Callthecops — Roleplayer Guild

Cool, well I've spent a few minutes working on some ideas that I just got in terms of world-building that I'll share here. I'm glad to have found you again and I hope we can work together some more. They're not terribly refined or anything for the record, but I think I've got the point across well enough.

Edit: also, how long ago did this desolation occur/start?

So first, the idea of the “Dark Library” potentially holding the secrets of whatever “magic” exists in this world made me think of words and chanting magic rituals. Then, there are these old gods that people are all praying to, even though they’re being ignored. This led me to a conception of magic in a similar vein to the Pioroa Shamans, an indigenous Amazonian tribe living in modern Venezuela. A summary of their magic is essentially that there exists a set of “Before Time” Gods, who were violent and brutal, engaging in constant warfare with eachother using the powerful magic that existed in the “Before Time.” Now, in the present, Shamans can use a powerful chant language (within psychedelic trances) to shift their spirits into the “Before Time” and access the magic there in order to re-write the history of the present time in order to heal sicknesses, make rain, ect.

Where I’m going with this is that maybe this Dark Library really is just a library containing the vast language of a time before the Gods died. So far all of our prayers have failed, because we did not know the right words to pray with. At first, once we’ve made it into the library proper, we start finding simple words that produce light, make grass appear, maybe even coat a sword in fire… But then the deeper we travel into the library the more powerful and deadly the chants become. As they become more complex, these chants force their user to interact with dark, malevolent Gods of death and warfare like the Vukash. Maybe there are some peaceful Gods too (though they likely won’t have the power to defeat our enemy). 

Then the party is going to have to face the moral issues of dealing with these Gods, paying the prices they demand, the dark visions and planes of the “Before Time” (do they start to corrupt?), and whatever else people come up with. I’ll stop here for now so that other people can see what they think and maybe add in some more stuff before I try to unilaterally hijack the magic thing but yeah, that’s what I’ve got so far.

Club Akakarah – 2:43 am

The still night air of the African port city felt cool as the southerly Spanish breeze rolled across the Straight of Gibraltar into what was long ago called ‘The Interzone.’ Down in the harbor district, old smuggling dens now held one of the Arab world’s darkest underground nightclubs, Akakarah. Out back, in the former warehouse’s damp cobblestoned loading bay, a heavy iron door was flung open, as the deep, shifting pulse of electronic music poured out into the night. Two men in dark grey muscle shirts drag a well-dressed partier through the door and give him a good shove, sending him stumbling on his feet into the open.

“Fuck you! Ya piece o’ shit cocksuckers! That guy had it coming to him!” As the lone man slurred limp-dicked insults in what vaguely sounded like a British accent, one of the bouncers stepped forward with purpose. He wore a look of dispassionate disgust on his face, only partly obscured by a thick, full beard. As the bouncer raised his arms into a fighting stance, a look of fear cast over the young Brit’s face. Underneath the heavily crisscrossed scars earned from some deep lacerations, the kid could almost make out an Army Rangers tattoo.

“You want to act like a little shit, and get away with it? Go to fucking Miami.” The brutality was over in seconds. A sharp right hook to the jaw, a knee in the stomach, and a hard shove into wet cobblestone. “Welcome to Tangier, kid.” Growled the grizzled, American Ex-Pat, “Don’t you fucking ever come back.”

The second bouncer, a tough looking Moroccan native, finally stepped away from the door and let the poor bastard’s friends come out and help carry him away. “What a joke, isn’t it Paul?” He said in Darija, the Moroccan Arabic dialect.

Paul shook out his right hand, still a bit bloody and sore from another scrap he had been in a few nights ago. “Life is a fucking joke, Saeed, my friend. That’s why we drink.” Paul flashed a quick smile and pulled out a cigarette, “Want one?”

Tangier, Morocco – 6:17 am

Even early in the morning, the Medina in Tangier bustled with life. The market smelled of freshly baked bread and spices, the sounds of chopping and cutting, pounding and grounding, only pierced by the squeals and squawks of those animals destined to meet the butchers’ block. As Paul stumbled through the crowd, exhausted and half drunk from his shift at the club, he massaged his right hand, the hard, calloused knuckles busted open from contact with too many faces. Distracted by the damage, the Ex-Pat hardly noticed the out of place Suit approaching, envelope in hand. “Open this when you’re alone.” He said, shoving the envelope into Paul’s hands as he pushed past.

Paul stood still for a moment in confusion, his mind heavy, before whipping around in panic. He started after the strange man but quickly realized that he had been lost in the thick crowds mobbing the marketplace.

“Oh, fuck.”

Apartment of Paul Graves – 6:53 am

Congratulations Paul Graves,

Paul raised a shot of whiskey to his lips, his still bloodied hand trembling, spilling more booze on the floor than down into his liver. He slammed the shot down on the table and then swiped it off the table, hardly caring as it shattered against the floor. A highball glass took its place on the table, next to a notebook filled with poetry, a .45 caliber handgun, and that damn letter.

You have been selected for the Vorace Lalune Award for Excellence. You will find your plane ticket inside this envelope, as well as a credit card for you to pay for any expenses you may need to cover. The pin number for the card is 0822. Use it as needed.

Your boss has already been informed of your sudden departure and your spot at work will be held for you during your week vacation. 

Au revoir,

Agatha Lalune


Ice skittered haphazardly as a frenzied Paul cracked an ice-tray, somehow managing to score enough into the glass for his purposes. As whiskey flowed into the glass, things started to get blurry. Paul downed it all in one go. It all went black.

Somewhere over Spain – July 1st

Truth was out there somewhere, and Paul knew he was just about to reach it. All around was empty void. Darkness and despair. A white light appeared in the distance, illuminating a grey mist surrounding everything in all directions. So thick that it seemed like nothing else existed in the whole world. Or maybe nothing else did exist. Nothing but this mist. Paul swam weightlessly toward the light, drawing closer and closer until he found it’s source. A beautiful woman, her pale skin giving off a brilliant light, and washing away even the shadows cast behind Paul as he floated toward her, arm outstretched. Drifting closer and closer he could feel the warmth of her glow, filling him with such beauty and wonder. He reached out, softly searching for a cheek to rest upon. But just as he was about to feel her skin beneath his fingers, she started to fade away. Like smoke, twirling off the end of a cigarette, she began to evaporate, dispersing into the void. Becoming again what she once was, her light disappeared as she joined the mist. Once more, only darkness remained.

Spain – 3:26

Paul woke from his dream with a start. “Where the fuck am I?” He asked aloud, his lips more comfortable with those syllables than was healthy. The past few days came back to him in bits and pieces, all of it was blurry, and even of that, a great deal was indecipherable. What was clear however, was that he was currently on a private plane, and that he was headed for France. He wasn’t handcuffed either, which was a good sign.

Within a few moments, an almost disgustingly pleasant flight attendant appeared, speaking with a far too cute French accent. “Hello sir, I hope you’ve had a restful sleep.” She smiled, “Can I get you any thing to drink? Coffee maybe?” The girl was good, Paul noticed. He couldn’t tell whether she knew how fucked up he had been or not. Still kind of floating around in his head, Paul was pretty sure he had just been on a pretty heavy mescaline binge. He definitely needed the coffee.

“Uh… Shit. Uh, yeah thanks. How about booze? You got anything for this edge?” Paul answered.

The girl almost lost her seemingly constant smile at that, nearly betraying that ‘I don’t think you need any more, sir’ kind of look. “Is Irish cream in the coffee okay?”

“Yeah, whatever, that’s fine. Thanks.” Paul stood up as she left and made his way to the bathroom. Washing his face in the mirror, Paul recognized that dead look in his eyes that always followed a few days like the ones he’d just had. What he didn’t recognize was the shirt he was wearing. It was white and dotted with small multicolored feathers, probably designer. It seemed more like something his father would have worn. Paul rolled up the sleeves, exposing the latticework of scars covering his thick forearms. That was definitely not something his father would have worn so comfortably, but Paul was proud of the pain. It had made him who he was.

After returning to his seat he found the coffee and his black rucksack all there for him. Looking through his bag, Paul found no weapons, which was probably alright considering from all appearances that by some insane chance, this trip was legitimate. There had been no reason to panic all along. He did find though, unsurprisingly, a pill bottle full of mescaline, and about an eight-ball’s worth of coke. The mescaline he left in the bag, but the coke he slipped into his pocket. Finally, he pulled out his notebook and decided to write for the remainder of the flight.

Bordeaux–Mérignac Airport – Late Afternoon

As the plane descended through the clouds, Paul downed the last of those three fingers of scotch he had been provided after the coffee. It couldn’t be a bad place that he was headed, so long as they were serving better whiskey than the usual Tangier rot-gut he was used to. Tearing two pages out of his notebook, Paul moved to crumple them up, but hesitated before standing up and folding them into his back pocket as he made his way to the bathroom again. Once inside he made sure to lock the door as he pulled out the coke he had been holding on to and tapped out a line on the sink counter. A subdued, but undoubtedly wonderful euphoria washed over Paul just as he washed his face, the cool trickle of water droplets dripping from his thick beard highlighted by his attention to sensory phenomena. He closed his eyes and gave over to the feeling of falling through the sky, losing track of time until suddenly the plane went wheels down. It was time to face whatever the hell it was that he had just signed up for.

Stepping down on the airfield, Paul embraced the light easterly breeze rolling in from the sea tempering the heat radiating off the tarmac. At the bottom of the stairs stood a man in a suit, “Welcome to France, Monsieur Graves. Please, allow me to show you to the car.”

‘The car’ it turned out, was really a limonene. Paul’s skeptical gaze and dilated eyes were hidden behind a pair of stylish sunglasses, (which much like his shirt he had no idea how he had come to own). But as he was ushered into the vehicle he saw he was not alone. Was she another poet here for the award? She didn’t look like the dangerous type at least, and Paul was still pretty low key messed up and feeling good anyways. Pulling the folded pages from his pocket, Paul proceeded to toss them onto the seat next to his fellow passenger. “Here, I don’t want this anymore, but I can’t bring myself to destroy it either. Hold on to that for me.”

If she picked it up, it would read:

She is the early fog that hangs beyond the woods,
Longing to be wrapped between spruce and pine,
And yet still, though her blood is the essence of its hemlock,
She has no place in these woods.

For she is the veil between worlds uncrossed,
Who resides perpetually beyond this world of light,
Casting shadows darker than black winter nights,
Concealing forever the stars in this forest without trees.

Yet neither does she belong to the village beyond,
Never shall she blanket its earthen walls,
And though her essence runs through their veins,
She is no lady of the town.
For she lies in the fields unseen,
Neither substance nor void,
She is the edge of this world, from which chaos emerged.
Before there was time- she lied in wait.
Giving suddenly- shape to the bounds of emptiness,
And that which would pass from the dark to be born as light.
She is no creator, yet uncreated she simply appears with the dawn
Her name is Achlys, for she is Mist.
She is misery.
It is from her sorrow that all takes form.

--

I am the lost whispers of words never spoken.
I am the comfort of the cool oasis water,
While desert sand runs down your throat.
I am the scent of a flower without petals,
And from its seeds I sow the soil with doubt,
In a garden made of rocks.

I am the brother of sweet dreams and night terrors.
Beyond the realm of sleep,
I am the waking visions of scenes unreal.
Both something and nothing,
Substance and void,
I walk among these village folk,
The only man to have seen the trees.

But yet, I do not know from whence I came,
For I have known many mothers.
Cradled by both flesh and branch,
Born of both woman and wilds.
I am afraid to open my eyes,
And at once behold two skies.
One as black as the other, blue.
And yet, I refuse to be blind,
Instead I stumble through the forest,
As I wander through the streets.
Lost within endless plurality, I cling to the arms of men,
Finding only dead bark beneath my fingers.
I crawl towards the mist.

--

For she stands, still between two halves,
Neither the end of the world, nor the bounds of nothing,
She is the hope that I might be whole again.
As I break from the trees, and leave behind these dirty cobblestones,
Split visions like split bodies become one, here.
Where she is the early fog that hangs over this field where I wander.
But so too is she the lost.
She is the pale spirit of suffering,
Her slit wrists spill tears,
Streaks of blood run from her eyes.
But she who has seen beyond time
Shall take no comfort in my ephemeral embrace.
Still I fall to my knees and weep beside her.

Knowing I am illusion.
Something that remains nothing,
I reside at the edge of the earth, and beyond the bounds of nothing.
So, unable to take form, she slips fast from my fingers,
And though my hand is laid upon her face, I can feel only sorrow.

Neither substance nor void,
Her name is Achlys, for she is Mist.
She is misery.

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