From Chapter Two -- for Phil
You wake up to someone shaking you gently. Opening your eyes, you feel disconnected, not all there. This is about the feeling of waking up in a new body last time, though.
A child, maybe seven years old, a little blonde girl in a nightgown looks fearfully back over her shoulder. "Father," she whispers harshly, "you must leave. There is a Questioner, newly arrived in town." She hesitates, tears shining in her dark eyes.
Looking around, you see that you're in a room, probably an attic, judging by the slope of the roof. The area is tiny, barely large enough for the bed you were sleeping on, and a bedside table bears a trio of flickering candles. "I'll leave you to dress," she says. "Meet me in the kitchen."
She quickly scurries away before you can master your new body's tongue.
Mentally reflecting on the fact that rolling out of bed in a hunted condition was becoming entirely too standard, Dracos dressed himself quickly, relaxing to let the body's own instincts generally guide his sense of balance and such. He took a brief glance around the room, seeing if there was any mirrors, or more importantly, things neatly hidden that he should probably take with him.
'there are probably more pleasant ways of entering fatherhood,' Dracos mused silently while he swiftly readied.
Dracos
Phil's body seems to remember how to remove the dressing gown it was sleeping in and quickly finds the bag at the foot of the bed. This is also an occasion of interest.
Within the bag are: Spare changes of clothes, non-priestly vestments, and ... well, what looks like a priest's vestments, pretty much. There's a holy test (presumably), too, along with a number of scrolls, and a writing kit. Much of the clothing is stained with ink, presumably from spills and such.
There's also a small pouch with four ... copper? ... coins in it. They're about the size of a standard U.S. one dollar coin, actual value unknown. There's also some candles, a tiny bit of steel and flint, and that's about it.
There's not nearly enough time to read the book, and there's no title. But the symbol on the front (which is also the symbol on the front and back of the priestly vestments) is of a large, red double-doorway, one door white, one door black.
Dracos dresses in the normal clothing, packing the back quickly and taking it with him as he followed where he saw the young girl head earlier, presuming it to be the way to the kitchen.
Dracos
Phil finds he was in the third floor (attic, really, after all) of a classical house. Taking one of the candles after extinguishing the other two, he finds that it is just as old as it looks. It's got tons of creaky wooden beams everywhere. But he does manage to find his way to the kitchen. When he gets there, the girl has just finished filling a small sack with bread, cheese, three apples, and a waterskin. Light here comes from a small, Arabian looking oil lamp.
"They're almost everywhere," she says unhappily. "Liza says that they won't go into the grasses ... but you'd need to go through the regression gate to get there." She winces. "If they found out about that, then they'd stake you for sure. As it is...." She trails off, then bows her head. "I don't know where you want to go. But I believe what you taught us. Momma and Poppa will distract the Questioner -- but you should hurry." She bites her lip and looks up at Phil forlornly. "Will you come back, someday? Will you really show us how we can go through the progression gate, too?"
"Some day," Dracos replied with a simulated heartfelt nod of remorse. his mind already miles away trying to map out possible symbolic meanings of progression and regression gate and what grasses he supposedly could hide in to stay away. "But now, haste must serve..." He quickly considered routes to leave the house, giving a half second to see if the young girl would suggest a direction by posture or word which he should already have known.
Dracos
"I...if you go out the back," she says slowly, "you can go down the creek. It would be dark, but the Questioner couldn't see you, and the water would keep their dogs from scenting you. It's almost a day's walk to the crossroads, but you can find your way from there, right?" She licks her lips, jumping in fright as there's a loud crash against another door.
"Open!" a distant, angry voice cries. "The Church of the Gates demands it!"
"You mustn't tell me where you go!" she cries in an urgent whisper, leading Phil to the door. "I don't want to tell them!"
Dracos turned her back, "Know nothing of it then... thank you for your bravery," He moved swiftly, trusting the young girl's advice which seemed sound to him, heading out back, he stayed low, moving quickly as he dared.
Dracos
It's dark outside, but there's enough ambient light from ... where? No stars. No moon. But it was so dim inside.... From the back porch, Phil can see that there's light from around the side of the house -- bright light, like someone with a lantern is approaching. Ahead, the ditch or depression that probably represents the creek is visible. If the rear door faces north (no clue, with no stars), then the creek runs east-to-west, though the girl didn't say which way to go. It's about forty feet from the back door, and Phil is able to cross the yards and scramble down a ten foot slope until he reaches the creek. It's about seven feet wide, and maybe a single foot deep, at a glance. In the dim non-light illuminating it, it's black and sluggish, nothing reflecting from the surface.
Hurrying towards the depression and eager to stay out of the approaching light from the side of the house, sideplacing figuring out the various puzzle pieces as to his identity for the moment as he focused on not getting caught. When he reached the creek, he listened briefly for what sounds his pursuers were coming from, testing the water quickly with a foot before heading down the center of the stream, attempting to keep the noise to a minimal as he went away from said pursuers.
He mentally noted he needed to read this book of doors and probably commit it to memory pretty soon.
OOC: West if I can't figure out which way is away from them.
OOC: Borrowing: Speed Reading (3), Deduction (3), and Persuasion (3) for the immediate future from my real self.
Moving away from the town (it looks like it was a town, judging by the occasional lit window through the trees), Phil heads the approximate 'west' direction -- assuming the door did face north. The creek gurgles occasionally on its own, so as long as feet are raised, there's no undue splashing.
The chosen course seems to lead upstream, judging by the occasional resistance. But that is the way away from the town. In the distance, a mournful cry sounds, like the howl of a dog. No shouting, or bright flares of large fires, at least.
Dracos distracts himself with a soft hum as he keeps moving, not trusting himself as safe until the sky changes above or he starts getting really tired. He did take note of the terrain as he traveled, trying to get a better grip on the new world. Apparently, the general level of culture was somewhere around the era of ..mmm, the Crucible as he recalled it. No electricity that he saw. Hopefully that meant a lack of guns with hunters after him, but more hopefully he'd not get the chance to find out.
Dracos
The walk, for some reason, makes Phil wish for a horse. After a few hours, the sky does lighten, though it's curiously non-directional, and there's no _sun_ in the sky. A few clouds dot the horizon, but nothing else. There's no sounds of pursuit, at least, though at this point his feet are cold, and very wet. Still, the river water is refreshing, and by the time some of that cheese, and maybe an apple start sounding good, birdsong is filling the bushes lining the upper reaches of the creek.
It's hard to make out details through the thickets, brambles, and so on, though the view might be better from the top of the slope. The creek bed also curved gently throughout the trek, so it's difficult to tell which direction the house actually was.... But that quickly becomes moot, as a bridge comes into view ahead. It's a simple affair -- a single support column in the middle of the river, and essentially a great slab of boards. No railing, and no roof, but wide and probably sturdy enough for a horse and wagon.
Climbing out of the creek at this point, Dracos perused the area around him with his gaze, consider both what cover was available and which way roads traveled. He paid particular attention to which roads seemed like they were heading back towards the village and which ones were heading 'any other direction'.
Finally, if there is nobody along the roads at this point, the hungry and tired preacherman finds a clean spot among the bushes where he'd be at least somewhat obscured and opens his pack, starting in on the cheese with one hand and reading the book with his other. A diary might be more useful at this point, but his other self's religious text would have to do.
Dracos
The surrounding area is mostly flat, with occasional low rolling hills. If Phil went west, then the town would be east (roughly), and at the top of the bridge a road runs next to the creek in that direction -- until it reaches the bridge. South of the bridge is what looks like an orchard, trees planted in a regular grid, though they aren't bearing anything yet. They look like apple trees.
North, the land levels out, less hilly, but more thickly forested. Not far past the bridge is a crossroads, with one road going south to the bridge (and then turning east towards the village), one road going northeast, and one going west. The creek seems to lazily drift southwest, if one wanted to go that way. From the creekbed, Phil is able to find a hollow cluster of brambles that will provide perfect cover for a man sitting and taking his ease.
A great place to catch your breath, and after you sit, it has a nice view of the creek (which is clear, no longer so ominous looking, in the light), and then Phil notices that there are berries on the brambles. They look like blueberries.
Turning his attention to the book, Phil is able to skim through it fairly quickly. A few of the pages are probably hand-made, judging by the illumination (details and scroll work in the margins), but the vast majority look like they're from a printing press. In fact, in a few places, the edge of a printing plate's indentation is visible.
The book's premise is pretty straightforward. It's divided into four sections. The first one is the story of Creation, which works out to:
The Creator cast the spheres across the anabaric shroud (which is some sort of reserve where all souls and energy come from, and eventually must return), and linked them with the gates. Then the Creator assigned the task of maintaining the gates and how they should be used to his chosen followers, who obviously became the clergy years down the line.
There's some scattered stories of various awesome clergymen throughout ancient biblical history -- there's a mesiah-like character named 'Rasheed', who brings the secret of crossing through gates without triggering progression or regression, to that the clergy (and they alone) could travel freely, spreading the Creator's word.
After that is a listing of commandment-like rules and such, which is only a handful of pages. They tend to follow the religious mean of any standard real-world religion that Phil can recall: Do bad things, and the Creator will punish you. Heavily implied in the book is that the Church will fill in on the judging and persecuting part if the Creator can't be bothered.
The next section is larger, and is filled with random parables, tidbits, and is the section someone would flip through and point randomly to a passage if they wanted to solicit some kind of guidance. That resonates with some half-memory Phil can't ... quite ... dredge up, but mostly reminds him of classic Knights of the Round table type stuff.
After that is a short section on what's going to happen in the future. That someone will come and try to bring the secret of crossing through the gates without using them to everyone, instead of just the clergy.
Looking into the gates, which appear in every section, they appear after some study to be some sort of weird instant-evolution/de-evolution thing that the Creator gave his followers as a gift.
By the time Phil puts the book down (speed reading or otherwise) about two hours have passed, and there's the sound of horses leading a cart as a leisurely pace away from the village. They'll reach the bridge soon, judging by their progress. No way to tell which path they're going to take, though Phil does recall a signpost being at the crossroads.
Dracos took a few of the berries to chew on while he read, figuring if they're poisonous instead of real blue berries, the small amounts won't hurt him. Checking the sign quickly, he stayed hidden along a nearby path, figuring he could come out after observing their entrance and mime being a fellow traveler. As much as he'd like to hitch a ride, at this venture, it would be premature to simply show up if it happened to be one of the questioners. Thinking on that, did they show up in the religious text? The behavior thusfar seemed like heresy inquisitors.
Mentally, planning ahead, Dracos recognized he needed to find his companions again. As well as these gates. The sooner the better, as any of them passing through one unaware could have bad consequences.
Dracos
OOC: Basically, curious about any sections regarding heresy and the dealing with.
The traveler unhitches his horse by the bridge with a whinny, after chucking the cart's wheels so it doesn't roll away. Then he comes into sight. A worn, classical looking farmer in white shirt, brown pants, wearing a man-purse (they're called satchels, Phil thinks). He leads the horse down the bank of the creek on the opposite side of the bridge from Phil (though still on the southern bank), and lets it drink from the water.
The signpost is too far away to make out clearly from here -- at the crossroads it'd be easier, but that would involve exposing himself to the ... farmer? It's harder to make out the cart from the brambles without revealing himself, but it looks like the stereotypical cartload of hay.
The book didn't mention much about heretics or questioners, beyond comments that heretics against the Gate can't leave their spheres, and that the typical punishments are stoning, and being staked out in the sun with no water or food until death.
Dracos makes a note to swipe a their equivelent of a vatican book of rules or something if he ever manages to corner one. But, for the moment, he was a traveler. In fact, he was a traveling trader, or so was to be his story. Readying himself in mind for such, he left his hiding, coming down the path towards the crossroads, apparently unaware of the farmer for the moment, but hailing when he got a few steps beyond close enough for good observation.
Dracos
OOC: Acting, Analyze, and persuade I suspect are going to get a bunch of use here. In case I need to roll one right off.
Hatbot> ACTION --> "Dracos rolls 3d6 analyze social! and gets 10." [3d6=1, 5, 4]
<Chibi-Suu> Dracos throws them bones: analyze social! --> 15
<Dracos> Oof!
<Dracos> versus 13, not that that helps
The farmer seems a bit startled, then gives a bright smile, one hand going to the horse's leads. "Greetings, traveler," he says. "Where are you headed this fine day?"
Dracos glibly replied, "Wherever the road will take me." Having not read the sign, he wasn't in a good place to name cities in particular. "And yourself, good man?"
Dracos
"Just carting this over to Darby," he says with a nod. "Master Vladimere says his thralls need a new load every few days. Are you looking for work?"
"Work would not be unwelcome," Dracos replied, weighing in a hand his sack. "Do you offer such?"
Dracos
"Well," he says slowly. "I could give you a ride if you'd be willing to help me unload, but beyond that...." He pauses. "Actually, Master Vladimere might have room for a worker." He shrugs, then, as the horse has finished drinking its fill, and walks back up the bank. He swiftly re-hitches it. "If you want a ride, I'll let you on for a shilling, or free if you promise to help unload."
He climbs up on the front of the cart, then gestures to the inviting stack of hay on the back.
"Well met then, I'll help unload," Dracos agreed, getting on the cart.
Dracos
"Alrighty, then." The man flicks reigns at the horse, and it quickly begins to lumber forward at a pace not much faster than walking. Phil climbs to the top of the haystack -- except for being itchy, and scratching a bit, it's pretty comfortable, and there's a nice cool breeze coming from the town he left.
"I hear," the man says, tossing it over his shoulder, "that the Questioners back in Willet were looking for a rogue preacher. A deacon gone heretic."
"Sounds like messy business. Did they catch the heretic?" Dracos replied, leaning back.
Dracos
"Didn't find a sign of him," the man says with a shrug. "The Questioners found who was letting him stay, but they said he'd gone days ago. Still, keep an eye out. The Questioners don't like letting heretics get away, and fallen priests especially."
"Advice well taken," Dracos agreed smoothly, thankful that the farmer wasn't keenly questioning.
Dracos
"Mm," the farmer intones, as the signpost is passed. Back along the path that the cart came from, the pointer says, "Willet, Kent, Searhurst, Anabara Gate." Ahead, and to the left, the pointer says, "Darby, Soma, Grasslands," and then to the right, it reads, "High Church, Storn, Windhurst Gate". The farmer guides the cart to the left -- towards Darby.
Dracos stayed quiet, remembering those names for later and trying to reference any of those gates against things he's read. The world is probably made up of a group of small planet areas with the gates going between them.
Dracos
"So, stranger," the farmer says, once the silence has stretched on. "Where are you from, anyway? And what's your name? I'm Delvin, by the way. Farmer by trade."
"Augustin," Dracos spun off in a second, "From here and there, Storn originally. Nice to meet you, Delvin."
Dracos
"Nice to meet you, too, Augustin," Delvin says, nodding. "If you're needing some shade, just dig under the hay. Don't throw any out, mind, but make yourself comfortable."
Without any shocks, the hay still makes for decent (though itchy) bedding, and the ground is pretty flat. For being just simple dirt roads, they seem well maintained.
Thinking of the names of the gates, Phil assumes that they're the same gates mentioned in the handy holy book, though it didn't name anything like 'Anabara', or Windhurst. Thinking about it, Phil does manage to get the idea that each 'sphere' only has two gates, so they're obviously connected in a linear fashion.
Dracos nods, taking a spot in the shade and discreetly reading over a scroll while time passed.
Dracos
Jackpot! The bible was interesting, and will allow Phil to BS his way through meetings with people who study it, more likely than not. But the scrolls are where the information's really at.
The scrolls are a journal. The journal of one Philip Bloom, formerly a deacon of the Church of the Gate, and now a self-proclaimed heretic. The scrolls outline that the Church of the Gate is suppressing the way to cross through gates without invoking either regression or progression ... and reading about that suggests that it's some kind of evolutionary force. It can make people more primitive, or more advanced.
The letter denounces the practice of using this process to essentially 'breed' people to make desired traits stronger. And this forced process is used extensively on the heretical, or opposition to the Church. Since non-Church people can't pass through the gates without some risk, only the Church really has control over travel.
This means they concern commerce, too, as well as communication. The scrolls explain how Deacon Bloom opposes this practice, and seeks out the oppressed to try and promise them a way to attain true freedom.
Reading between the lines, Phil is able to assemble a basic understanding of the interrelationships of the 'spheres'. Some of them produce more food, and some produce more people. Some produce valuable trade items, so they are for the most part dependent on one another. The Church's grip on the transfer points gives them de-facto control, which has obviously expanded into the Questioners.
And boy, does Deacon Bloom ever hate the Questioners, and the fact that they represent the worst of what any Church Phil can think of has done. It's easy to compare them to the Inquisition, because they aren't far off, even though some priests are squeamish about it, and don't really agree that they should have the authority that they do.
As good as it was knowing more about the church and such, this only spurned Dracos onward as he sought clues as to the methods that allowed travel between the gates and more importantly the Deacon's plan, for it was surely one in some vein he needed to make sure succeeded.
Dracos
The scrolls don't explicitly state much about using the gates, but from what Phil can tell, the trick of it seems to involve using both doors in a gate at the same time. It might make more sense once the gate was actually examinable.
In the meantime, Delvin comments, "There's a wagon coming down the road ... looks like it's from Master Vladimere's place."
Dracos murmurs a bit, as if he's just waking up, "Hum, you said something?" He blinked sleepiness out of his eyes convincingly.
Dracos
Sitting up, Phil can see a coach coming down the road towards the cart at a mad pace. The coachman is cracking his whip over the team of four horses leading the sleek, black enameled carriage, and they're hurtling along. Devlin has already led his cart to one side, to avoid blocking traffic.
"Hoy!" he yells, waving his hat, as the coach is abruptly reigned to a halt, beside the cart.
The coachman's eyes are wild, and he spits out, "Calamity! Flee, good man, the thralls have gone mad -- they've slain Master Vladimere in cold blood and broad light of sky!"
Devlin blinks in shock, his jaw dropping open. Within the coach, the sobbing of a woman ... or more than one woman, can be heard. A few servants are clinging to the back of the coach, and look up the road in fear, though the path behind them is largely obscured with the dust they've thrown up.
"Madness," Dracos commented quietly in presumed shock, his eyes quickly roaming over the others to observe and analyze their responses, trying to predict both how dangerous what they were coming from really was and whether he'd be able to slip away sensibly.
Dracos
OOC: Probably a bit much but social analyze or perception or whatnot.
OOC: 13 was rolled *is having cp problem*
It would be pretty simple to flee. The coachman doesn't look like he would want to hang around. He's an easy read socially -- he's scared witless. What this means about his skill in normal situations? Hard to say. But he's just frightened and wants to leave. The other people on the carriage look highly interested in fleeing, too.
Delvin doesn't wait too long -- he starts bringing the cart around, even while he asks, "If Master Vladimere has fallen, who will manage the thralls?"
The coachman sputters, then with a look of determination says, "The High Church will know what to do." At that, he cracks his whip, and the carriage begins rumbling down the road -- not quite as quickly as before, but still fast.
"Sorry, Augustin," says Delvin, still turning the cart, "I think we should turn back. If you're headed towards Darby, best wait until the Church can handle this."
Dracos pondered the likelihood of stealthly slipping out of the cart when it gets moving, so as to continue on without the farmer realizing he left.
Dracos
OOC: Just want to do a quick check there. If not, I'll leave openly.
OOC: Don't you know if you've got the Stealth skill?
Phil thinks that once the carriage is gone (throwing up a cloud of dust), that he could drop off the back of the cart while Devlin wheeled it around, and then just march into the dust cloud. It's inevitable at some point that Devlin will notice 'Augustin's absence, but it might not be any time soon.
Focusing on wrestling the horse around, the farmer says, "Just hold tight; no worries about helping me out, now. It's much more important that we reach the High Church, friend."
Dracos nodded in agreement, keeping worry on his face to hide any sign of such a plan...and doing just that as Devlin moves off, holding his breath as he snuck swiftly down the path through the dust. There was really no question of it, one of his friends had to be involved with such a sudden surprising shift to the natives.
Seeing a mansion ahead, Dracos hurries towards it, knowing that he'll have to figure out what is going on quickly. With a questioning group less than two days walk away, it wasn't likely to be long before trouble arrived after him.
Dracos
After a few dozen yards, Phil clears the worst of the dust, and is simply left to walk down the road. A large Victorian manor is visible in the distance, probably a mile or so away. The dust isn't perfectly readable, but more likely than not that's where the carriage came from.
Heading down the road towards the house, Phil is met at the gate by twenty large, red-skinned, shirtless (but cloaked) individuals carrying cudgels. While they have an identical, totally homogeneous appearance, Phil instantly recognizes Tom.
Dracos now goes to Uphill Battle (http://www.soulriders.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1002768#1002768).