Session 226, Part One - Several Impossible Things Before Lunchbreak
Several Impossible Things Before Lunchbreak
Just three days after the events in Alais Primos, King Baldrey held an extraordinary council meeting in Torfeld Palace. It would have been sooner, but outside agents had been invited, and needed to be given time to respond, make arrangements and travel to Risur. So, in addition to the unit (all save Rumdoom, who was ‘busy’, and in any case, not fond of too much talking, particularly after the protracted speeches he had been forced to endure in Trekhom) the following dignitaries were present:
From Risur there was Harkover Lee, Viscount Nigel Price-Hill, Stover Delft, Alden Wondermaker, Lauryn Cyneburg, Duchess Ethelyn of Shale, Hildegaard (representing Rumdoom) and the newly invested Governor Soliogn. (Thanks to her very public rescue of children on Cauldron Hill, Gale had enjoyed a late surge in support and narrowly won the Governorship of Flint only the day before. At the inauguration, King Baldrey gave a fine speech about the incredible symbolism of this moment, as it ushered in a new age both politically and ethically.)
From elsewhere came Brakken of Heffinata, Vlendham Heid (with Kvarti in tow), Morgan Cippiano and Matunaaga. Matunaaga had come a day early and spent the time with his family. Glaucia had been invited but asked Brakken to come in her stead. Cippiano was here as Aulus Atticus had also declined (so precarious was the situation in Crisillyir) and everyone had finally stopped kidding themselves about the link between the Family and the Church.
There had been a debate as to whether to invite Benedict Pemberton. Korrigan was initially unsure. Gupta successfully advocated for him (blushing only very slightly as she did so) but in the end, her effort was futile: Pemberton was invited, but declined: “Thank you, kindly, but I have too much on my plate right now. Keep me posted, though, won’t you? Let me know if I can be of any assistance.”
Gale paced – or, rather, floated – back and forth, and kept glancing around as if she expected someone to attack. She wasn’t used to formal surroundings, or the confines of a single room, however grand. (Uru realised she was right, and that bombs usually went off at moments like this. However, he resisted the urge to slip under the table, unable to sense anything out of the ordinary.) Brakken quietly read the surface thoughts of aides who came and went just in case any of them were mind-controlled.
On the king’s behalf, his Principal Minister called the meeting to order and explained its primary goal: to decide how best to deal with the threat of the looming Gyre, and thwart the Obscurati. Thanks to their successful defence of Triegenes, the unit was now in possession of the Axis Seal Ritual, handed over to them by a grateful Aulus Atticus and a reluctant Arch Secula Degaspare. Harkover now explained how to replicate that ritual:
- The ritual required a connection with eight different planes – Air, Earth, Fire, Water, Life, Death, Space, and Time. Most planes had two primary energies they could be used for. Each world chosen would lend some of its nature to the party’s homeworld.
- Any physical object could function as an icon for a world; the Ancients used gold because they had tons of it and it was long-lasting. Crafting an icon required visiting a world and channelling its native energies into an object, which it absorbed over several days (perhaps even weeks). Then you had only to mark the icon with a symbol to represent the world.
- A question mark remained over the reappearance of the sun. The ghost of Toteth Topec had told that was a last-minute inclusion. The ritual made no mention of it. Did something need to be put in the middle, or did the seal just need to be closed? (Uriel also wanted to know how the Ancients had put the seal in place to begin with, and suggested returning to talk with the ghost of Toteth Topec, if he was still haunting the High Bayou.)
- Even the colossus wasn’t strong enough to survive the energy that poured out of the breach. Additional defensive magic was required. The Ancients had specific chants performed by several hundred allies at the site of the ritual to keep the energy from going out of control. The Ob apparently used those same chants, performed in nearby bunkers, and it was working until they were sabotaged by the servants of the Voice of Rot.
Here was another threat that needed to be dealt with. Thanks to Kasvarina, the unit knew that the titan was coiled around the plane of time. What was he up to? And why did he want Kai Korrigan? Finding out the answer to that was another argument in favour of the main proposal:
That they travel to the Gyre and find the planes they needed to fix the world.
While the Ancients had as much time as they needed to make the ritual happen (notwithstanding their ongoing efforts to fend off multiple alien invasions) the unit did not have that luxury: the Gyre was drawing ever nearer, Av was close to possible destruction, and the Ob could regain the upper hand at any time.
Leon’s explorations had taught them that regular teleportation was insufficient to take them to the Gyre. Telescopes were able to provide a visual reference for teleportation to nearby worlds, and masters of the art could teleport back to anywhere they had already been. (Home; back to a world they had already visited.) But no telescope was powerful enough to draw a bead on the planar motes clustered around the Gyre. (Could they build a telescope on the outermost nearby world? No: it would still be too far, and in any case there was not enough time.)
Here, a heated but premature debate sprang up about which worlds to choose, should a solution be found. Unhappy at the idea of compounding the Ob’s arrogance, Uru advocated the status quo, though Brakken laughed at the idea of forgoing all the rich possibilities in favour of a solution chosen “ten thousand years ago by a bunch of alcoholic orcs who were high on primitive narcotics. It didn’t do them much good, either, in the long-run.”
Uriel thought that improvements could certainly be made, assuming they could reach the Gyre: “Let’s see what’s up there…”; Alden Wondermaker reminded Uru of how far their bio-tech discoveries had come this this ‘new version of the world’; Leon broached the idea of leaving things as they were right now, only fixed; Lauryn Cyneburg pointed out that the Ob’s choices had been predicated on an element of coercion and control: “We don’t have their lanterns. Do we want to hand power straight back to them?” Leon said that they would have to do that as a last resort – if they couldn’t do any better, they would need to cooperate with the Ob to fix the world and “get the sun back”. But it was agreed that if changes were made, any element of control should be avoided. Heid asked them about what they learned at the convocation, and some of the unit mentioned Reed Macbannin’s faction, Arboretum. Matunaaga reminded them that this provided no barrier to outside invasion.
Korrigan levelled with them all at this point: he felt that the isolation of the world should end. Matunaaga was unhappy at this prospect. “Consider our ongoing struggle to fend off the gidim. Their assault will never end and we cannot fight them off forever.” Korrigan disagreed. He thought they could. After all, had they not already done so? And with greater global unity and strength, and the removal of limits on mortal power, the world would be in a stronger position to resist. Matunaaga absorbed all of this and then nodded. Though no longer a member of the unit, he remained as loyal to Korrigan as ever, and yielded to his wisdom.
Now that he had their attention, the king went on to say that he may have stumbled on a way for them to reach the Gyre: He had witnessed the disappearance of Weary Enid’s vessel from the summit of Cauldron Hill, when the Gyre was overhead, and the hill was eroding. The hags had been in the process of attempting to kidnap Kai and take him to the Voice of Rot. And where was the Voice of Rot? Why, the Gyre. Divinations had proven that the Bleak Gate was also there and it was this connection which was causing the hill (and everything on it) to be eroded and drawn upward.
“So we just need to cover ourselves in soil from the hill?” asked Uru.
“Why does everything with you have to involve soil?” asked Hildegaard, before the more constructive reply that this was not necessary came from Harkover:
“You don’t have to disguise yourself as the hill. Just be on it when the Gyre moves overhead. The Mayor of the Nettles has examined this theory and confirmed it only this morning.”
Maybe it was the memory of the soil she had ingested during her scouting mission with Uru, but Quratulain was suddenly sick in her mouth – so much so, that she was forced to lift her intimidating skull mask, with its glowing red eye – revealing her young, feminine face with its haunting blue eyes – and eruct into a kerchief. This done, she quickly replaced her mask, ashamed of her vulnerability.
Concerned, Korrigan asked her telepathically if she was all right, then declared a lunch break.