The Other Place: #14 A Boat To Procure
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Fourteen: A Boat To Procure
Caedar-writing-artwork.com
Lady Oolong and Lady Steamsail find themselves on the opposite shore of Countess Mlde.
Lady Oolong lowers her head and unsheathes the rapier within her dragon headed cane. “It’s the original, you know” she says to her sister.
“It was always his prized possession,” Lady Steamsail says, as she stares around for a way to cross. The wind over the water makes swimming through the air difficult.
I’d like to think he’s still alright, Lady Oolong sings.
Breathing in an unsafe place
You know,
I don’t think he gave in
I don’t think they know I have it
Oh, sister, Lady Steamsail sings in reply.
He’s as stubborn as a tax collector
As tough as a billy goat
I think he’s still sane
Even after so many years
With a sniffle, Lady Oolong sheathes the rapier. “Do you see a boat we could procure.”
Lady Steamsail squints towards the lake. “Why, I think Chief Shabuni will be saved. There is a fine-looking skiff with two nervous rowers, just waiting our arrival.”
Lady Evelyn Oolong is portrayed by Taylor Norris, RMT taynorris@gmail.com
Lady Marina Steamsail is portrayed by Joanne Gosling Jgosling@calclosets.com
Background by Dianne McBride diannemcb@gmail.com
Check Out:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Delaware Street
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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The Other Place: #13 Flow Through The Floor
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Thirteen: Flow Through The Floor
Caedar-writing-artwork.com
As he focuses on becoming immaterial, he hears footsteps enter the hall. Countess Thelma Mlde is no longer just an image. Her corporeal being is almost overwhelming in its confident presence. She’s only a few steps from him now. In her hand is the antique silver mirror. Anger makes her eyes an abyss of rage as she stares into it.
“Where is he?” she demands into the mirror.
Cautiously he crouches down as tingling sensations run from his fingers to his toes. His nose grows numb.
“Sink through the floor,” Roisin Moodlive encourages him, inside his head.
He feels his body become liquid and everything gets larger in the hall as he flows downward. Just as his eyes sink into the floor, he swears Countess Mlde stares directly at him. If he could, he would inhale deeply but there is no breath for him to intake.
He nearly becomes tangible as his body flows through the air of the room below. He stares down, into a large room, filled with strange humans. An overwhelming terror grasps a hold of his chest as he floats behind the two vampires, who brought him to the castle. But it’s not them that terrifies him. It’s the gathering they are staring at.
Staying ever so still, he listens in to what the vampires are saying.
With much thanks, as always, to Leah Weir for portraying Countess Thelma Mlde.
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Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Delaware Street
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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The Other Place: #12 An Enchanting Message
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Twelve: An Enchanting Message
Caedar-writing-artwork.com
Lady Oolong is smoking her pipe outside the red door of Lady Iris’s mansion, talking to Lady Steamsail, when the sisters both stop to listen.
“Do you hear a siren’s voice melded with enchanting strings of a lyre, dear sister?” Lady Steamsail asks.
Lady Oolong takes a puff of her pipe. “Why, yes, I do. It seems we’re being beckoned to Countess Mlde’s castle but not by the countess.”
“Isn’t that where our stepfather, Mr. Intrepid is believed to be?” Lady Steamsail asks. “And the spirit of The Inventor’s twin?”
“Why yes,” Lady Oolong replies. “It’s also believed that Mr. Siku Claws and Ulysses are there as well.”
“I sense the music is from Roisin Moodlive,” Lady Steamsail says, staring thoughtfully into the direction of Countess Mlde’s castle. “And there was a sense of Chief Shabuni, but no more.”
Lady Oolong takes a puff. “Why is Chief Shabuni there when he should be here?”
“Twist of fate,” Lady Steamsail replies. “I wonder if The Inventor and Mr. Clockwind have finished the clock?”
“Not to worry sister, fate has intervened,” Lady Oolong says with a final inhale. The herb mixed with the tobacco in her pipe helps clear her mind. “We were supposed to wait here, but now we need to put on our goggles and turn phantasmal.”
“To Castle Cumplit,” Lady Steamsail says with relish.
Lady Evelyn Oolong portrayed by Taylor Norris, RMT taynorris@gmail.com
Lady Marina Steamsail portrayed by Joanne Gosling Jgosling@calclosets.com
Check Out:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Delaware Street
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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Blog Eleven: Focus On Becoming Immaterial
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Eleven: Focus On Becoming Immaterial
Caedar-writing-artwork.com
“We need to get out of this room,” Roisin Moodlive’s soprano voice sings up to him, “Countess Milde has company.” He sees her grab a cane seat chair.
He follows as she tugs him into a hall with Corinthian moldings at the base of an archway. Just beyond the archway are doors on opposite sides of the hall. Moodlive places the head of the chair under the doorknob of the room they just left.
He turns and looks down at her. “Why me?” he asks.
Others are here, she sings
Powerful entities inside
Inside corporeal bodies
Oh, Dimoso they’ve brought you here
For your magic
“I’ve never done anything magical until I came here.” He can hear the frustration in his own voice. “And everyone here seems to have the same abilities as I do.”
The magic is in your bones
Innate and meant to be
A part of Mother Earth
Not meant for humans to use, Dimoso
“Those rowers better have not lied to us,” the distant voice of the vampire with the storm grey overcoat says from the room they just departed.
“You need to escape,” Moodlive says, her voice full of urgency.
He pulls out the jar and note from his pocket, and passes the jar to her.
The note says in Lady Elsewhere’s handwriting: Don’t take off the key. He grimaces, realizing he had already made that mistake. The ointment is to make you more invisible, if necessary.
“Can you feel him?” he hears the vampire in the sea green overcoat asks in a desperate tone.
“No, and even invisible he’s so big it would be impossible to miss him,” replies the vampire in the grey storm overcoat. “Let’s move on.”
He can hear the door rattling and the cane chair rocking as the vampires try to open the door.
“We need to cover you in this ointment, clothes and all,” Moodlive tells him in a hushed tone as she starts rubbing ointment onto his shoes. She scoops out a glob and says, “Here,” and passes him the jar. “Cover your hat and googles. I’ll start on the back of your trench coat.
“What then?” he asks, as the banging on the door gets more violent.
“Done,” Moodlive says. “They’re not powerful. They won’t be able to sense you now that you’re completely invisible. Lean against a wall until they finish searching the room.”
“What will you do?”
“Listen Ladies Oolong and Steamship,” he hears her sing as she brushes the strings of her lyre.
Countess Milde has called a meeting
A meeting with the hierarchy
We head to the dungeon
Where Dimoso will find what he came for
But help is needed
If we’re to succeed
At the end of the song, he sees her hands reach up to his chest. She turns into yellow mist and flows into him; lyre and all. Inside his head, he hears her voice tell him, “Focus on becoming immaterial.”
Check Out:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Delaware Street
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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The Other Place #10: Don’t Stop Moving!
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Ten: Don’t Stop Moving!
As he leans forward, copying Roisin Moodlive, he notices there is a bulge in both of his overcoat’s pockets. He remembers putting the bag with the antigravity stones into his left pocket but he’ll have to look again at the note and jar in his right. His feet raise off the ground. Using his arms to move and for direction while kicking his legs back and forth as if he were treading water, he follows Moodlive around the tower of the castle.
He glances down and wishes he hadn’t as his legs instinctively stop kicking and his arms go still at the terror of falling.
“Don’t look down, and don’t stop moving,” he hears Moodlive’s distant voice warn.
As his body starts to fall he focus on leaning farther forward until there is pressure under his belly, as if he were leaning over a steam pipe. Gulping nervously, he starts to kick and stroke the air with his arms again.
Staring up he sees Moodlive slip inside a round window. He makes wider strokes to increase his speed as she peers out the window and waves for him to hurry.
Check Out:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Delaware Street
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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The Other Place: #9 Lean Forward And…
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Nine: Lean Forward And…
The skiff docks against a cedar dock so old its planks have turned a greyish brown. At the end of the dock, he sees a crushed stone walkway and further a castle that appears vaguely familiar.
“Off you go, big boy,” the vampire in the storm grey overcoat says, while heaving up on his arm to make sure he understands.
Once he’s on the dock he turns to Roisin Moodlive and offers an invisible hand. Her lightly freckled cheeks smile up at him and she reaches up.
A dainty hand, with long fingernails curled at the ends, pushes his arm away. “We don’t help the likes of her,” the vampire in the sea green overcoat chides him.
Memories of Msizi in a rage flash before him, and as he snarls, he grabs the sides of both vampires’ heads and smashes them together.
Roisin Moodlive leaps onto the dock as the two rowers paddle the skiff away from the dock.
He glares at the rowers but they refuse to return. In a moment they’re too far for him to leap onto the skiff.
A light pressure on his arm causes him to look down.
Nodding towards the two unconscious vampires, Roisin Moodlive tells him, “We need to leave before they awake.”
“Where too,” he asks, glancing everywhere but the castle.
“To the castle. You’ll have to go there eventually anyways—to find what you’ve come for. But not through the gates.”
“How else?” he asks.
“We’ll fly?”
He blinks and waits for her to explain.
“Do as I do.”
He watches her lean from her ankles so that the rest of her body is straight. She leans so far forward he is sure she’ll fall over. Then her feet raise off the ground. “It’s like swimming,” she tells him, brushing the air with her hands and arms.
Picture of Chief Shabuni by Alex Watt
Picture of Castle Ward by Leah Weir
Check Out:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Fergie: Big Girls Don’t Cry
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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The Other Place: blog #8 Remembering the Handsome Clock and Roisin Moodlive
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Eight: Remembering the Handsome Clock and Roisin Moodlive
He can sense her behind him as the Schiff bobs up and down across the grey waves. Terror should be engulfing him as the castle looms larger but her presence is distracting him. He never expected to meet her corporeal form. It must be a lyre she is playing behind him for a harp would be too large. Strange that the vampires show no reaction to her playing. The one with sea green overcoat is tormenting the two rowers.
“Countess Mlde will be hungry when we arrive,” the shorter vampire taunts. “You two look swollen enough to satisfy her.”
“I just want to die,” says one of the rowers.
“Not likely,” the vampire in the stormy grey overcoat says in a cruel tone. “Whatever you did before must have been horrendous. And you know what the saying is, Hell is on Earth for the returning wicked.”
As he stares forward, he remembers when he first met her. He was much younger then. On a case to find the murder of a number of citizens with suspected villainous characters. It was a case he wasn’t sure he wanted to close. The family of one of the deceased wanted nothing to do with his belongings, so held an auction. Mr. Clockwind had purchased a handsome and horse clock and wanted him to see it. As Mr. Clockwind wound the clock a knock came at his shop’s door. “Just wind it a few more times,” Mr. Clockwind had told him, “I’ll be right back.”
He turned the key on the bottom of the base until it no longer moved. As he stood up to appreciate the craftmanship, a faint red glow emitted below the roof of the handsome. Diligently, he felt along the edge of the roof. A nearly invisible clasp released and the flare of red turned bright yellow, blinding him. His chest burned terribly for a moment. “Hello,” a soft, soprano voice called into his mind. “I’m Roisin Moodlive.” From behind him he could hear Mr. Clockwind returning. Quickly he pressed down on the roof of the handsome until he heard a click.
Original picture for cover by Dianne McBride diannemcb@gmail.com This was such an interesting picture that, other than cropping it to fit, I left it as is. Dianne’s husband Bob Godglick who portrays Mr. Clockwind also repairs vintage clocks. Considerate Done: Vintage Clock Repair: bgdm201@gmail.com
Honourable Mention cont.:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Fergie: Big Girls Don’t Cry
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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#7 A Friend’s Warning
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Seven: A Friend’s Warning
Chief Shabuni feels that something is missing. As the two vampires lead him towards a dock at the end of the street, he undoes the first few buttons of his shirt and slides his hand inside. The ridges of the moving scar on his chest are gone.
At the dock he glances across the choppy grey waves at a crop of trees. Further back, he can see the shadowy image of a castle.
From behind him, he hears the soft sound of harp strings gently plucked, and a voice, nearly inaudible, singing:
You are heading into danger Dimoso
This is my place
And I know
I know
You can never die here
Only be terrified, charmed, into a docile existence
Your soul Dimoso
Not your tangible body
Not your tangible mind
But the mind that holds your soul
When the time comes
Heed me friend
The song and playing end. Replaced by the soft sound of clicking heels. As the steps get closer to him, he wants to turn around. To see if it is actually her. But he dares not.
Bobbing beside the dock is an immaculately kept skiff. Two men, in fine clothes, sit with the handles of the oars in their hands. Their eyes stay open in fear.
The vampire with the sea green overcoat passes a coin to a man wearing a faded purple trench coat and stove pipe hat. The man’s eyes are hidden behind goggles with silver wings on each arm.
“I too would like to cross,” he hears a soprano voice call from behind.
Original picture for cover by Dianne McBride diannemcb@gmail.com
Honourable Mention cont.:
Maggie Boone https://www.instagram.com/missmaggiemoon/?hl=en
This is a clip of her singing Fergie: Big Girls Don’t Cry
Currently she’s doing a kickstart for her debut EP: Delaware Street
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Blog Six: An Unwelcome Invitation
For anyone whose missed the 6th blog in the Steampunk Gothic hybrid story: The Other Place
The Other Place
(a semi-musical Steampunk Goth hybrid story)
Blog Six: An Unwelcome Invitation
Between the street buildings he sees two gentlemen treading in the air. The soles of their brown Edwin Clapp shoes are the height of a nearby streetlight. One man wears a stormy grey overcoat and dark violet vest that matches the colour of his trousers. The other has on a sea green overcoat with matching trousers. His vest is pine with intricate gold designs. Both men are wearing dark purple bowler hats. As they talk, he sees the tips of their very long canines sparkle. They glance around the street as they animatedly discuss something he can’t hear.
He steps back as he sees them dive towards him.
“Well friend,” The man in the sea green overcoat says up to him with a charming lisp, “You’ve been invited to a party.
The harp sound in his…
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