Just working on an outline for a doctoral thesis."

"Really?" Souvie was surprised. "What’s the subject?"

"’Why Alaskan women as so beautiful’."

At that moment Kenny’s cry of help burst out of the bathroom and followed after him. Three seconds after that there were a multitude of voices raised in shouts from outside, and a tremendous crash which was immediately followed by a very loud squishy noise.

A few seconds later, as the people gathered in the great hall watched the main doors, a litany of curses were heard coming from outside.

With a thunderous explosion of noise and a not so cheap display of pyrotechnics, the two main doors were thrown open. As the concussion from the sound waves battered the people gathered inside, the Head Warlock himself, Shon Richards, strode angrily into the great hall, his eyes blazing with fire as his hair and cape flowed behind him. Behind him scurried several novices of Bliss, their feet sloshing on the floor, the hems of their gowns wet and matted with some gelatinous substance.

"Alright!" Shon roared with the anger of a vengeful deity, "which heathen here dared to cover my May pole with a condom, and dress it up to look like Prince Charles?!"

There was a spattering of chuckles from the group.

Father Ignatius quickly covered his mouth to hide his laughter.

Seeing this, Conjugate leaned across the table and whispered to his friend, "Did you do that?"

Father Ignatius nodded slightly as the tears began to build up in his eyes.

One of the young novices timidly stepped close to Shon and whispered in his ear. Shon roared in anger. "And who dared to flood the entire field with anal ease?!"

Unable to control himself any longer, Father Ignatius called out, "How do you know it’s anal ease, Shon? Have you sampled it?"

The room erupted in laughter.

The Head Warlock turned and marched out of the great room, quickly followed by his novices.

As the laughter began to die down, Conjugate asked, "Why Prince Charles? A bit political, don’t you think?"

"I was trying to make it look like Mickey Mouse." Father Ignatius dabbed a handkerchief to his eyes as he slowly regained control from his laughter, "But I just couldn’t get the darn ears to stay up."

"Okay, hold it!" Rui Jorge leapt off his bar stool and marched to the center of the room. "This has gone on long enough. This is supposed to be an Easter challenge. Here we are nearing the end of page nine, and there hasn’t been one single mention of Easter."

"Let alone any sex!" Rey added from the bar.

"Exactly." Rui looked up toward the ceiling lights and past them. "Now either add some sex, and show me some connection to Easter, or I’m canceling this story. Right here. Right now."

At that moment, the entire speaker system for the great room was activated. After a few puffs of sound shook the speakers, the sound of a needle being placed on a record was heard. Then the slow scratch of the record turning came in pulses through the speakers.

Rui, still looking up, announced, "I’m still waiting."

A voice broke through the speakers in song. It sang, "You know Dasher and Dancer 3;" there was a sharp scrapping noise, then silence for a few seconds. Then the sound of the needle being replaced on the record returned. The voice once more began to sing. This time it sang, "Here comes Peter Cotton Tail, hoppin’ down the bunny trail, hippity, hoppity, Easter’s on its way."

The song continued, and the gathered people began to clap and sing along to the words.

Then the man singing the song called out for everyone to join in and help him sing the song a second time. And as the group sang out the words, the main doors opened, and into the room hopped a tall, fluffy white rabbit carrying a large Easter basket, and tossing candy and chocolates to the men and women. Making his way around the gathering, the rabbit made extra sure that everyone took some candy.

Finally, as the music was ending, the rabbit hopped to a stop just in front of Rui. With a smile, the rabbit offered Rui a chocolate covered egg.

With a shrug Rui accepted the egg. "But what about the sex?" he asked as Aquillae pulled the head off of his rabbit costume.

"Sex?" Aquillae smiled. "Just wait till they get finished eating that chocolate."

Rui stopped just as he was about to bite into the egg. "You didn’t? Did you?"

Aquillae tossed a few jellybeans into his mouth, and chewing on them gave Rui a wicked smile in reply.

A heavy fist pounded down on the table near Aquillae. No one in the room heard the noise as they were already beginning to feel the effects of the candy’s secret formula.

Uther Pendragon rose from his chair and marched off toward his small room where he kept the original draft document of the group’s Story Codes. "Damn upstart!" he cursed as he strode toward the room, "should have at least marked the story as a MC, or drug."

The End J

Aquillae
aquillae_diquitus@hotmail.com

All comments and or retaliations are welcome.  Just remember to be gentle.