Reuben Cabot: 3/12/97 (unknown date)
Cab's vision left us all with a lot to think about. In the meantime, we were in a place that I knew nothing about, but I intended to learn what I could. I started by examining the prime patterns of the place: the patterns were there, but only barely. They flickered like a fluorescent light bulb about to burn out. Great. I tried to look sideways and saw absolutely nothing - just a blank wall separating us from this world and whatever might be next to it.
I looked to Dog, who had crossed with the others. He was pacing nervously, something that was distinctly out of character for him. *What do you think about this place?* I asked.
He lifted his head, sniffed loudly, and wrinkled his nose. *It stinks.*
Lots of help there. I realized that I was very tired, having spent the last twelve hours or so constantly drumming. I could have banished the weariness, but I decided to save my strength - I didn't know what sort of resources were available in this place. We agreed that we would sleep in shifts, and I went to where my bedroom would be in the Chantry in reality.
The door to my room opened with a creak. All of the furniture was there, but it was as if someone had abandoned the place many years ago - dust covered everything, and the paint on the walls was peeling. I shook the bedspread free of dust and sneezed. I lay down on the bed and Dog jumped up next to me, snuggling close for security. I fell asleep with one arm thrown around him.
After four hours or so, Cab came in and woke me up. I shook my head and stretched to wake up. I felt a little better, but I'm not sure whether only four hours of sleep helped or hurt me. I went into the living room and looked around at the dimness. I took up my drum again and started a low beat to keep the spirits at bay, similar to what I had done the night before. Maybe it was necessary, maybe it wasn't, but it helped to pass the time. Time slipped by as I was in a semi-trance state, and soon it was evening. Or I thought it was evening. My watch said it was 7:30 PM, and the dimness outside got darker, anyway.
Kasee showed up a little after that, stretching and yawning. She watched me for a few minutes, then asked if she could help. I had her sit next to me and handed her my drum. I clapped out a rhythm, showing her where to hit the head of the drum to produce the different tones. Once she had it, she continued playing for a bit, then thanked me and passed the drum back to me.
The others had started to wake up and were once again assembling in the living room. No food was to be found in the kitchen, so Renee thought for a moment, then concentrated and produced a cold, cooked chicken. Interesting. If she could manipulate matter patterns that way, maybe I could do the same thing with life patterns. I grabbed a small amount of prime (there wasn't much to be had) and created a bunch of bananas and some kiwis. Renee looked at me and said, "Kiwis?"
I shrugged. "They're high in vitamin C," I offered.
As we ate, Eric sat down on the sofa and seemed to tune us out. After a while he sat up straight with a cry. He stood up, then quickly fell back to the sofa. "Don't meditate for quintessence here," he gasped. "There isn't any to be had."
Renee and I rushed to his side - he had been hurt pretty badly. Renee healed him a little, then I tried. Neither of us were all that successful. I was startled by a tap on my shoulder - Mary was standing behind us, watching. She knelt beside me and put her hands on Eric, as Renee and I had done, and I watched as she, too, worked to reinforce Eric's life patterns. When she was done, he was healed. I shook my head in bemusement. Damn, is there nothing this girl doesn't do?
Dog and I walked to the front door of the Chantry and looked out. There was a blighted forest all around the house, and the smell was musty. Looking out beyond the clearing of the house, I could just barely see a black tendril snaking through the woods. I guessed that was what we were supposed to follow. Stepping outside onto the porch, I felt as if the world were closing in on me. After a bit, the feeling diminished, but it was always there a little, nagging.
We struck out as a group, once everyone was fed, following the black tendril. We passed through a somewhat denser forest. I tripped on fallen, half-rotted branches from time to time. Dog, predictably, never had a misstep. After a half-hour's walk on the wide path that wound through the woods, we passed a huge building that seemed to be falling in upon itself. I stared at the building as we walked past it, trying to figure out why some of the contours looked familiar.
"It's Crabtree." Renee's voice broke the near-silence we had been walking in.
"What?"
"The building. It's Crabtree Valley Mall."
Looking closer, I could see she was right - it looked like Crabtree Valley might look in a few hundred years, in some post-apocalyptic world. I shuddered and dismissed the thought. We circled around the mall and turned onto another path that would have been Creedmoor Road, still following the tendril. The topography changed as we walked, and began to look less and less like the skeleton of Raleigh that had at least seemed a little comforting. When we came to Wade Avenue, the similarity stopped altogether as we walked out of the forest and found ourselves at the edge of a vast desert. The tendril continued out into the arid land.
We stopped for lunch. My watch said it was 2 AM, but in the perpetual half-light of this place, it was hard to say whether that had any relevance or not. Kasee was munching on a candy bar she had brought, when she suddenly stood up. "Look! There's someone there watching us."
We looked in the direction she pointed, back towards downtown, to see a man-shaped figure standing unmoving, watching us. He was easily a half- or three-quarter mile away, so we were unable to make out any features on his face. He didn't seem to move or pose any kind of threat, so we ignored him for the moment. Renee, who had been staring at a spot on the ground for the past few minutes, looked up with a perplexed expression on her face. "I can't make food here."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I usually can convert prime energy to matter. But there's no prime here. And the things that seem solid, made of matter - aren't. That rock over there isn't made of matter. I don't know what it's made of, but it isn't matter."
Resigned to skipping "lunch," we struck out into the desert. As we walked, we kept looking over our shoulders at the figure behind us. He seemed to follow, but even as he followed, he became smaller. Yes, this does tend to violate the laws of perspective. Meanwhile, in front of us we began to see something shimmering on the horizon - something big. Of course, the tendril pointed directly to it. At around the same time it resolved itself into a huge walled city, the figure behind us shrank to a small blob, then disappeared. Only to reappear about 20 yards in front of us.
It seems it wasn't a blob at all, but an owl. It spread its wings and gave a loud "Hoo! Hoo!" Walks All Paths waved us to a stop, saying, "Wait. I know who this is now."
He walked forward slowly. He reached into a bag around his neck and pulled out something and offered it to the bird. The owl snapped it up in its beak and began to grow. He grew until he became human. Shaking himself (in a very birdlike way, in spite of his current form) he said, "It took you long enough."
As the garou and the man talked in low tones for a few moments, I notice that the back of the werewolf's jacket seemed to bulge outwards a bit. He reached back and started to scratch, then Renee walked forward and helped him take off his jacket. As he did, large wings spread out behind him. A look of wonderment crossed his face, then he fell to one knee and said, "Thank you for your gift, Owl."
The man called Owl nodded, then gestured to the city in the distance with his chin. "See that? That's a place called Stygia. You'll have to go there, 'cause that's where the tendril goes. There's a wraith there named Lord Balthazar. Seek him out, Strider, and show him your gift. He will help you."
Walks All Paths nodded. "Thank you for your advice, Great Spirit." Owl waved him off and started walking back the way we had come. In the space between heartbeats, he disappeared, leaving us alone in the desert again.