Outrun the Scythe: A Tale of Daemons and Immortals (Updated 8/3)

[Trip]

I absolutely love the lore in this. It's just *chef's kiss.*

I have no idea who I am rooting for right now. On one hand I want Sheila to succeed to spite Vega but on the other hand I love the Ironstars. They all have such distinct personalities.

Also the editing, sets, and poses for this story is fantastic. 

@mpart: Take whatever side you want. It might get too murky anyways. I do hope to release some of the poses at various intervals, though not necessarily the lots because the outside of them would definitely be a disappointment. This really is just a story built on boxes that happen to look nice on the inside and even then, not always (NO DOORS NO BATHROOMS ALL CHEATS ALL THE TIME BABY).

I have a whole ritual when I play normally that involves moving npcs/homeless sims into homes before I start. I also tend to not turn aging on for a week or so just to let sims settle in and have a chance at some babies before the older ones die/age up. Otherwise I found I was just sticking to a few favorites and I like genetic surprises around town. Though, granted, I've always had a thing for the homeless sims and npcs vs the starting townies, so I tend to try and keep them around as much as I can.

@Chubling: I'm definitely gonna take that advice for the next non-dynasty game I play. I mean it was in the back of my mind too but the aging off tip wasn't. It's definitely a way to introduce some genetic surprises into town because every town has its predictable StoryProgression couples among the "normal" townies.

Also in the stages of possibly adding Monday updates as well. Watch this space though I'm not sure if it means a Monday surprise tomorrow.

[Trip]

🙠 0.2 🙢

“If we cannot find Vega, it will cause grave harm to you as it will to us, even if you did this for the love you have for me,” said Screwtape. He had not calmed down, and Vega wasn’t anywhere to be seen once he pushed me out of the house. She basically disappeared into a vortex of selfishness. If she was beamed back to her home planet, then I’d be the happiest undead woman in the delta. “We never harbored hatred for you, we simply were too incompatible for a relationship.”

“Sure, but you said you loved me and then knocked up my sister-in-law,” I said. “Anyways, I’ll be checking out the hotels around here.”

“Not during tourist season! It is impossible even for an Ironstar.”

Oh no, he was right about tourist season. The weather was mild by Twinbrook’s standards, much nicer towns nearby had cherry blossom blooms, and it was also spring break. I had never been homeless before. Even the cradle of death was a home, in a way, if I forgot about the sluggish ghosts I shared it with.

“Go see dad,” Marco said, taking a seat next to me. He was older than when I left him, with dyed hair and a face that told the real story. But he also had a new child with Alhena.

“He’s still alive? But how?”

“The seventeen year age gap?”

“And you took after me, didn’t you,” I said to him. Alhena, Screwtape’s granddaughter, would have needed a spouse eventually. Vega had to arrange all marriages in a dwindling pool of “descendants of my trusted friends.” I guess she was desperate enough to consider even my son.

“Alhena might not let you see our son, but I love her,” he said. “His name’s Heathcliff though, uh, you have more grandkids than that.” I loved how that rolled off the tongue...and honored Heath too. How did he feel about being a grandparent? What did I miss out on? Who was the mother of the rest of them anyways?

“Your dad still lives in the same house, right?”

“Just make sure he’s not at bingo instead.”

“Oh, god help me if he doesn’t want to date a zombie! I didn’t even think about him.”

“You’ll be fine, you know how chill dad is,” said Marco.

My son needed to be right. I dreaded running in those heels for a good reason, but I couldn’t get up the hill fast enough. His mother and the kids got a large inheritance from their fathers, from art or stolen goods or a little of both. It was the right amount to buy a creepy mansion with. It was creepy enough for kids to vandalize when I was in school. The paint peeled and half the yard had turned into a miniature swamp. I was afraid of it too until I learned what was inside: Heath, and a warm and loving family unlike my own. Even my sisters-in-law were kind.

But then again, even the old Racket mansion was a better place than my old home. And they had dead bodies in there! It was a shame I couldn’t just change my name and join anyone else. I wondered what was even stopping me.

Just a dash of Stockholm Syndrome, as usual.

I figured that most of Twinbrook was used to bizarre happenings. There were grey people, and red people, and also some of our water may have been radioactive. So I wasn’t even considering how to explain myself coming back to life. It was the next chapter in this town’s wacky tale.

But Heath didn’t get the memo.

He didn’t hurt himself by falling, but I worried that he did. He wasn’t that old at all when I passed away, but how much time had passed? I should have been suspicious when he didn’t join my spirit. I always pictured couples having an afterlife like that. It is how I liked to picture my parents.

I helped him up, and that was when reality dawned on him. Heath squeezed my hand and looked me in the eyes.

“It’s a long story, and it’d be easier for everyone to stay dead, but I couldn’t. And not everyone wanted me dead either,” I said. “Did you ever meet my friend Cara? This whole story starts with her.”

“Who?”

“Well, I’ll explain it one day.”

“I missed you a lot,” Heath said. “I realized there were a lot of things we never did together.”

“Like get married?” I asked him.

“I was thinking about retiring in Sunlit Tides with you!”

“I wish I could have done that instead. Maybe both, I...I let myself be influenced by the wrong people, and I should’ve questioned that. I don’t know how much time is left to make it right.”

Heath sighed. It was a good sigh, like dropping yourself onto your couch after work. “I’ve heard of couples with less time I guess. No one’s sick or anything, I’m just sad all my friends are dead and the grandkids don’t call.”

“Well...I’m probably not allowed to see Heathcliff either, I guess we can complain about it before bed every night.”

“I’d love to, but with Scrabble and TV too?”

I cried into the sleeve of his shirt. I hadn’t been hugged like that in decades, considering that Cara had a life beyond me. It was for the better if my fiance was still alive, though.

“We can get married as soon as City Hall says we can,” I said. “I promise this time.”

“Thanks, Sheila.”

I’d need a week to rent a dress and a tux and tailor both, but everything else was easier than I expected. Heath had kept all my old clothes and even some of my money. He felt so bad about getting rid of it and figured it would be handled after his death. And of course, I could move in. It was a big house, creepy or not.

And being married to Heath was about as beautiful as I imagined it. He fit into his suit like a glove and the years made him no less handsome. We wed under an overcast sky, in full view of the beautiful old City Hall building, and the spring carnival too. I missed the carnival too while I was dead.

But the best part was that Alhena didn’t block my invitation to Marco. And to Heathcliff too. The Ironstars coddled their babies and barely let them on the porch, let alone elsewhere in town. That mindset rubbed off on me when Marco was born too. He was very sheltered, though he ended up sheltering himself as he got older. I was glad to see him break the cycle with his son.

We told Marco that he and Heathcliff were welcome at any time. No call or warning needed, the crib upstairs was always going to be empty. Marco always enjoyed his father’s house. If I had to be honest, Vega was a horrible interior designer. I didn’t see so many open spaces even in her people’s void-like corners. Cara couldn’t boat me around without me bumping into cattails. But Heath’s mother and owners before her made the house cozy, if eccentric.

As in, I should have hated that wallpaper and all the pink everywhere, but I didn’t.

All Marco had to do was avoid us, watch TV, and care for his newborn. Over supper, he filled me in on the past twenty-plus years. His high school girlfriend, Amelia, was the mother of two of his children. Another was born to Cody Carlton. And I thought my son had good taste! But then again, no one was good enough for him. I think he agreed and would prefer to die alone, but he had time to figure it out.

Those were some fine tales, but I preferred the sole company of my new husband. I never had a wedding night. The two of us were a lot more scandalous with our son born out of wedlock. As it turned out, my secret dream was boring monogamy and Heath in a tux. We felt twenty again...or twenty and thirty-seven, as it actually was when we first met.

It was so easy to be alone in his house, even if someone else lived there, which I was sure no one did…

“Oh to hell with it, I thought you moved out or died!”

I never liked to think about Heath’s niece, Carisa. She glowed in daylight with her shiny grey skin and rocked the short-haired look she always had. His sister, the now-late Kate, was her mother. But it could have been anyone because Carisa was her father’s daughter right down to her daemonic bones.

Screwtape was friends with the Bull family too, which was fine with me. It helped me meet Heath after all. Their parents were not wary of Vega in the slightest, his dad even boarded with us for a time but I barely noticed. I never figured that he had feelings for either of Heath’s sisters, neither Kate nor Meghan.

So when his wife died, I had hope. Not only because the house became a lot more pleasant without Clarissa picking fights with everyone. When Screwtape said he loved me, I held it in my heart for decades. I held it even when Heath said the same thing and meant it. And I figured the best thing to do was wait.

The worst part was that Kate said that she wasn’t the one to come onto him. I’d forgive the both of them if it was her seduction alone, she was at least very pretty like her brother.

According to Heath, Carisa was in Lucky Palms for two weeks.

“Have all the desert sunburn and gamble away my husband’s money all you want, but you’re the reason Screwtape never loved me!”

“Please, that implies he loves me too,” said Carisa.

“Is this something I’m supposed to know about?” Heath asked.

It wasn’t like he could stop his sister...or Screwtape. Before I died, he swore that he didn’t know about any of it until it was too late and Carisa was about to be born.

“It...it doesn’t have to be. I’m sorry,” I said.

“Just get along with my niece, okay? She owns the house too.”

My promise to Heath must have stuck, because the rest of the night was a normal wedding night. I had to be careful with him like never before; I never imagined I’d know Heath as an old gentleman. Though his only complaint about aging was not being able to run after the grandchildren anymore. At least his love was still there, even though my heart was now rotten from the inside too.

And of course, Heathcliff wouldn’t be walking for another year.

We both fell asleep quickly, or I tried to. I felt younger than I did when I passed away, somehow. There was truth to the great chasm between being 70 and being 80, I had just forgotten about it. And those 8PM bedtimes disappeared so quickly...

Then again, I still would have stayed in bed if my grandson wasn’t in the next room. If Alhena was going to be stingy with visits, I needed to make all the memories I could!

Marco didn’t have the same feelings about his cousin that I did. They weren’t close in age, but he must have had to chaperone her sometimes, especially with Alhena. What a strange family dynamic.

“...so you see, I think children are the best way to test a relationship,” said Marco.

“And I’ll be single my whole life then, no worries.”

“Can I see my grandson?” I asked him. “Not every baby gets to meet almost all the grandparents.”

“As if anyone wanted to meet Beck?” Carisa asked, with a grin. I may actually warm up to her after all.

Heathcliff wasn’t asleep, but wasn’t crying either. He was still pink-tinted and awkward like his dad was as a newborn too, with puffy lips and huge dark eyes that ran on the other side of his family.

In fact, he looked identical to his mum as a baby, and that was my only complaint. It also made him too beautiful to stare at directly as well. It was a weird bloodline.

“Oh, I’m so proud of all you guys,” I said, gently picking Heathcliff up from the pink cot. “Now you have to stop hiding the rest from me.”

“In due time,” Marco said. “After we settle everything in court.”

“And Carisa? I’m sorry about what I said.”

“Whatever man, we’ll talk about it over breakfast. I’m gonna die one day anyways.”

I had the chance to rock with Heathcliff until he cried again. At least he wasn’t asking any questions about my life, but I’d be happy to tell him everything when he got older. For once, I had a little bit of trust in the Ironstar line. Not because of me though, I trusted Heath a lot more as a grandfather.

But it was nice to see it for myself.

[officialghosts]

So much action happening, and it's so interesting to see how the Twinbrook genes have played out over the generations. Right now I admit I'm rooting for Sheila, it's pretty fun to see an underappreciated dynasty helper get their revenge

[Trip]

@officialghosts: thanks! Unfortunately or fortunately, Sheila and Heathcliff got the least egregious Twinbrook genes on their side so they're just normal sims. (obviously I've been handling adult Heathcliff for a while)

[Chubling]

Yeeeees Sheila! Get some gentle happiness! You deserve! I love the.Itinerary Ironstars, but I'm 100% team Sheila, though I do look forward to Heathcliff being a nightmare in the big city.

I really hope Sheila gets to set Screwtape on fire at some point. Dude deserves it (still love him though)

[officialghosts]

Yeah, Sheila's descended from the Drudges, right? They're certainly on the more conventional side as far as Twinbrook sims go.

[Trip]

Yeeeees Sheila! Get some gentle happiness! You deserve! I love the.Itinerary Ironstars, but I'm 100% team Sheila, though I do look forward to Heathcliff being a nightmare in the big city.

I really hope Sheila gets to set Screwtape on fire at some point. Dude deserves it (still love him though)

@Chubling: Oh yeah the big city stuff has been a blast. Though Moonlight Falls has so many cool, quiet spots. Most of the cooler details in Bridgeport are crammed into private homes (my favorite one is the makeshift photography darkroom in one of them) I'm sure Sheila wants to do that to Screwtape but her first mode of action is not violence but moping around or bottling it up so she can have fun with her grandson.

Yeah, Sheila's descended from the Drudges, right? They're certainly on the more conventional side as far as Twinbrook sims go.

@officialghosts: yep, direct child of Shamus and Eva. The Ironstars mostly stuck with the "better" families which was definitely a coward's move on my part.

[Chubling]

Bridgeport has such a vibe though. It's not my favorite, genetically (though I don't think any town I've played in had ever been void of at least a few neat looking sims), but it does have some cool locations. And it just feels so different from the other towns. I look forward to watching Heathcliff tear through it. And the rest of the descendants.

I would make a comment about things I want Sheila to tear through, but this is s family forum and I will refrain. I do have such a soft spot for characters who don't handle things well and shove it all down and then it just explodes out in a dramatic mess everywhere. I do generally want good things for her though, as opposed to the Ironstars who I love to watch make terrible choices that will definitely come back to bite them (pun intended *rimshot*)

[CeresIn]

Ahh Sheila... so good to see her alive. She deserves a lot of happiness (very far away from Screwtape).  The two parts of the story are interesting, I still don't know who will be my favorite, we would have to see how Heathcliff's personality develops.

[Trip]

Bridgeport has such a vibe though. It's not my favorite, genetically (though I don't think any town I've played in had ever been void of at least a few neat looking sims), but it does have some cool locations. And it just feels so different from the other towns. I look forward to watching Heathcliff tear through it. And the rest of the descendants.

I would make a comment about things I want Sheila to tear through, but this is s family forum and I will refrain. I do have such a soft spot for characters who don't handle things well and shove it all down and then it just explodes out in a dramatic mess everywhere. I do generally want good things for her though, as opposed to the Ironstars who I love to watch make terrible choices that will definitely come back to bite them (pun intended *rimshot*)

@Chubling: I'm liking some of the Bridgeport kids I have so far but I do think things will be better a few generations in. Town performance may be another issue entirely but I've avoided any special lag so far (Heathcliff has quite a few EPs turned off but that's a post for another day...)

We'll see which Ironstar has the most potential for failure. I can say for sure that Samhain lives up to being good and boring for whenever we check in on him. As a side note he was the only one who didn't date another person ever. He really couldn't upgrade from Beck's big luscious lips.

Ahh Sheila... so good to see her alive. She deserves a lot of happiness (very far away from Screwtape).  The two parts of the story are interesting, I still don't know who will be my favorite, we would have to see how Heathcliff's personality develops.

@CeresIn: Heathcliff is a fun sim to play and a fun sim to pose and imagine situations for, but a hard one to write. Maybe it's really apparent in the chapter below this post and I'm just warning you. Sheila trades off easier writing for more mellow gameplay though is that even a bad thing?

[Trip]

🙠 0.3 🙢

Getting into ballet was the best mistake I ever made, or so my family thought. When I was a kid, I lied to my parents about boy scouts being full-up so I could get into ballet. Sometimes I’d catch a dance taped for public television and it was a majestic sight, and I didn’t even know why. It predated all the “Heathcliff is a sissy boy!” taunts after all.

Ballet was going to make me the best sissy boy that Twinbrook had ever seen. And it took strength; ballet is an artform for the eyes and a workout for the legs and core.

"Toes out, Heathcliff!"

Society said what it wanted to, but it was nice to make progress on a stupid hobby. It could get me on a big stage in Empire City one day. I started out as a clumsy and shy little boy…

...showing promise at age eight…

...and a shoe-in for the Bridgeport Ballet as soon as puberty hit! That one was even better. Ms. Whelohff, my stern-eyed teacher, sighed and told us to practice more. I guess I had to leave a spot for my classmates too, they were great dancers too. They were a family of mine who waited for me at the Twinbrook Rec Center four times a week. So I forgot for a few hours that the rest of my life was going to be strange. And I feared it intensely.

As if I was the first child raised by separated parents, though?

Mum and her family were amused by it. I’d dance for them and get golf claps from Grandpa Samhain and Great-Grandpa Screwtape. The two of them blended into polite society somehow, but of course I asked about their grey skin and got a shrug. “We’re daemons,” said Samhain. “But we’re supposed to be kind.”

That didn’t extend to ballet, because they asked me about doing anything else. They didn’t want me to be manly, because they suggested art and music and riding horses too. But I think dance bothered them like it bothered a lot of boys in school. Samhain was a martial artist and a stage magician, and ballet is both of those but with less lying.

At least they told cool stories about traveling and my great-great-grandmother. She was a scholar and witch birthed from a supernova, and that’s why my last name was Ironstar. Where she was now, no one knew! I thought she was hiding in the basement, since no one went down there.

I said I was gonna change my last name when I got married and they laughed. Then I wondered who I wanted to marry at all. Then both grandpas had to admit to being in an arranged marriage and made it awkward. They both said they’d never been happier than they were with their wives, but I don’t think that Vega’s magic would have worked on me. Screwtape and Samhain were too normal.

And she would have done something weird like pairing me with Ms. Whelohff too.

For a while I lived in fear of it. I wasn’t convinced that the grandpas would be any better than her. I didn’t think they were evil, but if I didn’t have the words to say what I am and what I wanted, they didn’t either.

So escaping to grandma’s house it was! My dad lived there too. I used to ask Grandma Sheila if she was married to Screwtape and she pinched my lips shut. In my defense, Grandpa Heath died when I was little. Otherwise, she loved to paint and hear about ballet class. She said she was too old to learn how to dance or play an instrument, but I said that Ms. Whelohff taught old people too.

She bought a guitar after that.

Grandma was honest and would die one day. She was really tired of me asking if she was immortal too. She said some strange things happened to her. Then said that she was resurrected after her normal death and cherished all the time she had left. That meant spending it with dad and I.

I didn’t want to die, but I liked that house more anyways. I could be at either of them any time I wanted to because of what mum and dad told the court. And I’m still unsure how I ended up with the daemons one afternoon.

“Puh-lease, I’d rather not drag you two into my kid’s personal life. Letting you into mine’s bad enough.”

“But we've never had a kid like him," said Screwtape.

“And I’d never forgive myself if we messed this up,” Samhain said.

“Guys, you didn’t hear about the party, did you?”

I got invited to it by two of my fellow dancers, the Baker twins. They were linked at the hip and Sherrie was always chosen as my dance partner for recitals. But I still wondered if they liked me at all. They used to whisper about me all the time like the other kids. Imagine the endless cycle of “Heathcliff is a silly gay boy taking ballet” and “Heathcliff is only in ballet to get girls.” Like that’s supposed to make any sense put together. The same people thought the same two things.

The latter was supposed to be unusual to assume about any guy in ballet, but I actually understood it the most. Dance was intimate by design. I know I connected with my classmates on some level. There are more paths to them than through the heart. It was our shared understanding of movement and music. We had a middleman!

But was I attracted to them? Hell no, I figured out I was gay when Ms. Whelohff took us on a field trip to see Coppelia. I had the biggest crush on the dancer who played Franz.

I was the gay ballet classmate, and I was going to steal someone’s boyfriend.

And I really thought it could work!

If Sherrie was the beautiful fairy who would take my spot at the Bridgeport Ballet Company one day, then Kyla was her understudy. Actually, she was lovely and a great dancer too. I know regular boys liked her. But she was a werewolf who would end her career the moment a show lined up with the full moon. Her boyfriend didn’t seem to mind that, and he was the most beautiful of them all.

Tarik Byrd played football. We may as well have been from different planets, which was also technically true. I’d spare him that detail. I went to a game just to see him tackle other boys and wished he would do the same to me. Sometimes I’d see him in the gym, lifting in short-shorts. I’d pretend to look at myself instead, but I wasn’t as impressive.

Somehow, we got invited to the same party. I had more cousins than I thought, which I guess is what the Prudence boys, Tad and Hassan the Second, thought as well. They were the kids of my undying werewolf great-aunt, Valencia Knack. We kind of had the same jawline. And their other cousins were my dad’s other kids with another Prudence. It was bizarre. I guess one of them played football or was a male cheerleader and invited Tarik.

“You know, you should go easy on that stuff, I don’t know where Hassan got it from,” said Tarik.

Ballet made me boring. My diet was controlled, my days were scheduled out weeks in advance, and I may never get the chance to drink unknown stuff again. It tasted nice, if kinda bitter.

“You ever listen to Strapping Young Lad?” I asked him. He shook his head no. It was industrial metal from a dystopian future and Ms. Whelohff would not let me choreograph a dance to it.

And then Kyla put on a different CD instead.

It was so weird to get flustered over being near Tarik while effortlessly dancing in front of others while wearing tights. But then, I felt so loose. I’d fall if I tried to do an arabesque that night. Maybe that was what being Kyla felt like. She wasn’t always clumsy but brushed off her mistakes and falls like I never could.

I wanted to make a bold move more than ever. Being subtle got me nowhere. I never had a date after all while everyone else was on their second or third boyfriend.

“Aww snap Tad, I could never dip someone like that!”

I didn’t know what Kyla was talking about, she was a great pas a deux partner even if she wasn’t her twin. Usually the men did the dips, but as an unbalanced class it got reversed a lot. Modern ballet companies wanted those skills anyways. They wanted me to dance en pointe even though I was a tall and bulky man.

That wasn’t the kind of brag that would steal me someone’s boyfriend though.

Then someone said ping-pong, and I was either going to be fooled into drinking more stuff or revealing that I was a great paddle handler. I mean, I was an athlete in my own right.

But as it turns out, my arms were the least athletic part about me. I forgot Tarik’s sport was literally throwing hand-eggs to other guys. What hurt would another drink be anyways?

After more than I could count, I clung to his jacket and threatened to tear it off. And I cried and smelled kinda funny.

“You’re so cute!” I cried out. “And you gotta be bicurious at least.”

“What? No, you gotta go home instead,” he said. “Or it’s just gonna get worse…”

And that was the last I remembered. I lived, but now I was in front of the elder Ironstars to be grilled about my sexuality. Every teenager did dumb stuff at a party, but I was the only gay boy there. It wasn’t supposed to be news, but if the gossip circled around school before first period was over, then it had to hit the family too.

Some people were mean, but I feared them less than a trio of daemons, even if I was one of them.

“Look kid, we’ve been 95% sure you were gay since you were five,” said mum. “And we love you very much for it, or we did until these two knuckleheads started getting anxious about it."

"I worry if my mother comes back and wants you to continue her quest to help humans and live forever," said Screwtape. "There was never a need for this conversation about your sexual orientation before this."

“Man, you really know how to make coming out awkward.” I thought them living forever was a quirk of biology. Now they wanted to tell me there was a deep meaning to everything and I was a key player. Would I even be able to dance then? I guess it explained the arranged marriages though, like we were royalty. “Is this what grandma says ruined her life?”

“I will not take any blame for her suffering!” said Screwtape. “Not as if you said that, sweetest great-grandson. My mother was a woman who followed order and strictness, even if we did not understand why.”

“We found some of her writings downstairs, and it may be for nothing, but I think my dad's on to something.” said Samhain. “There’s nothing in the old book that says you can’t be who you are. But it never talks about romance and only talks about natural offspring, and we're not ready to face her wrath again.” At least he seemed as disgusted as I was with that. Grandpa was a true ally after all.

“Gimme the book then.”

I never thought of Samhain as much of a reader, but he had everything bookmarked with photos of my grandma. He always said I looked just like her before I dyed my hair for the first time. It was an odd book, half in English and half in an alphabet I was not going to learn.

“It’s daemonic, none of us know it either,” said Samhain. “And your great-great-grandma was as good of a translator as she was a tyrant.”

“Yeah, reads like it,” I said. It explained everything about Grandpa Screwtape, because this author was the same pretentious nutcase that he was.

You will forge the bond between Life and Death, living between their margins forever. But for a generation or eight of humans, your help will be most clever. Your talent and careers and parenting too...

But do remember: all the life you live will not be for you.

“It isn’t perfect poetry in English, I will admit,” said Samhain. “And the rules are a lot more extensive.”

“Doesn’t sound like they remembered gay people exist.”

“There’s just no hints about it, we’re confused until it happens.”

“No husband, no dynasty. I have to stick up for my kind somehow,” I said to all of them. They were swarming around me like fruit flies. “And I don’t think Tarik would agree--”

“You looked like a moron in front of him, it’s not gonna happen,” mum said. “It’s fine, we don’t have anyone to play matchmaker with anyways. You’ll figure it out on your own like a normal kid...and that’s all we want from you?”

“Uh...I think you all tried your best. No more awkward dinners now?” I asked. I was still going to grandma’s for dinner instead. She would take the news a lot better, besides the dynasty part. At least no one had actual plans.

Grandma had taken up guitar after all. She wasn’t good at it but she could play the main riff to “Planet Caravan” I guess. It was cool to hear her chords echoing off the walls of that creepy old place, especially in the “bird tower” as we called gazebo there. It became a parlor and foosball room.

“Hey grandma, I’m gay and the Ironstars were being weird about it!”

“Oh...it figures.”

She wrapped me in a bear hug, which was typical but this was tighter than ever before and it lifted me off the ground. And to think that was my job!

“I’m so proud of you...and always disappointed in them,” she said. “Don’t tell me that they tried to make you revive their dynasty.”

I rolled my eyes. “They think I was a moron for chasing Tarik.”

“You should probably clear the air with him, and I’m sure there are cuter guys at the Bridgeport Ballet anyways. At least call me to judge them if I’m still here.”

“But that’ll take forever.”

“Imagine how long living forever would be, though...anyways, Marco baked more than enough trout for the four of us,” said Sheila. I guess I had to talk to Aunt Carisa after all. At least she complained about her dad a lot and rode a motorcycle. And I think she might have been gay too, but the other kind and she never talked about it.

“Yeah, I’m not surprised by it either,” said my dad, after he got the news. “You’re not gonna have luck dating here anyways. Tell Ms. Whelohff how much you need to go to Bridgeport.”

“We haven’t inbred that place to oblivion yet,” Carisa muttered.

The recital was upon us and I tried to forget about Tarik instead of seeking forgiveness. It meant dancing with Sherrie a lot and avoiding the questions I feared the most from her. We were supposed to stay silent during a dance, but she broke it constantly. It was mostly gossip I didn’t know about or ask for.

“Oh, you see Tarik out there?” she whispered to me.

“More than ever before.”

“Not to scare you, but if you even think about hurting my sister or touching my wings, then I assure you that both will sear you with the pain of ten-thousand suns.”

“Sherrie! Mouth shut, toes pointed,” said Ms. Whelohff. “Or the whole audience will hear your petty squabbles next week.”

After practice, it was time to sit on the trampoline outside and wait. Or hope that a fall from the trampoline would kill me before embarrassment would.

“Hey, you doin’ alight?” Tarik asked me. “Remember when I drove you home?”

“No, and...and I know a date isn’t gonna happen. My mum called me a moron and she was right,” I said.

“You’re not a moron, you drank too much from the keg...I would’ve done it too.”

“And I tried to take your shirt off.”

“There’s a gay bar in the capital,” he said, as the sun started to set. He sat down beside me and I swore that our hands almost touched. I still had too much hope, didn’t I? “Heard so from a cousin. He’s way too old for you, but that doesn’t mean he can’t get you in.”

“So you don’t think I’m hopeless.”

“No, but maybe you have to hide that you live with grey people. I almost fainted on the porch when your grandpa answered the door.”

I laughed. I didn’t even want to laugh, and I was afraid to laugh in front of him if my stupid head didn’t have other plans.

“Yeah, they’re not gonna be the death of me, but I wish they were. Beats the alternative.”

And somehow, that wasn’t the last time I saw Tarik. There was still school, and he let me go to football games if I didn’t make things weird. And between everything, I wondered why he still expected that. Or why I delivered it.

But one thing was for sure: I needed to get out of Twinbrook. I wasn't sure how or if Vega was going to be a part of it, but I kind of hoped to never meet her again. No matter what, it was a long swim out of that swamp.

[Trip]

Oh there is a whole essay to be written about the original townie families that still existed at Week 21, Day 4 in the Ironstars' Twinbrook. Besides Tarik (just one of my CAS sims don't overthink it), I got most of the extras from taking who was left and using some MasterController Instant Baby magic.

1. The Baker girls came from the original townie time left behind, Newton Baker (pickled in time as a werewolf and wholly ignored by the Ironstars and why exactly?) and Yusun Carlton, one of Sinbad Rotter's fairy kids with Sofia Carlton.

2. Ms. Whelohff is actually the cousin to Sherrie and Kyla. She was one of the children of Sheena Whelohff (Sinbad and Zo's kid) and university townie Harold Assange. We did meet them in The Ironstar Immortals but not the kids. She was indeed slated as Heathcliff's potential wife. He couldn't really tell me about his preferences as a baby.

3. The party kids were a mixture of the children of Notzo Curious and homeless townie Cho Sonwhun, and the children of Valencia Knack (Harwood and Julienne's 4th child and eternal werewolf) and Hassan Prudence (Pansy Prudence and Justin Kayes' son). Valencia and Cho were living together but didn't give me any hints as to why. But I can pretend.

[Chubling]

Oooof. I would have way more opinions on the kids, but I'm too busy being caught up in lonely teenage gay feelings. You captured those beautifully. I'm really looking forward to Heathcliff running wild in Bridgeport.

[CeresIn]

I don't know what I liked the most. Heathcliff himself, his relationship with Sheila, Tarik... and I particularly liked the last scene.

[officialghosts]

Dynastys are always so heteronormative by necessity, it's always nice to see stories taking the time for gay sims. Hopefully Heathcliff finds Bridgeport more to his speed!