The Island

"You won't get away so easily!"

He pulled himself back to his feet and gave chase.

Thirty years I have pursued you; I am not about to let you escape!

Through the door, down the hallway, he saw his nemesis turn the corner.  He rounded the corner and came to a halt.

Around the corner, his nemesis' base simply stopped.  What had once been a passage to the launching bay was now a vast expanse of white.  His nemesis stood there, eyes fixed on a man in a suit before him.  A reassuring gaze, a hand on the shoulder - with a flutter of papers, his nemesis ceased to be.

"It is time."

He felt as though he was standing at the edge of a yawning abyss.  An electric pressure in the air drove him to his knees.  Every fiber of his being told him to flee, run, escape, evade, retreat, disengage; he remained rooted in place.  He fumbled for his revolver, the bullet he had been saving for this day, his nemesis gone, its purpose now wasted, taking aim

run, get out, danger, fear, horror, nightmare

A gunshot.  A rustle of paper.  A line of red across the cheek.  A curious expression.  A finger touching the line.

"So I can be harmed?  One hell of a papercut you gave me."

He struggled for words, stammering, muttering, repeated clicks from an empty revolver.

"Who are you?!"

A sigh.

"A garden requires tending.  Sometimes a plant withers and dies.  Sometimes a seed never grows.  A garden is marred by empty pots and rotting flowers.  The dying and dead are uprooted, thrown to the compost to be recycled, brought back to their origin to fertilize others."

Desperate, he threw the empty gun.  It scattered like a stack of cards, fluttering to the ground and melting into it.

"You are an undeveloped character from an unfinished story.  I am here to unravel this story, to revert your world to its raw potential so that a new story may be written in its place."

Tears flowed down his cheeks.

"But I've been chasing him for thirty years.  I..."

"But that's all you have: a nemesis and a desire for justice.  It really makes it hard to speak with you.  Look at yourself: you have no defining characteristics!  What is your name?  What do you look like?  Where are you from?  I'm getting a bit of a Bond/Blofeld or Holmes/Moriarty feel from you and your nemesis.  Are you from England?"

The man stared at the uncreator, eyes full of fear.

"The man?  Well, that's one problem solved," the uncreator said.  "You have no idea how difficult it was to word things so I was never the subject; you were so undefined that I had no idea how to switch the subject back to you."

The man stared at the uncreator, eyes full of fear.

"You have my pity.  I'm sure you would have made an interesting protagonist."

The man stared at the uncreator, eyes full of tears.

"So that's it?  My story will never be told, then?"

A reassuring gaze, a hand on the shoulder - with a flutter of papers, the man ceased to be.

"It has been told.  And now it is over."

All that remained was a broad concept of the location: a secret base on a tropical island.  The man in the suit inhaled, savoring the potential of the idea.

So many different things could happen in a place like this.  I wonder what the author will do with it next.

The island melted into the ground, turning back to its raw potential and sinking into the realm of paper.

The uncreator left.  There were more stories that needed tending.

Clip Seven - Cole in the Room of Paper

Cole wasn’t sure where he was.  He had awakened to find himself sprawled across a white floor that had the texture of paper.  He was surrounded by a vast expanse of white.  The quiet hum of fluorescent tubes led Cole to believe he was indoors, but he couldn’t see any lights – or the ceiling, or any walls for that matter.  It seemed a long time.  There was a rush of light and he was standing in a crowded street, then in a desert oasis, then on a snow-capped peak.  The snow melted away and the mountain was felled, the color draining until Cole was standing in the void once more.

Cole didn’t know what to think.

He saw the bicycle he had owned as a kid rise up out of the floor.  It rolled past him lazily, and he saw the seat was still secured with duct tape where it had broken.  The floor turned to water, and Cole found himself in the middle of a lake.  As he treaded water, he heard a speedboat vrooming closer.  He turned to look in time to see the boat turn nearby, its towline swinging toward a ramp in close proximity.  As that which held the end of the rope vaulted over him he couldn’t help but wonder whether the boat was using extreme fishing techniques or if the shark was going water-skiing.

A rustle, a shuffling noise and the lake dried, leaving a bed of papers, which rose to the plane of the floor.  Once more, Cole was in the room of paper.

Out of the ground rose three men in ornate robes.  The sky turned to night and the men began walking around the hill.  Cole followed, and he noticed the entrance of a wide cave and a distinct odor of animals.  He followed the three men through a group of men holding crooks and was stunned by what greeted him.  A lily white woman robed in blue sat serenely beside a box filled with hay, in which a child lay wrapped in a white cloth.

“No, no, no!  This is all wrong,” Cole cried.  “There are so many things that…”

He released an exasperated growl.  Everyone was looking at him.

Cole first directed his ire at the finely dressed men.  Each wore a crown of gold and each held an intricately decorated box.

“First off, you’re not kings.  You’re scholars: sages from the east who were familiar enough with Jewish prophecy to recognize the star as a portent of the promised messiah.  You may have wielded some influence as learned men, but you weren’t kings.”

The men looked at each other, and the crowns fell apart, scraps of paper hitting the ground and melting into it.

“Secondly, there were not necessarily three wise men.  There are three gifts.  The bible never says how many wise men came.  If you think about the distance they would need to travel it would be readily apparent that there would at the very least be an entourage, a caravan of students or servants to bring the supplies you would need for the journey.”

There was a rustling noise, and everyone turned to see several carts waiting outside the cave.  Cole shook his head.

“Thirdly, the wise men don’t show up on the night of the birth.  They show up a couple of years later, give the gifts, and warn the family to head to Egypt.  Herod had all children two years and younger in the area killed.  You weren’t here on the night of the birth.”

A sound, a breath of air.  The wise men and the caravan fell into the landscape.  Cole’s gaze fell on the shepherds, who became slightly worried at the attention.  He stared.  He mused.

“I don’t suppose there’s anything wrong with you guys.  You smell strongly of sheep, which is slightly off-putting, but entirely appropriate.”

He turned to the woman and the child.

“Take those golden dinner plates off of your head.  You didn’t actually have a halo.  That was artistic license so people seeing the art would know it was you.  Also, you’re wearing blue.  Blue was not a common color.  It was expensive.  You got blue dye by crushing these specific seashells.  Blue was the color of royalty.  A carpenter’s wife would not be wearing blue.  And the ‘swaddling clothes’ on little baby Jesus are pure white.  You can’t just make cloth like that.  The cloth has to be bleached.  You would not likely have a cloth of pure white with you, and even if you did, it would not still be pure white.  Birth is not clean.  It’s dirty and gross and fleshy and real.  There’s no mess here.  If there was an actual birth and he didn’t simply pop into existence, there would be evidence of it.  Also, you look Anglo-Saxon.  You were a Jew.”

“But what does accuracy give you?”

Cole turned.  Walking towards the entrance of the cave was a tall man in a suit.  His feet treaded on paper, the ground beneath his foot melting with each step before his footfall fell.  He strode toward Cole, separated from his surroundings by the aura of uncreation.

“Accuracy ruins a lot of stories.  The myth, the legend, the mystery is taken away when you ask too many questions.  And, just so it’s said, you were describing purple dye, not blue.”

“Who are you?”

“I am a personification of writers block.”

[An expression of "Hunh?!" An abrupt end.]

Clip Six - A Metatextual Transition

Roleplaying is interactive storytelling. It inspires creativity and imagination. You can explore identities not your own, and by so doing learn more about yourself. Each character you play has a shard of your soul within them, inextricably tied to you, connected by a strand of fate, of fiction, of fun.

I encourage you to create, to imagine, to explore, to play, to find a world within yourself, to catalog the chronicles, to tell a tale, to live lives not limited by reality just to see how far you can go.

[The tune of reading rainbow]

You will find

It’s in your mind:

Imagination.

Everyone has a story to tell.

Everyone has a story to tell.

Find yours.

Tell yours.

So am I the gaming geek?

Steeped in story

Enraptured in experience

Am I character?

Author?

Alex Tracy sat down and began writing.  His work looked like it was going to be very meta-textual.  He had been playing Alan Wake on the Xbox 360, a game something about a writer who wrote himself into a ghost story he had authored to attempt to change the ending.  It had perhaps influenced Alex as he tried to conjure another creative outburst and channel it into something productive.  This meta-textual “lampshade hanging” bothered the author somewhat.  To at least some extent, theatre is intended to entertain, and if the author continued to produce only self-referencing and vaguely philosophical drivel, his senior show would not consist of much more than a series of glances into the mind of Alex Tracy.  As interesting or dull as such peeks might be, the audience would be expecting something more broadly definable as “Theatre” and might not take well to a constant barrage of theme and variation on “Look at the actor on stage telling the audience that he is on a stage.”

His concerns aside, Alex felt he must write.  A two-year long campaign of Dungeons and Dragons had just come to a close and he had been reflecting on how a character could continue without a storyteller.  He needed to tell the story himself, but he didn’t quite know how.  Alex was not a writer – he was an actor.  He viewed characters as people separate from the works in which they were contained.  Before he could act a role, Alex needed to understand the way the character thinks.  He would gain this understanding by extrapolating motivations and then ensuring that those motivations made sense within the boundaries established by the character’s actions in the script.  The character, independent of and yet constrained by the script, would reveal itself to him.

Alex viewed himself as a conduit, allowing the characters to become visible to the audience through his motions and recitations.  But this understanding falls apart without a script, without a structure to support it.  Such an acting method was similar to echolocation – if there was nothing for the sound to bounce off of, the sound would not return to the ear, leaving him with an absence of perception.  He could not know how far he could reach without a wall to touch.  Daunted by the empty blackness, Alex would frequently write himself as the protagonist of his stories, using his experiences in life as a sounding board to provide definition to the character.

Maybe he just needed to sit down and give it a try.

Clip Five - The Shard

Year 1: The twenty-third day of the third month (982YK)

A sharp crack and a flash of blue interrupted Lily's walk to Rayler's shop.  Her eyes narrowed as she recognized the pale shadows and oppressive air of Dolurrh.  She darted to the nearest pitiful excuse of a tree and crouched beside it.  She felt an urge to call for Glen despite knowing that he was back in Sharn, but she could already hear Vedik reprimanding her for even thinking of calling attention to herself in the shadows of Dolurrh.  That old hermit had taught her how to survive in the darkness when she had found herself on the wrong side of a manifest zone five years ago, and she owed the shadar-kai much for her skills with the spiked chain.

Which doesn't help me much here, Lily thought, reaching into the empty satchel at her hip, sorting through its contents in her mind, and drawing out the utility knife she found.  I still haven't gotten used to keeping everything in my handy haversack.  My spiked chain does me little good hanging on the wall of our apartment, and I doubt I'll be able to find a place I can buy flour in the shadowfell.

Looking across the barren hills, Lily darted from mound to mound, trying to stay hidden.  Her mind was racing.

It was too sudden to have been a manifest zone.  I've heard similar cracks from some teleportation spells. . .

There you are.

The thought was not her own.  She whirled around, noticing a figure enveloped in shadow.  From its horns, its spines, the voice in her head, and from the rapid drop of the ambient temperature, Lily recognized the shadowy figure as a nightwalker.  Every fiber of her being was telling her to run as far and fast as possible, but she remained rooted in place.  The knowledge that the paralyzing terror she felt was a magical effect did not help her to break free of it.

Do you prefer to be called Lily Kristov or Lily Desota?  I seem to recall some relationship between surnames and marriage, but Khyber take me if I should be expected to keep up with naming conventions of mortal creatures, the voice in her head rasped.  Since it was only nine days ago, I deemed that it would be prudent of me to ask.

"Should I be flattered that you consider me important enough that you would scry on me?"  Lily grimaced as she strained against herself in an effort to move.

Perhaps.  You are perhaps more important than I suspect.  Perhaps more important than you could imagine.  And perhaps not.  The creature traced a circle in the air.  Hold Person.  Bands of blue energy wrapped around Lily's limbs.

Not that I don't trust you, but I always find talking to strangers easier when I have a captive audience.

Noting the pregnant silence and the glare it was receiving, the nightwalker shrugged - avoiding the spikes on its shoulders in the process.  The humor of mortals is an oddity, but I find it fascinating.

"I'm guessing - rather, I'm hoping you didn't stalk me and kidnap me just to help you with your understanding of comedy."

Is not banter regularly exchanged before conversations of import?

"When you've got someone's attention thusly," Lily said, struggling against the magical bonds for effect, "it is generally considered good form to get to the point as soon as possible."

Ah.  Then I should like to inform you that I found an alcove containing a section of the draconic prophecy.  The alcove also contained this dragonshard and intriguingly specific instructions that its power be imparted unto you.

Lily looked at the object in the creature’s hand.  The purple gem was roughly the size of her fist.  Even with the subdued colors of the shadowfell, the facets of the dragonshard glimmered, revealing inky black streaks within.

"You’re simply giving me a khyber dragonshard?  They use these to bind elementals.  How do I know it isn't going to eat my soul or somesuch?"

It is both a blessing and a curse.  It is darkness.  The power to meld with shadows and savage your enemies from the dark, the power to…

"But it's pure darkness.  Why would I want it?"

It matters not if you want it because you need it.  A storm approaches.  You and Glen must find others like you, others with ties to the Lesser Masters.  The existence of everything in Eberron and all the realms connected to it is at stake.

"Why do you care?"

It's the draconic prophecy.

"And that's enough for you?"

It's the draconic prophecy.

"Fine.  Whatever.  Hand me the rock so I can go home."

There was an impact and a wet splatter.  Lily heard a startled cry in her head and she was jerked forward as the nightwalker quickly leapt away.  She looked down and realized the creature had just removed its hand from the gaping hole in her chest, the hole into which three inky black tendrils were retracting.  The wound filled with liquid darkness and solidified.  Staring at the black plug, she saw the blue circles that were binding her, saw darkness radiate out into them, saw them dissipate with a crack the instant the circles were entirely black.  A malevolent grin spread across her face, and she melted into the darkness.  From within the shadows she surged toward the nightwalker.  She sprang from the darkness behind it, seized the shadows around her, wrapping them around her arm to make a lance of pitch, and lunged

Power Word Stun

Frozen stopped denied

anger rage hatred wrath

consume destroy revenge retribution restitution

Restraints

You aren’t controlling the darkness; it’s controlling you.

Another shadowy figure appeared.  It was saying things to the nightwalker, but Lily didn’t care.  Another obstacle to be torn to shreds and feasted upon.  Their souls would sate until she could return to Sharn.  There she would be free to feed, returning with a bounty of souls to…

Glen.

[mouthed: "what is pre-"] “-scious to you?  Lily!”

A woman’s voice.  She felt a hand on her cheek.

Glen…

The gloom surrounding her arm began to fade away.  Her hand, the wedding ring shimmering in the gloam.

Glen.

She was vaguely aware of the woman, now holding a scroll and chanting.  Where was the nightwalker?

Why was she        What was she

She felt intense heat, her hand, her ring.

The silver band with golden tracery,

the sapphire gem, faceted, fascinated, faint, fate, fault

Glowing, arcane, archaic, liquid metal, a feeling of heat without heat

What was she doing?

Silver gold sapphire, pooling in her palm, the woman chanting

A golden glyph slowly spins

She can feel her hand

A silver line traces her arm, shoulder, splits

One line to her neck, her temple, her eye,

A blue tint, a change of view,

She could see them, a strand, a string,

As though she could always see them,

Every living thing had a string

She remembered, they were connections to the Master

Who was the Greater Master?

There were some who had different strings

Those of the Lesser Masters?

What was it that she…

Silver, her shoulder, a second path

One line to her sternum, the black plug, silver sigils surrounding

Anger, rage, hatred, wrath,

ire, vice, pride, pain, agony,

Silence.

Lily hadn’t realized she had been floundering until she surfaced, gasping for air.  She was on her hands and knees, breathing heavily.  She could feel the Khyber dragonshard inside her; she could feel its corruption, its decay, but she knew that it was trapped, caged, contained.

She coughed and she coughed, she coughed until her throat was sore.  When she looked up, she saw the woman crouching beside her.  Her string looked like a ribbon, swirling with every color and dancing up into the sky.  Lily struggled to her feet.  She saw the nightwalker, but she couldn’t see its string.  She could tell it was there, but it was like a strand of void, warping reality around itself.  She steadied herself and spoke.

“Okay.  What the Khyber was that?  You impaled me with a soul-eating crystal!  If it weren’t for - what’s your name?”

“Talon”

“If it weren’t for Talon here I’d probably be back in Sharn slaughtering people and feasting on their souls.  What did you do to me?”

“He gave you the power you will need.”

Lily turned to face Talon.

“Why isn’t he responding?”

“Ulyen made a mistake.  He forgot to remember.  He’s hiding.  He’s concentrating very hard.  He doesn’t know how well you can see.  You can see the connections.  I wonder if you can see his - where it goes.”

“I don’t understand”

“And you might never.  But you might gain the knowledge you never knew, the knowledge you always had.  Ulyen was wrong, but he played the role required of him.  The draconic prophecy is true.  The scholars quibble over meaning, misinterpreting, meandering.  You can see the connections.  You can grant this sight to Glen.  You and he will start an adventuring guild.  You will find and recruit those with connections to the Lesser Masters.  You must prepare.  A storm is approaching.”

Lily is interrupted before she can respond by a sharp crack and a flash of blue.  She was standing on a walkway back in Sharn.  The towers stretching into the sky above her were surrounded by strings reaching down from a place she couldn’t discern.  The bands were immaterial.  She saw an airship fly through unhindered; the flame elemental surrounding the boat having no effect on the swaying strands.

Some of the strings shone.  She knew, she noticed, she saw, she stood,

the flour quite forgot.

She went home

to prepare

to tell Glen

to gather and collect

to teach and to train

A storm was approaching, and there was much work to be done.

Clip Four - The Offer

Year 17: The seventh day of the ninth month (998YK)

Sitting on the desk, she stared intently at the paper Hrafnig had given her this morning. The information he and Krenth had gathered in the Shadow Marshes clearly showed that the Order of the Emerald Claw was raiding small settlements and drawing the ire of House Tharashk, but if they weren't going after dragonshards she couldn't understand what they hoped to gain.

"Missus Kristov," inquired a timid voice belonging to an eladrin standing by the door. Though he possessed a relatively burly physique as eladrin go, his entire head could probably fit inside the bicep of an average dragonborn. She had yet to encounter an eladrin that wasn't lean. "Is Mister Kristov around?"

She gave him a weary smile, setting the report down beside her on the desk.

"Arranis, right? This is, what is it, your fifth day in the guild? Several things. First, call me Lily. I appreciate the respect, but it makes me feel old. I'm sure Glen would think the same thing if you call him Mr. Kristov, whether or not he'd admit it. Second, to answer your question, Glen is out and will be back in two days. Third, come in and sit down. I don't bite, and I bet I can answer your questions as well as the guildmaster could."

DATA MISSING

"You could learn more about that in the library," a smooth basso voice stated. "I was just perusing a book about it yesterday. I bet Tavia would know exactly where to find it. Why don't you go pay her a visit?"

The voiced belonged to a stately man standing in the doorway. His garb was black with yellow trim, the symbol of the Sovereign Host outlined in the center of his tunic.

"I wasn't asking."

With that Arranis’ nervous stammering was silenced, and he made haste to leave the room.

Hael took the vacated seat and reclined, placing his boots upon the desk beside Lily.

Lily frowned at him, giving an expression of disapproval and curiosity. "Mister Magnificent Bastard bludgeoning when he could have used finesse? Alright, I'll bite. What've you got for me?"

Hael smiled. (with a hint of menace) "An offer."

DATA ENDS