Summerdream

My legacies are over, but I'm still writing stories. Aymeri and Ico, Tania and Auberon, and even Moth have their own non-legacy story blog, Summerdream.

Ch. 51: And the lived happily ever after

People who follow the MTS discussion thread already know I had to cut this legact short due to lag and freezing, which were unfortunately as bad in Los Aniegos as they were in Appaloosa Plains.

I've started a new legacy which can be found here:
Dayspring Legacy

The new legacy isn't a direct continuation of this one, but the founder is a descendant of Aymeri and Ico.

Chapter 50: Into the Sunset

Grim comes for Kelsey during dinner.

Chayton is left bereft at her passing.

This place only became his home after his long travels, it only became his home because it was Kelsey's. Without her, though he loves his daughter and her sons, he's not sure this place is his home anymore. Maybe it was time he moved on.

"Don't be ridiculous," Sage replies when Chayton tells her he's thinking of leaving, "Kieran and Kaiden need you here; you can't leave them now."

"I was never much of a father to you," Chayton admits sadly.

"Don't," Sage sighs, "We had this conversation when I was a teenager. You may not have been here at the start, but you've been part of my life for years now, and you are a grandfather. You aren't going anywhere now. Understood?"

"Understood," Chayton nods with a slight smile.

Kieran has his birthday.

He becomes a young adult.

Jasmine had her birthday just a few days before he did. She lives alone with her elderly mother, and invites Kieran to move in with her.

"She'll be thrilled to have a doctor in the house," Jasmine enthuses. Kieran is going ahead with his plan to start a career in medicine.

Kaiden's birthday follows the day after his brother's.

Grim decides to intrude on the birthday celebration.

"I'm so sorry about your grandpa," Becky consoles him.

"I got you a birthday gift," Kaiden says, handing her the box. Becky's own birthday was a few days before his.

"I love it," she squeals when she tears off the wrapping to reveal a heart shaped amethyst. She loves anything purple. "I'll treasure this forever."

Kaiden suggested they go hang out at the arcade, but Becky wanted to go dancing.

"You dance pretty good," she remarks, "I don't suppose you want to go to the prom with me?"

"I thought you were dating Richard," Kaiden answers.

Becky rolls her eyes, "We broke up yesterday. You aren't going to leave me dateless for the prom are you?" She laughs and bats her eyes at him.

"So, is this a date date, or are you just trying to get back at Richard?" Kaiden asks.

"Silly, I broke up with Richard so I could ask you out," Becky says with a teasing smile.

"Sorry, dumb jock moment," Kaiden laughs.

Becky slaps his arm gently, "You know you're not. Dumb, I mean. I guess the jock part is about right. And I'll have to fight off all the cheerleaders and popular girls that will be throwing themselves at you."

Kaiden puts his arms around her, "They can try throwing themselves at me," he says, "But I won't catch them."

Kaiden is a jock, and is very active in the school's sports program.

And when he's not in school, or out with Becky, he's at the gym. His dedication to his team pays off when recruiters from the Los Aniegos Badgers come to one of their games, and offer Kaiden a position on the team as soon as he graduates.

Kaiden tells Becky the big news on prom night.

"L.A.?" she gasps, "Really? Oh, you aren't going to leave me here, are you?"

"Becky, if you aren't coming with me, I'm not going," Kaiden says.

"You're kidding," Becky laughs, "You wouldn't give up an opportunity like that just for me, would you?"

"Of course I would," he answers.

"Well, I won't let you, I'm coming with you," Becky says, "Moving to L.A. is a dream come true. I won't have much of a music career if I stayed here."

Kaiden becomes a young adult.

He and Becky pack their things and head out west to the smoggy city of Los Aniegos.

With his family's wealth, they buy a house in the hills, just beneath the famous Hillwood sign. The house comes furnished, so the couple can just move in. Once they get settled in their new life here, they can redecorate it to suit their tastes.

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Challenge Notes:

In the MTS forums, I've mentioned the difficulties I've been having in Appaloosa Plains with lagging and periodic freezing. These problems started back in Kelsey's generation, and have become worse over time. The freezes have become particularly annoying, I get several of them per Sim day.
I had said in the forums that I was going to abandon this legacy and start fresh rather than move, because I'm also involved in rebuilding Riverview for my next legacy after this one, something I hinted at in one of my previous chapter comments, when Aymeri and Ico and Tania and Auberon decided to cleanse the town of human pollution and make it their own.
I didn't want the the hassle of preparing another world for Kaiden to move into while simultaneously building up a new Riverview, and I was feeling very unmotivated by Kaiden's generation roll, so I thought I'd drop it.

But the Riverview project is slow going as I'm completely rebuilding, so I decided I could carry on this legacy in Los Aniegos, which is prepopulated and has the LN venues I require for Becky's band career.
Assuming Becky sticks around long enough to form a band.

Kaiden's roll is Second Chance, 3 kids. Primaray career is sports, secondary is Busker/Band for partner 1 and Inventor for partner 2.

The goal is Awesome and the Misc. Fun is Runs in the Family (Complete, as both Kieran and Kaiden got the Brave trait).

I used Nraas Traveler mod for the move, so Kaiden and Becky are still related to their families in AP, which is now a vacation world attached to L.A. as a base hood.

Chapter 49: Stupid and Slow

Kieran was a little nervous about starting high school right after returning from China. Being out of town for much of his childhood has made it difficult for him to make friends. But on his first day of school, Jasmine Hobble Parrot asks for his help with her French homework.

After homework is done, Kieran invites her to play with him, but she says she's not into games, and she'd rather watch. But she doesn't pay much attention to the game at all, instead talking to him about her family.

"I never had my dad around much either," she says, "And when he was around...well, my parents never got along well. I was surprised they kept trying to get back together, after breaking up so many times. You're lucky your parents' divorce was so friendly, and your step-dad seems really nice. And your mom is so cool, traveling al over the world like you do."

Kieran may be a genius, but it took him long enough to figure out that Jasmine might have had other reasons for coming home with him other than help with homework. He puts his controller down and sits next to her on the couch.

He makes a bold move, putting his arm around her shoulder. He would have been mortified if she rejected him, but she leans against him and smiles. High school isn't going to be so bad after all.

Aftr school on Friday, they have their first date at the arcade. This time, Jasmine actually plays instead of just watching.

Before the date is over, they share their first kiss, and Kieran asks her to go steady with him. Jasmine reminds him of their upcoming prom.

On Saturday, Kieran meets Jasmine's mother Deidra at the library. She's quite impressed with his plans to pursue a career in medicine when he graduates.

Kaiden becomes a child.

With their youngest now old enough to travel, Sage and Joffrey plan a trip to Al Simhara. While their vacation house there would be sufficient for all four of them, Sage decides she can afford something more grand.

For herself, Sage is perfectly fine with a sleeping bag on the floor of tomb for accommodations while she's out exploring.

But she wants her boys to have the best. They have a pool back in Appaloosa Plains, but nothing as magnificent as this pool.

Joffrey takes the boys out fishing while their mother is plundering the pyramids.

In the evenings, they have the game room.

Kieran is responsible enough to take care of his brother alone for a few days they decide, and Joffrey accompanies Sage to Abu Simbel.

"I'll find a way to get you in," Sage promises when a fire trap gets between them.

One dive well and a floor switch later, Sage has found a way for Joffrey to get in.

Abu Simbel hides some of the greatets treasures to be found in Al Simhara. And it protects its treasures with fire.

Her looting awakens the Red Priest's mummy.

According to Wane McMottder, mummies are notoriously stupid and slow, and Sage has no problems getting past this one. Although she had to struggle to reopen the hidden door that closed behind her when she entered this chamber, the mummy still doesn't get to her in time to attack. Joffrey even manages to get a few pictures of the shambling creature before the couple moves on to loot other poorly guarded chambers.

They return home late at night to find the boys safely asleep, so they take the opportunity to enjoy their hot tub undisturbed.

Back in Appaloosa Plains, Logan brings his son Terrence to visit Kelsey.

Logan has been very successful in his journalism career. He's also written several novels, which Sage almost feels bad about not reading.

Kieran drops by his father's house after school. While they were away in Egypt, Jeremy and his girlfriend Leigh Sutherland got married.

So Kieran finally gets to meet his new step-mother and and his youngest half-brother, Sean.

Jeremy helps his son with his homework. Kieran tells him of his plans to pursue a medical career, and Jeremy is very proud. Any steady career would have pleased him really, since he was so afraid his son would adopt his mother's more carefree attitude toward work.

Rowley passes on. This makes Scout very sad.

Family game night.

Kaiden plays at the public pool with Becky Hennessy-Massey.

After getting good and wet on the water slide, they play in the sand.

Jasmine waited for Kieran while his family was away. On Saturday afternoon, they engaged in a make out session on a public bench, ignoring the disapproving (or envious) stares of the elders sitting across from them.

______________________________
Challenge Notes:
The traveling is really drawing out this generation. Sage and Joffrey are still YA, with something like 7 days until they turn Adult.
Sage has now completed every tomb in all 3 locations. I did have to cheat to gain access to Hatshepsut's tomb, because Sage was unable to deliver the required photo to continue that quest chain. I had to enter build mode on that lot and change the key shape from a named key to a generic crescent (Sage had a few spare crescent keys on her) to get in.
The weird thing about the Adventurer career is that it can only be pursued while traveling. So Sage has nothing to do while at home. I'm not worried about money. Although the bills are high, the family is quite rich, and if push came to shove we own three vacation homes that could be sold for cash.
The problem is I'm getting very bored with playing this generation. Joffrey paints when in AP (he's got his LTW to max painting and photography, and he's in level 9 of the Artist career), and I sometimes send Kelsey out to round up minor pets to sell, especially when she rolls a wish to catch something. Sage and Chayton are pretty much just unemployed, they've achieved their LTWs and have not much to do.
I love my vacation homes and would like to travel some more (Sage can reloot old tombs and dig at excavation sites), but I feel this generation has gone on long enough, and I'd like to just move on to the next. So, I don't know what I'm going to do.

When Rowley died, I had a small glitch with Grim. He didn't do the whole routine with Rowley. He appeared in the kitchen, then instead of going to pick up Rowley and do the ascension to kitty heaven they normally do, he just popped out of existence and left an urn behind. I think it might have been a routing issue. Anyway, not a huge deal, I'm just explaining why the only pic I have of the event is of Scout mourning for Rowley.

Jasmine Hobble-Parrot's father was Davis Bird, a son of Oriole Bird and Benjamin Schmidtt. Davis and Deidra Hobble-Parrot had an on again off again thing since they were teens. They even lived together briefly, and had two children together, Jasmine and her older brother Elvis, who seems to be following his father's pattern of dating everyone and fathering multiple kids on one woman he keeps dating and breaking up with. I secretly hoped he would marry into the Pressley family, because I would have loved having an Elvis Pressley in my town. This is why I keep all story notifications on my town, btw. I love knowing everything that goes on, so I know all the details of the Sims my own Sims get involved with.