Chapter 66: Meteor

Somedays you just feel like a loser.

Then you leave for work, and a meteor hits your front yard.

 Hmmm. That's a pretty big dent. What's that in the bushes?

Winston Small, the next door neighbor. It's a bad time to be spying in the bushes.

Crap! WINSTON!!

Oh. He's okay.

Maybe.

Rest in peace, Martin and Melody. We knew it was weird to put your graves in the front yard.

Zephram's awesome anchor bench is just gone.

The fire spreads inside.

Ashby just aged up to child, without Nol's notice. Nol is absorbed in her latest masterpiece, The Yellow Cat.

Ashby just needed to use the potty. But the toilet is on fire.

Winston is a good neighbor.

Some firefighters arrive to help Winston.

Kimberly's husband and Holly's half brother Taylor notices the flames from down the road, and hurries over to do the panic dance. He put too much hairspray on his mohawk today, and it catches fire.

The firewoman howls, ushering the extinguished flames into Sto'Vo'Kor.

Nol finally looks up from her computer and sees charred wreckage outside. She rushes to comfort her terrified daughter, then squeezes Winston tight and sobs into his arms, ignoring the terrible burns on his skin that she's touching.

Martin wonders WTF just happened.

Little Ashby talks about the meteor and the firefighters for days. The science behind meteors interests her (all Archers have had a love affair with science), but the most impact on her little mind was Winston and those fire-fighting women, who rushed to help with no fear.

Cleaning up takes a long time.

Jazz's dive well is broken. ='(

Ashby decides her favorite color is black.

She longs to tinker with cars and electronics, but for now her parents insist these building blocks will help her understand the skill later. Ashby thinks they're probably lying to her, because it makes no sense.

Now that she's old enough, Nol explains the nature of Pablo's career to their daughter.

As you might have noticed, Nol's third pregnancy ended several pictures ago. Baby Iago is now a toddler.

With Pablo's job more and more demanding of his micromanagement, Nol spends more time teaching Iago his basic skills. More time than she spent with Ashby and Rio, I mean.

Books are still on Nol's mind. Her brain is a swirl of new ideas, making it hard to concentrate on her real life.

Pablo is so happy when things go right at work.

Ashby's parents won't let her decorate her new room in all black. They promise she can have a larger room when she's older, but for now this previous storage space will do. A second bed is added against the opposite wall in anticipation of Rio's age-up to child.

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Etc.: Iago had the same hair as his mother and his brother, Rio. I switched it back to the original Randy Archer blue. Sorry there were no pics of Rio this update. He's still a toddler.

The meteor broke Martin and Melody's graves, so they could no longer be mourned. I was afraid it killed their ghosts, too, but relaxed when Martin appeared that very night.

A sim week later, I realized the meteor also broke the mailbox. I could not replace the mailbox or use the mailbox. Finding this unacceptable, I used mastercontroller to clean up the whole lot. The graves and mailbox now work properly.

I guess that would have fixed Jazz's dive well too. But I'd already sold it. I was really upset about that. The meteor broke a lot of things I couldn't just "replace," like the topiary giraffes and graves.

The firefighters axe hanging under Pangu's Axe was obtained via the time machine. Maybe it's Ashby's. ;)

Ashby's randomized traits are good, hates art, and athletic.

Rio's randomized traits are excitable and virtuoso.

Iago's randomized traits are evil (LOL) and easily impressed. I suppose that means his evil nature will be easily satisfied by cutting in lines at amusement parks.

Pablo's traits, since I never gave a complete list before, are ambitious, daredevil, family-oriented, easily impressed, loser.

Nol's traits, since I never gave a complete list before, are lucky (another trait she shares with Jazz besides bookworm), hopeless romantic, excitable, bookworm, and eccentric (a common Archer trait).

The game has been freezing a lot. Initially I was considering starting a new legacy in the same town when the next expansion pack comes out, using generation 10's heir, but the problems with this game are making that increasingly unlikely. I'll probably start up a brand new legacy in the new town I hope they release. I've spent a long time collecting all the paintings the Archers have you know... it will be sad to let them go.