Feel free to move this when you are ready to insert me into the game.
[sblock=moved to IC thread]The architect waited in the lobby to the master’s private chambers. The githzerai secretary had continued meditating on her mat as he had entered. He knew not to disturb The Master or his secretary while they were in meditation. Instead he sat down on the nearest straw mat and gazed out through the large crystalline window. Beyond he saw the flaming Orb, his hated enemy, trapped at the center of Placidio. He imagined for a moment how this world looked to the systems they passed: a thousand men and women focusing their mental effort toward adjusting the inertia of the colossal comet within which they traveled.
Unconsciously he fingered his short length of chain counting the links like some ancient rosary. The cold iron links felt hot in his fiendish fingers and when he reached the last of the seven links he continued fondling the first with a mounting perverse glee. Since the secretary was preoccupied, he relaxed his tight control of his unnerving gaze. He wondered what image she would have beheld had she opened his eyes: a lover, a friend, a parent? He smoothed out his apron around him nervously. Did the master know how much metal he had sown into his gown? Did it violate the pact? He snickered to himself and then reverted his form to that of the naïve young man, his most frequent affected personae.
“His holiness, will see you now.” Chimed the voice of the secretary in his head. How rude! She had not even asked to intrude upon his thoughts. He thought back at her just a bit too forcefully, “THANK YOU. YOU MAY RETURN TO YOUR MEDITATIONS.”
Her reply, spoken out loud to emphasize the sardonic tone: “I know.”
Getting up just a bit too quickly The Architect floated up a few inches in the light gravity. He waited to settle back down to the floor while the secretary smiled back at him.
The master sat cross-legged on the tiny raised platform at the far end of the room.
The chamber was very cold, but neither the master nor the architect noticed. The chamber was situated in the outermost shell of Placidio, near the axis of rotation. Few would enjoy the cold near weightlessness of the chamber, but the master was clearly at home here. The architect pocketed the links in his apron to allow himself to concentrate and step-floated into the room.
“Master,” he croaked nervously, “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?”
Tryrroth Khan Buddha, Master of Placidio replied calmly, “Whichever.”
The Architect paused for a moment composing his thoughts before continuing, “As you may have heard, there was an accident yesterday. Work shoring up the base of the hall of records had been proceeding as planned until a large segment of the stone crumbled during refurbishment. The shock broke loose a large section of outer shell and caused a minor breach. The hole was quickly sealed…”
“Get to the point. How much ice did we lose?”
“Several thousand liters broke off from the shell, but that was not the real problem. The banker has estimated that we lost over a thousand cubic meters of atmosphere before we could seal the hole.” The architect paused to let the news settle in.
Tyrroth calculated quickly, “So we lost nearly two years worth of atmospheric water during this accident?”
With trepidation, The Architect continued, “There is more. During the accident, two of the brethren were crushed. By the time the hounds arrived, one was already dead. The other is stable and is in the care of the adepts.”
Tyrroth smiled, “So did you bring his body to Goldenmane?”
“No Sir, I was called away…”
Still smiling: “Tell the truth, Kyton, before I summon in Gale to rend you into pieces so small that it will take you a week to regenerate.”
“It was my fault, your Holiness. I was stoneshaping a section that I thought was sufficiently buttressed.”
“There. That wasn’t so difficult. You will ask the Goldenmane to raise him… stop sending mentally! Go to him. Speak. To. Him. Use your voice. I want you to supplicate yourself the Lammasu. When the brother is raised, compensate him from your own funds. Shore up the weakened section with new stone. We will get water elsewhere.”
“There is no more to use. Stone that is.” With a wicked grin the architect continued, “Unless you want me to evict those who live in that section and shape their towers down to slabs.”
Annoyed at the architect, the master snapped uncharacteristically, “NO! We will get more. Somewhere. I will purchase some.” Mentally Tyrroth contacted his banker, the Janni, named Rothman.
“Rothman, see to it that the water lost in the recent accident is replaced and buy some stone. Don’t bother purchasing it as ice unless you can get a bargain; I will transmute it if I have to. Sell off the last of the gold denary if you need to.”
“Is that all?” Tyrroth asked the architect.
“The-good-news-is-that-the-breach-did-not-hinder-our-acceleration. In-fact-it-helped-us-somewhat.” Slurred the architect, his words stumbling after each other in a great haste to leave his mouth, “We gained 0.1 G centripetal enhancement bringing equatorial gravity to 0.4 of standard up from 0.35. There was also an enhancement in our current course vector of 0.03G. We will need to apply a 1 mG correction at some time within the next year or so, but that should be trivial over that amount of time and the adjustments to meditation schedules have already been implemented.”
His eyes were seething with impatience and yet still the master smiled: “Very well. Now be gone, Kyton. And do not even think of asking for another link. I know it has been over a decade since I granted you one, but your service of late has not satisfied your end of the contract. Be careful. Should I choose, I would let you find yourself too close to the Orb. We wouldn’t want your hated enemy getting a hold of you would we?”
Once the architect had gone, Tyrroth allowed his smiling face to relax into a scowl. How had that infernal fiend provoked him so? He was a 13th level pa’oo capable of suppressing his emotions to the core of his soul. And yet the fiend had done it this time. Thinking back he figured it out; the architect had let slip his unnerving gaze as he described the accident and for an instant, the master had subconsciously beheld his tutor, Confucius the 3rd. How dare he! He felt that he needed to unwind… somewhere else.
Tyrroth became gaseous and floated out of the chamber through the cracks in the stone walls. Today the “sky” was uncharacteristically clear; he could see all the way to the vine covered towers on the far side; he was the only cloud in the sky. It must have rained very recently. Soon the clouds would reform, condense into precipitation and the cycle would continue.
Just then he noticed a number of shapes hovering on the far side near the axis of rotation. He sped toward them, thinking that there had been another accident. As he crossed the mile gap, steering clear of the Orb, he discovered that they were children playing in the null gravity. He slowed to watch them for a time. They took no notice, evidently assuming he was an ordinary cloud, albeit faintly bespeckled blue.
They were practicing their katas and forms, but in a way undisciplined and childish; It was play to them. Suddenly it occurred to him how important this must be to those who lived here: to train with the casual enthusiasm of a child but eventually giving in to the rigors of monastic life and the discipline associated with it. He thought of formalizing this exercise in enthusiasm, but then immediately realized the impossibility and irony of such an effort. He began to corporealize so that he could praise the children more formally.
The children gasped. Presumably a few of them recognized him from their studies. In zero gravity he drifted toward them. Those who were on the periphery cast out a few drift-stones to send themselves floating toward the cluster that he was approaching. As he got very close, he began the classical form, bending his knees and arms and rotating hands in the delicately graceful Tai Chi. One of the youngest had researched the ancient form on the Psi-Web, and began to show the older children. Soon a dozen small figures floated within Placidio in graceful motions… Tyrroth Khan Buddha at the center of them.[/sblock]
