(Excerpt from Quantum Entity
Trilogy—Book 2, American Spring)
(In a Back
to the Future event, Ottawa Food Bank, Christie
Lake Kids, Make A Wish Foundation and
Exploriem.org will stage SKIP-AID in Ottawa,
Canada in
August 2013)
(PLEASE NOTE: Mature content)
“OK
guys, you are voluntolds on this.” Naya is talking to her brothers about her
latest project. “You need 80 volunteer hours to graduate.” She hears them
groan. “So look at it this way, I’m helping you.”
Naya
has been intricating the twins in her schemes since she is five and they are
two so this is nothing new to either Finn or Magellan. What’s new is that her
14 year old brothers (now in High School) actually need to do the hours so
they’re more than voluntolds, willing participants even. Plus they have some
plans of their own.
Although
the boys would never say it, they’re glad their older sister is back. She’s not
exactly all the way back but Magellan can see she’s getting there. On her sweet
16 birthday, they’re the only guests along with Dad, Mom and Zora. Magellan
asks José-Luis to come but his team is involved in a friendly at Luna Colony so
he begs off.
Soccer
on the Moon is really cool. Nets are much bigger because goalies can leap so
far and the entire field is enclosed in a clear pen so that the ball is always
in play. You can bounce the ball off the end or side walls, even the invisible
ceiling set at a standard 30 meters.
José-Luis is polite but distant. Magellan can’t figure out what
gives. He knows that Naya would like to see him.
“We
are going to stage SKIP-AID here. It’ll be a benefit for St Jo’s, the Salvos,
San Francisco Food Bank and Make A Wish Foundation Greater Bay Area. Also,
we’re going to raise money for Da’s not-for-profit Belizean Leadership
Institute but don’t tell him that, OK? Let’s surprise him.”
Damien
has turned Nell’s ridiculously huge home, Maya Fair, into BLI, Belizean
Leadership Institute. It’s a place where post grads and some promising
undergrads can go to do research and take a few courses, all expenses paid.
“How
much we aiming to raise?” Finn asks.
“$600,000 in net proceeds.”
Both
boys whistle. This isn’t your average neighborhood lemonade stand.
“Do
we get to, like, keep any of it?” Finn asks her.
Naya
just stands there disapprovingly with her hands on her hips. They’re reversed
just like her Mom. Magellan thinks about telling her that she looks like Ellen
at the moment but stops himself just in time.
…
SKIP-AID
is not a new concept. It’s new to the Valley but not North
America. In fact, it’s an event Naya is borrowing from the
Northern Ontario Muskoka town of Huntsville
where they’ve been doing it for nearly 50 years. It’s the one thing she did
with Ray Michaud and his wife while staying at Pops’ place that she remembers
clearly because it’s the one day she wasn’t completely blotto.
They
invite senior executives from the area (mainly Toronto)
to come to Fairy Lake and skip stones. But there’s a
catch—they pair them with kids from families that use local food banks and with
other kids who are in trouble. Everyone, anyone can skip a stone. They bring special
skipping stones in from a local quarry, every hand size is accommodated.
So
if a CEO, COO, CTO or VP can skip a stone say 11 times and their kid just 3,
their combined score is 14. Execs can buy a mulligan for more dough. If they
flub it or their kid does, no problemo, buy another rock.
It
costs $350 QED for an executive to enter and $50 QED for each stone they buy
extra. But the big money is from pledges. Naya hopes to get 1,000 bigwigs
entering and that each of them can get pledges of $10 per skip so if they throw
14 times (combined score) that’s $140 per donor. She tells her brothers she
wants to raise $600k but privately she thinks they’ll raise over a million.
Her
Dad’s friend, Dr. Durai, is letting her use his quantum bubble generator. Hers
will be the first event to use it. She knows he thinks it’s frivolous but
SKIP-AID sponsors are gonna love it. SKIP-AID is being held at Spreckels Lake
in Golden Gate Park. The entire Park will be enclosed
in a quantum bubble which is invisible but can be tuned to anything they want.
Wanna reduce solar irradiation to zero? No problem. Which means they can turn
day into night, show Mtv on the bubble’s surface or run slow motion relays of
stone skipping (if, say, someone wants to challenge a referee’s call that it
skipped 15 times not 16.)
Jagad
Durai is working with General of the Army (Retired) and CEO of DARCH Farrar
Staubach on wrapping Mars in a quantum bubble which will eclipse the technology
Imperial China used to wrap Luna by a factor of, well, infinity. So working on
Naya’s little project is pretty pedestrian but Jag is powerless to resist
anything that she wants him to do.
Mixed
Media Collective run by Darryl Hnatyshyn is one of the prime beneficiaries of
this new technology. Darryl is a pal of Naya’s, a recovering alcoholic like her
and an event producer who at 37 has found a soulmate in Naya. She meets him in Vancouver while she is
living on the streets there. One of the first things she does when she comes
back to San Francisco
is go looking for him.
He’s
been living with her at St Jo’s, in one of their sheds out back like the one
that Dekka used long ago, for the last year. He is in awe of her and would do
anything for Naya. He loves her for saving him from the scrapheap.
Their
main setup area is gonna be at Golden
Gate Equestrian Center. Naya has to argue with their
admin people to get their permission but when she tells them she’ll be bringing
Make A Wish kids and women from the shelter she is staying at plus most of San
Fran’s liberal media to protest the fact that their Center is good enough for
horses but not for kids, they crater.
What
they can’t figure out is how a 16 year old girl gets so politically savvy.
First of all, they don’t know that her Mom is the person who disposed of the
old Republic, her Dad’s a Nobel winner and she’s been to Hell. Naya hasn’t had
a drink in almost a year and every day is a battle so going to war with patsies
like Golden Gate Equestrian Center’s
admin people is a lay up for her.
She’s
added music (by Nell Enterprises of course) and crafts to her event. Her Da is
bringing his crazy medallions and Worry People to the fair and her bros are
gonna teach people how to play Street Paddle Tennis.
It’s
a game that her grandfather, Pops, invented. In Naya’s family nothing stays secret
for long so she knows that Damien’s grandfather is actually his Dad which means
he’s really her grandfather. Da doesn’t talk about him much but she’s pretty
sure she woulda liked him—he was fucked up just like Naya.
Anywho,
Street Paddle Tennis is probably the cheapest sport you can do other than
Ultimate. You got sneakers, some street chalk, a couple of wooden rackets and
some tennis balls or whiffle balls, you in business!
The
court is laid out by pacing it—its 54 feet long and 24 feet wide. You put a
chalk line down the middle and a service line 8 feet either side of the center
line. Any asphalt surface will do.
The
court looks like this—
The
boys will show people how to play and explain its rules which are:
Rules
for a Serve—
1.
Serve must be underhand.
2. Serve can be out of hand or bounced once.
3. Serve must go over the serve lines (it may land anywhere in the court past the
serve line).
4. Person who is serving must stand on back lines.
5. Receiving person must also be standing on their back line.
6. Both people must be standing within two feet of the back centerlines.
7. Whoever has a ball, serves.
8. Once the person who is serving hits the ball both players can move.
Rules
for rallying—
1.
Players must hit ball on first bounce (or you may volley it out of the air
except on a serve).
2. Ball must pass the center of the court (except on the serve, when the ball
must go past the serve line).
3. Ball must land inside the court or on back lines or sidelines.
4. No overhand smashing (you may hit the ball overhand, except on a serve, as
long as you stop at the vertical; i.e., no follow through on overhand hits—the
idea is to promote longer rallies.)
5. Paddle or player cannot cross centerline.
Points—
1.
If serve does not go over (or touch) serve lines, it is a point for the other
player.
2. If ball lands out of bounds (before a bounce), a point is awarded to other
player.
3. If ball dose not make it over the centerline then point is awarded to other
player.
4. If ball bounces twice on a side then point is awarded to other player.
5. First player to seven points wins. (You do not have to win by two points.)
6. Point is awarded on every play except a let (the players play the point
over).
Refereeing—
1.
Players who are playing referee themselves.
2. If both players are not sure about a point then it is a let.
Spirit
of the Game—
1.
In a Street Paddle Tennis competition or tournament, scores are recorded after
each match.
2. Each player also reports a ‘Spirit of the Game’ score for the other
player(s)—this is a score that measures sportspersonship.
3. A score of 10 indicates a very high standard of fair play. A score of 5 or
less indicates very poor sportspersonship. Individuals with consistent scores
of 5 or less may not be asked to return for tournament play. Fair play is
always encouraged.
Doubles—
1.
Doubles are played like singles.
2. Both players have to start at their back line on the serve.
Safety
+ Suggestions—
1.
Never play in traffic.
2. Any asphalt surface will do—such as a parking lot at work or school.
3. Chalk as many courts as you have room for and have a tournament amongst all
your friends.
4. If sun or wind or other factors make a difference in the game, switch sides
from time to time.
5. Each set is best of five games—first to three games, wins the set.
6. Each match is best of three sets—first to two sets wins.
7. Always play fair and, if in doubt, call a let.
8. You may use spray-on chalk to lay out a court on grass—street paddle tennis
on a grass court is a different game but just as much fun; you can pretend you
are playing at Wimbledon. You will have to
make sure that the grass is fairly short.
Keys
to Competitive Street Paddle Tennis/Handicapping the Game—
1.
Rush the Centerline—it is a good strategy if your opponent does not have a good
passing shot.
2. Move Your Opponent Back and Forth, Up and Down the Court.
3. Spin the Ball.
4. Get lots of competition with players better than you.
5. Organize Tournaments and Clinics.
6. Make holes in your racket for a faster racket. Before drilling the holes,
take duct tape and place it around where you want to drill. Be sure not to make
the holes too big so they won’t affect your shot. After drilling the holes
remove the tape, you should be left with a smooth hole. (Adam, age 13
discovered this).
7. Handicap the games so that everyone can play with everyone.
8. That means that better players can play with others who aren’t as good and
it can still be competitive.
9. The maximum handicap allowed under Street Paddle Tennis rules is 5. That
means that a better player starts the game with a ‘0’ while his or her opponent
starts with 5 points. So the weaker player has to win just two points to win
the game while the stronger player has to get seven!
10. Create your own ladder of competition with a handicap like golf only the
inverse of it. For example, on our block we have the following rankings:
a.
Finn Handicap 5
b. Adam Handicap 5
c. Magellan Handicap 4
d. Damien Handicap 3
e. Dekka Handicap 2
f. Naya Handicap 1
g. Ellen Handicap 0
11.
Obviously, Street Paddle Tennis handicaps are the opposite of golf—the higher
the handicap, the better the player!
12. In the above ladder, if, for example, Finn plays Naya, the score starts off
Naya 4, Finn 0.
Naya’s
business model (she did learn something from her mother after all) calls for
celebrity endorsement. This is what her model looks like so far—
She
can’t ask JEL to endorse her event since he seems to be not talking to her for
some reason. So she goes after someone closer to home—Tor Haden, star QB for
the San Francisco
49ers. His nickname is (rather unimaginatively) ‘Thor’ because he can throw
like anything; even better, he’s a local boy from San Mateo County.
She
could call Jamal and ask him for an intro to Thor but she doesn’t need
to—she’ll just go over to their practice facility and ask him.
She’s
done 12 covers for IMG since coming back to San Fran, one of which her Dad does
not approve of. It’s her latest one where she is butt naked with only
strategically placed quarry stones covering her most private parts with a
headline, WOULD YOU SKIP A DATE WITH THIS GIRL?
Naya
has to be completely shaved for this shot to work which is OK because she’s
been doing that since before her days bodysurfing with José-Luis. Calatrava
bikinis just fit better and perform better when there’s no pubic hair to get in
the way. For her Vanity World shot, they attach really thin quarry stones with
nanosite connectors that release when ordered to so no messy glue needed and
therefore there is no pain when removing them either. The two stones they use
on her breasts barely cover her areola; in fact, they purposely fall just
short. Her breasts are now Nell-sized (although on her much taller frame they
are not quite so dominant as Nell’s are).
Like
most dancers (retired), she doesn’t care a hoot about naked bodies least of all
her own. If it’ll help SKIP-AID (and it sure does), Naya’d pose completely
naked upside down on a trapeze.
She’s
the ‘It’ girl of the moment after release of Vanity World’s updated app with
Naya in it. She knows her Mom doesn’t approve either but it’s kind of hard for
Ellen to be critical of her since the sex tape she made with Da is still the
single most viewed video on the Internet.
Jamal
keeps sending her scripts—several Directors want her to do a film but Naya is
resisting. She has to be careful not to work too much and she needs to nap for
an hour every day. She gets tired and she knows that’s when she’s most in
danger from two things—another seizure or falling down a rabbit hole paved with
alcohol. She can’t even let herself smell the stuff—the craving becomes so
intense it’s scary. So no parties, no dinner dates, no sitting around campfires
drinking wine, no weeks on a film set with enablers all round her plying her
with drugs (which Naya couldn’t be less interested in) and drinks (which she
certainly is damnably interested in).
She
has no friends her own age but is really close with Zora and Daniella both in
their 30s now. Daniella has four kids; the youngest is a red-haired, blue-eyed,
vanilla colored girl of six who Naya adores. Her older brother, Danny, about
Naya’s age, is still the biggest, most juvenile pain-in-the-arse you can
imagine. Finn loves hanging out with him. Magellan, not so much.
She
has also rediscovered Third Mesa, camel riding, swimming (in the stream that
runs along the gorge) and visiting Nell’s grave. She feels safe there for a
bunch of reasons not least of which Chief Nahuel, like Chief Dan before him,
does not permit any alcohol in the place. She’s not sure what her Uncle would
do if anyone brought it into Third Mesa but she thinks the reaction would be
swift and merciless. Nahuel has a great sense of humor but Naya can tell
there’s a toughness there too—much tougher than his grandfather she’s been
told.
The
magazine calls itself a fashion, music, film, business and entertainment social
catalyst which Naya thinks is just political cover for running titillating
photos of nearly naked girls. But her story does pretty much cover the
waterfront for them—she talks fashion and social enterprise with them. They
also really like her backstory. Naya doesn’t try to hide anything—her illness,
addiction, recovery or even where she is living (in a women’s shelter.) Their
reporter can’t understand why a girl who is the President’s daughter who has
the resources to send Naya to a much more upscale retreat to get help, doesn’t
do that. It’s the one question she doesn’t ask Naya—she pulls her punches,
once. The other question she should have asked but didn’t was what caused
Naya’s illness.
This
is the one subject Naya does not want to discuss because she knows it will hurt
José-Luis’ image and possibly his career if he gets blamed for what happened to
her in Stockholm.
He’s already got a bad image as Germania’s
Playboy Princeling (they actually call him that.)
But
Erik Renke doesn’t miss either element. His story leads with NEGLECTED
PRESIDENT’S DAUGHTER LEFT TO FEND FOR HERSELF over a picture of a destitute
woman living in a cardboard box (not in San Fran but on a Toronto street) who is obviously not Naya.
Inside there is an interview with a kid (still fat) who gives him the scoop on
what really happened on Monumental Tower—how José-Luis forces five year old
Naya into the abandoned stairwell, tears her dress (the kid actually has a
photo of little Naya like that on one of his fake social media profiles—he
sells it to Toronto Chronicle Tab along with his version of the story), rapes
her, then tries to cover it up, nearly killing her when he ‘accidentally’
pushes her off the Mansard roof of the place where Swedes have been coming for
decades to commit suicide. Her head bounces off the roof which is what sends
Naya crazy. It’s the fat kid who finally pulls her back over the railing and
delivers her to an uninterested mother (the President) who is too busy partying
with Swedish Royals (here they publish an unflattering photo of the Queen with
her mouth open and full of hors d’oeuvres) to even watch out for her only
daughter. The photo also shows the Queen with a wine glass in her hand. If
anyone actually takes the time to look closely at it, they would notice her
glass has sparkling water in it. These days apps and Materiality TV (Mtv) are
so good you can see if a guy missed anything while shaving this morning and the
lines between television, film, journalism, magazines, documentaries, books,
music, newspapers are meaningless.
When
Farrar sees/reads/watches/hears this story (the background music they add is so
moving that when he gets to the rape part and he sees Ellen’s beautiful
daughter with her tiny full length ripped dress, Farrar is stirred even though
he knows the whole story is crap), it’s a reminder that he still has some
unfinished business on Earth, not that he needs to be reminded.
José-Luis
loses four of his main sponsors when the story breaks. None of the tabloids
bother to report that José-Luis was nine when all this went down preferring to
run images of a fully grown, fiercely competitive, bullet-headed man next to
the picture of little Naya with her torn dress, fainting into the arms of her
Dad. It’s a killer set of images. Raping five year old girls looks believable
given his Germania’s Playboy Princeling
backstory.
Only
a shoe company and an alcohol one stand by him. The latter is exceptionally
pleased with the story. Hey, life’s a party and what’s a party without booze
and pretty girls? This story has everything they’re looking for. Bonanza time!
José-Luis
cannot believe how Naya has sold him out. He’s been hurting for years and now
this? The story is everywhere. She must have done it to get even with him or
for money, probably both. Fans whistle now when his name is announced even when
they play at home. Every time he touches the ball, the whistling starts and
doesn’t stop until he lays if off or shoots on goal. As a result, José-Luis who
has always wanted the ball on his foot when the game is on the line, starts to
shy away. His game is changing. Not for the better.
…
Selected Characters from Quantum Entity
Trilogy/Music by SONSOFDAY/Music and image used for non-commercial purposes in
this unlisted video
@ProfBruce
@Quantum_Entity
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