Uphill Battle

[Carthrat]

"I'm not certain, but I think we'll be abl- ah. Just one?"

Upon the assent, Tom nods. "We'll speak to him at the gate, then- come on."

Setting aside the books for now, Tom starts to head to the front of the mansion...

[Brian]

The others all follow Tom to the gate, where a single traveler is trudging down the road.  Despite being a dashingly handsome man who really doesn't look that much like Phil, Tom instantly knows that this is, in fact ... well ... Phil.

[Carthrat]

"Ah. I think I recognize him.. somehow," states Tom, sheepishly. "He should be alright."

Stepping forward, he calls out; "Hey, you! You going to take all day to get up here, or what?"

[Dracos]

"Possibly, Tom.  What's the situation up here, beside the fact there is not much time?"  Dracos hurried on up towards where the crowd with tom was gathered.  "Friends of yours, I presume?"

Dracos

[Carthrat]

"It's a.. well, no, it's a short story," mutters Tom. "But what are YOU doing here? It hasn't even been an hour since we stopped being thralls and.. well..."

He eyes the corpses that are strewn across the front porch rather guiltily. "We were just preparing to leave, but to be honest, all I can be sure of is that staying here is a bad idea."

[Dracos]

"I work fast.  You know that.  What's been going on here?  We should have enough time to bandy about and trade information before we get moving.  The closest church questioner they could be sending out here is unlikely to be less than one day's travel from here to begin with.  Assuming they're not driving cars or some such," Dracos explained and questioned in a single breath.

Dracos

[Carthrat]

"I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about," affirms Tom. "Anyway, look, as far as I know, we were all being.. bred, like dogs-" this comes out with a guttural growl, and Tom clenches a shaking fist. "-to be the perfect worker, the perfect manual slave.

"'course, I didn't think to stand for that, and the guy responsible isn't getting up again. It's to do with these.. gates. Somehow they.. change people."

[Dracos]

"Yeah, they're kind of important in a lot  of ways.  They change people by either progressing or regressing them through the stages of evolution, or at least, that what the books say.  I might be able to figure out how to fix that, if I could see one of them.  Slavery doesn't surprise me though.  Culturally, we seem to be in about the puritan era, though I suspect there's more to it.  So, there's slaves, crazed superstitions, and most relevantly to us probably in short measure, an exceedingly powerful church authority that controls said gates and pretty much all travel through them.  Deacon Bloom" he gestures to himself, "Used to be one of them before becoming a heretic and obsessively trying to figure out how to share the secret of traveling through the gates safely with others outside the church."


Dracos

[Carthrat]

"-wait, you actually use them to travel?"

Tom scratches his head, and nods. "I.. wasn't sure. Sounded like they might be multi-purpose, right?

"I found mention of Nathan, by the way. It seems he was some kind of traveller from.. somewhere else, some forbidden city. His friends got caught or something, and ended up.. well, they're in this group, but nobody can recall the past."

With a bit of a helpless shrug, he starts to lead Phil back into the mansion- but not before directing Seven to continue making preperations to leave. Not that there's much to be done, he reflects.

"Anyway, my plan was to head to one of these gates, but I'm glad I ran into you, because I wasn't sure what I was going to do when I got there."

[Dracos]

"That's not too surprising with Rez, and more..mmm.  And I'm also glad I found you, or more specifically you and your metric ton of strong friends as I wasn't sure when luck was going to run out with those trying to track me down.  Mmm...  We definitely need to study these gates.  We also need to raid the church area near by in some capacity.  I'll have to think upon that."

Dracos paused a bit, considering something rat probably didn't have enough information on to work with.

 "You may or may not have figured it out.  But patternwise it is clear to me that we're always placed at pretty critical and world changing junctures when we enter these dreams.  It is not random or accidental who we end up as or where and what we are, though it may not be evident to begin with.  My placement is pretty obvious as fulfilling the Deacon's goals would undoubtedly be a world changing event, possibly bringing the world out of the dark ages by breaking the church's hold on both governments and people.  Yours I don't think is merely as simple as leading the thralls to freedom and upsetting the world order in such.  It is likely something deeper.  Have you found anything referencing who you might have been before they threw you through the gate?  If not, we need to bring all possible information with us as we go.  It's our great weakness right now.  We're not really in a battle of physical danger so much as knowing enough to outmanuver the hostile presence already in existence to stabilize the status quo.  It is likely there was a higher reason than just enslavement for your presence here.  Finding that out is almost certainly to be as important as figuring out the secret of the gates.  Which one are we planning on heading to?... And do we have any idea where they took Rez?"

Dracos

[Carthrat]

"Well, it might be clear to you, but I haven't been doing this very long," replies Tom, sounding rather sulky.

"And look, I still barely know a thing about this place! I've no idea who I might have been- the guy's journal mentioned that Nathan had some assistants when he came here, but they were caught and ended up like this- aside from that- damnit, nobody here even remembers their name! I can't say I know which gate, either- I couldn't find many specifics in the library. I did get together a pile of books that I thought might be useful.

"All I know is that slavery-" Tom spits on the ground "-is abhorrent, and if ending the practice isn't something I should be trying to do..."

[Dracos]

"I know, I know, that's why I thought to bring it up.  You don't have the 'second time around' thing to provide the pattern and preparation," Dracos mused.

"Feel free to jab if I go somewhere weird, I'm in brainstorm how to win with sidepoint brainstorm how to flick church in nose  mode.  I sometimes go a bit fast there, admittingly."

Tapping his chin, Dracos was in thought as he caught Tom's last words. "No, No.  You should be doing that.  I'm saying there's MORE to it.  And same with these others most likely.  Some were criminals you said and some were captives...  the captives are probably important, they're probably people that someone had a NEED to make disappear and you were probably someone that they had a NEED to make disappear.  And we need to know why.  It's could be an ace in our hand later if we know."

Dracos considered the plan ahead, "Good planning so far.  We can read them as we travel and more specifically hide from our pursuers.  How many are with us anyway?"

Dracos

[Carthrat]

"Twenty or so," replies Tom. "I already looked for reasons why, but I didn't find much. Not sure I will, either, but who knows?

"Anyway, what's your story?"

[Dracos]

"Hmm, didn't I already say?" Dracos shrugged.  "I, Deacon Bloom, am a heretic on the run for breaking with church doctrine and attempting to give the secret of safe transmission through the gates to everyone."

He paused a second as if in thought.  "It might've been just through the gate of progression or something.  I'm not sure though, and I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't some special rule the church kept on that gate.  We'd have to see to be sure."

"Anyhow, the local inquisitioners, called Questioners here, were after me and I escaped up here in disguise.  Came here when I heard of trouble happening with the 'thralls' and figured one of us would be at the center of it."

Dracos
Is it metagaming if it is almost all based on prior game facts? =P

[Carthrat]

"I'll show you the books we discovered," states Tom. "But nonetheless, let us set out shortly."

OOC: Don't look at me. >.>