She spares some time to help her son with his homework. He was jumping around to avoid aliens only he could see, again, so she just had to physically grab the boy, sit him down, and force him to focus.
Though Zephram's continued trembling is a sure indicator he still feels his life is in danger... and Paprika wonders if suppressing his defensive behavior is more torture than helpful.
Back to the ghosts. When Cody dies, Paprika places him with the other Archers.
The passage of time has dulled Fiona's features. She's a blurry memory of what she once was.
Paprika isn't feeling like doing her job today. Her mind is on her mother.
The ghost eventually takes pity on the ghost hunter and moves on of his own volition.
Why do ghosts haunt in twos and threes? Why was one a caveman, one a Frenchman, and one... uh... Tracy from high school? Seems he'd like to help Paprika with her grief as well.
...After performing a rather unspeakable "experiment" in the name of science, Paprika captures Tracy's soul for re-release elsewhere.
She's sorry about this, but he's being such a bother to the old woman who lives here, and Paprika still needs to do her job, get paid and buy Paz a car.
After meeting his father's new bride, Zephram was seen punching the bunny toy and counting. 1, 2, 7, 9, 3, 4, 80, 60, 21. The same numbers he rattles off when going down the stairs. They don't mean anything.
Paz takes over her grandparents' room on the first floor. She gives it new wallpaper, trying to disguise the fact that it once belonged to her grandparents. Pavel's painting remains, along with a bar of woohooium - a metal Paz finds quite curious.
Ever-industrious, Paz gives her brother's room a redesign as well.
Dalma notices the positive change in her boyfriend's mood immediately.
"The demon zebra is gone," Zephram explains. The hexagonal atrocity has been moved to the basement.
Dalma finds the arms of a pirate comforting.
"How is my smile, Z?"
"Political."
"Good. Mom told me to perfect it."
"You don't have to be a politician, you know..."
Dalma shakes her head. "I know, but I'm not backing away from it. She's thrown a challenge in my face. She doesn't think I can do it, even, she's always down-talking me. Well I'll show her."
"She'd go easier on you if you were doing well in school," Zephram points out. "Or not dating me."
The ghosts have broken Cruz's sink.
"Just stay outside and stop yelling," Paprika grumbles. "I'll take care of it."
"What are you doing here, Jason?"
"Visiting my sister."
Cruz married Jason and Dax's sister? Small world.
Never trust the French. They'll team up with the Chinese and break your sink.
Can't sleep. Dragons. Must invent dragon catching device.
Martin never got to finish this book. The annoyance of the matter finally rouses his spirit from the grave.
Welcome to Riverview.
Chief exports: picket fences and ghosts.
Sometimes Jazz would stare directly at the camera, too.
Young Paz may be cute most of the time, but she has quite the temperament. When she loses at chess, she throws the pieces on the floor.
Paz and Chad talk about what they want to be when they grow up. Scientists.
"Do you think astrological signs are stupid?" Chad quizzes.
Paz grins. "Wow, yes, how did you know?"
Zephram goes into a field to set the cow toy free.
Paz and Chad meet at The Grind by chance. Chad cannot dance with Paz, because... well... he's been Alison Newbie's boyfriend since forever. Not that they get along or anything. In fact they seem to hate each other. But he still can't be seen dancing with Paz when it's not her birthday.
Paprika is here to spy on her daughter. Yuri appears, not glowing for some reason. Must be the lighting in here.
"It was the same for Dimitri," Yuri muses. "The paranormal was drawn to him."
Paprika turns around, wide-eyed, to question what Yuri just said, but he's already gone. Vampires run far too fast.
Paz hates this garden. So unorganized.
"The sun is out, Zephram, you're not going to discover any stars!"
"Lies! You can't lie to me, paisley!"
The teen years pass quickly, and soon he is a grown up pirate.
For some reason Dalma thought the pirate thing would drop when they became adults, considering Zephram only dresses the part and occasionally says "arrr" when she least expects it. It's not like he goes around stealing things.
Oh well. Pirates are hot.
Zephram kisses Dalma passionately, trying to distract himself from the terrifying sight of the orchids.
Dalma has made good on her promise to her mother and entered the political field. She is expecting a promotion soon and seems pleased, so Zephram is happy for her.
"Now that we're adults... maybe we can have a more adult relationship," Dalma suggests. She wears her perfected Palpatine smile for best effect.
Since she's asked him to stay over, Zephram does the cooking. There's an exactness to cooking that he enjoys, and Dalma's kitchen has gadgets to master that his family does not.
Yes, he's wearing the hat and shoes to bed. But they don't stay on long.
With Z at his girlfriend's house and Paprika out doing her job, poor Paz is home all alone. She jolts awake at the sound of alarms, and runs down to the basement to find a cop and robber engaging in some sort of interpretive dance. It's no wonder the burglar gets away.
The next morning, Dalma leaves for work. She tells Z he can stay at her place for the day, but as soon as she's gone he traipses off to the employment offices. He still wants to be a doctor, but after careful analysis of Zephram's history of hallucinations, Riverview will not allow him into the medical programs. Or any other field he's expressed interest in, for that matter. It seems Zephram is only suited for part time work.
He decides he'd rather be a homeless bum, and takes a nap on the bench outside the grocery store to see what that's like. To his dismay, no cops appear to beat him for loitering or vagrancy. It doesn't rain. He doesn't catch a disease, or freeze to death. This just isn't working out.
So Zephram goes home and cries to his mother about it.
"I'm useless!" he shouts.
Poor Paz over there, just trying to do her homework.
Paprika gives her son a job at the family graveyard. The hedges need trimming, and some of the vandalized graves should really be scrubbed clean. She tries to tell him it's an important job, but he just won't buy it. ='(
A wise mother, she distracts him with the Ghost Grabber 9000, thus ending the difficult conversation.
"So you've always wanted to try this out, right?"
_____________________________________________________
Etc.: So the house actually gets burgled... when my Can Apprehend Burglars sim (Zephram) is out of the house. FIGURES.
Generation 5 (Paprika) is still in play because technically Paz is the heir. When I first suggested the "single parent with help" roll, I expected firstly not ever to actually roll it, and secondly, if I did, to use it to drag in a distant relative or best friend to help raise the heir's children after some horrific breakup with the other parent. They would have gotten along famously before moving in together, and then have a period of annoyance and adjustment as actually living together took its toll on their friendship. It would have been a fantastic, if somewhat predictable little tale.
And then I got the roll during a generation with exactly two children. And I decided I would do things differently. That's why Zephram is still around. His adult trait is neat.
He really did want to be a doctor. Probably because he has the good trait or something. As a child he was constantly talking about pills and stethoscopes. Sorry buddy... I rolled part time career for secondary. Yuck.
By the way, I hate that glitch where the vampire skin tone doesn't load properly. It's ruined many screenshots. Yuri decided to run away before I could get any other pictures of him. The jerk.
Paprika's generation may technically still be in charge, but the goals are complete. Two kids, single parent. She reached ghost hunter level 10 quite some time ago, and I'm working on the little extra goals for that career. Like the ribbons. She finally collected all seven varieties of spirit. She's had a lot of parties, and I should probably apologize for making most of them birthday parties. ZZZZ. Paz will age up before Paprika is required to have another party. The party to remember was taken care of pretty early. So yeah, she's done. Or she will be, after that ribbon is obtained. Three cheers for Paprika.
Somehow I thought Zephram was the heir...well, he'll be around anyway, as the helper. Poor guy, getting stuck with part time work. I always feel bad for the ones who get that. So boring!
ReplyDeleteI love his relationship with Dalma.