[Taocow PBEM] Fwd: Chapter XIII - Of Prophecies and Visions - Resend

[Aaron Clausen]

On 8/1/07, Aaron Deskins <aarondesk at yahoo.com> wrote:
> [Carlos] "This Bruth may have more information, but I'm a man of
> action. We need less talk in this little group and more action," says
> Carlos. He is intent on getting more weaponry, wizardry, or anything
> that will help in the fight against the demons. [/Carlos]

[GM]
As the conversation proceeds, Alex, Amanda, Bongo and Talas remember a
conversation back in Ireland:

"That House of Wyrm emblem again." Bongo said as he dug into his pancakes.

"It keeps popping up everywhere," Alex mumbled.

Bongo put down his plate and fumbled around in his pack and pulled out a
small metal strongbox, the symbol of the dragon on the lid identical to that
on the key.

"Rod, you remember asking me about that journal?" Bongo asked, "Well let's
see." Bongo opened the lid. All that remained in the small box was a travel
guide to Chicago (clearly pre-Rifts) and the journal with the name "Quinton
David Barnabas" written on it. The dog boy gently opened the book, which, in
daylight, looked old and brittle. The first page had a sketch of a young
woman, no more than twenty years old. Beneath it was written the name Lovely
S'talza.

"Name mean anything?" Bongo asked before flipping to the next page. At the
top was the date, February 3, 2150. "Hmmm, in the old dating calendar,"
Bongo mused, "That would put this journal at over two hundred years old."

"I know that name," Amanda confessed, "I had a dream that I was her. Finish
what you're saying, then I'll tell you about it."

The journal spanned about six weeks and seemed to describe a mission by
Barnabas, on behalf of the High Priest of She Who Has No Name, to follow
this pale-skinned demon, the K'murd-faka and prevent him from raising the
Gods of Chaos. With him was a young woman, S'talza, descendant of the heroes
of Old Earth (apparently Barnabas's lover, by the number of highly
descriptive love poems written about her) and a lizard man named Griz.

About a week into their journey (February 10, 2150), Griz disappeared late
in the night. They searched for the lizard man, but found no trace. They
caught up with the K'murd-faka demon and an army somewhere along the
Atlantic coast in the Old American Empire. Bongo muttered about wishing he
had that map he'd been asking about.

"The last entry," Bongo said finally, "indicates that he and S'talza
actually found the Temple of Rath-Iren, though the demon had arrived their
first. They were going to try to reach something called the Hall of Gates,
to, as Barnabas says here, 'correct the balance and prevent the Gods of
Chaos from unleashing unspeakable atrocities. Unfortunately, it doesn't
exactly how, and I still don't know how we figure into it."

"So apparently this temple must be somewhere back in North America," Bongo
sighed, "We ended up a lot farther away than we should have. Maybe we should
get back on that ship!"

Alex just shook her head with her greens eyes flashing something close to
anger—maybe annoyance would be a better word. She stated after a moment, "If
the year is what they say it is, it will not do any good but if it was our
time, we might be able to catch a ride on a Triax transport."

"That's a good possibility. Since what I remember from my dream had me still
back home in the U.S. The first part anyways."

Amanda paused, trying to collect herself enough to relate what she knew. "My
dream had two clear pieces to it. One was of my old friends. They were
talking, but the only word I heard was my name. There wasn't any other
sound. Then we were standing at a map. I couldn't tell what it was a map of
but had a name on it. Rath-Iren."

She spelled the name out to make sure she was pronouncing it correctly.

Phaeton nodded grimly, but said nothing.

Amanda stood up and moved to the plates of food, examining things slightly
to make sure she recognized it before taking anything.

Alex continued. "Then the dream got weird. And I mean that with the last few
weeks in mind. I was with a man, he was calling me S'talza and he had a ring
with that emblem on it. Nice big ring, Ivana Trump'd have choked on it. He
wanted to get pictures of a temple and a ritual back to Lazlo and had a
digital camera, maybe that one.

"Then we were tied up being sacrificed to some dark force. A man, that pale
guy from the ship, called him Quinton Barnabas. Quinton told S'talza to
remember the box. Quote: 'Just beyond the altar, beneath the grey paving
stone'.

"Then they killed him and I was running, but I don't know how I got loose.
Next thing I know, I'm being woken up by you."

She turned to Bongo. "One, any idea who that woman was a descendant of? And
two, what do you need a map for when you have me?"

Alex reached into her purse and pulled out her PDA. Starting it up she began
searching through it's files for the old Encarta encyclopedia program.

Bongo shrugged. "The name S'talza doesn't ring any bells with me, but at
least we now know of one place to ask; Lazlo. It's a little out of our way,
though and I didn't think that Lazlo even existed that far back in time."

When Bongo caught site of the PDA he let out an, "Oooh, that's really old!
Look up these co-ordinates."

Phaeton sat down for a moment, then got up again, seeming quite agitated.
"Clearly you have had a vision of Rath-Iren and these people, S'talza and
Barnabas, whoever they may be, are important as well, if for no other reason
than that is how you got that metal box."

"It seems we have a problem then. I am no expert but being on the other side
of the planet poses a problem. It seems the answers to our problems are in
America and returning there should be our first priority".

Kyle then grabbed a plate of food and began eating and continuing to take in
as much of the conversation as possible. As he dug in, Amanda's PDA with its
archaic software popped up information on Ashe County, North Carolina. The
area was in the Appalachians and was one of the more lightly populated areas
of that state at that time.

[/GM]

-- 
Aaron Clausen   mightymartianca at gmail.com
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