Saturday, May 14, 2016

A Mess

Just to get this off my computer.

THINGS TO SEE ON THE CANALS OF COLCVIIC
1. Platform of crooning singer-boatmen in their traditional tin masks, harmonizing to an old peacetime tune of ‘O Idol Ikon’. They are disheveled, wandering.
2. Drug-ruined river-dreamers who float on their backs amidst layers and layers of gaudy golden cloaks, streamers and sashes trailing underneath them like jellyfsh stings, thin opiate smoke issuing from their toothless mouths.
3. A rotting pier collapsing into a canal, seabirds scattering into the air, someone splashing amidst the sprinters and foam and filth, screaming.
4. Disinterested submarine giants standing around, the tops of their palid, mottled scalps just barely touching the water’s surface. They’re watching surface-dwellers and frowning deeply.
5. A merchant houseboat breaks away from its moorings during exchange. The merchant herself is aggravated but willing to wait until the exchange is completed as per custom. Just below the waterline, diminutive Guild agents affix hooks to the houseboat and prepare to swim it out to sea.
6. Shrouded, silent watchers with muskets monitor you from the highest rooftops, their footing sure on steep, decaying shingles. 

POWERS THAT BE
1. The Variegated Guild—also known as the Guild On High, The Face, The Guilt, the Practical Associates. They have faces in opium trafficking along the river.
2. The Damned Clan, sprawling, teeming, legally-bound but not blood-related family. Mercenary-inclined, tattoo fingerprints on random parts of their bodies but scour smooth their original ones.
3. Sun-Eaters, representatives of Resplendent IV. They're trying to eat the sun.
4. Of The Polyp Genesis, mutagenic dabblers, butchers, and a significant source of food for all Colcviic. All butchery and disposal of the dead is overseen by their members. No-one questions the fact that some meat has to be plucked free of teeth during the winters.

THINGS YOU CAN START WITH
1. Polyp Renegade—Oilcloth bag full of terratomas, rimfire shotgun with 6 shells, 6 oil flasks.
2. River Rat—Ratcatcher pole, 5' twine, thick leather gloves and collar (AC 1), bitter lozenge (re-roll v. Poison once), work orders.
3. Canal Showboater—Ornamented brass kidney-belt (AC 1), slashed-and-puffed shirt, stale soporific powder in a handkerchief, petrified wooden club, loaded dice.
4. Damned Initiate—Padded jack (AC 2), 3 long bronze knives, fingerprint tattoo.
5. Sailor—Salt-stained overalls, blue-striped shirt, whistle, boarding spear, offering to an ocean deity (burn to calm local weather).

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