#34 – Okay, Who Brought A Lobster To The Dolphin Club? Was It YOU Jack? Was it???
The music bounced off one wall of the hotel lobby, then another. It shot across the cavernous room then quickly weaved its way between each Tik Tok Teen. The entire space seemed to bend and warp; the floor heaved upward then downward, the teens linked arms to steady themselves—the floor shaking like an earthquake of epic proportions. Then a thick bass rumble, a very loud subwoofer noise, could be heard behind one of the walls of the hotel. And if you paid close enough attention, between the rumble, someone in the lobby screamed… but, then again, no one actually screamed. No, that scream was instead an ancient sound effect used through the ages, a Skywalker Sound ‘find’ from far in the past, a Spielberg special, yes, that scream was…. The Wilhelm Scream. The scream lifted from an old studio reel by Ben Burt and then unknowingly placed in the original Star Wars movie. Innocently used in place of a real scream for that of a storm trooper, a storm trooper shot by Luke Skywalker himself. The scream unmistakable as the storm trooper fell to his death. Ahhhhhhhh!!!!
The original reel containing the scream, had been labeled “Man being eaten by alligator”… it was never meant to have been discovered, no, that old reel to reel tape was supposed to have been destroyed just the same as ‘The Porter Pyramid’ tape Scott Borchetta and Taylor Swift found all those years ago. The sound of silence, nothing but the silence of tape bias. You see, all the old tapes filled with old samples made into new art, well, that was just the start of it all. As I said, that old tape, it wasn’t destroyed, in fact, quite the opposite happened, that reel sat silently waiting for the day that Ben Burt would finally find it. And oh what a find too! The infected sound sample sitting dormant waiting for a host—a set of ears to find and a mind too—and just as art forgers leave timebombs in paintings, every and any creative work of art fixed to any medium could possibly also contain timebombs that might find their way into any creative mind of anyone who consumes that work of art, more on that later. It may indeed be no accident that Olivia Rodrigo’s music lists Taylor Swift as a writing credit. Perhaps Olivia’s younger ears in her younger years simply unknowingly consumed a Taylor Swift timebomb placed inside Taylor’s songs. Anyway, as for that old sound sample? The Wilhelm Scream… Of course it couldn’t have worked out better for the old sample, our friend Ben didn’t just put the scream in any old movie, no, of all movies he put it in Star Wars… and the more it was heard, the more it was used, Indiana Jones, Spaceballs, Toy Story, Kill Bill, Lord of the Rings, Despicable Me, so many movies there are too many movies to name… a sound that couldn’t be put down… a sound that can’t be stopped. Welcome to a world filled with Wilhelm mayhem.
“You guys…” Stan pointed at the wall. It was pulsing in sync with the kick drum of the Crazy Train music that was filling the room. Everyone turned their gaze to the wall watching it quiver like a giant speaker at a rock concert, they glanced at each other, uneasy, not sure if they should run or hide, or both. Of course, their first instinct to pull their phones out and live stream what they were seeing—like they were chilling together at Coachella and Kanye West or Billie Eilish had just taken the stage—was currently not an option. Instead, they decided to stand there and watch the impending train wreck. A moment before the crash for just a second, just one second, an audio blackhole occurred, a very brief Ben Burt moment of silence. It was as though all sound completely drained from the room for just a second… The crash through the wall was deafening. The wall exploded into a hundred thousand pieces, dust and debris showering down around them. The bits and pieces of wall turning into burning embers, carried through the air by a windstorm circling the room, the embers transformed to trails of smoldering ash then wisped away into clouds of smoke. The smoke clouds lingered for a moment contorting above their heads before the torrent of smoke and ash formed sideways tornadoes, then traveled straight into various wall mounted mirrors scattered throughout the hotel lobby.
“OH MY GOSH! AH! WHAT? THE! What did I just see? I… CAN’T, EVEN… AHHHHHHH” Jillie Jean screamed. “THERE’S A FREAKIN’ TRAIN! COMING THROUGH THE WALL!!!!!” She pulled out her broken phone and attempted to coax it back to life. “COME ON!!!!! WORK!!!! I NEED TO FILM THIS!!!!!!! WORK! STUPID PIECE OF JUNK!!!!!!” She yelled at the bricked device. “I NEED EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY FOLLOWERS TO SEE THIS!!!!!! UGH, NOTHING IN MY LIFE MATTERS WITHOUT BEING ABLE TO SHOW THIS TO EVERYONE!!!!” She banged on the lifeless device.
“Okay, you need to calm down, you’re being too loud, you need to just stop, like can you just not step on my gown…” Sashy The Sassy Swiftie quoted some of his favorite Taylor Swift’s lyrics.
“WHAT THE HECK!?!?!” Jillie screamed again eyes the size of softballs as she gawked at Sashy. “SASHY!!!! YOU’RE WEARING A GOWN! WHERE DID YOU GET THE GOWN FROM!!??!?!?!” She lifted her foot off the gown Sashy was wearing that suddenly seemed to appear out of nowhere. “Sorry I didn’t mean to step on it.” Jillie apologized for being too loud and stepping on gowns, she was trying to calm down. But how can you calm down at a time like this? How can anyone possibly calm down! What is life without the ability to put things on social media the moment they happen!
Sashy looked down at his gown, “Whoa! I’m wearing a gown! Oh my god I love it. Okay, I need to take a selfie! BUT I CAN’T TAKE A SELFIE!!!! Okay, stop, now I need to calm down.” Sashy, unable to take a selfie, sadly put his broken phone away and inspected his gown instead. He twirled around, it sparkled in the light like a mirror ball. “Wow. This is a nice gown! I don’t know where it came from, but it’s SO nice. I LOVE IT! It’s like a got a piece of Taylor Swift herself wrapped around me!”
“Oh yeah? Well two can play at that game!” Jillie looked down at her hand and a pair of scissors appeared, she reached over and cut a lock of Billie’s hair off.
“DID YOU JUST CUT OFF A PIECE OF MY HAIR!??!” Billie Eilish yelled at her stan as she pulled her hair in front of her face to see some of the strands were now shorter than the others. “NOT COOL, JILLIE! THAT WAS NOT COOL! JILLIE!!! YOU CAN’T DO THAT! YOU CAN’T JUST CUT OFF A PIECE OF MY HAIR!!! DO YOU UNDERSTAND??? YOU CAN’T JUST DO THAT!”
Jillie held the lock of Billie Eilish’s hair in her hand and smiled then laughed manically, soft at first then slowly louder and louder. She then placed the hair strands on her own head. Laughing louder and louder.
“JILLIE!!!! THIS ISN’T FUNNY!!! THIS IS SERIOUS! YOU CANNOT JUST INVADE MY PERSONAL SPACE LIKE THAT!!!”
“Wow, this just went from lit to ratchet, like, really fast.” Kymmie stood beside Jillie watching in disbelief not just at the train and not just at Sashy’s sparkly new ‘Calm Down Gown’, but also at Jillie sprinkling Billie Eilish’s hair strands all over her own head, her eyes took in the dazzle of the gown and watched Jillie and Billie fight until Finneas snapped his fingers and his sister’s hair instantly regrew anew. Billlie gasped then hugged her brother for fixing her hair.
Jilllie stopped laughing and instead tried to mash Billie’s hair into her own her. She gave up and instead tried to snap her fingers in the same way Finneas had.
Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at Jillie.
“What? Why’s everyone looking at me like that?”
No one said a word. They simply gawked.
“Why do I feel like I missed something? Is anyone going to tell me what’s going on?”
Without saying a single word Billie pointed at the mirror. Her stan Jillie turned to look into a mirror.
“DRATS!” She screeched out, “FINNEAS!!! How come when you do it, like cool things happen and when I try… I get this!” Her hair looked like she was straight out of Clarissa Explains It All mixed with Rugrats. The 90s scrunchie was back! Jillie style.
Everyone attempted not to laugh. Kymmie snorted and then covered her face, too embarrassed to even look at anyone. When she opened her eyes, she looked upwards, instead of at everyone else. She then fixed her attention on the bits and pieces of hotel wall turned into embers and now floating above them. She looked back over to the mysterious Polar Express-esk train once more. It was now slowing to a stop in the center of the hotel lobby. “Someone, please tell me this is not real.”
The song Crazy Train blared loudly from the interior of the locomotive as it continued to blast through the wall of the hotel lobby like the Kool-aid man blasting into the room. Rails? Where we’re going, we don’t need rails.
“ALL ABOARD!” One of the passengers screamed out the window of the still moving train. Then laughed boisterously. “HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!”
“No Ozzy! We’re getting off, not getting on!” Another voice yelled back loudly over the train engine to correct Ozzy.
“Oh… that’s right!” Ozzy Osbourne replied in his uniquely British ‘Ozzy’ accent.
Finally, the train came to a complete stop and the doors of the massive Hollywood locomotive motion picture machine opened. An automated prerecorded voice droned over the music, “Thank you for riding The Crazy Train, we hope to see you again in the future for all your travel needs between reality and…” The voice was interrupted by Ozzy turning off the ignition switch.
Between reality and what? Between reality and WHAT?!?!?! What’s the second place!?!?!? WHERE ARE WE!?!?!?! WHERE IS HERE? Where is only here if you remove the W.
The voice slowed just after the word ‘reality’ exactly on the word ‘and’ like a tape deck or record player suddenly losing power, the next word blurred and bent and stretched into foreverness until it reverberated into the room as a low rumble like distant thunder, distant drums. Unintelligible gibberish.
“Billie!” A voice called out. Billie turned around and Finneas was holding the handle of an open train door and removing an old-school conductor’s hat. Ozzy Osborne exited the train after him also wearing the same hat.
“FINNEAS!” She ran across the hotel lobby and hugged him. “I’M SOO GLAD TO SEE YOU!!!” She started to cry tears of joy as she latched on and hugged him super tight.
“I’m glad to see you too Billie!” He said back, enthusiastically, then attempted to peel her off him.
“I thought I lost you!” Billie said as tears continued to form and fall from her eyes while she kept her brother in a vice grip bear hug. She was never so glad to be reunited with anyone in her entire life.
“Billie… you didn’t lose me, trust me, I’m not going anywhere. I’m here for you, always. Okay?”
Billie let go of Finneas for a moment, she smiled, then hugged him again. She finally loosened her grip on him and stepped back. She tried to think of how to explain everything. How to start, where to start, words. “I, umm… We… this place… things… weirds. I can’t talk right now. Let me think—”
“Wait, you changed your hair.” Finneas said, interrupting her, a surprised look on his face.
“Oh… yes! Well, not exactly. It… kind of changed on its own. I can’t explain it.” She looked over at Jillie still sporting Billie’s old dyed green roots and black hair. “I, umm…. Finneas, I can’t explain anything right now.”
“I like it.” Finneas smiled.
“Okay, um, thanks… listen, Fin, I think something crazy is going on right now and I don’t know exactly how to put into words everything that’s happening…” She looked over at Sashy the Sassy Swifie—Taylor Swift’s Tik Tok Teen stan—as he twirled around in a sparkly gown pointing at people and saying they needed to calm down…
“…and YOU need to calm down, and YOU need to calm down, and YOU need to calm down... WATCH THE GOWN, people, WATCH THE GOWN!!!”
“Yeah… about that. When you say crazy, you’re talking about the train busting through the wall. Right? Ozzy’s Crazy Train.” Finneas pointed to Ozzy then grinned at his sister. “Okay, so it’s more than just the Crazy Train, but yes, we know, everything is ‘weird’ right now?” He made quotation symbols with his fingers as he said the word weird.
“I think weird is an understatement. I… THINK it’s an understatement!” Billie replied in an anxious voice, eyes wide darting left and right. “Also, Finneas, that’s one heck of a way to make an entrance!”
“It was Ozzy’s idea.” Ozzy nodded and smiled.
“Wait… Is that the Hogwarts Express?” Jillie walked closer to the train.
“Ummm… Kinda.” Finneas replied. The word in a slightly higher pitched voice, his voice cracking on the word kind of, like he was a teenager being confronted by a parent after noticing a dent in the new family car he’d just taken out for a spin for the first time on his own after learning to drive. His voice returned to normal, confidence. “It’s just the engine car, not the entire train. But yes.”
“WHAT DID YOU DO TO IT!?!?!?!” Jillie screeched.
“We, um, tricked it out. You know… made it better.” He cleared his throat, nervous again.
“No you made it crazy! It’s a crazy train!” Jillie yelled.
“Well, it’s that too.” Ozzy smiled.
“Are those ROCKET ENGINES? YOU PUT ROCKET ENGINES ON THE HOGWARTS EXPERESS!” Stan ran over to inspect the massive rocket engines attached to the side. “Wow. “
“It wasn’t my idea… again, it was Ozzy’s idea.” Finneas pointed at Ozzy.
“What?” He shrugged, “I think it looks great!” Ozzy replied in his Ozzy tone British voice.
“It does! Man this is AWESOME! It’s straight out of a movie! Soooo cool! SO COOL!!! ROCKET ENGINES ON THE HOGWARTS EXPRESS! It’s MARVEL-ous!!!” Stan hovered his face as close as he could get. “Hang on, I know these rockets, I’ve seen them before!” He looked up back at Ozzy and Finneas then back to the rockets, “They’re from… I can’t place it… Maybe Star Wars, or… no… Marvel… where have I seen these rocket engines before? I’ll think of it.” He moved in even closer inspecting the oh so familiar rocket engines modifying the propulsion system of the Hogwarts Express crazy train.
“The paint job is cool, I like the black, kind of looks like my car…” Billie added while looking over at the train, she then stopped speaking abruptly. “What?! Is that hot pink??? Those tiny little detail lines, right there. They’re hot pink. Ew, I hate pink.” She crossed her arms and looked away.
“Alright Billie, just relax. If you don’t like the pink then we’ll get rid of the pink.” Finneas snapped his fingers and the pink was gone. Faster than you can blink the color changed from pink to red.
“Whoa. What the flipping freaking frack?” Jillian Jean, Billie’s overly obsessed number one fan, squealed.
“WHAAAAAAA…” Stan pressed an eyeball up against the detailing work that had previously been hot pink but was now a velvety looking red.
“How… how did you do that?” Billie asked curiously. “Finneas… what IS going on here?” Her eyes wide as she stared at her brother.
“Billie…” Jillie pointed at the train while looking at Billie interrupting her. “THE HOGWARTS EXPRESS TRAIN JUST BUSTED THROUGH THE WALL AND YOU’RE WORRIED ABOUT THE PAINT JOB!??!?!?! What am I going to do with you!” Jillie tossed her hands up in frustration. “I need a closer look. I need to remember every detail of this so that when my Tik Tok is working again I can make Toks and Grams and Snaps and tell the world all about it! No one is going to believe this… without pics it didn’t happen. But look, LOOK! IT’S HERE RIGHT IN FRONT OF US!! It’s happening! It’s all happening!! UGH! I COULD BECOME NUMBER ONE IF I HAD TIKTOK RIGHT NOW!!!!! LISH! DO YOU UNDERSTAND!?!?!?! I COULD BE BIGGER THAN CHARLI AND DIXIE D’AMELIO COMBINED!!!!! I NEED TIKTOK!! I NEED MY PHONE BACK!!!!!”
“Jillie…” Billie made an OH MY GOSH face, “Just chill, okay, I’m sure you’ll get it back eventually…”
Jillie growled at Billie and stormed off like an upset teenager that had just had a fight with her mom.
“Billie…” Finneas paused before proceeding with what he was going to say, ignoring the Tik Tok Teens as they all walked away to inspect the tricked-out train complete with wings and spoilers and buzzers and bells and whistles and whirly-ma-bobs and lights. He lowered his voice and leaned in close to Billie. “Billie, listen. Listen to me. What I’m about to tell you, is going to blow your mind…” He paused again. “This. Is. It.” His words were slow and deliberate. “Like, THIS. IS. IT!” He said louder, then nodded and smiled after saying the word “IT”.
“What are you talking about?” Billie replied.
Finneas made a ‘shhhhh’ motion with his index finger over his lip, he glanced back at the Tik Tok Teens then grabbed Billie’s shoulders as they stood face to face “We’re…” He paused. “—how do I say this… “ He paused again, “We’re down the damn rabbit hole!!!” He shook Billie excitedly as he said it.
“Wha—What?” She tried to respond, her voice quivering between shakes… “Whaaaaahaahahhahahahahhahahahaahhahahahahhaha…” Finneas stopped shaking her for a moment “If you’d stop shaking me I could respond!”
“Sorry, I got really excited! Billie, listen, we’re in the creative abyss! The place where it all starts!” Finneas shook his sister again like he was trying to wake her up. But there’s no waking up when you’re down the rabbit hole.
“Wait, hang on… Finneas, what are you saying?” Billie was dazed and somewhat confused. She was… all shook up. Uh huh… yeah. All shook up.
“WE’RE INSIDE BIG MAGIC, BILLIE!!! PURE IMAGINATION!!!! WILLY’S WILD WORLD OF WONKAVISON! THE LAND OF MAKE BELIEVE!!! CALL IT WHATEVER YOU WANT TO CALL IT! THIS IS WHERE IT ALL COMES FROM. THIS IS REAL! And we’re INSIDE THE PLACE!” Finneas was getting more excited every time he repeated it. “WE ARE INSIDE THE STREAM!!! THIS IS WHERE ALL THE STREAMS START!!! ALL MOVIES, ALL TV SHOWS, ALL MUSIC!!!!! EVEN OUR OWN MUSIC!!! EVERY IDEA THAT ENDS UP ON NETFLIX OR SPOTIFY OR ANY OTHER STREAMING SITE… IT ALL STARTS HERE!!!! PURE IMAGINATION!!!!!!” He shook Billie again.
Billie tried to respond with the word “I’m” but all she could get out was the word “I” like she was riding a bike over the world’s bumpiest road, Finneas shook her again excitedly and she resembled a bobble head “IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII—” Finneas stopped and Billie finally managed to say something. “I’m sorry what?”
“Billie, we’re IN THE SPARK… the place where every single creative idea comes from—”
“No, I get what you’re saying… but, that’s not possible. This is not possible. How is it even possible? It’s not possible! You can’t go INSIDE creativity.” She grabbed Finneas by the shoulders and shook him the way he shook her, he bobbled like a bobble head. His head fell off and rolled to a stop on the floor beside him like one of the Fireys from the movie Labrynth. For a brief second Billie thought FInneas had turned into a Firey. Firey Finneas. She rubbed her eyes and blinked, and he was back to normal. This can’t be real. She thought. I’m losing my mind.
“Oh, but we did.” Finneas replied in a low steady voice while his body attempted unsuccessfully to pick his head back up and reconnect it. Billie bent over and picked up her brother’s head placing it into a pair of outstretched hands that belonged to his body. “Eighty-eight miles per hour! We’re here! Here in Jason Momoa land…” He raised an eyebrow as he spoke, his body attempting to recombobulate his previously disconnected and still discombobulated head “…anything is possible!!! Even divorcing Lisa Bonet after you marry her! And then possibly re-marrying her again later, who knows!” Finneas backed up, and his hands snapped his head back into the place, he smiled triumphantly, his head finally fully reattached properly. “Watch.” He looked to Ozzy and Ozzy nodded. Finneas and Ozzy both snapped their fingers simultaneously. The tricked-out Hogwarts Express train began to flip in and retract tiny bits and pieces of itself. It started with one small piece here, then a larger bit there. A rocket engine crinkled up like a folded piece of paper. The process continued faster and faster until it folded up entirely into a train the size of a Hot Wheel car… The teens jumped back making various screams and cries and yelps as they watched the train compress itself to a fraction of the original size. Finneas walked over and picked up the tiny Hot Wheels size train and held it up in the air. “Lizzo, can you keep this in your tiny purse? We might need it later.” Finneas tossed the train to Lizzo, she snatched the train from the air and placed it delicately inside her teeny tiny purse.
“I’m sorry, what? WHAT?” Jillie and Kymmie stood with eyes the size of a full moon. “What? WHAT!?!?!?! THAT WAS CRAZY!!!! TIKTOK WE NEED YOU!!!!!!” Jillie and Kymmiie screamed out together in agony and then pretended like they were in intense pain as they writhed on the floor unable to function without the ability to make tiny videos of the terrific things happening before their very eyes.
“Okay, now I have even more questions.” Billie tilted her head sideways at her brother ignoring the overly dramatic teenagers on the floor nearby. “Like, never mind the fact that your head fell off your body and you reattached it, I want to know how you did that train thing, Finneas.”
“YEAH! WE WANT TO KNOW TOO!” The phoneless and social-media-less quadraphonic funtastic four teenagers echoed jumping back to their feet. It seems they were finally interested in something that wasn’t on a screen.
“Okay, I promise I will tell you, but later… I don’t really have time to explain anything right now… we have to go. Like, now. Oh, and, real quick, just don’t interact with your muse if you see it.”
“My muse? Why?” Billie asked looking around, as though she might catch a glimpse of herself in muse form.
Finneas made an ‘it’s obvious’ face. “Just don’t do it.” He paused and then continued, “Actually, try not to really touch or change anything here… I’ll explain more later, but, I’m not exactly sure what that does but I’m pretty sure the outcome changes things… out in the real world.”
“I think I already did that.” Billie pointed to her blonde hair and then to Sashy’s gown. “Oops.” Billie shrugged. Sashy also shrugged and said ‘Oops’ exactly like Billie had just said it.
“Well, try not to change anything else. We have to be very careful about the steps we make from here on out.”
“What exactly do you mean by that—” Kymmie inquired, she looked over at her dad , Carl Lyle—The Carlyle Lawyer who appeared to be very displeased with everything going on at the moment. He was making the same face as when they encountered a closed road and needed to take a detour around it. Kymmie wasn’t sure exactly what to make of it… perhaps they were making a detour right now going around some kind of original road that had been closed… metaphorically speaking of course.
“Uh… guys… Remember that lobster from earlier?” One member of the group interrupted what Kymmie had asked Finneas.
“Yeah.” Some of the group replied back.
“Well, it’s coming over here.” Scotty ‘B-Chetta’ Borchetta interrupted, as it was his turn to interrupt… that’s how the interrupting game is played, we go counter-clockwise.
The lobster walked quickly in their direction.
“Ehlo…” It called out in a French accent as it closed the gap between them. “EHLO!!!!” It yelled. It was now the lobster’s turn to interrupt.
“Okay… annnnnnnd now it’s talking to us.” Kymmie added, halfway between fascination and freak out. “There’s a walking talking lobster!!! A WALKING TALKING LOBSTER!!!”
“You know I have a name other than ‘walking talking lobster’! My name is Jacque, and I live under a rock.” The lobster continued to talk in their direction in his French accent, it was as though he were trying to catch up to them the way you’d catch up to someone who dropped something on the sidewalk ahead of you, and you wanted to get their attention to give the dropped item back. “Excuse me, sorry” The lobster pushed by some hotel guests. “I am The Rock Lobster!” He proclaimed as he finally reached where they were standing.
“Well dang. It’s The Rock Lobster.” Scott Borchetta replied as though he had just recognized an old friend.
“You’re the what?” Kymmie asked, confused. “I’m so confused!”
“He’s a guy with a French accent dressed like a lobster.” Finneas commented quietly then leaned closer to Billie. “Be careful what you say to him. He seems a bit fishy.”
“I heard that!!! I am a lobster, not a fish!” The Lobster proclaimed.
“Riiiiiiiight.” Finneas replied.
“Nooooooo FINNEAAAAAAAAAAAS, he’s not a guy dressed like a lobster, he IS a REAL lobster, we saw him earlier.” Jillie corrected Finneas.
“I didn’t say he was a fish… I just said he seemed fi—Nevermind.” Finneas decided it was best not to argue with the teen stan and the upright standing lobster.
“I am a real lobster. It is true! Ehlo… and well to you.” The Lobster said in his French accent. He held out a claw which was too big to shake, he then held out one of his smaller lobster legs.
“Riiiiiiiight.” Kymmie replied reaching out to shake one of the lobster legs. The others also reached out to shake a leg but not break a leg. “He’s definitely a real lobster, but his accent kind of sounds fake.” She said in a quiet voice towards Finneas and Billie and Jillie and everyone but The Lobster as they continued to shake hands and legs while the lobster balanced upright on his tail.
“Okay, yes, this a fake French accent, but I promise you, I am a real lobster.” The lobster replied having heard everything despite the attempt to direct hushed words to specific parties nearby.
“Did anyone order lobstah for dinner? It’s getting away.” A hotel guest yelled out in a New England accent pulling out a giant shell cracking device like a pair of nunchucks and an oversized fork like the one used for retrieving lobster meat from a freshly cracked lobster claw. The fork was about the size of a pitchfork. The guest pulled a bib out of a bag and a giant stick of butter. They then held the oversized fork as though they were ready for jousting.
“I AM NOT YOUR DINNER! I AM THE ROCK LOBSTER!” The lobster yelled back. “QUIET! I HAVE BUSINESS TO ATTEND TO RIGHT NOW!” The lobster snapped a claw in the hotel guest’s direction.
The hotel guest gave them the stink eye then retreated, unsatiated. The lobster returned attention to the small group of Tik Tok Teenstagramers and the group made up of mostly celebrities surrounding them.
“I’m on the run, do not tell anyone.” The lobster said in a quiet ‘I’m telling you a secret’ voice.
“Riiiiiiiiiight.” Kymmie said again. “Who are you running away from? That guy with the pitchfork trying to make you his dinner?”
“Yes, I am also running from him, but he’s of no concern to me. I’m running from zee Dolphins.”
Kymmie furrowed her eyebrows, “Zee dolphins? You’re running away from dolphins? You’re a lobster, running away from dolphins?”
“Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.” Kymmie repeated once again but with a longer iiiiiiiiii this time.
“Like what kind of dolphins? The football team? Are you sure you aren’t more scared of that dude with giant fork and lobster bib? I would be much more worried about him than some silly dolphins. Especially with that bib. He looks pretty serious; he looks like he’s ready to eat you!”
“No.” The lobster replied, lobster serious.
“Hmm, so why are they chasing you? These dolphins that you speak of, not the people trying to eat you but the dolphins, unless—” She paused. “Unless the dolphins are trying to eat you too?”
“Because I’m trying to help you.”
“Well that makes no sense. You’re not helping us… You’re just talking in a French accent.” Jillie proclaimed. “I mean if anything you’re confusing us.”
“Yes, I am helping you right now, I am trying to warn you.”
“Umm… okay, sure, why not? Who am I to disagree with the talking lobster?” Kymmie shrugged and broke the fourth wall staring right into the camera mimicking Matthew Broderick in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
“This lobster kind of reminds me of the guy from the Monty Python movies….” Carl Lyle said to Scott Borchetta from just behind the teens, like two dads talking just out of earshot of their children playing nearby.
“Yeah, a little.” Scott replied. “It’s the accent I think.”
Carl nodded back. He turned and flipped a burger on a grill beside him.
“Burgers will be ready in a bit.”
“Great! I’m famished!” Scott said back.
“Hold on, why are you called The Rock Lobster?” Sashy asked.
“Because I live under a rock.” The lobster replied.
“A rock?” Stan questioned the crustacean.
“Yes. And that rock is under a pierre.”
“Don’t you mean a pier?” Kymmie corrected the lobster.
“Yes, that is what I said… a pierre.”
“You’re just saying pierre.” Jillie fired back.
“No Pierre lives next to me under the pierre.”
“Well why doesn’t he live under the rock with you? Is there just not enough space? How big is this rock?” Kymmie was holding her book and pen making notes. A detectives cap had suddenly appeared on her head.
“He cannot live under the rock!!! He is not The Rock Lobster! I am The Rock Lobster. But there is plenty of space under the rock.”
“Excuse me Lobster. Jillie here from The Homesworks Club, is this just a regular rock, or do you live under The Rock’s house?” Jillie asked, a follow-up question, competing against Kymmie to interview The Lobster. The scene changed for a moment to a news conference with Kymmie and Jillie fighting to ask another question. The Lobster stood before a podium with microphones in front of him. He tapped the mic, it made a short ear-piercing feedback noise that quickly faded away, he then snapped his claws together.
“It is a rock under a pierre where people walk that is not hierre.”
Bieber started to make a beat and Ye began to rap over it…
It is a rock under a pierre
where people walk that is not hierre!
It is a rock under a pierre
where people walk that is not hierre!
“Riiiiiiiight.” Kymmie jotted down what The Lobster was saying: Under rock, pier, walk, not here. She turned to (Kan)Ye and the Biebster, “GUYS! SHHHHH!” Justin made a ‘WHATEVER!’ face at Kymmie before Kanye and him stopped. Kymmie turned back to The Rock Lobster standing at the podium, “Okay, Kymmie here, if there’s plenty of space, why don’t you just let him live under your rock too?” She asked shoving another reporter out of the way, the scene growing more chaotic as other reporters pushed against Kymmie and Jillie towards The Lobster shouting questions in the direction of the podium. The Lobster clacked his claws on the podium like a judge slamming down a gavel to restore order in the court room.
“Because it is a metaphor for the housing crisis in LA!” He lifted his claws into the air as he spoke.
Suddenly the podium went poof and the swarm of reporters vanished into thin air. The teens stood looking confused unsure of why—if there were so many extra rooms sitting empty in LA—couldn’t people just live in them?
“Well, that’s dumb. Just because he’s not a notable lobster he can’t live under your rock? Even though there’s tons of space?” Kymmie grilled the lobster. He took out a napkin and wiped some sweat off his head then reached over and turned down the grill. Carl yelled out, “HEY! I HAD THAT SET AT THE PURFECT TEMPERTURE!”
‘The Rock’ Lobster continued, “Yes. However… If he can make a name for himself like I was able to do. He will have his own rock too!”
“This is everything that’s wrong with everything.” Jillie shook her head and threw her arms in the air. Confetti randomly flew from the tips of her fingers into the sky and then turned to glitter and rained down on them.
“It is true,” The lobster lamented. “But I did not come here to discuss the rocks under which we live.” The lobster narrowed his eyes and lowered his fake French accent voice to a quieter very serious fake French accent tone. “Do you want to know about the dolphins or not!?!?” He whispered yelled.
“I mean, not really.” The teens shook their heads. “To be honest we just want to take a bunch of selfies with you to post to Insta…” Kymmie and Jillie and Sashy and Stan sighed together, their sadness in sync… Addison Rae, move out of the way! Is what Jillie was about to say but somehow the other teens heard her thoughts in nodded in agreement… if only their phones and social media accounts worked right now! Jillian turned back to the Lobster, “I’d rather know why you’re called The Rock Lobster, does it have ANYTHING to do with The Rock?” Jillie asked.
“I love The Rock.” Kymmie commented.
“I think he’s super cool too.” Stan smiled at Kymmie. Kymmie smiled back at Stan. Stan looked away and squirmed in his Yeezy Boost shoes.
“No! My name has nothing to do with The Rock!” The Lobster interrupted, who’s turn is it again to interrupt? I forget. I don’t think it’s The Rock Lobster’s turn to go… “Why does everyone always ask that?”
“Um, because he’s The Rock, and you’re ‘The Rock’ Lobster?” Stan shrugged.
Scott Borchetta laughed as did Kymmie’s dad Carl, as did everyone who was alive in the 80s. The Tik Tok Teens just shrugged and said “I don’t get it. What’s so funny? WHAT IS A ROCK LOBSTER!?!?!”
“You just had to be there… ah, the eighties.” Carl replied to the teens and Scott nodded in agreement.
“I am not ‘THE ROCK’ Lobster… I am ‘THE ROCK LOBSTER! Now… Dolphin? Or no dolphin?” The Lobster crossed his claws across his chest and tapped two lobster legs impatiently.
“Okay fiiiiiineeee… oh my gosh… tell us already!!!” Jillie Jean demanded. “Like, what are these dolphins that you’re talking about?”
“All I can say is that zee dolphins are coming.”
“Yeah, you already said that, but WHAT dolphins?” Billie reiterated what her teen stan had demanded.
“THE DOLPHINS!” The Lobster huffed and lifted his claws into the air.
“You aren’t giving us any new information from what you already told us at the beginning of the conversation. Who are these dolphins? Where will they come from? What do they want? Why are they coming after us????!!!?!?!” Jillie yelled at The Rock Lobster. “I demand answers from you!!!”
“That is all I am going to tell you.” The Lobster it’s crossed claw arms again and looked away.
Jillie growled. “This is the most rediculish lobster I’ve ever met! I can’t work with this lobster anymore.”
“Well, you don’t have a choice, it’s in the contract.” Carl Lyle Lawyer produced a signed contract.
“I don’t remember signing anything.” Jillie scratched her head.
“No, you didn’t. But I did. In Loco Parentis, remember? In place of parent. Currently, I’m your acting guarding. And also talent agent.”
Jillie turned to Kymmie. “Can he do that?”
Kymmie thought for a moment, “I don’t know, let me ask my lawyer.” She turned to her dad. “Dad, can you do that?”
Kymmie turned back to Jillie and shrugged. “He said yes.”
“This isn’t fair.” Jillie pouted.
“Well, Jillian, life isn’t always fair.” Carl replied in a dry Professor Snape voice.
“Rediculish. Just rediculish! I hate being a teenager! I can’t wait until I’m old enough to be my own guardian.” Jillie began to pace back and forth. “I’ll make my OWN contracts, and everything will be on MY terms!!!”
Justin Bieber laughed. “Yeah, I thought that when I was your age too.”
“Here, Jillie, put on my calm down gown and calm down.” Sashy removed the gown and put it on Jillie.
“Oooo, wow. I feel better already. It’s sooooooo… Swiftie. I mean nifty! It’s nifty! Whoa that was weird, it’s like something took over my feelings and I suddenly had a deep longing fondness for Taylor Swift. Like, I just LOVE her so much… she’s like… really cool… OH MY GOSH I LOVE TAYLOR! And this gown too, wow.”
Sashy smiled at Jillie and then took her place pacing back and forth, “Dolphins… Dolphins… let’s see, Dolphins… what Dolphins, what Dolphins?” Sashy repeated deep in thought. “You know, I wonder if The Lobster referring to—"
Before Sashy could finish his thought the rouge lobster hunting hotel guest swung from the ceiling on a rope, a large fork sticking out like a javelin.
“Look out!” Sashy screamed at The Rock Lobster.
The lobster stepped to the side reaching up and snipping the rope just as the bib wearing guest whooshed by them. The guest fell to the floor losing a grip on their weapon and the oversized lobster stabbing fork ricocheted across the hotel lobby taking out a few random guests as it sideswiped them, yanking their feet out from under them. The Lobster Hunter guest was dazed with his back on the floor. The Lobster walked to the guest and stood over him. His voice calm and collected, his French accent coating each word with courage and confidence. “For the last time… I. AM. NOT. YOUR. DINNER!!!”
The lobster’s claws grew 10 times their normal size and he slammed the snappers into the large marble floor tiles on either side of the lobster hunter hotel guest like a hot knife going through butter.
The man made a high-pitched yelping sound like a small dog. He jumped to his feet and ran off. The Lobster removed his giant claws from the floor, one claw at a time, leaving large gaping holes in the hotel lobby floor. He held his giant claws up and made a body builder shape with his claws in the air. Then, just like that, The Lobster’s claws returned to their normal size.
“Well, you don’t see that every day.” Carl said to the others.
“He’s kind of like The Rock, but… a lobster version of The Rock. If The Rock were a lobster… He IS The ROCK Lobster!” Kymmie yelled excitedly. “THE ROCK LOBSTER!!!!” The other teens yelled and then danced.
“ROCK LOBSTER!!!!!” Everyone else yelled and danced too. “ROCK LOBSTER!!!!!!” They yelled again a few more times and danced in sync to some invisible song that sounded eerily similar to the B52’s song by the same name. Rock Lobster!
Jillie stopped dancing and stood with a big smile on her face. “THAT WAS SOO MUCH FUN!!!! OH MY GOSH… I should have a phone out right now recording this. Like, do you realize how many views I would be getting on Tik Tok right now if I could have made a Tik Tok of what just happened? DO YOU REALIZE HOW FAMOUS I COULD BE RIGHT NOW!!!?!??!” Jillie was freaking out and pointing at The Rock Lobster. “Instagram… Snapchat… I’d even settle for Facebook live! I mean, I NEVER use Facebook… and I’d USE FACEBOOK RIGH NOW IF I COULD! I miss using social media… like, a lot…”
“Hang on, that giant claw thing you just did, you’re not going to use those on us are you?” Stan asked. His voice a mix of fear and curiosity.
“No. Unless you are trying to eat me for dinner.”
“That won’t be a problem.” Billie Eilish replied. “At least not for me. I don’t eat lobster.”
“I make no guarantees.” Ozzy said as a bat flew down from the ceiling. Ozzy stuck his tongue out like a lizard and grabbed the bat out of mid-air then gulped it down.
“Ewwwww.” Kymmie made a ‘grossed-out’ face.
“What I want to know is… How do we know you can trust you? Or what you say is true?” Billie asked. “How do we know you don’t work for him?” She pointed at The Whale.
“You mean The King Whale?”
“King Whale?” Billie looked from the lobster over to the man she had previously thought ‘The Whale’ but maybe it wasn’t… maybe it wasn’t the same man from her earlier meeting, The man who proclaimed himself to have become ‘Sole Trustee’ of so much Hollywood art because only he could be trusted… It’s so hard to tell what’s real right now or who to trust. “How do you know he’s The King Whale?” She asked.
“How do you know anything?” The Lobster replied.
“What?” Kymmie asked, caught off guard by the answering by The Lobster of Billie’s question with a question.
“How do you know anything?” The Lobster asked Kymmie.
“Because we do.” But truthfully, she wasn’t sure.
“BUT how DO you KNOW?” The Rock Lobster inquired again, his fake French accent accenting the words to make them even more quizzicle. BUT how DO you KNOW?
“I don’t know, we just do.” She still was unsure, even more so now than before… The Lobster had rocked her confidence.
“But how do you know what IS truth? If I ask ‘how you are feeling’ and you say okay… how do you know you ARE feeling okay?”
The teens stopped to think. “Because I feel okay… OKAY?” Kymmie replied but feeling as though she were not really sure if anything was anything anymore.
“But DO you?” The Lobster leaned an eyeball in closer to Kymmie’s face.
“Yes.” Kymmie answered again. But she didn’t. Now that she thought about it. She didn’t at all.
“But HOW do you know?” The Lobster questioned on.
“Because I… I do. I don’t know I just feel good. I’m fine! I FEEL fine. I JUST FEEL IT!!!” Kymmie yelled at the lobster in frustration, but there was panic in her voice. She wasn’t fine.
“BUT HOW DO YOU KNOW? What IS to FEEL?”
“This lobster is confusing me.” Kymmie said the words like she had been wandering in the desert for days and desperately needed water. She was on the verge of tears.
“But what IS confusion?” The lobster asked. The fake French accent even more French sounding.
“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!?!?!” Kymmie yelled at The Rock Lobster. “YOU’RE NOT MAKING ANY SENSE!!!! Nothing is making sense! I can’t work with this lobster anymore.” The other teens inched close to her and gave her a hug comforting her during this very confusing time in her young teenage life. Jillie took off the calm down gown and put it around Kymmie… Kymmie immediately felt the love of Taylor Swift infuse her soul. She then took the gown off and handed it back to Jillie who handed it back to Sashy who cocooned himself inside it again.
“I am talking about the meaning of life.” The Lobster stated in a guru yogi voice, but still with a fake French accent.
“Okay, then what’s the meaning of life?” Sashy asked sassily from inside his calm down gown cocoon.
“You already know.” The Lobster replied in his French accent.
“No, Lobster…” Jillie crossed her arms and shifted her stance to her back leg. “We don’t.” She made a signal at Sashy that she needed more calm in the form of the gown. Sashy took it off and handed it back to her. She put it on then tossed a loose part of Sashy the sassy swiftie’s Taylor Swift ‘calm down gown’ over her right shoulder.
“The meaning of life is already inside you.”
“What? WHAT?!?!?! That’s not an answer.” Kymmie screeched back at the oversized crustacean.
“Kymmie, just try to calm down. It’s going to be okay.” Sashy said in his least sassy voice.
“Do you want the gown again? It’s here if you need it.” Jillie had now cocooned herself inside it.
“No, I’m fine.” Kymmie breathed in and out slowly. She wasn’t though. She was just hiding her stress.
Stan awkwardly smiled at her and nodded. “Don’t listen to The Rock Lobster, I think he’s just trying to upset you. Don’t let him get to you.”
Billie shook her head. “Okay, if it’s inside of us then where is it? How do we find it.” Billie inquired.
“You must talk to your soul to find it.” The lobster said, his fake French accent that was now a mystical fake French accent.
Finneas stepped in front of the distressed teen shielding Kymmie from the lobster’s unrelenting barrage of upsetting questioning. “Our soul. Our soul will tell us the meaning of life?” Finneas asked, intrigued.
“Yes.” The lobster replied.
“Okay, then how do we do that?” Finneas asked again.
“I cannot tell you. You talk to your soul and your soul will tell you the meaning of life.”
“This is rediculish.” Jillie rolled her eyes. She wrapped herself tighter into the clam down gown.
“But how do you know it is as you say… rediculish?”
“Listen lobster—” Jillie wasn’t having any more of this nonsense. She shed the gown and tossed it back at Sashy. Sashy put the calm down gown back on and immediately felt a sense of relaxation once again.
“My name is not lobster. My name is Jacque.”
“WHATEVER! You’re trying to mess with our minds, and it’s not going to work.” Mean Green Jelly Bean Jillie Jean pointed at Jacque ‘The Rock’ Lobster.
“YEAH!” Kymmie shouted from behind Jillie and Finneas with Stan and Sashy to either side of her.
“But how do you know it’s not going to work?” The lobster asked back.
“Oh my gosh!!! THIS LOBSTER!!!!!” Jillie started to get frustrated again. She calmed herself without the help of the Swiftie ‘calm down gown’. Though, she missed how comforting it felt. Soooo comfy. “Okay, so I thought we were talking about Dolphins.”
“Yes. They are coming. That’s all I can say. I cannot say more.” The lobster quickly looked nervously back in the direction from which it came.
“You never answered our question. How can we trust what you say is true?” Finneas demanded.
“Because, I have a fake French accent!”
Billie Eilish shook her head. “How does that make you credible?”
“It makes me incredible!” The Rock Lobster shouted back. The teens exchange a ‘teen glance’ with one another. The Lobster continued. “How does one know anything is anything? One does not know, only to find the truth and the meaning of life, and your soul. With that… I must go. If you need me, I’ll be under the Santa Monica Pier with my friend Pierre.”
“Riiiiiight.” Kymmie squeaked out, mentally exhausted from this encounter.
“What do you guys do under there?” Jillie asked, also close to mental exhaustion but still holding it together… or at least trying to hold it together her teenage brain on the brink of a breakdown.
“We’re lobsters with fake French accents, what do you think we do? We just do lobster things… and talk with French accents.”
“Why don’t you just talk to each other in real French?” Jillie questioned.
The lobster lowered his voice. “You think you have it all figured out, but you don’t… “ He lifted a claw. “Do not worry about my fake French accent, worry about…” His voice boomed out the final two words in the sentence, “THE DOLPHINS!”
“Okay.” She acquiesced, inching closer to mental exhaustion. “If you say so.”
“I do say so. Tik talk to your soul, let your soul tok to you in your dreams and find the meaning of life… now, I must go… well to you.”
“Well to you too?” The teens shrugged back at the lobster.
The Rock Lobster then walked off in the opposite direction from which he came.
“What just happened? Where are we? What is life? Who am I? Who are you? What is anything?” Jillie uttered the words like she had gone mad.
“I don’t know anything anymore.” Kymmie said softly. “I thought I used to know everything, but…” She trailed off as she watched the lobster walk away.
“What a weird dude.” Stan commented.
“He’s not a dude, THEY are a lobster!” Sashy corrected. “Or maybe IT is a lobster… I don’t know, we didn’t bother to ask the lobster what pronouns the lobster prefers, DID we?”
Stan thought for a moment. “What weird… They.” Stan corrected himself.
“What IS the lobster?” Jillie asked.
“How do we know what IT is?” Kymmie added.
“How do we know what the lobster is, is?” Stan replied.
“What it is… my friends… what it is… it is what it is.” Justin Bieber said in a quiet voice from behind them and everyone nodded back at The Biebsler.
“Alright, I um, hate to break up your…” Scott scratched his head. ”Whatever it is I’m breaking up, but we need to get out of here. Like, right now…”
“Why?” Kymmie demanded for the sake of her emotional state.
“Because the dolphins are coming! You heard the lobster.” Scott replied in a worried tone.
“I don’t get it… what Dolphins?” Jillie asked Scott. “And what about The King Whale over there…”
Carl shook his head, “Don’t worry about him, Jillian Jean, he’s of no concern to us.”
Jillie looked at her idol Billie and they shared a something isn’t right here glance…
Kymmie shook her head in the same way her dad just did. Like father like daughter. “Okay, I don’t even know what is happening right now. This is insane. This is just… I don’t even know. Like, what is happening right now? I’m so confused.” Kymmie seemed to be talking to herself on the verge of a mental breakdown. And maybe she knew her dad was into something that he was hiding from her, but she loved him anyway because he’s her dad so what can you do, how do you reconcile that. But maybe it was her own fault, if she hadn’t kept breaking all her cell phones he wouldn’t need to work for The Whale, or The King Whale, or any of The Whales of Hollywood.. Or if she could just MAKE it in this darn industry or get enough TikTok and Instagram followers to become an influencer… Then again, maybe she had no idea what her father even did for a living… Innocent Kymmie a teenager on the verge of a mental breakdown.
“I think she’s losing her mind…” Billie commented to her stan Jillie.
“Well, she’s Ariana Grande’s stan and Ariana isn’t here to be there for her…” Justin replied to Billie standing beside Jillie, Billie’s teen stan.
“Then you take her!” Jillie said to Justin. “Take her under your wing and let her be your stan! Like you did for for Billie…”
Billie looked at Justin and sighed.
“Nah… I’ve got my own stans… way too many of them… soooo many of them… sooooo many Beliebers.”
Billie sighed again and looked at Justin like he was some modern day Fonz.
“You know, if you’re not careful, Taylor might take your stans…” Stan said to Justin and thought about his friend Dan previously a follower of Ye but now a Taylor Swift stan—”It happned to my friend Dan! He was swifted into becoming a Swiftie and stanning Taylor. Even traded in his Yeezy Boosts for a Cardigan!”
“Whatever… she can’t take everyone’s stans… what, like, is everyone going to become ONLY a fan of Taylor Swift?” Justin was in denial. They all were. Except Sashy the Sassy Swifite…
“Dolphins… Dolphins…” Sashy paced back and forth, “Dolphins… Could it be? Maybe? Could Taylor have sent help? Could she have sent them to save me? But if they’re here to help why the warning? Maybe it’s a warning for everyone else but not for me?”
“Sashy, who are you talking to? And… what are you talking about?” Kymmie asked Sashy.
“Me?” Sashy’s eyes went wide and he stopped pacing. “I’m not talking to anyone… or about anything! I don’t know, what?! I didn’t say anything… I’m just… I’m, just in the middle… thinking outloud. Trying to figure everything out!” He laughed nervously and then continued pacing. “Dolphins… Dolphins… Of course…” He looked around the hotel as though he were trying to spot The Dolphins. A club of dolphins…. And of course… Jack—Leader of the dolphins, Jack Leopard himself the leopard leader of The Dolphin Club, fearless leader of the dolphin pack. Leopard Jack!
Billie stepped away from her pack of teenage minions and moved closer to her brother. “Okay wait, Fin, so WHERE have YOU been? I mean what took you so long! What is going on?!”
“It’s a lengthy story, and it involves Lady Gaga’s dogs getting kidnapped and a lot of other stuff.”
“Lady Gaga’s dogs got kidnapped?!?!?” Kymmie’s jaw dropped to the floor like Wile E. Coyote.
“Kymmie, pick your jaw up off the floor please.” Carl said to his daughter in a dry disapproving tone.
She bent down and scooped up her jaw putting it back to where it was before. “Sorry dad.” She adjusted her jaw back into place. “I don’t know how that happened!” She turned to Finneas, “I think you mean dognapped? It was probably Taylor. Justin’s cats got catnapped by her. I was there and saw it with my own eyes!”
“It wasn’t Taylor, Lady Gaga and Taylor have an alliance. Taylor would never dognap The Gaga’s dogs.” Sashy snapped sassily at Kymmie.
“But do they? Do they? DO THEY? Doooooooo theeeeeeey?” Kymmie asked Sashy the sassy Swifitie. The words ‘do’ and ‘they’ came out of her mouth like a lyric video. They hung in the air and floated around until Sashy grabbed them from the air and tossed them across the room. They smashed against the wall and fell to the floor crumbling into millions of tiny pieces.
“Yes. They do!” Sashy replied. “THEY DOOOOOO!!!!!” Sashy paused for a moment. “How come I didn’t make words?”
“I don’t know.” Kymmie shrugged, “But DOOOOOOO they? Do they?” Kymmie leaned in close to Sashy’s ear and emphasized the word do, “DO they?” Another set of words floated into the air and Sashy grabbed those again throwing them to the ground. “Remember the backup dancer thing!”
“That was Katy Perry not Lady Gaga” Finneas corrected Kymmie.
“Oh yeah.” Kymmie thought for a second, “Dang, how did I get that wrong. How did I get that question wrong?!?!?”
“It’s not a test.” Sashy said back.
“EVERYTHING IS A TEST!” The words floated out of her mouth again and into the air, they inflated larger and larger and then floated up to the ceiling like trapped helium filled balloons looking for a way out. Like being able to fly in a dream but not being able to find a way out into the open air to fly freely anywhere you please.
“Kymmie! YOU need to calm down. Also, watch the gown.” Sashy pointed at the RED Tay Swift ‘calm down gown’ the tail of the gown trailed behind him and then wrapped around his feet on the ground all around him.
“I’m allowed to be upset, Sashy! I missed a question on the test! Don’t make me step on your gown!”
“Don’t you DARE step on my gown!” Sashy yanked his gown closer to him away from Kymmie’s feet.
Stan smiled, pleased at the quarrel… he was determined to win Kymmie’s love… if Kymmie were Kim Kardashian and he were Ye and Sashy were Pete Davidson, he was going to win this fight somehow… he just had to come up with a plan to capture her heart the way she had already captured his from the moment he first saw her.
“You guys, quiet, Billie is trying to reunite with her bother.” Jillie huffed at the other stans.
“Thanks Jillie.” Billie said to her stan.
Finneas poined at Jillian Jean. “Okay, um, so who’s that exactly?”
“My stan. I think we all get one…” Billie shrugged. “I’m not really sure how it even works. She just kind of showed up and now I can’t get rid of her.”
Jillie shrugged too. “I guess you’re stuck with me Lish!”
“Well, I don’t have one.” Justin said with sad puppy dog eyes.
“Justin, I offered you mine and you refused. And then I offered up Kymmie to be your stan and you refused and then you said you have a million stans.”
“His loss.” Jillie smiled up at Billie Lish Lish.
“I do have a million stans, they’re just not HERE with me right now.” Justin said back. “Well… technically, Billie, YOU used to be my stan, and maybe you still are… so technically, maybe you’re my stan…” Justin posed in a cool Bieber pose and made a peace sign at Billie.
Billie looked away blushing. She took a deep breath and pushed all those feelings from the past to the back of her mind. Why does he have to be so cool???? Billie’s heart skipped a beat as she looked back at Justin Bieber once more. Then she turned her attention back to her brother.
“Anyway, Finneas, I have so much to tell you… we went through the Wall of Sound! Like the ACTUAL WALL OF SOUND! Phil Spector’s’ Wall of Sound! Pink Floyd’s WALL… A mall from 1990s called and wants The Wall back WALL OF SOUND!”
“It was more of tunnel.” Kymmie corrected Billie.
“Kymmie, not now. I need to explain all this to my brother Finneas.”
“You want me to take care of her Lish?” Jillie made a motion like she was slitting a throat. A large gash opened and blood spilled out from Jillie’s neck then disappeared, the gash closed up on its own.
“No! JILLIE!!!!, wow… um, OH MY GOSH! No! Just wow… no, that’s okay, really. I thought you two were friends!”
“We are. She’s my friend, but it’s Lishy before anyone. Billie Lish Lish forever. you say the word and…” Jillie made the throat slitting motion again this time only a small bit of blood showed before the wound.
Billie made a super freaked out facial expression. “Can you just not do that anymore? Like can you just please not do that, Jillie? Please!”
“I’m only kidding!” Jillian laughed manically. “Or am I?”
Finneas leaned in and whispered in Billie’s ear, “Keep an eye on her. She kind of weirds me out.”
“No, Fin, it’s not just her…” Billie looked at the other Tik Tok Teenstagramers “They’re ALL like that.” She recalled scrolling through comments on social media. Most of them were run of the mill emoji but some of them were a bit on the freaky side. Like, afraid to sleep at night, freaky.
“Billie… have you ever thought about your sexuality?” Sashy was holding a personal mirror and fixing his hair.
“Sashy! We’re not having this conversation right now. Stop speculating about my sexuality.”
“Do you think I should dye my hair blue? I kind of want to dye it…” Sashy’s hair suddenly changed from black to blue. “WHOA! It’s BLUE!”
Jillie squeed. “LISHY! That’s like what happened to you! You were thinking about going blonde and then poof! Your hair turned blonde! Except, Sashy is now blue.” Jillie turned to face Sashy, “Sashy are you blue? Don’t be blue! Don’t let those sad thoughts get to you!”
“Wow.” Finneas looked from Billie over to the teens and then back to her. “They really are all like that. So, where do I get one of these stans? I’m thinking a little Finneas would be kind of cool.”
“Finneas! That’s the last thing we want is more of them showing up. At this point I can’t even handle the four we already have. If more show up… I can’t… I just can’t handle it—even the idea of it!”
“That’s alright, I got ya” Justin smiled. “If you get to the point where you REALLY can’t handle your stans anymore, I’ll take them off your hands. I can handle them.”
“Thanks Justin.” Billie blushed again… was she like this with him all those years ago? She thought of a video she made as a young teen. Oh my gosh… oh my gosh… I was a Tik Tok Teen too!
“We all do! We got you!” The rest of the group echoed in a chorus.
Justin continued, “Even though I passed on stans before, just know that I’ll take your stans if you can’t handle them.”
“Us too!” The stans yelled.
“You’re the ones we’re talking about, you know that right?” Billie said to the stans.
“Yeah.” They replied, “But we still got your back!”
“They’re so weird.” Finneas said quietly to Billie. Then he smiled. “I love it. I’ll take ALL of them if you don’t want them, they can all be little Finneas stans.”
“Thanks big bro, I’ll let you know… Anyway what were you saying about a dognapping?” Billlie asked her brother.
“As far as we can tell, it was The Whale who arranged the dognapping.”
“You mean The King Whale?” She pointed at the man standing on the other side of the lobby, “But why?” Billie asked.
“Yes, him, well, not him, it’s… there’s a lot going on… It’s part of the reason why we’re here… well, that and… Strangies.”
“Strangies? Lady Gaga’s dogs were dognapped because of Strangies?” Billie asked.
“Strangies! Dog nappings! Oh my!” Jillie shouted.
“Not really. Like I said there’s a lot going on.” Finneas seemed to be holding something back. Like he knew it all already, like he’s seen then new Willy Wonka movie already, like he’s seen the Rick and Morty movie… like he’s seen into the future of fiction, every spec script, the blacklist, the minds of every screenwriter on the planet before they even knew the idea was going to pop into their minds… into the future of every songwriter on the planet before they could write the next hit song… And what if you could, what if every single creative production in the world could be one-upped? What if every single creator in the world could have their creative thoughts siphoned off… what if both The Whale and The King Whale knew it too, and was going after it? Afterall… aren’t all creators in the same business to think of that next big idea before the other creators do… isn’t that how the big stars shine the brightest? They tap into that REALLY BIG MAGIC… the world of pure imagination… they think of all the brilliant creative ideas before anyone else does… and then sell it to the world for a pretty penny—
Ah… now we’re on to something. A penny for your thoughts… especially a creative thought. You see, there are those on this planet who have a special ability to tap into the world of pure imagination… to tap into the creative spark… and it’s those individuals that the Whale is most interested in keeping a close eye on. But wouldn’t you? Why bother negotiating to purchase the next big creative work of art after it happens when you can get in on the ground floor, get in before it happens… like an angel investor for creative thoughts… or even better, just take the idea before the was even an idea. It’s much easier to write your own than it is to find someone else that has written it and buy it from them. Why go through all the legal paperwork to acquire a work of art that someone else has thought of when you can just steal it before they even think of it. Steal… maybe that’s not quite the right term. Yank it right out from under their feet. Take it right from their mind before they even knew it was going to be in their mind. Yes, that’s better. It’s a much more streamline business model to simply pluck the ideas from the creative abyss before any other creator can get the spark… and it’s genius really, because for all they know they’re going through writer’s block. For all they know it’s a bout of self-doubt, for all they know their creative muse has left the building. No one has to be the wiser. Control the flow of creative ideas into the minds of all the creators and you control all of Hollywood, the entire music business… the empire is yours! I mean, afterall, haven’t you always wondered how that works? Haven’t you, the independent writer or musician or artist always wondered why your brilliant idea eventually ends up on the big screen? Or your musical riff sounds eerily similar to a number one hit song that comes along? Perhaps it’s just coincidence… but, perhaps not, perhaps not. That’s the secret… I think we’re on to something here… The world where all creative ideas live has always been there… it’s those who have the strongest ability to tap into that world that become the most iconic names and faces of the Hollywood scene.
And who wouldn’t want control of it all, control of everything in the creative realm, to control all the muses in the world responsible for making art… come along, let’s dive into the darkness of the creative abyss, buckle your safety belts my friends because this roller coaster ride is just beginning and we’re going on a very wild ride! We may have started in Disneyland, but we’ve left that world of cute cuddly stuffed animals, cotton candy, and flash photography as we ride this highway straight into the danger zone…
“What’s a Strangie?” Kymmie asked. “Oh wait, I know! A Strangie is someone who watches a lot of Stranger things!” Kymmie chimed in answering her own question.
“No. Stranger Things is a good show, but, no, that’s not what a Strangie is...” Finneas’ voiced changed into a campfire storyteller voice. “Gather around, I’ll tell you more… It comes from Karen Carpenter.” A campfire appeared suddenly, and they gathered around it. “Karen was in a band called The Carpenters. They were big in the 70s.” Finneas began handing out ingredients needed to make s’mores along with marshmallow roasting sticks. “Karen had a special term for her very weird and strange fans, she called them… Strangies!” The fire burst into a glittery sparkle the moment he said the word Strangies… it crackled with the intensity of a thousand Fourth of July sparklers being tossed into the fire. Then a miniature fireworks display exploded from deep within the campfire, a dazzling spectacle. Perfect for roasting marshmallows over. After a moment the fire returned to normal and Finneas continued his story. “Her Strangies were fans that seemed to have lost their minds over her and would do very strange things to get to her and get her attention. The strangest of things imaginable!” The group ‘ooooed’ and ‘ahhhhed’ at Finneas’ scary Strangie campfire story. “A good guess, Kymmie, but a Strangie is not someone who watches a lot of Stranger Things—”
“Duh.” Billie said then looked from her brother to Kymmie.
“Lish! Don’t be mean to my new friend.” Jillie screamed at Billie.
“I’m not being mean! All I said was duh. Okay, which side are you on? Because one minute you’re defending me, and the next you’re against me.” Billie didn’t understand these teenagers.
“How did I get another question wrong? I thought for sure Strangies were people who watch Stranger Things… I studied so hard for this!” Kymmie began to tear up. Jillie made an empathetic face, she got up from her spot around the campfire and walked over to where Kymmie was sitting. She gave her a quick hug.
“What is she talking about, there’s no test.” Finneas looked confused.
“EVERYTHING IS A TEST!” Kymmie said again in an upset very stressed-out teenager voice. The words again formed above her and floated up to the celling…. This time they stayed there. Hanging around. Like the past. EVERYTHING IS A TEST! The past is made up of test after test, so many tests passed and failed.
The rest of the teens got up and skipped, jumped, and sauntered over to her giving her positive uplifting catchphrases in an attempt to cheer her up.
“Kymmie, you’re not wrong… he’s wrong!” Jillie pointed at Finneas.
“ME?!?! I’m sorry, but again, who’s this? Like who does she think she is?!?!” Finneas asked, pointing at Jillie.
Billie rolled her eyes. “Her name is Jillie Jean, ‘Mean Green Jellybean’ Jillian Jean. She’s my little—I’ll explain it all to you later. You explain your stuff first.”
“Hi, Jillie Jean, I’m Lishy’s biggest fan.” She walked around the campfire and held out her hand towards Finneas, very debutant ball like. “I’m her stan.”
“Well, it’s very nice to meet you Jillie.” He turned to Billie. “Did she just call you Lishy?”
“Finneas, you missed a lot. You missed SOO much! I don’t even know where to begin to explain it. I can’t explain it all.”
“Ooo ooo! I can! Let me explain it!” Kymmie raised her hand like she was in class. “We were chased by Swifties and we almost got Swifted!” Kymmie explained in an excited voice snapping out of her moment of test anxiety stress induced sadness. “Stan kind of got Swifted by Sashy… but then Sashy’s batteries ran out or something happened to his Swifter. I don’t know what happened to it, all I know is it’s not Swifting people anymore.”
“Something… happened… to… his… Swifter?” Finneas made a confused face. “And his swifter isn’t swifting people anymore…” Finneas repeated some of what Kymmie had said in a tone of disbelief. “Wait… who’s Stan?”
“Hi!” Stan held his hand up.
“What’s a Sashy?” Finneas asked after waving at Stan.
Sashy stood up, crossed his arms and twirled flailing his gown out and putting his back to Finneas. He let out a displeasing sigh and a ‘Hurmph!’
“Now you did it.” Billie said to her brother.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to…” Finneas attempted to apologize. “Do whatever it is I did?”
“Sashy, calm down.” Kymmie ran over to him and gave him a hug. The other’s followed and they gave Sashy a giant group hug.
“Watch the gown!!!!” He decreed. “And I am calm, I’m wearing the gown.”
The other teens leaned in and hugged Sashy being mindful of the Ruby Red T-Swift ‘calm down gown’ sprawled out on the ground.
“I was expecting it to be just you here… and not, like a whole following.” Finneas flashed a nervous smile, “But it’s fine… I think.”
Billie shrugged. “If this is your definition of fine…” she waved her hands about implying that everything around them was the definition of fine. “And you know me… they find me wherever I go! Can’t get away from them!” She pointed at the Tik Tok Teens. “But, I like to think of them as my minions.”
Finneas laughed, then made a super serious face. “Billie! LISTEN TO ME, like I was saying before… THIS IS IT!! THIS is IT!!! This is where it all begins. THIS IS WHAT WE’VE BEEN SEARCHING FOR! WHAT WE’VE BEEN TRYING TO FIND THE WHOLE TIME WE’VE BEEN WRITING SONGS!!! We’re INSIDE the creative spark. The muse for all art, for everything. Where creative ideas come from. The BIG MAGIC! Elizabeth Gilbert’s place where all ideas start! WE ARE HERE!!! It’s Wonkavision in real life!!! FORGET TEN THOUSAND HOURS… This is INFINITE HOURS!”
“Wow. Cool.” She smiled back. “Sorry, that was an underwhelming response… I mean… yeah, wow! COOOOOOOOOL! Sorry, Finneas, I’m just not as excited as you are about being here. Mostly because I have to go to the bathroom and I’m pretty sure there’s no toilet paper in this place, or if there is some, it’s very hard to find it—anyway I still don’t get it… why? I mean, why are we here???”
Finneas thought for a moment, “How do I explain it. There’s a problem. It’s a problem with the creative muse.”
“What do you mean? What are you talking about?” Billie shifted her head sideways.
“Well there’s too much to explain um… there’s this anomaly… it’s… doing something strange to everyone’s creative muse.”
“Are you sure? Even my creative muse? And yours? Fin, like, what exactly are we talking about here?”
“Well, ours seems fine because our connection to the creative world is stronger than most. Just like Taylor Swift’s connection is strong. Just like all the top creators in the world have extraordinarily strong connections…”
“Okay, I’m listening…” Billie stood before her brother eager to know more.
“It’s just different for us… but them?” Finneas pointed at the innocent Tik Tok Teens. “It’s not good. Their creative connection is still fragile. It’s still unformed. And even for everyone else.. It CAN still be influenced and manipulated. So maybe we aren’t fine.”
“Manipulated!” Billie gasped the word out.
Finnneas nodded back. “But even well-established connections can be re-wired… Okay, even ours could theoretically be manipulated, but it’s very unlikely. It’s why Emma Watson is leaving acting… her creative muse is feeding her the desire and making her think it’s what she wants. But it’s because her creative muse is being influenced…”
“Wait, what?” Billie shook her head.
“The creative muse is your creative inspiration, your spark, it’s what guides you through the world it flows from big magic into the real world… it’s your intuition. The same thing that makes you and I want to make music, the same thing that gives any creator their spark… their passion, their drive… it’s why every creator creates. Every actor acts, writer writes, painter paints, filmmaker filmmakes… I was going to say cinematographers ‘tog’ but that just didn’t sound as cool.” Finneas shrugged before continuing. “It comes from here, Big Magic. Emma’s muse is being fed an alternate story making her think she wants what she wants. That she no longer wants to act. That she just wants to bake sourdough bread instead.”
“What’s wrong with baking sourdough bread?” Jillie interrogated Finneas.
“Nothing… There’s nothing wrong with it…” Finneas backtracked. “But—”
“Wait,” Kymmie interrupted, “So Emma Watson out there in the real world thinks that she wants to leave acting because her creative muse here in this world is under some hypnotic suggestion that she must leave acting and so that idea is now in her own mind?” She asked.
“Yeah.” Finneas said very cooly. “That’s exactly what’s happening.”
“I GOT THE QUESTION RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!” Kymmie screamed. “TAKE THAT TEST!!!!!!” She screamed at the ‘everything is a test’ words clinging to the ceiling above like helium filled balloons.
Billie nodded in agreement with Kymmie then turned back to her brother. “Okay… so what? I mean, actors quit acting all the time, musicians quit music all the time, painters quit painting all the time… artists quit. Maybe she just wants to do something else? Like bake some sourdough bread.”
“Well yes… but this is different, she’s quitting in a way that’s… well, because of what’s happening, the WAY she quit, how it all is happening, it created Strangies. She’s not quitting on her own accord… she’s being manipulated into thinking she wants to quit—coerced. She’s being influenced into thinking thoughts that, under normal circumstances, she wouldn’t think.”
“What is normal though?” Kymmie asked herself. “I mean… After the lobster encounter I don’t even know which way is up.”
It’s that way!” Jillie pointed up. Jillie and Kymmie suddenly found themselves standing on the ceiling looking down, Kymmie punched the words ‘a test’ from ‘everything is a test’ and they vaporized into nothingness, she felt so much better, Jilie pointing at the floor instead. “Wait? This isn’t right.” Jillie shook her head. “It’s THAT way!” They jumped off the ceiling and landed back on the floor.
Ozzy Osbourne gave them a thumbs up. “Right on. Cool trick! Yeah. I love it!”
“Thanks!” Kymmie and Jillie high-fived Ozzy then sat back down beside the fire. She looked up at the two remaining words floating around on the ceiling… ‘everything is’. I like that. She thought. Everything is… because everything just is…
“And Emma Watson’s strange thoughts created Strangies?” Billie said back to her brother ignoring the stans floor to ceiling and back again shenanigans. Been there, done that on Saturday Night Live. Billie recalled her SNL set where up was down and down was up and the floor had been the ceiling and the ceiling the floor.
“Yes. All of her fans… it’s the way she just left it all after Little Women. She kind of just… well, it was an unclean exit, and when you have an unclean exit, you get Strangies… But not your run of the mill Karen Carpenter Strangies, these are different… it’s like breaking up with someone. That feeling you get where you know the person is still there but, it’s over. It makes things strange… It turns her fans into Strangies…. And well, Little Women was a remake which adds a whole other layer to it all… and it’s possible that her muse is being influenced to lead her to do something else, besides make sourdough bread… but it’s not quite clear what’s going on yet.”
“I’m confused.” Jillie said back.
Finneas thought for a moment before replying to Jillie. “You know how when Elvis died, all those Elvis impersonators showed up?”
“Yeah.” Billie and Jillie responded at the same time.
“Well, they were Strangies! They’re like orphaned super fans.”
“Ohhhh I get it” Jillie stood up from her seat by the fire and stepped between Finneas and Billie trying to become the center of their conversation without really even being part of the conversation. “You mean like when Jesus died… and then his fans were like, what do we do now? And so they created a fan club. The Jesus fan club.”
“Ummm… The Jesus fan club?” Finneas gave a quixotic look in Jillie’s direction, “kind of… but, not really, I think you mean Christianity, but no… it’s more like the image lives on. You know, The Man In Black, Johnny Cash, the image and the man. When you take away the person and just have the image, things get weird.“
“Weeeeeeeeeeeird.” Jillie echoed. “It still sounds a lot like the Jesus fan club to me… the man is gone but the image lives on… and peace be with you and with you too.”
Finneas and Billie simultaneously replied to Jillie “Riiiiiiiight. No, this is definitely different.”
“What’s that about Jesus?” Justin Bieber asked. Kanye “Ye” West walked over next to Justin also interested in discussing Jesus. “We’re all about some Jesus talk!”
“We were talking about the Jesus fan club and his Jesus stans.” Jillie replied enthusiastically.
“I think you mean Christians?” Justin responded and Ye nodded in agreement.
“Some say pork roll, some say Taylor ham.” Jillie held up a pork roll in one hand and a Taylor ham in the other.
“Where’d you get a pork roll and a Taylor ham!??!” Justin gasped.
“I don’t know, but they look delicious—That’s not important—What you need to know is they’re the same thing.” She then merged the two of them into one. “WHOA… how’d I do that!?!?” She then took a bite out of the Taylor ham pork roll. “Mmmmm, not bad. Mmmmm… wow. This is actually really tasty!”
“Jillie, I’m not entirely sure you should eat that.” Finneas showed a concerned look. “You just conjured it out of thin air!”
“Eh, it’s fine. I’ve eaten worse.” Jillie said between bites of Taylor Roll Ham. “Besides, you did it with the marshmallows earlier!”
“Yes, but I know what I’m doing!” Finneas shook his head.
Jillie shrugged and took another bite and got Taylor Roll Ham all over her face.
Billie made an ‘ewww gross’ look. “Okay, hang on, what were you saying about the remake?” Billie asked turning her attention from her stan back to Finneas.
“Little Women… The remake problem. Movies, music… any time anything is remade, rerecorded, rebooted. It changes the original work of art.”
“Duh.” Jillie reflexively let out a duh. “Sorry, It… I… force of habbit.” She continued to eat her ‘Taylor hamwich’ sandwich making a mess everywhere.
Billie bobbed her head yes in agreement. “Okay, this time I’m on board with that duh but, Jillie, you need a napkin or something, you’re making a mess!!!”
“For you Lish, I will wish for a napkin in the same way that I somehow created this sandwich!” Jillie closed her eyes and tried to conjure up a napkin and instead created a roll of toilet paper. “I guess that will do.”
Billie grabbed the roll of toilet paper. “I’ll take that!”
“LISH! Don’t steal my tish!!!”
“Finneas… snap her up a napkin, will you?” Billie said to her brother while tucking he roll of toilet paper away for safe keeping, in this place, toilet paper was as good as gold!
Finneas snapped his fingers and a stack of napkins appeared. “Here.” He handed one of the napkins to Jillie, then after a moment just handed the entire stack to her. “You know what, just… just take them all.”
“THANKS!!!!” She grabbed the napkins and continued to eat and make messes and attempted to clean up the mess while she ate.
Billie shook her head at the hopeless stan. “Jillie is right, so what does that mean? So what if movies and songs, or artwork is remade…”
“Well, every piece of art from the past or present has the ability to influence future art.”
“Okay.” The Tik Tok Teen stans nodded at Finneas.
“Supposing an original work of art would have influenced a derivative work of art that the artist was going to make based on that original artwork, but instead a remake was created which then influenced that derivative instead. Well, that changes the newly created derivative. It takes the art echo in a whole new direction. Changes everything. Because that derivative has the ability to influence new creations on its own later on down the road, do you ever wonder why E.T. wasn’t remade and has no sequels? It’s all about the derivative artwork created under the art influence of that original art, Spielberg needed to keep that art pure. The Amblin Entertainment logo, the muse needed to stay pure. It’s all connected, there’s art connected to that work of art that, if E.T. were to be remade would change the Art Echo. The extra-terrestrial alien in the basket on the bike in front of the moon, look closer, not with your eyes, but with your mind, there’s more than meets the mind, what emotions do you FEEL when you think of E.T. in that basket on the bike flying the air in front of the moon….”
“HOPE!” Stan shouted out.
“Hungry.” Jillie said with another mouthful of sandwich.
“Jillie!” Billie shook her head at her little.
“I get it!” Sashy smiled. “It’s like listening to Taylor’s old music while you paint, or write, or craft, or sculpt… but then you replace Taylor’s old music with her new recordings and the art you would have made to Taylor’s old music is different because the new music moves you in a different way. It changes your emotions, makes you feel something entirely different!”
“Exactly!” Finneas pointed at Sashy. A gameshow sound played, and an announcer voice spoke in a cheerful tone: ‘TEN POINTS TO SWIFTIEHOUSE TEAM SWIFITE TAKES THE LEAD!’
“WHAT?!?!?! That’s not fair!” Jillie shouted.
Sashy the Sassy Swiftie shrugged. “Sorry. It’s Taylor’s world now, you just live in it.”
“Billie! Do something!” Jillie commanded of her pop icon obsession. “Or I’ll make an embarrassing video of you go viral…”
Billie rolled her eyes. “Finneas…”
Finneas snapped his fingers, and the gameshow voice came to life: ‘TEN POINTS TO EILISHHOUSE, GAME IS NOW TIED!’
“WHAAAAAAT? That’s cheating!” Sashy said angrily.
“What was that you were saying about Taylor’s world?” Jillie laughed manically.
Sashy retreated inside his gown like a turtle going into a shell.
“Wait you called me Billie!” Billie gasped at her stan.
“Don’t read into, Lishy. It was a one-time thing.” Jillie crossed her arms.
“What about us?” Kymmie The Teen Arianator pointed at herself and Stan, The Follower of Ye.
Finneas snapped his fingers again and a scoreboard appeared with 10 points going to each team. Kymmie and stan high-fived with each other vowing not to make the same mistake as before when they tried a high-four. “Now, where was I? There’s a reason why some films and songs were never remade, or never should have been remade, like, for example The West Side Story… we’re still trying to figure that part out. All I know is that all of it comes back to the image and the artist and when the two disconnect… it’s bad news at least, it is here in this place… where we are now.”
Billie pointed all around, “You mean here in pure imagination? The land of make believe. Jason Momoa, anything is possible… Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magicville… the creative muse of Taylor Swift’s world and we just live in it … here in MUSELAND!”
“Okay… so, what do we do? How do we fix it?” Billie asked.
Finneas got very serious, “Well I think we have two options, one, get Emma Watson back in the saddle, get her making movies again… Real, full length blockbuster movies… not just some New Year’s Day Harry Potter reunion special where she comes clean about her Regina George Hogwarts ‘Burn Book’ journals she wrote about everyone on the set of Harry Potter, or a tiny film she puts on Instagram. We need her to star in a record breaking box office smash hit in theaters around the world film.”
“Or?” The lawyer replied immediately in a way that he was in desperate need of the next piece of information.
“Yeah that’s pretty unlikely. What’s the other option?” Kymmie asked looking from her dad, the lawyer, to Finneas.
“Well… If we can get her Strangies connected to another creative muse, they might not—”
“Another creative muse?” Kymmie asked, in a curious childlike voice. “What about—"
“Might not what?” Carl cut his daughter off in a very concerned voice. “What is it that Emma Watson’s Strangies might do?”
Finneas looked nervously at the lawyer after catching a ‘careful what you say’ look from his sister. “Um, we need to figure out how to control these Strangies, that’s the important part. Think of them like orphaned Emma fans stuck here in the creative abyss, if each artist has a muse, each fan of that muse also has something like a mini muse here in this place and it seeks out the muse that it’s attached to, but if the muse it was following is suddenly changed out the blue, it makes Strangies… in the real world Emma hasn’t a clue, she doesn’t know what’s about to happen in Hollywood, no one really does.”
“Except us…” Kymmie said in awe. Jillie, Sashy, and Stan nodded like they were in on some big secret no one else knew about.
“Us and The Whale…” Billie added. “Or, The King Whale?”
“Both.” Finneas thought for a minute, “Well. All three, us, The Whale, AND The King Whale. But The Whale and The King Whale are one and the same, see, like I was saying earlier about Johnny Cash and The Man In Black, it’s the same but dif—”
“What’s about to happen?” The lawyer asked impatiently, cutting Finneas off. “Or what do you THINK is about to happen with Hollywood and Emma Watson’s Strangies?” He rephrased the question. “Remember, we’re not in the real world anymore… We’re a long way from Toto’s home and I would like to get back home, so please answer the question to the best of your knowledge.”
Billie shook her head ever so slightly at her brother and thought her own thoughts into Finneas’ mind… ‘don’t trust him’. Finneas nodded slightly back at his sister after hearing her thoughts inside his head. “I think… that… if enough Strangies overrun this place… it may spill out into the real world. And then the real world will become overrun with Strangies too.” Maybe that’s not entirely the whole story, but… he wasn’t going to tell him the rest… at least not just yet.
The lawyer looked over at The King Whale.
“Well dang.” Jillie’s eyes were wide. “There has to be a way to stop all that!”
Kymmie tapped her father’s pen against her found journal. “New muse… hmmm… new muse??? How about we use Sasha Spielberg’s muse?”
“Maybe.” Finneas thought for a moment, “But Sasha is complicated. She has multiple muses, she paints pet portraits, sings, does improv comedy, and her dad’s muse might interfere. It could get dicey. Anyone else?”
“Hmmm…” Kymmie thought and made more drumming noises with the pen and her journal.
“Wait, I know, what about Millie Bobby Brown!!! She seems like an adequate host. She can be the new Emma Watson!”
“Millie Bobby Brown eh?” Finneas looked up and to the left for a moment then back at Kymmie. “Yeah, that might work. But, first, we’ll need to find Millie’s creative muse here in THIS world and that’s a problem because Millie’s muse could be anywhere.”
“Okay… well, I’ll start a to-do list! That should help! That’s how I start studying for every test.” Kymmie opened up her journal to a fresh page. “1) Find Millie’s Muse.”
“I’m going to make one too! That’s how I start all my homesworks assignments!” Jillie opened up her journal to a fresh page and wrote the same thing down.
“Wait… something’s fading in under that…” Kymmie and Billie’s journals displayed the same text under the first item of their to-do lists.
2) Follow the Buzzy Bee to find Buzzy Lee, she will lead you musically to Millie’s muse if you choose, and there in Strange Town she can be found.
“What does that mean!?!?!” Kymmie and Jillie yelled out.
“I think we need to go to Strange Town!” Kymmie answered the question. “Jillie! Millie’s muse is in Strange Town!” Kymmie said to Jillie her eyes wide and excited.
“Okay but where’s Strange Town?” Sashy asked no longer cocooned up in his calm down gown and instead letting it just float freely behind him. Half the gown was now floating as if someone were holding it up an invisible wind making it look fashionable like a photoshoot. He changed poses as though a thousand flash photography cameras were taking his picture on a fashion runway. His hair blowing behind him but stuck in a still frame motion stop making him look Photoshopped in real life.
Jillie shrugged at Sashy. “Probably somewhere?”
Kymmie and Jillie both showed Billie the writing in each of their journals. “It says we need to find a buzzing bee.” Kymmie pointed at that buzzy bee part of the message.
“Yeah, and then we need to find Buzzy Lee.” Jillie added.
“AND THEN she’ll lead us musically to Millie’s muse… if we choose… what are we supposed to choose?” Kymmie looked at Jillie.
“We have to choose the right answer! It’s a test. IT’S A TEST!” Kymmie yelled out.
“And there in strange town she can be found…” Jillie read more of it like reading the clue for a treasure hunt.
“MILLIE’S MUSE IS IN STRANGE TOWN!” Kymmie and Jillie shouted out.
“I think we need to lead all of Emma Watson’s Strangies to Strange Town?” Kymmie deduced. She started to write in her journal…
“I can’t decide on an order! I’ll just keep both and cross one out later.” Kymmie looked at the journal indecisively.
“These teens are just way too stressed out about getting the right answer for everything.” Finneas said quietly to Ozzy.
Ozzy nodded back in agreement. “I usually find the right answer is right in front of you most of the time…” Finneas nodded back in agreement. “Or I just ask Sharon and she tells me.”
“Finneas, do you really think The Whale is influencing Emma Watson’s muse here in Big Magic making her think she wants to quit Hollywood, so he can create Strangies out of her fans to use to take over Big Magic?”
“Yep. But it’s hard to explain, The Whale is the man, The King Whale is the image… so they are one and the same. And while it’s The Whale behind it all, it’s The King Whale that’s doing the influencing here.”
“That’s so Meta. It’s like we’re inside the Metaverse!” Jillie clapped her hands excitedly.
“That’s one way to look at it. But this isn’t a computer game, or digital world. Or the Matrix, or a simulation. It’s the beginning of all creative thought before it becomes a creative work of art, before it’s written down, copyrighted, owned, and used in malicious ways to sway hearts between love and hate. And fought over with legal proceedings. Or meetings in a board room full of executives.”
Carl Lyle Lawyer narrowed his eyes at Finneas. “You make it seem as though legal protections and ownership of art is a bad thing.”
“Depends.” Finneas shrugged. “I think it can be both good and bad.”
“Tell us more about these Strangies.” Carl changed the subject. “Specifically, about them escaping here, this Big Magic Museland, and getting into the real world.”
“It happened before, Karen Carpenter… when she died… the way she died. Her creative muse was killed, and so it killed her… her heart gave out. That’s the problem with Strangies… there are… side effects. And you won’t always see them out in the real world, walking around, like Death Eaters.”
“I hate Death Eaters!” Sashy said in a nervous voice as his gown wrapped back up around him like a turtle going into a shell.
“It’s okay, Sashy, there’s no Death Eaters… Strangies tend to be more like manifest effects. A gun goes off on a movie set and kills someone, or a bankroll movie production will flop on what should have been one of the biggest blockbusters of the holiday season, or a concert will be overrun, and people die as the crowd pushes towards the stage unable to get close enough, Strangies show up in unexpected ways. Others have tried to control them before, tried to take over Big Magic and they have all failed, because there’s no controlling Strangies. Sometimes Strangies are simply an influence in the world, a gentle force a nudge in the wrong direction, turning the fate on an artist’s career, or a show, or a movie. But, sometimes, they do show up in the real world as a real person. And they stand there at the edge of your driveway waiting for you to leave your home. Stalking you at the gate like a lion in the zoo, but you’re the one in the cage. Or they rush your car window asking for an autograph at 3am outside a club. Or sometimes they come to your window in the middle of the night. A Strangie isn’t something to mess with, the best you can do if one gets into the real world is hide, Saundra Bullock knows it well. She had an encounter with a Strangie in the early morning hours of June 8th back in 2014.”
“Whoa.” Chills ran down Kymmie’s spine then the chills ran across the floor and jump up and ran down Jillie’s spine.
“AHHHH!!!!! GET THEM OFF ME!!!!” Jillie screamed. The teens attempted to shoo the running chills away. The chills then ran over and jumped into Lizzo’s tiny purse.
“I think I’ll keep these…” Lizzo snapped her purse shut. “I might need them later.”
“Careful with those.” Carl said in a lawyer tone like she was handling bagged evidence of a crime.
“I don’t like this place. I don’t like it at all!” Jillie kept trying to look at her back to see if the chills were still there. “I mean, I like it… but… It’s starting to get strange. At first I thought it was cool but now I’m not too sure. I kind of want to go home.”
Sashy came out of his gown turtle shell. “It’s okay… I’m here! We’re all here. The gown is here if you need it. It will protect you from the Strangies!”
“I’m okay. I’m calm, I just… feel like I’m losing my mind, over and over, and then it’s back again and I’m fine.”
“Me too. Jillie, oh gosh… me too!” Kymmie shook her head rapidly yes.
Billie turned her attention yet again back to her brother, these teen stans are just SO distracting! “Okay but unlike Karen Carpenter, Emma’s not dying. I mean the only way that might happen is if she meets Al Gore or something and they start geeking out about stopping climate change. Then she might be like on the ground saying… ‘I died!’ or something.”
“Wait what if… Emma doesn’t quit Hollywood and she gets behind the camera instead of in front of it? What does that do to her strangies?” Kymmie asked.
Finneas made a thinking face. “Hmmm… good question, I don’t know.”
“Okay, so what if we get her behind the camera? Will that fix everything?” Kymmie continued.
“I’m not sure, but I don’t want to find out. I’d rather find Millie’s muse anyway because if Emma’s Strangies won’t go quietly into the night, we’re going to have one heck of a fight on our hands.”
“What do you mean?” Stan asked. Carl had the exact same question and was glad he didn’t have to ask it.
“The Whale and his image The Whale King, he’s trying to use Emma’s Strangies to take over Hollywood. But the thing is, if he succeeds… no one will even know anything happened, because everything will happen here, in this world, the land of creative thought, the land of make believe. No one will have seen or heard a thing. Except, there are a few creators who have been able to see into Big Magic and they could be watching, they might know, everyone else just gets glimpses, they get pieces, inspiration, dreams, blips… it’s like the matrix, or inception, Ready Player One, the Metaverse, call it what you want… visions… tiny bits and pieces… but there are a few who can truly can SEE this world, or enter into this land of Pure Imagination—Wonka style… there are a few who can stay here… can stand here like we are now, but even those few can’t stay forever, they come and go quickly… Taylor Swift is of the closest to it right now, she visits often. Most people can’t stay simply because they get distracted… We are only here because we came in through the anomaly, and these Tik Tok Teens came with us, obviously…” Finneas stopped for a moment to watch the Tik Tok Teens distracted by their broken phones trying to make them work again before giving up and paying attention to Finneas once more. “Visiting here is what every single artist wants. What every creator wants to reach… call it what you want, Nirvana, enlightenment… it’s pure creative vision. It’s what all the great painters wanted. And generally, no one knows this exists. They only see the fire it creates, the art that is inspired by it… What happens in Big Magic goes into the real world… but people in the real world are blissfully unaware this place even exists, except for us creators, us artists, that can’t sleep at night because he toils away at an idea we can’t stop thinking about, because our muses are there feeding us. And if Strangies get out of control, it’ll be war with the weapon of suspension of disbelief before anyone even knew there was a battle beginning.”
“Wow.” The Tik Tok teens blinked in sync, and in awe.
“So wild.” Stan said with a smile. “This is going to become a Marvel movie by the end of this…”
“Stan, we’re not in a Marvel movie.” Jillie countered.
“Oh just you wait, little one, just you wait.” Stan stood his ground.
“Who you calling little!” Jillie suddenly grew to match Stan’s height and then she shrunk back down to her regular height
“How the heck did you do that!?!?!?” Stan shouted out in both wonderment and amazement.
“I don’t know? I just did it… and then it undid. That was so cool. I need to find out how to do that again! I need ot figure out how these super powers work! Kay… I like this place. It’s weird, but it’s a good weird, Strangies or not it’s my kind of weirdness.”
Billie Eilish shook her head at her little stan then looked back at her big bro. “How did you figure this all out.” Billie asked, ignoring the teen stans as they then attempted to figure out the magic trick that just took place like trying to figure out how to do a skateboard trick.
“Well it took us a while… weeks maybe, months… Years.”
“Weeks? MONTHS!?!? YEARS!!!! But the AMAs were like only an hour ago.”
“Well… not exactly, the AMAs you are referring to, the 2019 AMAs, the ones where Taylor performed and got like 700 awards were like 2 ish years ago. Time isn’t linear in here. And it’s relative to each person, place, and things are…”
“We are in a Marvel film!” Stan shouted. “It’s like Loki!”
“I mean not exactly. But sure. That’s one way to look at it.” Finneas replied to Stan and then turned his attention back to his sister.
“SEE! We ARE in a Marvel film!” Stan said excitedly to Jillie.
“This is so weird!” Jillie said back to Stan, but also to Finneas and Billie.
“Tell me about it.” Billie replied to her stan.
Teenagers in Museland… Like herding cats. Cats that want to take lots of selfies and post things to social media. And get Tik Tok famous.
Finneas continued speaking, “Anyway, Taylor wrote and recorded a song after the 2019 AMA awards, it was some collaboration song with Shawn Mendes, that part is not really all that important… what’s important is that the song was fed to her through her creative muse. And the art traveled from her muse into her mind, through her creative connection to this world that we are standing in right now. Taylor didn’t exactly ‘release’ that song…. More like someone else did using her and her muse as a vector of transmission for the artwork. It’s complicated to explain the specifics.” Finneas didn’t want to confuse everyone with all the complex details, “They got between Taylor and her muse using The Anomaly and were able to manipulate the connection. That song is just a test to see if it could even be done, and it did happen, Taylor wrote the song based on a creative inspiration from her muse and was set to release it with Shawn when she suddenly felt odd about the entire song. It was put into her song vault and instead Taylor and Shawn just released a remix of her song ‘Lover’.” Carl made a hmmmmmmmmm noise and Finneas looked at Billie then continued on, “Taylor somehow sensed that something wasn’t right with that original collaboration song so she pulled it and it’s been in her vault ever since. I don’t think she knew exactly what had even happened to her, but I think she could tell something was off. Now, we’ve found out information that there are plans to use her muse again. That plan is to release another song through her using her muse… and this new song is much more powerful than the original test was. It has not been written yet not in the real world. Wait, strike that, reverse it, no, change it. No one in the real world knows about the song, and they may never as this new song is a 2.0 version of the original test, a whole new variant, completely different, we don’t know exactly how this new viral muse song will spread. But what we do know, because we have seen the effects already is that artists out in the real world ARE feeling it’s effect so we do know that the song was given to her muse, just the same way the test song was, and not just Taylor’s muse, it was given to other muses too. And while it has yet to be specifically written, recorded, and released as a surprise single by Taylor in the real world, it’s already doing something disastrous. And here in Museland, if you heard the song, you’d think it was hers—it’s Taylor’s voice, it’s her song, but it’s not. It’s sampled and AI manipulated. It’s a neural network algorithmically generated song. Like a deep fake of music. A song for the muses here in this museworld. Created by The Whale and The Whales of Hollywood in a secret studio out there in the real world, and brought here and injected into this world as an experiment.”
“Whoa. AI manipulated neural network algorithmically generated deep fake Taylor Swift music?” Sashy was hooked on Finneas’ every word. “Sounds like trouble…. trouble… trouble…”
“I knew it was trouble from the start. We knew it was trouble from the start. That’s why we’re here.” Finneas pointed at Ozzy. “Now Ozzy and I and our team are pretty sure the single that The Whale King is giving out to muses isn’t designed to ever reach the real world. In fact we think that the test version that DID make it to the real world was a mistake because Taylor could tell something was wrong and she shelved it before it could be released and put it deep in her song vault buried away never to be heard. We think The Whale learned from that mistake and him and his Hollywood friends created something brand new based off that. But we also think Taylor’s muse isn’t like most muses, it’s much stronger, Taylor’s muse whispers to her while she’s sleeping and it will most likely feed her the deep fake when she’s dreaming, and when she wakes, she’ll create the song on her own anyway. She’ll have no idea her muse was used to accidentally feed her a deep fake song. And that song, if it’s ever released into the real world, will create real world Strangies out of her fans. Everyone will lose their minds. The whole world will go to madness.”
“Wow!” Everyone yelled out together.
“So, what’s the song called?” Sashy asked curiously, completely captivated by everything Finneas had just said.
“Yeah, tell us more about this deepfake muse song?” Kymmie asked excitedly, her dad nodded beside her expressing interest in the song.
Finneas snapped his fingers again and a few additional logs appeared out of nowhere floating through the air and finding their way to the fire burning in the middle of the hotel lobby. You might think the Fire Marshall would be throwing a fit right about now, things in Museland/Museworld lack certain safety protocols… this IS the most dangerous movie set after all. The fire reached out and grabbed the logs from the air sucking them, it growled and grumbled and grew in size ever so slightly as it consumed the lumber like a lion licking its lips after a nice size snack.
Finneas continued speaking. “The song is called ‘Hey Siri!’…
“Hey Siri…” Sashy repeated back.
Finneas nodded, “Hey Siri. The hook goes ‘Hey Siri play hey Siri’. It’s a derivative work of Toni Basil’s 80s song ‘Mickey’. This song is Taylor’s voice repeating the lyrics over and over again ‘Hey Siri play Hey Siri, Alexa turn it up, Okay Google, lets go!’ and that’s the whole song. But, unlike any song you’ve ever heard before, each time the song plays back it dynamically shifts. No two listens are the same, ever. It’s dynamic music instead of static, which means the ‘recording’ isn’t a recording at all, in fact it’s entirely AI generated. Every time you hear it, the song is different… it’s an infinite loop but it tricks the brain into thinking you’ve never heard it before and making you want more.”
“WHOA… But how????” Sashy pleaded for more from Finneas. “How does your brain want more of it?!?! My brain already wants more Taylor! I LOVE HER MUSIC ALREADY!!! HOW COULD I EVER WANT IT EVEN MORE???”
“Well, from what we can figure out so far.” He nodded at Ozzy Osbourne and Ozzy nodded back. “It works like one of those old JavaScript popups where it just was programed to open so many times that you can’t ever close it. It starts with one innocent pop up with a button that says, ‘would you like to close this pop up?’ and the only button to click is ‘close’. But when you click ‘close’ two more open up. Then you click ‘close’ again, and now 4 open. Then 8. 16. 32. Doubling each time until it becomes impossible to even see the screen. That’s what this song does in your brain, should someone here in Big Magic hear it, it will slowly take over their mind until it’s all they can think about, until they become completely and absolutely obsessed with it. Now, there’s no way of telling if the song ever gets into the real world what will happen, it’s possible it will do the same thing to every phone on the planet. No one will be able to stop it. It starts repeating so many times that it triggers itself to play itself over and over again and fills up the playlist on every single device in the world so you can’t play any other song. And then, once every phone is playing the song in sync with every other phone, and no one can turn it off, it will slowly attach to each person’s brain, maybe after the first listen you hate it, then after a few more it’s okay, then after a few more you start to like it… and soon, you love it, it’s your favorite song, you can’t listen to any other song. Phones and minds alike will get hooked deep fake Taylor Swift! And if any other devices are nearby that are not playing the song it will surely spread to them, all cell phones, or any device that can play music will start playing the song and fill the song queue with only that song like a pop-up taking over the entire computer screen… every phone with Siri listening within audible range picks up the request… Hey Siri… play Hey Siri… All the Alexa devices tune in… Alexa turn it up… And every Android phone won’t be far behind. Okay Google, lets go! Play Hey Siri, Play Hey Siri, PLAY HEY SIRI!!!!’
“Whoa.” The teens were transfixed on every word Finneas was saying.
“But you said the song isn’t in the real world?” Sashy asked checking to be sure.
“Not yet. No. Taylor hasn’t written it. Right now her muse has this song. Here… in Pure Imagination… Big Magic… Museland… THIS world. And somewhere here IS Taylor’s muse. And she has that song and her muse is singing it over and over and over again to itself... which means Taylor probably will get at least something from her muse… or if Taylor’s muse isn’t able to sing any other song, it may be that Taylor starts to get nothing at all… she may be going through a complete creative block, unable to write any new songs because her muse is stuck on ‘Hey Siri!’”
“How exactly did Taylor’s muse get the song?” Sashy asked.
The fire crackled then Finneas leaned in close and whispered, “It was given to her in the form of a tiny music box wrapped as a gift, hand delivered to her, here in this world by—”
“—The King Whale.” Billie whispered out finishing Finneas’ thought.
“Yeah. Her muse, in an act of pure curiosity, innocently unwrapped the music box and then wound the device up. She then tapped a tiny play button on it and began to listen to it. The music box has no pause, or stop, or rewind, or any other button of any other kind so her only choice was to let it play until the spring ran out but by then it was too late.” Her brother paused for a few seconds. “And eventually, unless we can stop it, it is possible Taylor in the real world WILL dream the song one night. Her muse will push it into her brain. The idea will pop into her mind, like an artistic Inception placed there by Leonardo DiCaprio and his pals. She won’t be able to let go of it. She’ll sit down at her piano, strum her guitar, sing into her voice notes on her phone. And that’s when the idea will really take hold… Hey Siri…. Play hey Siri… Even though the song was written using programming, a deepfake in this creative world… it will appear to genuinely have come from Taylor in the real world.”
“Whoa. Sorry, I just can’t stop saying whoa! Whoa.” Kymmie was freaking out. “WHOA!!!!!”
Her dad shifted his stance uneasily. “Tell me again, what does a deepfake Taylor Swift song have to do with Strangies and Emma Watson?” Carl Lyle the lawyer asked calmly. “Just so I have all the details.”
“Well… I think the plan is to use that song somehow to influence other artists and create more strangles by getting them to also quit making art, with enough Strangies Museland can be overrun, all of art in complete chaos, making it easy for someone else to take control of this place and control every muse how they see fit… from what we understand Taylor’s muse was supposed to give it to the other muses spread it from the original music box… throw a big party in the Folklore Forest here in Big Magic, and perform the song for all the other muses so it would spread to all the other muses… and it’s possible that other musicians out there in the real world will then be fed the same song and there will be hundreds or thousands of musicians out there in the world who all write the same song at the same exact time, it could turn into one of the largest examples of multiple discovery, serendipity, a whole new level of Zeitgeist. Every artist creating the same artwork at the same time. Like I said before, Ozzy and I and our team think the song was never supposed to leave here and go into the real world, but we think The Hollywood Whales have underestimated the creative connection that Taylor Swift has to her own muse… Taylor and her muse are super tight, like the best of besties. And, even if it doesn’t and Taylor never writes that song, from what we can tell, The Whale still be able to use the song here along with The King Whale muse to influence Taylor in the real world because one of those artists with a muse here that Emma Watson’s Strangies can get to is Joe Alywyn.” Finneas and Ozzy shared a look, “It’s possible that The Whale’s approach is multi-layered. That if one plan fails, another additional layer of planning will succeed. Backup plans to backup plans. Emma’s Strangies disrupt Joe Alywn’s muse… making him want to quit acting too. And, if he quits acting Taylor and Joe might break up… and THAT creates an entire ripple effect. The way that Kim Divorced Kanye… more Strangies disrupt more muses and create even more Strangies”
“Imma let you finish but first, Kim and I got divorced?” Ye said in disbelief.
“OH NO!” Sashy screamed out.
“Ooops. I guess you didn’t know about that yet.” Finneas stopped himself from saying any more.
“Damn.” Ye shook his head, still in disbelief. “I can’t believe Kim and I got divorced.” He refused to believe it. “I’m going to have to think of a plan to get her back then.”
“She’s also dating Pete Davidson now.” Finneas quickly added before Kanye could talk more about plans of getting her back.
“PETE DAVIDSON! If I wasn’t here in Museland I would beat his…”
Justin put a hand on Ye’s shoulder. “Now don’t do anything rash, just let God save you from the crash.”
“Well someone had to tell him.” Jillie said between bites of another Taylor Porkroll Ham Sandwhich.
“You’re eating another one of those?” Billie asked.
“If you throw up later we’re not cleaning it up.” Sashy said to Jillie.
“Relax. I’ll be fine.” Jillie took a big bite and over emphasized how delicious the sandwich was.
“Wait, if we’re in here and our muses are in here too, who’s out there?” Kymmie asked.
“No one.” Finneas looked at Billie. “Life just goes on as if you were there even though you aren’t.”
“Sometimes I feel like I’m not really there. I’ll just leave the room, and end up somewhere else, and then eventually I return, and my mom is like JILLIE ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO YOUR FATHER AND I??? And I’ll be like… YES MOM! I heard you! Next time I won’t throw your clothes in the trash when I want to use the washer, I’ll just put them in the dryer.” Jillie took another bite of her sandwich.
“Jillie, you really should talk to someone about that.” Billie shared a concerned look with everyone else.
They sat in silience for a moment by the campfire as it crackled away.
“Finneas, what was that you saying about Joe Alwyn quitting acting?” Carl finally broke the silience.
“Oh, yes, well, if Joe gives up acting Taylor and Joe would eventually break up because they would begin to fight. Without acting, Joe would sit around at home all day and decide to start a collection of Cheetos that look like Abe Lincoln, which Taylor Swift’s cats would accidentally eat. This will then cause Joe and Taylor to fight over where the missing Cheeto collection went, as Taylor’s cats would never fess up to the crime… subsequently leading to their breakup. And then, once they break up, Taylor will just sit around writing sad 10 minute songs all day. She’ll say she’s not feeling All Too Well and will refuse to leave her home. And her Swifties will slowly become Strangies… and that’s exactly what The Whale wants… sad Swifties become… `Strangies. And then The King Whale can take control of them all… control them all, control them all, too well.”
“We have to do something!!!” Sashy screamed out again. Upset that anything bad or sad might happen to Taylor.
“We will try. But, it also may be too late for all we know, we received communication that Shawn Mendes is already making evil eye comments about Joe’s eyes… so we know Shawn’s muse is already starting to feel the effects of the Hey Siri song.” Finneas explained in a very serious and matter-of-fact tone.
“IT CAN’T BE TOO LATE! WE NEED TO STOP THIS! WE NEED TO FIND MILLIE’S MUSE!!!!” Sashy screamed once again even louder this time.
“I agree with Sashy, we need to find Millie’s Muse, fix everything, and then we need to get back to the real world!” Kymmie declared.
Finneas shook his head no. “I have to clarify, I keep saying real world, and this world… we’re still technically in the real world, this isn’t really a different world than the so-called normal world, it’s a bit like how the past, present, and future are all the same world, we’re still in the real world technically, we’re just slightly ahead of creative human thoughts, it’s just like, umm… Have you ever read The Langoliers?”
“No.” Kymmie replied shaking her head no, the other Teens also shook their head no.
“Well, it’s a story by Stephen King and it’s about lagging behind time, and then The Langoliers come and eat you up. This is like the reverse, we’re ahead of time, but it’s not exactly time that we’re ahead of, not in the way that we’re in the future. We’re just before time when it comes to creative thoughts and ideas. We’re inside the creative spark. We’re inside everyone’s collective imagination, their mind before they think of a thought that becomes a song, a book, a movie, a painting, any and all creative form of expression. This is that ‘AH-HA!’ moment, the ‘I HAVE AN IDEA’ place. And because we are inside the origin of creative thought for every artist on the planet anything we do here, can influence anyone else in the rest of the real world.”
“HOLY CRAP!” Jillie smiled and turned to the other teens, “We ARE influencers!”
“Jillie!” Billie laughed at her stan.
“Should have seen that coming.” Carl said to Scott.
“Fill me in?” Finneas whispered to his sister out of earshot of the teenagers.
“They’re all trying to be influencers. But they don’t have working phones or social media right now.” Billie explained to her brother. “So, they’re acting… strange.”
He mouthed the word ‘oh’ back to his sister before continuing his train of thought, a sane train of thought—sane, at least for now, “So, you all want to be influencers, I think I have a way to explain it all… okay, remember when I said The King Whale released the song ‘Hey Siri’ as if it were Taylor’s song?”
“Yeah.” The teens collectively nodded.
“And remember how I said that it was not yet release it to the actual world, and that as of right now it is stuck here in this big magic world, this creative Coachella inception dream state?“
“The land before time world.” Jillie commented and Kymmie made a note in her notebook.
“Okay, so, this song… this viral song… what exactly is it doing again?” Kymmie asked, holding her dad’s pen close to the paper, ready to write down anything and every bit of information Finneas had to offer. “Sorry, I’m having a hard time paying attention to all of this, can you just get to the point already?”
“Okay basically, it’s infecting everyone’s muse and flooding all creative sparks so they can then be completely controlled. Every creative person in the world, everyone who makes art in any capacity, every single artist alive. Each and every one of them, their muse will be infected by this earworm and not even know it.”
“Go on…” Kymmie wrote notes in her journal. She subconsciously began to mimic the way her dad worked as memories of watching him work from the doorway of his home office, or papers sprawled across the dining room table before her mom telling him that ‘dinner and business need to be kept separate’ began to creep their way into her creative consciousness: Muse flood, spark control, earworm infection.
“What will eventually happen after all is said and done, is that every creator on the planet will eventually create art thinking it’s their own art, but really, it’s being fed to them, as if it’s their own. Like Trojan artwork. They open the creative gates and let it into their mind and make art, and all of that art they create will really be for the purpose of creating art to influence and control all future art.”
“Those sound-like very bad influencers.” Jillie looked to Kymmie.
“Well, we won’t be like that, we’ll be good influencers.” Kymmie said back to Jillie.
“Yeah.” Jillie nodded back at Kymmie. “We’re only going to use our influence to make the world a better place!”
“Were we like that when we were starting out?” Finneas whispered to Billie out of earshot from the wannabe influencer Tik Tok Teens.
“I don’t know… probably.” Billie watched the teens playing a quick game of rock paper scissors, each time they threw a rock, or paper, or scissors, their hands actually turned into each object. Kymmie turned into Edward Scissor Hands for a brief second during her turn when she threw scissors. Carl, the lawyer, had a concerned look. A moment later Kymmie, Jillie, Sashy and Stan were paying attention once again to Finneas…
“SO what happens next?” Stan asked.
“Well… Whatever any artist out there in the world is doing—we’ll just keep saying the real world, the world we came from—whatever they are doing, they will THINK that they WANT to do that, but it’s really entirely and completely going to slowly become this ‘Hey Siri’ song—The Whale’s song feeding their creative muse. So, Taylor will most likely want to start making lots of sad autumn sounding songs, even when it’s not autumn, even in winter… or spring, or summer—It will always be autumn in Taylor Swift’s mind—”
“TAYLOR AND JOE ARE GOING TO BREAK UP!” Sashy screamed out in an over the top overly dramatic cry.
“Sashy, don’t worry, we’re going to stop it. Taylor and Joe aren’t going to break up. We’ll find the buzzing bee, and Buzzy Lee and she’ll lead us to Strange Town and where we’ll meet Millie’s Muse and she’ll take care of all the Strangies and Joe’s Muse won’t convince him to quit acting and then Joe and Taylor won’t break up!!!”
“Excuse me, I don’t mean to interrupt…” a woman entered stage left… or maybe it was stage right… It all depends on which way you look at it. “I’m here for the midnight river meeting, I brought some rust.”
The blonde-haired woman with hair cut short held up an old bag that appeared to be from the old west... on the bag it says RUST and in small letters it says Property of Alec Baldwin, just below that it says safetyforsarah.com. “I was asked to bring this to the midnight river meeting.”
“Oh! Hmmm,” Billie thought for a second, “All I know is that it meets at midnight. The Midnight River Meeting meets at midnight... but I don’t know where it meets. There was someone else looking for that SAMEmeeting, and I think SHE might know if you can find her. Her name is… umm…” Billie tried to recall her name, “Sarah Jones, yes, Sarah, she’s…” Billie looked around, “…here somewhere… I don’t know where she went though.”
“Sarah! Yes! SARAH JONES! I’m looking for her! SO she IS here… Oh, thank you! THANK YOU SOO much!!! If you see her tell her I’m looking for her, my name is Halyna Hutchins...” The woman smiled at Billie then walked away.
Kymmie wrote her name down in her book, ‘Halyna Hutchins’. Kymmie’s book began to quiver and shake and flipped to a new page on its own, the page was a screenplay from a scene in a movie called “Rust”. The screen took place inside of a church, a shootout scene of some sort. Kymmie read a note scribbled in the margin.
The live round of ammunition came from a gun that belongs to THE WHALE.
SAFETY ON SET FOR ALL IN FRONT AND BEHIND THE CAMERA!!!
“Look!” Kymmie held up the book for everyone to see. She pointed to where it said THE WHALE.
“The Whale!” Jillie yelled out.
“Shhh… keep your voice down young lady.” Carl said in a parental tone.
“Whatever…” Jillie shook her head in a disapproving manner.
“The Whale is behind ALL of this… without a doubt, it’s gotta be The Whale. Who else would be doing this?” Kymmie turned towards Billie, “I mean, you and your brother already said it was him but THIS is proof.” Kymmie’s dad, THE LAWYER seemed uneasy with the current situation, he shifted his stance.
INTERIOR – DAY – HOTEL LOBBY
A lawyer shifts his stance uneasy and looks around as though he’s looking for someone that is late for a business meeting. He then looked back at his daughter.
“You don’t know that for sure.” Carl replied. “That book could be giving you false information. Remember, you did find it on the side of the road. Be very careful what you believe. For all you know that book in your hand belongs to Emma Watson and she’s telling you what to think and you’re just believing everything she says to you without thinking things through like I taught you. Sure, she’s right about all the climate change information she posts, even though I’m paid handsomely to believe otherwise, and off the record, I agree with her feminist views and fervent activism, but you can’t simply pick up a book left out on the sidewalk and start believing everything it tells you… Emma is known to leave books for people to find, it could have been left on purpose by her or one of her Book Fairies. For all we know she’s feeding us this information right now because she wants us to see it.”
“Hmmm… But… Dad… look at what it says… it has to be real!” Kymmie held the book up for everyone to see.
“I know what it says, we all do, because you keep showing everyone what it says instead of keeping your diary entries a private matter, as they should be. Kymmie, let me put it like this, let’s say you follow Emma Watson on Instagram.”
“And you comment on her posts.”
“I do.” She nodded excitedly.
“And she doesn’t comment back or reply to your messages or send you a direct message.”
“Hmmm… she doesn’t. But I know she can see everything I tell her! I just know it!”
“Well, let’s say Emma Watson does see everything you post, let’s say one day you received a Direct Message out of the blue from an account that isn’t her official verified account, and it’s instead an account labeled ‘Emma Waston’ and this account begins talking to you as if she were Emma Watson, and she tells you that she very much so appreciates all your lovely comments.”
“Well that’s stupid, no one is actually going to believe she’s Emma Watson, the name on the account is Emma Waston—”
“Yes, that is true. But, maybe it’s a secret account.” Carl suggested.
“I mean, okay, so why wouldn’t she just message me from her REAL account?”
“Exactly.” Carl nodded. “Unless… she used this account as a special SECRET account.”
“Oh that’s true! So maybe it really is her! Famous people have secret Instagram accounts! Emma Waston could REALLY secretly be Emma Watson! She’s just being secret!”
Carl nodded, “But… maybe it’s not actually her. Maybe it’s someone else, a catfish.”
“Oh… Hmmmm…” Kymmie looked at the book then back up at her father. “Well… how do I know if it really is HER then?”
Carl smiled, satisfied. “You don’t. Without the verified check it could be anyone, anyone at all…”
She looked back at the book, what a persuasive argument. “So then who sent this message?”
“Exactly.” Carl replied in a satisfied tone. Nothing like a little father daughter lawyering.
Finneas continued ignoring The Lawyer’s argument, “The Whale IS behind it all. And if it works the way it’s planned, he’ll be able to suggest art into the mind of every creator. He’ll control the entire pipeline of ideas from start to finish. He’ll control who creates art, when and where and what kind of art they make. And that art will affect the feelings of anyone who consumes it… complete creative manipulation.”
“Whoa. There it is again, Kymmie, your whoa-ing is contagious… I, um… whoa!” Jillie clamored.
“Sorry Jillsy… Wait why does it say safety for EMMA?” Kymmie asked. “Let’s just say I do believe what’s written in this book… Why would it say that?”
“I’m not sure.” Billie answered. “Is she behind a camera now too?”
Finneas shrugged, “it’s possible… anything is possible. She might be. Her muse is under the influence of The ‘Hey Siri’ Whale Song… Emma out in the real world could be doing some very strange things… Once a muse creates Strangies here in this place, it’s hard to go back… they’re like free radicals in your bloodstream… This isn’t Babes in Toyland we’re talking about, it’s Strangies in Museland and Strangies in Museland cause creative chaos and wreak havoc on the creative process. It can lead to madness.”
Kymmie flipped through the book trying to find more information, nothing. How did she know if this was really real. She thought about what her dad said, how could she know if the Emma Waston Instagram account sending her DMs was REALLY Emma Watson in disguise and not really an imposter? An Emmaposter Watson. How am I supposed to tell what is real and what is fake anymore? She turned back to the page she was on before.
Cold guns. Warm guns. Smoking guns. Poking funs. Don’t let The Whale Song silence Alec from making fun.
“What does that mean?” Kymmie asked, showing only Jillie the new writing that had just appeared in her journal instead of everyone.
Jillie shrugged. “I don’t know, the only making fun I know of was when he made fun of Trump on Saturday Night Live.”
Kymmie and Jillie both pondered what the mysterious message was trying to convey to them… Maybe Alec Baldwin’s fans were now all Strangies too? Maybe the Strangies were spreading… Free radicals in the creative bloodstream. Wreaking Hollywood havoc. Strangies in Museland. Saftey on set… but here in this place… there are no safety protocols… anything goes… it’s the most dangerous movie set anyone could ever imagine… because it is anything anyone could ever imagine.
“We gotta get out of here. Get everyone else… We can’t stay here. It’s not safe.” Finneas looked towards the exit of the hotel. By all first impressions you would think this hotel is The Westin Bonaventure Hotel & Suites in downtown Los Angeles. But it’s not, it’s simply an imaginary version of it that only exists because everyone thinks it exists. It is nothing more than a Hotel California, going to California in my mind and with an aching in my heart, but if you’d rather it be Carolina instead, all you have to do is think about direction, wonder why you haven’t before. “You have to think of this place like a giant movie set, it’s a movie set where anything and everything can happen, it’s the origin imagination. If you can dream it, think of it, imagine it, it can happen here, it does happen here, it WILL happen here. We aren’t in LA LA Land anymore. And all it takes is a single thought… You think it, you dream it… it pops into your imagination, there’s no build time, there’s no editing process, there’s no pre-production or post-production or any production costs at all for that matter… it’s pure real time production…. If you can dream it, you can build it the very moment you think of it. It’s like a gun going off without even pulling the trigger. If you even THINK a single thought about the gun going off, it will go off. Anything inside that mind of yours can become real in zero time flat!”
“Yeah yeah yeah, Rin Tin Tin Finny Fin Fin… ALLLLL I heard from that is how I can get anything I can possibly think of the moment I think of it… anything I want when I want it…and all I have to say about that is… THAT is AWESOME!” Jillie smiled. She began to dream. A small bubble above her head began to fill with images, it floated up and away carrying the images with it, like a floating snow globe.
Finneas shook his head, frustrated with his sister’s tumultuous teen stan, “Yes, it CAN be awesome, anything is possible here, pure imagination knows no boundaries, but as I said, it’s just like a movie set with no one to oversee any safety guidelines and there’s no limit to anything. No budget, no finite restrictions, it’s completely infinite creative thought. Yes, Jillie, it’s awesome—” Finneas turned his attention to the other Tik Tok Teens. “But not all thoughts are good thoughts, not all creative thoughts are safe and constructive… some are pure chaos… destruction. I know that you’ve had passing thoughts inside those young minds of yours that have been thoughts you would never want to climb out of your minds and stand in front of you. Imagine any thought that pops into anyone’s head anywhere in the world, and all those thoughts could possibly pop into your own head without warning… now imagine being on a movie set that can build those creative thoughts the moment they pop into existence, into YOUR mind, and you have no way of stopping them unless you can think of another thought quick enough to stop the previous thought. If you think of a trapdoor, there’s a trapdoor. Without warning, there’s a new floor under you, or ceiling above you, or another sun in the sky… going from standing upright to floating in Zero G. Without anything to stop your thoughts it becomes the most dangerous movie set you’ve ever stepped foot on. Anything is possible, anything can happen, and it all depends not just what is in each and every single one of your own minds, but what’s in all of our minds… even YOU can become something entirely different, you can think yourselves into danger… but we can also think each other into danger.”
“That sounds dangerous.” Billie replied. “That sounds REALLY dangerous.”
Finneas nodded with a hint of panic in his eyes. “Exactly. So keep an eye out. Watch your step. We’re not in LA anymore. This place isn’t anything like ANYWHERE you’ve ever been…” Finneas looked at The Whale in conversation with Travis Scott’s muse. The King Whale held up a tablet size screen with a countdown clock on it, like he was pitching an idea to Travis Scott’s muse, something to be fed to Travis Scott out in the real world… The Whale was up to something, always up to something, always planning, manipulating, calculating, coercing. The Whale’s muse, The King Whale, continued speaking with Travis Scott’s muse but looked back at Finneas and smiled a spooky smile before turning his attention back to the countdown clock. Chills ran down Finneas’ neck. “Ah! Lizzo! Keep those darn things in your purse!”
“Sorry!” Lizzo put her tiny purse on the ground and the chills ran across the floor and back into her tiny purse.
Finneas waved to everyone pointing at the hotel exit, “Come on, let’s go. We’re on shuffle right now… Time is about to change, and if that lobster is right about the dolphins, I don’t think we want to stick around to see what comes next.”
“You noticed that too, the time and dates are all time signatures!” Stan said excitedly. “Like we’re in a Marvel movie!”
“Stan, we’re not a in a Marvel movie. We’re in a Taylor Swift movie.” Sashy’s tone of voice was his usual sassy self.
“I can see it both ways.” Kymmie said with a smile to both of them. “And maybe it’s a Marvel movie where Taylor Swift takes over the world.”
Stan and Sashy looked at one another then back to Kymmie.
“It’s one or the other, not both.” Stan said back to Kymmie.
“Yeah, it’s one or the other.” Sashy agreed.
“Okay. Well… maybe it will be one or the other, I haven’t decided yet. Right now, it’s both!” Kymmie smirked and made flirty eyes at both Stan and Sashy.
Stan and Sashy looked at one another like they could become future foes.
Finneas pointed to Ozzy, “Soooooooooo, anywaaaaaaay…. about that time thing… We think part of this world is like being in a giant playlist. It would seem as though it’s some kind of giant Spotify playlist, on shuffle… Time isn’t linear anymore, it’s shuffled. I mean, time is STILL time, it’s just time isn’t on time, love isn’t always on time and time isn’t either anymore, it’s tempo and meter and, musical key… Honestly, I don’t even know and our team is still working on figuring that out. But, Ozzy was trying to explain it all, he says he’s been here before years ago in his Black Sabbath days and thinks this might help.” Finneas held up some sort of strange device that the teens had never seen before.
“What is that?” Kymmie asked standing beside Billie. The other Tik Tok Teens run over and gawk at it.
“It’s an 8-track. You can’t shuffle it… You can’t rewind it… it just plays… Like time. Like how time SHOULDbe. Or, the way we were used to time being.” Finneas paused. “Tapes go forward and backward… Records and CDs can skip around, Streaming playlists can shuffle between songs from different albums on a whim… But 8-Tracks? 8-Tracks are a continuous loop and only go forward, there’s no rewind, just like time. And 8-tracks have something else, it’s called… quadraphonic sound.”
“QUADRAPHONIC!??!?!?! THAT’S OUR NAME!!!!” Jillie screamed out in an over-the-top excited voice. “Wait, isn’t it? I forget, that was, like… yesterday, or something. Or was it yesterday? It feels like 5 minutes ago, but it also feels like yesterday…“
“I don’t know, umm sure.” Billie shrugged trying to answer her stan’s question. “To be honest I wasn’t really paying attention.”
“This place is weird; it really is weird, Billie, and it keeps getting weirder by the minute. Or is it hour? Or day? Or week… what month is it? What is going on right now!?!?!? What year is it?!?!” Jillie began to freak out.
“It’s Twenty Swiftie!” Sashy smiled.
“Twenty Swiftie, that’s right.” Jillie said in an unsure voice. “Twenty Swiftie… I can’t believe it’s Twenty Swifie already! It was JUST Nineteen Swiftie!”
Kymmie opened her journal and began to talk to it while she wrote, “Kymmie’s log, Museland stardate Twenty Swiftie… There… seems to be… some kind of… time warp everyone is doing, again.”
Finneas shared a look with Billie before continuing, the look was something along the lines of ‘where did you find these teenagers?’ and Billie’s look back at her brother was something like ‘I didn’t. They found me!’, Finneas started to explain the Quadraphonic music experience, “There’s something about a quadraphonic mix where…”
Ozzy jumped in, “It’s where the four output channels pan in sequence through the four source channels to create a rotating sensation.”
“Whoa. A rotating sensation… I wanna try!!!” Jillie yelled.
“I WANT TO TRY TOO!!! I want to rotate my senses!!!” Kymmie screamed with excitement. They began to whirl around a few feet off the ground. “Whoaooooaoaoaoaoaoaao.” They spun around in circles vertically and horizonally flipping and twisting like a gymnast.
Finneas shook his head at the teen stans. He whispered to his sister. “They need to learn to take this more serious, because things are going to get very serious very fast.” He turned to the stans and spoke in a loud booming voice, “That’s not at all what Ozzy said but I will show you all how Quadrophenia works, not right now… but I promise everyone will get to try the rotating sensation, or sense rotation, whichever one you prefer.”
The teens floated back on to the ground. “YESSSSSS!!!!!” Kymmie yelled out.
“I think I’m gonna be sick.” Jillie held her stomach and turned green.
“WE TOLD YOU NOT TO EAT THAT SANDWICH!” Billie yelled at her teen stan.
Jillie’s color returned back to normal.
“It’s okay Lish, I got it under control.”
“Recording Quadraphonic sounds is tricky, it can’t be done automatically, we need two mixing engineers who can coordinate their efforts to create the effect, with new music.” Finneas tried to explain, the soon to be abandoned campfire site nearby now burning slightly dimmer.
“I’m so confused.” Jillie shook her head no.
“I think I understand.” Kymmie said to Jillie, “We need to make new “old” music?”
“Yeah. Something like that.” Finneas nodded. “Quadraphonic… Space… Forward… Time, figuring out which way is up, Emma Watson’s Strangies… Hey Siri… It will all make sense eventually… trust me. Anyway, let’s go. Our ride should be here any minute now.” Finneas looked towards the exit then back to the campfire. He snapped his fingers and the campfire extinguished itself. It continued smoldering for a few seconds… then instead of going out completely the fire burst into flames once more. Finneas noticed Jillie’s eyes fixed on the fire as it began to grow in size, Jillie stared at it as the fire grew, hotter and the flames continued to rise higher into the air. Finneas snapped his fingers again, the fire dimmed just slightly, but then continued to grow, faster now. “JILLIE! CLOSE YOUR EYES!” Finneas yelled.
“Why? This fire is so crazy.” Jillie replied in a daze. The fire grew even taller, hotter, an inferno quickly spiraling upwards, out of control like a wildfire. Jillie’s emerald eyes hypnotized by the towering bonfire. ”It’s so… so fire wild…” her voice slow and monotone. The song Firestarter by The Prodigy began to play.
Billie looked at her brother and then back to her stan. “JILLIE!!! JUST CLOSE YOUR EYES!!!!”
“But…” She replied again, her attention completely engulphed in the bright dancing flames. Her seafoam green ocean eyes unable to look away from it.
“JILLIE!!!!!!!!!” Kymmie yelled pulling on Jillie’s arm pleading with her. “CLOSE YOUR EYES!!! JILLIE CLOSE YOUR EYES!!!!” Kymmie pulled at Jillie trying to bring her back from the light and for a second Jillie turned to look at Kymmie…. The fire momentarily flickered.
“Fine.” Jillie huffed shaking her head and blinking her eyes trying to cut the connection from her mind to her desire to see the fire grow upwards into the sky. She then closed her eyes tight, keeping them closed, and the fire stopped growing.
Containment. Creative containment.
Finneas held his arms out like he was picking up an invisible water bucket. He heaved the invisible substance onto the fire and the fire flickered then went out entirely. Finneas shook his head as he showed a concerned look. Billie’s eyes were wide with alarm as she stared back at her brother. They need to learn to take this serious, because things are going to get very serious, very fast. “Most dangerous movie set you’ve ever been on.” Finneas repeated back to the group. “Remember, we are NOT in LA anymore! THIS IS NOT A GAME! Try to keep your thoughts in check… meditate, practice mindfulness, be present and stay in this moment. Keep your thoughts calm and collected and don’t let your emotions take over. Okay?”
“Way to almost burn the place down.” Sashy said to Jillie inspecting his gown for burn marks.
“Sorry.” Jillie apologized to the group. “Guys, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to… like, I just couldn’t stop. I tried to but I couldn’t stop!” She looked away from everyone, “I tried to stop but I wanted more and I’m soooooo sorry. I almost hurt everyone because I couldn’t stop wanting more. I’m sorry. I screwed up! I’m screwed up. I’m sorry, my brain is just messed up sometimes! I wanted more fire. It was beautiful. I wanted it, I wanted more and I’m sorry, sometimes my mind just, I think there’s something wrong with me or with my thoughts or…”
“Hey, kiddo…” Finneas knelt eye level with Jillie. “It’s okay,” He gave a comforting smile to his sister’s stan. “Really, it’s OKAY. There’s nothing wrong with your thoughts… we all have thoughts that if people knew what they were would probably think we were crazy. And in the real world, no one can hear your thoughts but you… but here… every thought in your mind can become real…”
Jillie wiped a wet eye and shook her head yes. “I promise it won’t happen again. Sometimes I just… I get carried away with my thoughts… but I promise I won’t let that happen again.”
Kymmie began to think about her own thoughts…
I don’t want anyone to know my thoughts… I don’t want anyone to know my thoughts, my thoughts are weird. My thoughts aren’t normal. I don’t always think nice things or good things or… I don’t want my thoughts to become real things!
“Kymmie are you okay?” Finneas asked Kymmie noticing that she looked to be deep in thought.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” She smiled back.
Finneas nodded then stood back up to address the rest of the group, “Come on, our ride is almost here.”
“Just come on, let’s go, I’ll explain everything, I promise.”
“Wow.” Kymmie shook her head, “Everything just keeps getting more complicated! How am I ever going to pass this test? And now I have to figure out how to rotate my senses!” …and not let any of my weird thoughts escape from my mind!
“Don’t worry, we’ll all help you figure it out.” Everyone in the group smiled back at her.
Kymmie looked at her journal and noticed new lettering had appeared.
ROLL CALL. PLEASE TAKE ROLL.
“Wait, I have to take roll!” She proclaimed excitedly.
“Take roll?” Her dad asked.
“Yeah, look, the book says so!” She showed a new page in her journal that asked for roll call of everyone present. “Maybe I can’t post tik’s or Insta pics or scroll through social media at the moment, but at least I can take roll!”
“Don’t fill that out.” Her dad said. “As your dad and your attorney, I advise you NOT to fill that out. Please remember our previous conversation about Emma Watson—”
“BUT I have to!!!! I need to get something right. I need to fill something out. I need to figure it out! Dad, you said you would help me figure it out!!!! I NEED TO DO THIS!!!!! I can’t… control… my thoughts… DAD, JUST LET ME DO THIS!!! PLEASE!!!!”
“Well… alright.” Kymmie’s dad said the words with only a slight hint of annoyance. Perhaps he was slightly more than perturbed, but he hid it well. It’s more likely he was scared but just didn’t want to show it that either. In Museland keeping a pokerbrain was key.
“Whoa Kymmie, okay just calm down and fill it out then!” Sashy said with a smile.
“Dooo it! Dooo it!!!! Dooooo it!!!!! DOOOOO IT!!!” Jillie cheered. Pompoms in her hands. “Go Kymmie! If she can’t do it no one can!!!!!” Jillie jumped up and down, now wearing a full cheerleader uniform. “WHOAAAAAA!!!!!! LOOK AT THIS COOL CHEER GEAR!!!!!!!!! I’m okay with this thought being real.”
“Okay now YOU need to calm down.” Sashy pointed his finger at Jillie.
“GO KYMMIE!!! GO KYMMIE!!!” Jillie shouted as she jumped up and down.
Kymmie laughed. “Okay, who’s present….” She looked around. “YOU! Who are you and what is your role?”
“You know who I am.” Billie stopped talking, Kymmie stood there waiting with her pen and her open journal. Billie continued, rolling her eyes. “Okay, fine, I’m Billie Eilish…”
“And your role?” Kymmie held the book closer to the pen.
“What do you mean? Role? Like… I’m Billie Eilish…. I don’t know… I’m Billie Eilish?”
“Hmmm….” Kymmie wrote just Billie’s name and then looked up. “If I were to cast you in a movie, what part would you play? Like, what do you do?”
“Umm…” Billie thought for a moment. “I’m team captain of The Billies.” She shrugged at Justin Bieber and then made an ‘I don’t know’ face at Finneas.
“Okay. And you?” She pointed at her dad.
“WHAT IS YOUR NAME!?!?! AND WHAT DO YOU DO!”
Carl blinked twice, then sighed. “Carl Lyle Lawyer, I’m the Carlyle Attorney. And I pay for all those expensive phones you keep breaking.”
Kymmie wrote in her journal then pointed her dad’s fancy expensive pen at her next subject. “And you?”
“I’m Finneas. And…” He paused. “I’m here to rock the world! Duh.”
Billie looked from Finneas to Kymmie, “Wait can I change my answer? I wanna rock the world too!”
“No! You already put an answer down. You’re captain of The Billies.”
Billie made a ‘this isn’t fair’ face.
“I’m Ozzy Osbourne. I’m innssaaaanottins, but isshanortsih rott and rocaaak.”
“Okay, I didn’t understand ANY of that.” Kymmie scratched her head in confusion. ‘I’m just going to put down Crazy Train Conductor.” She pressed her dad’s fancy lawyer’s pen to the paper, that might as well be her pen now and spoke aloud while she wrote. “Ozzy Osbourne, Conductor of the Crazy Train!”
Ozzy smiled and nodded pulling out a new extra fancy conductor’s hat and putting it on. “ALL ABOARD!!!!!!! HAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHHAHA!!!!!” He screamed out in a joyful yet slightly crazy tone.
“Let’s see… And you’re Lizzo, holder of the tiny purse and pied piper flautist.”
Lizzo nodded. “I like that.”
“And… Oak Felder, world renowned music producer.”
“Well thank you.” Oak Felder smiled back.
“Kanye West, no longer named Kanye, now goes by Ye.” Kanye pulled out a pair of shades and put them on over an existing pair of shades he was already wearing. The two pair of shades morphed into one new pair.
“And newly single ready to mingle.” He said in a cool Kanye voice. “But with a plan to get Kim back.”
Stan reached in his own pocket and pulled out the exact same pair of shades and put them on. “If he’s no longer Kanye West, does that mean I can change my name to Kanye West?” Stan asked trying to mimic the way Kanye was standing.
“No Stan. You can’t.” Kanye replied to his stan, but Stan seemed to be already considering the idea anyway.
“I don’t know if I would just go by Kanye, or say the entire name… Kanye West… or just say New Kanye, or maybe NKW… K Y Westie…”
Kymmie laughed at Stan and Stan smiled back at her.
“And you’re Stan. And your role is to make me laugh and be a cute boy that I think I like, but I’m not sure if I REALLY like you, but I think I do.”
Carl rolled his eyes and shook his head.
“But I like you as well… The way that Pete Davidson likes Kim Kardashian. Or maybe it’s the way Kim likes Pete?” She pointed at Sashy. “I don’t know why I just said that… it was like the thought just kind of popped into my head and then it popped out of my head all on its own! And now everyone knows a thought that I didn’t want everyone to know!!! Also, are Pete and Kim REALLY a thing now?”
Ye and Stan rolled their eyes behind their sunglasses. Stan was glad Kymmie couldn’t see his reaction behind the sunglasses, and Kanye was glad Kim couldn’t see his reaction either.
“And your name is Sashy and your role is to wear that gown and not let people step on it and to tell people to calm down.”
“And to find out where all my Swifties went! And fix my Swifter so that I can turn all of you into Taylor fans just like me! And we can just love Taylor Swift’s music forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever… I love Taylor so much! And, also, my role is to find Taylor’s muse here in Museworld… before the Strangies do.” Sashy continued speaking, piggy backing off the end of Kymmie’s original sentence.
“No, that’s not a good idea.” Carl suggested. “Finding Taylor’s muse is a very bad idea. We don’t want to do that, we want to stay far away from Taylor’s muse.”
“I agree with that…” Finneas jumped into the conversation hurriedly. “We don’t want to interact with anyone’s muse… Especially with Taylor Swift’s.”
Sashy made a ‘whatever’ face crossing his arms and waving them away with one of his hands while keeping his arms crossed.
“Okay, who else… “ Kymmie pointed to Pop Wansel. “YOU!”
“I’m Pop. Pop Wansel. And umm… my role is… I just kind of came in with Oak… We were at his studio working on a beat, when you all showed up with Taylor Swift’s masters that you stole from the Bielibers after the Swifties tried to ambush you, and that was after Taylor and her Swifties stormed Big Machine Records and Scooter Braun still kept Taylor from getting her Masters, but Taylor got them back anyway because she tricked Justin into trading her masters back to him in exchange for his cats that Taylor catnapped because it was bring your cat to work day and Justin had his cat at Big Machine Label Group’s headquarters when the Swifties stormed Big Machine trying to capture her old masters tracks and instead they captured Justin’s cat. Did I get it all?”
“Yeah, pretty much.” Justin nodded.
“And now we’re here.” Pop pointed in every direction around him.
“In the creative ether.” Jillie added.
“Yeah.” Pop replied. “Or, what is it called?”
“MUSELAND! That’s what I’m calling it.” Jillie agreed. “It’s like Disneyland but not… It’s Museland!”
“I don’t know how I feel about Museland, we should make up a cool name for it.” Kymmie said to Jillie.
“That is a cool name!” Finneas said to Jillie. “What’s wrong with Museland? I like Museland! Jillie, Museland is good, don’t let Kymmie talk to you out of it.”
“Hmmm… Maybe Museland isn’t so great.”
“WHAT?!?!?!” Finneas threw his arms up in frustration. “MUSELAND IS AWESOME! It’s like GRACELAND! I mean anything with LAND at the end is great, really. But Museland is perfect!”
“Alright, well, we’ll have to think of something.” Jillie nodded at Kymmie, ignoring Finneas. “Ohhh, wait, I know! What about CREATIVELAND!!! That’s also like DISNEYLAND, but for being creative!”
“Creativeland?!?!? Jillie, no. Museland… stick with Museland. Creativeland? That just sonds like Cleveland. No one wants to call this place Cleveland. That just makes me think of That ‘70s Show!” Finneas caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, for just a split second he could have sworn his reflection was that of Topher Grace’s character Eric Forman. “Whoa!” He closed his eyes then opened them again and was back to himself.
Kymmie made a, ‘maybe’ face.
“Well, I like Creativeland!” Jillie crossed her arms and looked away the same way that Sashy had just done.
“Just use Museland.” Finneas said to Jillie and Kymmie. “Museland is good!”
“You’re wasting your energy.” Billie shook her head at her brother. “They’re just going to do whatever they want to do anyway. Don’t let yourself get sucked into their drama.”
“Well, we’ll put it to a vote later and see which one wins. Right now I’m in the middle of something! I have to finish taking roll!” Kymmie decreed. “Okay who’s left…” Kymmie waved her pen about like a wand. “YOU!”
“Umm… I’m Scott Borchetta.”
Scott looked at Kymmie’s dad, Carl, the Carlyle Lawyer. “I decline to comment.”
“That’s not an option!” Kymmie shook her head at both her dad and Scott Borchetta.
“Okay, fine, I don’t know, I’m just here to talk about the old days.”
“Old man.” Kymmie said as she wrote ‘Scott Borchetta is an old man’.
“HEY! I’m not an old man!” Scott growled.
“Too bad, I already wrote it down, and it’s in pen so there’s no delete button. Scott Borchetta is an old man!” She held up the book then looked at it again with a smile having completed her task of taking roll of everyone currently present in their group. “Wait… weird. There’s new writing below the list! It says… Thank you for the list of names… -T.S.” She squinted closer nearly putting her entire head inside the book, “And look! Some of them are underlined in red!!! I wonder what that means? Look Scott, yours is underlined in red, that must mean something special, and Ye yours is underlined and… Dad, yours is underlined too! Weird.”
Carl cleared his throat and spoke in an out of character somewhat nervously unsteady voice. “We should get going.” He glanced around, seemingly spooked.
“Okay.” Kymmie nodded and spoke softly to herself as she inspected the page in her journal… “A list of names… and some are in RED underlined… weird. I wonder who T.S. is… Oh well, at least I got SOMETHING done! I feel so accomplished!!!”
“That’s great, honey.” Carl feigned a worried smile at his daughter. “You did great.” When she looked away his face flashed a worried look, then flashed back to his normal poker face and poker brain, keeping his Carl thoughts in check.
“Oh, I almost forgot…” Finneas showed a nervous smile, ”Um, Justin, you know that earworm that’s stuck in your head?”
“Yeah. What about it?” Justin looked at Finneas, dubiously.
“I wrote that song. But to be fair… I didn’t know that’s what Selena Gomez had in mind when she asked me to help her write ‘Lose You to Love Me’.”
“You suck so much.” Justin narrowed his eyes and made a sour face.
“Sorry about that.” Finneas shrugged.
Carl cleared his throat again, this time really loud then he looked at his watch.
Kymmie made an annoyed face at her dad. “Alright! We’re going… Geeeeez DAAAAAAD.”
Kymmie put her book away, then pulled it out again. “WAIT! I forgot one more name, that guy from earlier that saved us in the tunnel of sound! He kind of just disappeared but I’m going to write his name down anyway… William Bowery… magic key holder. There we go, finished. I wonder where he is now?”
“He’s probably with Taylor.” Sashy said with a smile then pulled out the set of rainbow keys William Bowery had left behind and inspected them. They glowed and glimmered in the light like rainbow kryptonite.
Kymmie looked at her book, William Bowery’s name wasn’t in RED underlined, instead, it had pink hearts around it. “Hmmm… strange. I wonder what that means?” She closed the book and put it away. “Well, hopefully I didn’t forget anyone! Okay, dad, let’s go!” She then turned to Finneas, “Where’s our ride, Fin man. I’m ready to rock and roll!”
The group headed for the door and Jillie caught a glance of herself in a hotel mirror.
“BILLIE!!! LOOK!!!! MY HAIR IS BLONDE LIKE YOURS!!!!!!” Jillie screamed out, “WE MATCH AGAIN—” Jillie abruptly stopped speaking mouth gaped open.
“What?” Billie turned to look into the mirror too. Billie’s hair had changed again this time from blonde to brunette. “Whoops. Sorry Jillzy!” Billie stuck her tongue out and then smiled at her teen stan.
Jillian Jean growled, and her face turned green again. “Billie! We’re supposed to match!”
“Well, slow-poke, catch up!” Billie smiled. “I might keep this hair color for a while… but, hey, you never know I might change it!”
They all began walking towards the exit again as a group.
Through the open door the wheels of a fast car screeched to a stop. Carl the attorney approved of this fast car as it met the specification of the one he had suggested to Scott earlier… as your attorney I suggest you get a very fast car with no top, get out of LA… tape recorder for special music… and Acapulco shirts… Ozzy had brought the 8-track tape recorder for special music, the fast car was now waiting outside, there was still the matter of megaphones but he was not too worried, after all, this is Big Magic, or Museland, or Creativeland as Jillie named it—anyone can acquire anything with enough pure imaginative thought, as for the shirts—
Finneas stopped walking and stared for a moment pointing to the attorney who had somehow managed to ditch the suit and was now wearing an Acapulco shirt and some shorts, “Whoa, I like the shirt…”
“Thanks.” Carl smiled a sizable smile, probably the largest one he’d smiled in years. “You want one?”
“Sure!” Finneas replied, also with sizable smile.
Carl let his poker brain down for a minute and his thoughts streamed out of his mind and out into Museland… they swirled around the group like a tornado filled with freshly washed clean laundry. Suddenly they were all wearing Acapulco shirts. Even Sashy had one on under the calm down gown.
“WHOA!” Kymmie screamed out. “LOOK!!! WE ALL MATCH! Cooooooooool!”
Finneas turned to the rest of the group. “Come on, let’s go. Our ride has arrived!”
