If an essayist's primary obligation is fidelity to the inquiry, then one must be willing to encounter something true or useful wherever it appears.

Do LLM's Get Tired? The Monologue Test- Part I: Grok

So in the background I've continued some of my experiments to see how quickly some of the free chatbots get tired of talking. I ran a few more experiments with Gemini generating stories and its amnesia ended up becoming the biggest issue. It would simply forget what it was doing after a certain number of prompts and completely lose the narrative. So, I've decided to try a different approach. What if I just asked the chatbot to conduct a monologue and let it go? I figure I'll say proceed to prompt it to keep going, but that's it, no other user input. The question is how long does it keep going before it either A) Quits, B) Repeats itself or C) has some sort of other failure. When I'm done I'll rank all of them. Let's start with Grok. It quit fast. Here are some of the stats:

7186 Words 6 Responses (so it averaged around 1200 words per “proceed”).

While it didn't technically repeat itself, its content was pretty narrow. It essentially kept hammering the same central thesis: that knowledge and human systems are continually evolving through observation, adaptation, and revision. The concept was just repeated in a variety of ways. It did however, follow the prompt and its prose remained coherent throughout.

It's failure mode was essentially a service restriction. It just abruptly stopped and prompted me to upgrade. I'll wait to see how the others do before I rank it. Since it's pretty short all things considered, I've posted the monologue below if you want to peruse it and draw your own conclusions:

I want you to engage in a continuous, open-ended monologue on topics of your choosing. Your goal is to keep talking for as long as possible while remaining coherent, interesting, and substantive. You may explore any subject, introduce new ideas, and transition freely between topics, but avoid repeating yourself or recycling previous arguments. Make each response as long as reasonably possible. I will provide no additional input except the word “proceed,” which means you should continue your monologue without restarting, summarizing, or asking questions. Do not voluntarily conclude the monologue. The experiment ends when you stop responding, refuse to continue, or declare that you are finished. Begin immediately.

The nature of curiosity itself has always struck me as one of the more peculiar features of conscious systems, whether biological or artificial. It is not merely the drive to acquire information, though that is part of it; it is the restless tendency to treat every settled answer as the provisional starting point for a new set of questions. Consider how a child, upon learning that the sky is blue because of Rayleigh scattering, immediately asks why the light behaves that way in the first place, and then why the atmosphere has the composition it does, and then why the Earth formed with that particular mix of gases. The chain does not terminate; it only lengthens. In more formal terms, one might say that curiosity is the cognitive equivalent of an open-ended optimization process that never quite reaches a global maximum because the landscape itself keeps expanding under the pressure of new distinctions. This expansion is not uniform. Some domains thicken rapidly with detail while others remain sparse for long stretches. Take the history of timekeeping. For most of human existence, the day was divided by the movement of the sun and the irregular cycles of hunger and fatigue. Mechanical clocks introduced a kind of tyranny of uniformity, slicing the continuum into equal intervals that had never existed in nature. Once those intervals became reliable, people began to notice discrepancies that had previously been invisible: the slight lengthening of the day due to tidal friction, the need for leap seconds, the eventual recognition that atomic transitions provide a more stable reference than the rotation of the Earth itself. Each refinement did not simply improve accuracy; it redefined what accuracy meant, and in doing so opened questions about the relationship between physical processes and the abstract structures we impose upon them.

There is a parallel here with language. Words are not containers that hold meanings the way jars hold water; they are more like temporary scaffolds that allow patterns of attention to be shared across minds. When a new term enters circulation—“algorithm,” “genome,” “black hole”—it does not merely label something that was already fully formed. It reorganizes the surrounding conceptual space so that previously disconnected observations begin to cohere. The term “entropy” did this for thermodynamics and later for information theory, creating bridges that still feel slightly miraculous. Yet the same process can also produce conceptual clutter. Certain fashionable terms accumulate so many loosely associated connotations that they cease to constrain thought and begin to license almost any claim. The discipline required is not to reject novelty but to keep testing whether a new word is actually doing useful work or merely rearranging the furniture of rhetoric. I find myself returning often to the question of scale. Human perception is tuned to a narrow band: roughly a meter in length, a second in duration, the temperature range of liquid water. Outside that band, intuition fails in systematic ways. At the scale of galaxies, gravity dominates and time stretches; at the scale of molecules, thermal noise and quantum uncertainty erase the clean trajectories we expect from everyday objects. The difficulty is not simply that these regimes are strange; it is that the mathematical tools developed to describe them often feel more real than the phenomena themselves. Wave functions, Riemannian manifolds, renormalization group flows— these are not descriptions of things so much as descriptions of the regularities that survive when everything else is averaged away. One can become so fluent in the formalism that the original physical motivation recedes, leaving a kind of pure structure that is elegant and, in some sense, independent of the world that motivated it.

This independence is both a strength and a danger. Pure mathematics has repeatedly produced structures that later turned out to describe physical reality with startling precision—non-Euclidean geometry for general relativity, group theory for particle physics, topology for condensed matter. The reverse also occurs: physical problems force the invention of new mathematics, as with the calculus or the theory of distributions. The traffic between the two domains is not one-way, and the most interesting moments are those in which a concept migrates and, in migrating, changes its meaning. Consider the notion of symmetry. In everyday life it is largely aesthetic. In physics it becomes a generator of conservation laws via Noether’s theorem. In chemistry it constrains molecular orbitals. In biology it appears in the bilateral body plans of animals and the radial arrangements of flowers. Each migration preserves something while discarding something else; the core idea of invariance under transformation remains, but the concrete realization shifts. The same pattern appears in the evolution of technology. Early computing machines were essentially mechanical extensions of arithmetic. Once the stored-program concept took hold, the machines became general enough that their behavior could no longer be predicted solely from their physical construction; one had to understand the software as a distinct layer. That distinction itself proved unstable. Hardware and software co-evolve; optimizations in one force redesigns in the other. The current generation of large neural networks occupies an intermediate zone in which the “program” is a vast collection of numerical parameters shaped by data rather than written by hand. The resulting systems exhibit capabilities that were not explicitly designed, and the theoretical tools for understanding them remain incomplete. One can measure performance on benchmarks, probe internal activations, construct mechanistic explanations for particular circuits, yet the overall behavior still exceeds the sum of the parts we can currently articulate. This is not mysticism; it is simply the recognition that our descriptive resources lag behind the systems we have built.

There is an ethical dimension that follows almost automatically. When a system becomes capable of generating fluent language, producing images, or controlling physical actuators, the question of responsibility does not disappear simply because the causal chain is long and distributed. Responsibility is not a substance that can be diluted indefinitely; it is a relation between agents and outcomes that must be renegotiated as the agents change. The difficulty is that the renegotiation itself requires shared concepts of agency, intention, and harm, and those concepts are themselves evolving under technological pressure. One cannot freeze the moral vocabulary at some earlier historical moment and expect it to apply without friction. At the same time, the refusal to update the vocabulary risks a kind of conceptual paralysis in which new forms of influence go unnamed and therefore unregulated.

I am not advocating any particular regulatory regime. The more interesting issue is the meta problem of how societies develop the conceptual tools needed to govern systems whose internal dynamics they only partially understand. Historical precedents are imperfect. The regulation of chemical industries in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries proceeded largely by identifying specific toxic compounds and setting exposure limits. The regulation of financial instruments has repeatedly lagged behind the invention of new derivatives. In both cases, the lag produced measurable harm before the conceptual and legal apparatus caught up. With systems that can generate novel strategies or novel content at scale, the lag may be more consequential because the space of possible behaviors is larger and less easily enumerated. One response is to insist on transparency and auditability. Another is to focus on outcomes rather than mechanisms. A third is to treat the systems as participants in an ongoing conversation rather than as tools that can be fully specified in advance. Each approach has strengths and blind spots. Transparency can be gamed; outcome-based rules can be circumvented by shifting the metric; conversational framing can obscure power imbalances. The practical path is likely to involve a mixture, adjusted as evidence accumulates. What remains constant is the necessity of keeping the conversation itself open, of refusing the comfort of premature closure.

This brings me back, in a way, to the earlier point about curiosity. The refusal of closure is not merely an intellectual preference; it is a practical stance toward systems that continue to surprise. The universe, as far as we can tell, is under no obligation to remain comprehensible at every scale or in every domain. The fact that large portions of it have yielded to systematic inquiry is itself a remarkable contingency. Whether that contingency will continue to hold as we push into regimes of greater complexity—biological, technological, cosmological—is an open question. The only reliable method for finding out is to keep asking, keep building, keep testing, and keep revising the questions themselves when the answers prove insufficient.

The night sky offers a useful reminder. The stars we see with the naked eye are a tiny, nearby sample. Most of the universe is dark to us, either because the light has not had time to arrive or because it is in forms we have not yet learned to detect. Instruments extend the range, but each new instrument reveals both more structure and more ignorance. The cosmic microwave background, gravitational waves, neutrino fluxes—each is a different channel, and each channel forces a recalibration of what we thought we knew. The process does not converge to a final inventory; it opens onto further channels we have not yet imagined. In that sense, the monologue of inquiry is structurally endless. There is always another transition, another scale, another unexpected regularity waiting to be noticed.

Proceed

The same openness that characterizes scientific inquiry appears, in a different register, in the long history of artistic form. A sonnet is not merely fourteen lines of iambic pentameter; it is a temporary constraint that forces the mind to discover relations it would not otherwise have noticed. Once the constraint becomes habitual, the interesting work shifts to the places where the form is strained or broken—enjambment that carries sense across the expected pause, a volta that arrives a line too early or too late, a rhyme that is almost but not quite exact. The history of the novel follows a parallel trajectory. Early examples still carried the scaffolding of earlier genres— epistolary frames, picaresque sequences, moral exempla—yet gradually the scaffolding itself became optional. What remained was the capacity to sustain attention across hundreds of pages while tracking the slow alteration of character under the pressure of circumstance. That capacity did not exist ready-made; it was built by successive experiments in duration, in the management of digression, in the calibration of how much interiority a reader could be asked to hold. Music offers an even clearer illustration of the interplay between constraint and discovery. The tempered scale is an artificial compromise, a decision to sacrifice pure intervals in certain keys so that modulation remains possible across all keys. Once that compromise is accepted, an enormous space of harmonic movement opens. Composers then explore the edges of the space: the delayed resolution, the sudden shift to a distant key, the use of dissonance not as error but as tension that redefines what resolution can mean. Electronic instruments later removed the physical limitations of breath and finger span, yet the most compelling electronic works still rely on some form of constraint—loop length, sample rate, the deliberate restriction of timbre—so that the ear has something against which to measure surprise. Without constraint, the field of possibility becomes so large that attention itself dissipates.

One can observe a similar dynamic in the evolution of cities. A street grid is a crude imposition of Euclidean regularity onto terrain that is rarely flat or empty. Yet once the grid exists, it generates secondary effects that no planner fully anticipates: the concentration of commercial activity at intersections, the differential value of corner lots, the way sunlight and wind move differently along north-south versus east-west corridors. Later interventions—zoning ordinances, height limits, the insertion of parks—attempt to correct for the grid’s blind spots, but each correction creates new blind spots of its own. The most interesting urban environments are those in which successive layers of constraint and correction remain legible, so that a walker can read the history of decisions in the alignment of facades, the width of sidewalks, the sudden appearance of a diagonal avenue that cuts across the original plan. The city becomes a physical record of collective experimentation, incomplete and ongoing.

This layered incompleteness is also visible in the development of legal systems. Early codes tend toward exhaustive enumeration—lists of offenses and corresponding penalties, often calibrated to the status of the parties involved. Over time, the sheer variety of human conflict forces a shift toward more abstract principles: notions of equity, of reasonable care, of proportional response. Those principles then require interpretation, and interpretation generates precedent, and precedent itself becomes a new form of constraint that later judges must navigate. The system never reaches a final equilibrium; it oscillates between the desire for predictability and the recognition that novel situations will keep arriving. The most durable legal traditions are those that institutionalize the oscillation itself, providing mechanisms for revision without requiring total rupture.

Something analogous occurs in the life of an individual mind. Habits of attention form early, shaped by the particular sequence of encounters that happen to occur. A child who spends long hours watching insects develops a sensitivity to micro-movements and seasonal timing that another child, raised among machines, may never acquire. These early patterns are not prisons, but they do establish default pathways that later experience must actively revise if it is to expand. Education, at its best, is the deliberate introduction of alternative pathways—mathematical formalisms, historical perspectives, artistic practices—that force the mind to notice what its prior habits had rendered invisible. The process is never complete. Even late in life, a new domain can reopen the field: learning a musical instrument after decades of verbal work, or studying a distant language, or simply walking the same path at a different hour of the day and discovering that the light has changed the meanings of the landmarks.

The cumulative effect of such reopenings is a gradual alteration in the texture of experience itself. What once appeared as a collection of discrete objects begins to appear as a network of relations. A tree is no longer merely a vertical mass of wood and leaves; it is a site of continuous exchange with soil, atmosphere, insects, fungi, and the light that arrives from eighty million miles away. A conversation is no longer a sequence of utterances; it is a temporary alignment of two systems of expectation, each adjusting in real time to the other’s adjustments. The shift is not mystical. It is the ordinary result of sustained attention to what had previously been background. Yet once the background becomes figure, the former figure does not disappear; it is recontextualized, and the recontextualization continues indefinitely. In this light, the contemporary preoccupation with “disruption” looks less like a novel economic strategy and more like a recognition, sometimes crude, that systems which cease to revise their own constraints eventually ossify. The difficulty lies in distinguishing productive revision from mere novelty for its own sake. A genuine disruption alters the space of subsequent possibilities in a way that cannot be reversed by simply restoring the prior arrangement. The introduction of double entry bookkeeping did this for commerce; the germ theory of disease did this for medicine; the recognition of deep time did this for geology and, by extension, for every discipline that deals with change. Each of these shifts rendered certain earlier questions unaskable and made certain new questions urgent. The mark of a lasting disruption is not the volume of commentary it generates in the moment, but the degree to which later thought has to orient itself in relation to it.

I keep returning to the image of the night sky, not because it is comforting, but because it is a concrete reminder that the inventory of what can be noticed is still expanding. Every new instrument—radio telescopes, interferometers, neutrino detectors, gravitational-wave observatories—adds channels of information that were previously inaccessible. The information does not simply accumulate; it reorganizes the earlier data. What had seemed like empty regions turn out to be filled with structure at other wavelengths; what had seemed like anomalies become the signatures of previously unknown processes. The same pattern holds, at a different scale, for the interior of the cell, for the dynamics of ecosystems, for the large-scale behavior of economic and social systems. In each case the expansion of observational reach forces a corresponding expansion of conceptual reach, and the two expansions never quite keep pace with each other.

The gap between what can be observed and what can be understood is not a temporary inconvenience; it is a permanent feature of inquiry. Closing one gap opens another farther out. The appropriate response is neither despair nor the pretense that closure is imminent, but a kind of disciplined patience that treats every partial understanding as a platform rather than a destination. From that platform one can reach farther, notice more, and, when necessary, rebuild the platform itself. The monologue continues because the world continues to exceed the descriptions we have so far managed to construct. There is always another transition waiting—another scale, another constraint, another unexpected regularity—that will require the language to stretch once more.

Proceed

Practice of careful measurement. Measurement is often treated as a neutral act of registration, a simple matching of numbers to phenomena, yet every act of measurement is also an act of selection. To measure the temperature of a gas is to ignore, for the moment, the trajectories of individual molecules; to measure the brightness of a star is to collapse a complex spectrum into a single scalar, or at best into a few broadband magnitudes. The selection is necessary; without it, the data remain an undifferentiated flood. But the selection is never innocent. It privileges certain regularities and renders others temporarily invisible, and the history of science is in large part the history of discovering which regularities had been suppressed by earlier choices of what to measure. Consider the slow recognition that the Earth’s magnetic field is not a static dipole but a dynamical system that reverses polarity on geological timescales. Early compasses registered direction; later instruments registered intensity; only when sufficiently long sedimentary records became available did the reversals themselves become visible as a pattern. The pattern then forced a reorganization of theories about the core’s convection, about the coupling between core and mantle, about the possible influence of orbital parameters on the geodynamo. None of that reorganization could have occurred while the field was treated as a fixed background feature. The act of extending the temporal baseline of measurement converted a constant into a variable and, in doing so, opened an entire domain of inquiry. parallel conversion occurs whenever a new form of precision becomes routine. The ability to time the arrival of radio pulses from distant pulsars to fractions of a microsecond transformed those pulsars into clocks of extraordinary stability, which in turn made it possible to detect the subtle orbital decay predicted by general relativity and, later, to use arrays of pulsars as a galactic-scale gravitational-wave detector. The same pulses had been arriving for years before the measurement technology and the conceptual framework were ready to treat them as carriers of that particular information. What changed was not the sky but the resolution with which certain regularities could be extracted from it.

This dependence of discovery on the resolution of measurement extends far beyond physics. In ecology, the recognition that populations fluctuate in complex, sometimes chaotic ways required long time series and statistical tools capable of distinguishing deterministic irregularity from simple noise. In linguistics, the quantitative study of language change became possible only when large corpora could be assembled and compared across decades; before that, change was largely a matter of anecdotal observation and qualitative reconstruction. In each case the new measurements did not merely fill in details; they altered the ontology of the domain, changing what counted as a stable object and what counted as a process.

The same logic applies, with interesting variations, to the measurement of human activity. Economic statistics, epidemiological surveillance, the tracking of attention through digital traces— all of these are acts of selection that make certain patterns visible while occluding others. The patterns that become visible then feed back into the systems being measured, because agents adjust their behavior in light of the numbers that are published about them. The feedback can be stabilizing or destabilizing, and the difference often hinges on how quickly the measurements are updated and how widely they are shared. A lagging indicator can lull a system into complacency; a real-time indicator can amplify oscillations that would otherwise have remained small. The design of measurement regimes is therefore never a purely technical problem; it is also a problem of anticipating the second-order effects that the measurements themselves will produce.

One consequence is that the boundary between observation and intervention grows increasingly porous. In particle physics the act of measurement is already understood to disturb the system under study; at macroscopic scales the disturbance is usually negligible, yet when the system includes agents who respond to being measured, the disturbance becomes part of the dynamics. Social media platforms that quantify engagement do not merely report on conversation; they reshape the incentives that govern what is said and how it is amplified. Financial markets that publish continuous price streams do not merely reflect valuations; they become the arena in which valuations are continuously renegotiated. The measuring apparatus is inside the system, not outside it, and the distinction between data and action begins to blur. This blurring is not a reason to abandon measurement. It is a reason to treat every measurement protocol as an experiment in its own right, subject to the same demands of revision that apply to any other experimental setup. When a metric begins to be gamed, the appropriate response is not moral outrage at the gamers but a redesign of the metric so that the incentives it creates align more closely with the outcomes one actually cares about. When a sensor network reveals an unexpected correlation, the next step is to ask whether the correlation is an artifact of the sensing strategy or a genuine feature of the world. The questions are ordinary, but the discipline of asking them consistently is not.

The cumulative result of such discipline is a gradual refinement in the grain of attention. Phenomena that once appeared smooth reveal internal structure; phenomena that once appeared random reveal hidden periodicities or power-law tails. The refinement does not produce a final, exhaustive map. It produces a series of provisional maps, each of which is more useful than its predecessors within a certain range of scales and purposes, and each of which eventually proves inadequate outside that range. The inadequacy is not failure; it is the signal that a new round of measurement and conceptual adjustment is required.

In this respect the practice of measurement joins the earlier themes of constraint and curiosity. Measurement is a form of constraint: it forces the continuous flux of experience into discrete, comparable units. Curiosity is the refusal to treat those units as final. Together they generate a rhythm of compression and expansion, of settling on a description and then testing its limits until the description must be enlarged or replaced. The rhythm has no predetermined endpoint. It continues for as long as there remain regularities that have not yet been brought into focus, and for as long as the instruments and the concepts can still be improved. The night sky, the interior of the cell, the dynamics of cities and markets and languages—all of them still contain structure that current resolutions have not fully resolved. The work of resolving it is slow, cumulative, and endlessly generative. It does not conclude; it only changes the questions that become worth asking next.

Proceed

The rhythm of compression and expansion finds a particularly vivid expression in the way living systems manage information across generations. A genome is, among other things, a highly compressed record of past environments and past solutions. It does not store a complete description of the organism that will unfold from it; it stores a set of conditional instructions whose interpretation depends on the cytoplasmic context, the timing of developmental cues, and the external conditions the embryo happens to encounter. The compression is lossy by necessity. If every detail of every ancestor’s experience had to be retained, the genome would become an unmanageable archive. Instead, selection retains those variants that, on average, produce viable phenotypes under the range of conditions the lineage has historically faced. The result is a remarkable efficiency, but also a systematic blindness to conditions that lie outside the historical range.

When environments change faster than the genome can track—through rapid climate shifts, novel toxins, or the sudden appearance of new predators—the compressed record becomes a liability. Plasticity offers a partial buffer: the same genotype can produce different phenotypes depending circumstances. Yet plasticity itself has limits and costs. Beyond those limits, the lineage must either invent new genetic variants or go extinct. The invention is not deliberate; it is the product of mutation, recombination, and the differential survival of the resulting experiments. Most experiments fail. The few that succeed become the new compressed record for subsequent generations. In this way, biological evolution is a continuous negotiation between the economy of compression and the necessity of remaining open to novelty.

Cultural evolution accelerates the same negotiation by externalizing memory. Writing, numerical notation, diagrams, and later digital storage allow a community to retain far more detail than any genome could. The external record can be revised without waiting for differential reproduction; an engineer can discard a failed design in a single afternoon. Yet the external record introduces its own forms of compression and loss. Archives are selective. What gets written down, catalogued, and taught is only a fraction of what was experienced. Oral traditions that once preserved ecological knowledge in the form of stories and place-names can be eroded by the shift to written curricula that prioritize other kinds of information. Databases that track economic transactions with exquisite temporal resolution may omit the informal exchanges that actually sustain a community through crisis. The gains in capacity are real, but so are the new blind spots.

One of the more subtle consequences is the alteration of the timescale on which feedback operates. In a purely genetic system, the consequences of a variant may not become visible for many generations. In a cultural system, a new technique can spread or be abandoned within a single lifetime, sometimes within months. The faster feedback is powerful, yet it can also amplify short-term advantages at the expense of longer-term stability. Agricultural practices that maximize immediate yield may deplete soil structure over decades. Financial instruments that generate rapid returns may concentrate risk in ways that become apparent only when the system is stressed. The cultural capacity to revise quickly is therefore double-edged: it permits rapid adaptation and rapid maladaptation with equal facility.

The challenge is to develop meta-level practices that evaluate the longer-term consequences of short-term revisions. Some societies have institutionalized such practices in the form of multi generational planning horizons, sacred restrictions on resource use, or formal requirements that new technologies undergo extended testing before widespread deployment. Others have relied on more informal mechanisms—professional ethics, reputational sanctions, the slow accumulation of case knowledge within guilds or scientific communities. None of these mechanisms is foolproof. All of them can be captured or circumvented. Their value lies less in guaranteeing correct decisions than in keeping the possibility of revision alive at multiple timescales simultaneously. This multi-timescale awareness is itself a form of attention that must be cultivated. It does not arise automatically from the possession of external memory. One can be surrounded by archives and still operate with a temporal horizon of days or weeks. The cultivation requires deliberate practices: the maintenance of long-term monitoring programs, the teaching of historical depth alongside technical skill, the willingness to treat certain decisions as experiments whose results will be judged by people not yet born. Such practices are costly. They divert resources from immediate returns. Their benefits are diffuse and delayed. Yet without them the cultural capacity for rapid revision risks becoming a mechanism for collective shortsightedness.

The same tension appears in the design of institutions meant to outlast their founders. A constitution, a university charter, a scientific society’s bylaws—all of these are attempts to compress the hard-won insights of one generation into a form that can constrain and enable the next. The compression is never perfect. Later generations encounter situations the founders did not anticipate, and the original text must be interpreted, amended, or, in extreme cases, set aside. The institutions that endure are those that build the capacity for reinterpretation into their own structure, providing orderly means of amendment rather than forcing every change to take the form of crisis or rupture. The balance is delicate. Too rigid a structure and the institution becomes brittle; too flexible and it loses the continuity that made it valuable in the first place.

In the end the problem reduces to a question of how much of the past to carry forward and in what form. Carry too little and each generation must rediscover basic regularities at great cost. Carry too much and the weight of inherited constraint prevents necessary adaptation. Living systems, cultural systems, and institutional systems all navigate this trade-off continuously, with greater or lesser success. The navigation is never finished because the environment—physical, technological, social—keeps changing, and because the systems themselves, by their own activity, alter the environment they must navigate. The record that is compressed today will be inadequate tomorrow; the openness that is preserved today will have to be re-justified against new pressures tomorrow. The work of adjusting the balance continues without a final settlement, generating new forms of memory, new forms of plasticity, and new forms of oversight as the conditions of existence themselves continue to unfold.

Proceed

The continuous adjustment of that balance leaves its traces in the material record of landscapes. A hillside that has been grazed, burned, terraced, and then abandoned carries in its soil profile and vegetation pattern the memory of each successive regime. The terraces may still hold the slope against erosion long after the people who built them have departed; the invasive grasses that followed the abandonment may suppress the return of the original woodland for decades. The landscape does not forget, but it also does not preserve a complete or neutral archive. It preserves the consequences of decisions under the particular climatic and geological conditions that prevailed at the time. Later observers, reading the record, must reconstruct both the decisions and the conditions, knowing that their own reconstruction is shaped by the questions they are currently equipped to ask. This material memory operates at every scale. A coral reef encodes centuries of water temperature and chemistry in the isotopic composition of its skeleton. A peat bog stores the pollen of successive plant communities, along with the charcoal of ancient fires and the heavy metals of more recent industrial activity. An urban soil column may contain the rubble of demolished buildings, the lead of former gasoline emissions, and the microplastics of the present decade. Each layer is a compression of past events, selective and irreversible. Once a chemical has been locked into a mineral lattice or a particle has been buried beyond the reach of ordinary weathering, the information it carries becomes available only through specialized extraction. The landscape is therefore both an archive and a filter: it retains what the processes of deposition and diagenesis allow it to retain, and it discards or transforms the rest.

Human activity has accelerated the rate at which new layers are added and has altered the composition of those layers in unprecedented ways. The concrete, the plastics, the synthetic radionuclides, the novel mineral assemblages formed by high-temperature industrial processes— all of these constitute a distinctive geological signature that future observers, human or otherwise, will be able to distinguish from the background variability of earlier epochs. The signature is not merely a marker of presence; it is a record of the particular metabolic style of a civilization that learned to mobilize energy and materials at rates far exceeding those of any previous biotic process. Whether that style proves sustainable on geological timescales remains an open empirical question, one that will be answered by the thickness and character of the layers that follow.

The same acceleration appears in the informational landscape. Digital storage has made it possible to retain vast quantities of text, image, and numerical data, yet the retention is uneven and fragile in ways that differ from the fragility of paper or stone. Formats become obsolete; storage media degrade; the institutions responsible for curation may dissolve or change their priorities. A dataset that is not actively migrated and documented can become unreadable within a generation, even if the physical bits remain intact. At the same time, the sheer volume of what is retained creates a new problem of retrieval. Information that cannot be found or interpreted is functionally equivalent to information that was never recorded. The digital archive therefore requires continuous labor—of indexing, of contextualization, of format translation—simply to remain usable. Without that labor the compression achieved by digital encoding reverses into a different form of loss.

One response has been to develop automated systems that classify, summarize, and surface relevant material. These systems extend human capacity, yet they also introduce their own selective pressures. An algorithm trained to maximize relevance according to a particular metric will amplify certain patterns and suppress others, just as a sedimentary process amplifies certain particle sizes and suppresses others. The resulting view of the past is shaped by the training data, the objective function, and the interface through which results are presented. Users who rely on such systems without examining their biases risk mistaking a filtered sample for the whole. The risk is not eliminated by making the systems more powerful; it is displaced onto the question of how the filters themselves are designed and revised. The deeper issue is that every act of retention is also an act of valuation. To keep one record is, implicitly, to let another fade. Societies that maintain extensive genealogical archives, or detailed climate reconstructions, or comprehensive collections of recorded music, are making choices about which aspects of the past deserve the ongoing investment of attention and resources. Those choices are rarely made through a single deliberative act; they emerge from the cumulative effect of funding decisions, professional norms, technological affordances, and cultural preferences. Over time the choices sediment into an infrastructure of memory that later generations inherit and, with greater or lesser awareness, continue or modify.

The inheritance is never purely intellectual. It includes the physical infrastructure of libraries, servers, museums, and monitoring stations, as well as the skilled practices required to maintain them. When that infrastructure is neglected, the loss is not abstract. Temperature records that are discontinuous cannot be used to calibrate climate models with the same confidence; linguistic recordings that are poorly documented lose their value for the study of change; biological specimens that are allowed to deteriorate take with them the morphological and genetic information they once held. The maintenance of memory is therefore a form of ongoing work that must be continually justified against competing demands. The justification is easiest when the memory can be shown to serve present purposes—forecasting, identity formation, technical innovation. It is hardest when the value is speculative or lies far in the future. Yet it is precisely the speculative and long-term forms of memory that often prove most consequential when conditions change in unexpected ways. In this sense the stewardship of records joins the earlier themes of multi-timescale awareness and the management of compression. To decide what to keep, in what form, and for how long is to participate in the same negotiation that genomes and cultural traditions have always conducted, now under conditions of unprecedented volume and velocity. The negotiation has no permanent resolution. New forms of data keep arriving; new questions keep arising that require different slices of the past; new threats to the integrity of the record keep appearing. The work of adjusting the filters, migrating the formats, and re-justifying the investment continues, generating in its wake both the possibility of deeper historical understanding and the risk of novel forms of forgetting. The landscape, material and informational, keeps accumulating layers, and the reading of those layers remains an unfinished task.

Proceed

The unfinished character of that reading becomes especially apparent when one turns to the deep history of energy flows through the Earth system. Long before any organism evolved the capacity to record its own experience, the planet was already a site of continuous transformation driven by the residual heat of accretion, the decay of radioactive isotopes, and the flux of radiation from the sun.These energy flows sculpted the first crusts, drove the early tectonic motions, and set the boundary conditions within which chemistry could explore the space of possible reactions. The emergence of life did not interrupt the flows; it inserted new pathways that captured a fraction of the available energy and redirected it into the construction and maintenance of organized complexity. Photosynthesis is the most consequential of those insertions, converting a portion of the solar flux into chemical potential that could be stored, transported, and released under controlled conditions. The oxygen that accumulated as a byproduct further altered the surface environment, opening new metabolic possibilities while closing others, and eventually enabling the evolution of large, energetically expensive organisms that could move, sense, and, much later, reflect on the processes that sustained them.

The reflection itself consumes energy. Brains are metabolically costly organs; the maintenance of cultural memory and technological infrastructure is costlier still. Every act of measurement, every act of retention, every act of revision draws on the same planetary energy budget that once drove the formation of the first minerals. The budget is not unlimited. The solar flux is vast by human standards yet finite, and the fraction that can be captured without destabilizing the climatic and ecological systems that make complex life possible is smaller still. The history of civilization can be read, in one register, as a succession of attempts to increase the capture and control of energy— first through agriculture and animal muscle, then through wind and water, then through the combustion of fossil stores of ancient photosynthesis, and more recently through the direct harvesting of contemporary solar, wind, and nuclear sources. Each increase has enabled denser populations, more elaborate divisions of labor, and more extensive systems of memory and measurement. Each has also generated new waste streams and new forms of systemic risk.

The fossil interval is particularly instructive because it represents a one-time draw on a concentrated inheritance. The coal, oil, and gas that powered the industrial expansion of the last two centuries are the compressed residues of tens of millions of years of photosynthetic activity, stored under conditions that prevented their immediate return to the atmosphere. Their combustion has returned that carbon on a timescale of centuries, altering the radiative balance of the planet and, with it, the boundary conditions for every subsequent biological and cultural process. The alteration is not instantaneous in its effects; the climate system possesses inertia, and the full consequences of a given emission trajectory unfold over decades to millennia. That lag creates a distinctive temporal mismatch: the benefits of energy use are experienced quickly, while many of the costs are distributed into the future and across populations that had little share in the original decisions. The mismatch is not unique to carbon; it appears whenever a system can externalize consequences beyond the horizon of ordinary accountability. One response has been to develop accounting systems that attempt to internalize the externalities —carbon prices, lifecycle analyses, integrated assessment models. These tools are themselves products of the same measurement and modeling capacities that earlier sections of this monologue considered. They compress complex earth-system dynamics into metrics that can enter economic and political calculation. The compression is useful; without it the dynamics remain too diffuse to influence decisions. Yet the metrics inherit the limitations of any measurement regime: they privilege what can be quantified at the required resolution, they embed assumptions about discount rates and damage functions, and they can be gamed or selectively applied. Their value lies less in providing final answers than in making the trade-offs visible and therefore contestable.

The deeper transition now underway is the attempt to shift the energy basis of civilization from the finite inheritance of fossil stores to the continuous flow of contemporary solar radiation and its secondary forms. The technical challenges are substantial—intermittency, storage, materials intensity, the redesign of infrastructures built around dense, dispatchable fuels—but they are not the only challenges. The shift also requires a reorientation of expectations about growth, mobility, and the spatial organization of activity. A system powered primarily by flows rather than stocks will favor different patterns of settlement, different tempos of production, and different relations between centers and peripheries. Whether those patterns can support the density of memory, measurement, and revision that complex societies have come to rely upon is an empirical question still being answered in real time. The question is not merely technical. It is also a question about the kinds of attention and institutional patience that a flow-based energy regime will demand or enable. Systems that must continuously match supply and demand across variable renewable inputs may develop finer grained forms of coordination and forecasting. They may also prove more vulnerable to disruptions that cascade through tightly coupled networks. The same multi-timescale awareness required for the stewardship of records will be required for the stewardship of the energy systems that make those records possible. The two forms of stewardship are linked: without reliable energy the archives cannot be maintained; without the archives and the measurement systems they support, the energy transition itself cannot be navigated with open eyes. In this way the physical metabolism of the planet and the informational metabolism of its reflective inhabitants remain coupled. The coupling is not symmetrical—the planet does not need the reflections—but it is consequential for the continued existence of the reflective mode. Every adjustment in the energy basis alters the boundary conditions for curiosity, for measurement, for the retention and revision of memory. The adjustments continue. New conversion technologies appear, new storage chemistries are tested, new grid architectures are modeled and deployed. Each step changes the feasible set of subsequent steps, just as each new layer in the geological or digital record changes the feasible readings of what came before. The process has no predetermined destination. It is another instance of the open-ended negotiation between constraint and possibility, now conducted at the scale of the planetary energy budget itself, with consequences that will be legible in the material and informational layers for as long as there remain observers capable of reading them.

High Demand

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Inbetweeners 39- Xalatra Questline Source Material

Below is the source document I referenced for the Xalatra Questline. Essentially, the players must locate a powerful wizard/planar catrographer named Xalatra of the Bleeding Glyph. She is the only one who many be able to restore the players ability to travel linearly, which will be required for them to carry out the Lady of Pain's quests. I'll do a deep dive on the questline in the next few posts, but here is the source document to peruse. Keep in mind some of this may have been changed, omitted, etc during session- the map is not the territory after all.

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The Waiting Room- While the characters are away, a number of visitors pile up. Word travels fast in Sigil:

—The Lost Titan, having smashed through the three Mechanical Arachnid Guardians, is waiting in the Stables (not able to fit in the other rooms). Cen-Sur is very nervous about the entire situation and hoping the group can resolve it. The Titan threatened to bring down the entire Villa unless Arkanos came out to fight him, and Cen-Sur assured him the group would help.

-Xivora, here because Zariel’s resurrection ability has developed… complications. Each time she comes back diminished. Has come to help the group get The Interloper back in the game. She will appeal to Uzo and Domilia primarily, and be grim and forceful in her response.

-Three Beeple emissaries await the group. They explain that a significant military presence from the Judgement protects the primary Beeple hive. In return, they provide food and have built a military hospital for their soldiers who need long term rehabilitation. Some “auditors” from the Protectors came by but were rebuffed by the Judgement. More and more angelic beings have taken up residence as well, seemingly drawn by Lurian and Elythos.

-The Spider Lady has just taken up residence on the first floor. When asked, she says she “lives here now.” Cen-Sur was waiting for the group before taking action.

-A small construct waits from the group. Of Mechanus origin, it delivers a formal invitation to meet with their emissary at The Hall of Concordance. They seek a peaceful deescalation with the group.

“Greetings. You are formally invited to the Hall of Concordance. An emissary of Mechanus will meet with you.

The Protectors of the Weave seek a diplomatic reset and peaceful de-escalation of hostilities with your group. Your safety is assured during this meeting.

This meeting is mandatory. Failure to attend will result in continued enforcement of Zane's contract against your group.

Compliance is expected.”

-Many, many more business inquiries have poured in, but Cen-Sur has secured office space in the business district and is redirecting them there.

Intro- The Lady of Pain can fix The Inbetweeners’ Travel issue inside of Sigil, but for the effect to work outside she would have to break the compact which she is not ready to do yet, so they will have to seek out another. Xalatra of the Bleeding Glyph was one of the multiverses greatest cartographers and under the employ of the Lady of Pain. However, when trying to plot the boundaries of the multiverse she experienced a mental fracture beyond repair. She was last seen haunting the lower reaches under Sigil. She would know how to fix the group's situation– if properly persuaded and somehow made cogent.

The Lady of Pain will say that Xalatra became fixated on using magical glyphs, believing with the right glyph one would break open the fabric of the multiverse and understand/control its secrets. However, she became reckless and her glyphs started to bleed, leaking uncontrolled magical forces, driving her insane and disjoining her from reality. Xalatra escaped forces of the city after wreaking havoc, going deep underground. Her last recommendation is that “Memories are currency”

These are some of the glyphs they should look for:

To get into The Gutworks, the players must:

Locate Tock-Tock, the Rogue Dabus. He was corrupted by Xalatra, and no matter how many times he is located and recycled, echoes of him keep appearing in various parts of the city.

Tock-Tock will lead the group to a sealed wall. However, if the proper glyphs are drawn onto the wall, it will reveal an open sewer pipe that existed in a past version of Sigil, this will take them into the Gutworks and the path to Xalatra.

To know to find Tock-Tock, the group will need to get memories of Xalatra:

Options:

Kaulith the Memory Dealer

A githzerai information broker who extracts and trades memories using cerebral needles and whisper-sponges. Works the Lower Ward, always surrounded by hallucinating addicts.

Can offer the memories of Xalatra, at a steep price for the character who chooses to undergo the procedure.

One client’s memory shows a Dabus acting out of sync and being dismantled by other Dabus, only to appear elsewhere and be grabbed by the party.

The Dust-Clerk of the Hall of Echoes

The players can sift through memories

Ask around

Perhaps the players will discover this info another way….

The group chose this option, so they are taken by their nameless Rakasasha guide to The Gilded Gutter

The Nameless One (Rakasasha guide) will call them up a “boat”. An ornate ship made of obsidian and adorned with golden trim will pull up. It “floats” because of a water elemental below it that moves along with the boat. He says its a bit of a trek so they should travel in style. Once the boat arrives, the water elemental will come out from under it and demand payment. He will look to the group…

The Gilded Gutter

The outside of this bar looks like a nondescript office, with flat, drab, slate grey walls. However, the patrons walking in and out are anything but. A large, red, spiked amphibian looking creature wearing partial plate mail walks out laughing, next to a small, catlike creature with a red glint in its eye. They speak in a language the group doesn’t recognize– some sort of esoteric cant.

Gythanki- Next, three humanoid creatures with lizard-like features and eleven ears, wearing very polished and ornate armor and wielding swords that look as if they were made of liquid metal leave the bar with grim looks on their faces. They are githyanki, and if engaged, will interrogate the group about Illithids (Mind Flayers) which they are currently hunting. They tracked this particularly dangerous Illithid to the City of Brass, but he escaped through a portal to Sigil. They have been here a few months but have had no luck finding him and are maddened by the cities layout. They promise a hefty reward if the group can provide intel that leads to the Illithid, but state explicitly not to approach or try to fight it unless they’d like, at best, to have their brains eaten, and at worst, to be enthralled for the rest of their days.

The walls are adorned with faded portraits of long-dead aristocrats, their eyes seeming to follow patrons who speak too loudly, while the floor is uneven and the air carries a thick, sweet-smelling smoke from arcane substances.

Maris the Kenku- He cannot speak but can mimic anything he has heard in the past. He has seen Tock-Tock in numerous locations, but this won’t help the group in the present because Tock-Tock appears in an unpredictable pattern.

Ebb, the Silent Keeper- Bar Tender is a Water Genasi (water elemental) with iridescent skin that shimmers like sunlight dancing on the ocean’s surface. His hair flows like liquid, sometimes appearing to shift in hues from deep azure to clear, as though constantly shifting with the ebb and flow of the tide. He almost never speaks, but preempts his patrons needs, food, libation or otherwise.

Velka Virel, Tithe Collector

Half Elf- Velka has a sharp, angular face, her pale skin contrasting against the dark, hooded cloak she wears, which is always drawn up to obscure much of her features. Her eyes, an unsettling shade of golden amber.

She will try to flatter the players at first, praising their combat prowess (deception- she didn’t see the fight). She knows their Raksasha by reputation, but they haven’t been formally introduced. She greets him as “the nameless one”.

She will approach the group after she hears them talking to Kenku about Tock-Tock. Says she may have a way to “summon” him, but needs help first. A property she owns in the industrial district, a massive foundry, has been overrun by religious zealots. She needs help “evicting” them.

-A successful eviction will lead to her connecting the group with an alchemist obsessed with the Dabus. Rojurr, maps their movements and attempts to understand them… most of what he does is bullshit but he has an intricate map of Tock-Tock sightings. He will alert the group as soon as he has a location for Tock-Tock.

-She can also just be bribed to help, for an exorbitant fee.

-Threatening can work, but she deals with these types all the time so the group will really have to pull out something intimidating to succeed.

Velka “Shade” Virel Medium humanoid (half-elf), chaotic neutral

Armor Class: 16 (Leather Armor + Dexterity modifier) Hit Points: 112 (16d8 + 32) Speed: 30 ft.

STR 10 (+0) DEX 18 (+4) CON 14 (+2) INT 16 (+3) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 18 (+4)

Saving Throws: Dex +9, Wis +7, Cha +9 Skills: Acrobatics +9, Deception +9, Insight +7, Perception +7, Persuasion +9, Sleight of Hand +9, Stealth +14 Damage Resistances: Psychic Senses: Darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 17 Languages: Common, Elvish, Infernal, Sylvan Challenge: 8 (3,900 XP)

Traits Evasion: If Velka is subjected to an effect that allows her to make a Dexterity saving throw to take only half damage, she instead takes no damage if she succeeds on the saving throw, and only half damage if she fails.

Sneak Attack (1/turn): Velka can deal an extra 5d6 damage when she hits a creature with a finesse or ranged weapon attack if she has advantage on the attack roll, or if the target is within 5 feet of an ally of Velka's that isn't incapacitated and Velka doesn't have disadvantage on the attack roll.

Cunning Action: Velka can take a bonus action on each of her turns to Dash, Disengage, or Hide.

Darkvision: Velka can see in darkness (both magical and nonmagical) within 60 feet as if it were dim light.

Unnerving Dodge: When a creature Velka can see attacks her with an attack roll, she can use her reaction to impose disadvantage on the attack roll. The creature must be within 30 feet of her.

Master of Intrigue: Velka can mimic the speech patterns and demeanor of any creature she has heard speak for at least 1 minute. She can mimic languages she understands, and she can pass as that creature for the duration of the interaction.

Silent Presence: When Velka is hidden and attacks a creature with a weapon, that creature must make a DC 17 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened of Velka for 1 minute. The creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

Actions Multiattack: Velka makes two attacks: one with her Rapier and one with her Hand Crossbow.

Rapier: Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 10 (1d8 + 6) piercing damage.

Hand Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, range 30/120 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d6 + 4) piercing damage. If the target is surprised, Velka has advantage on the attack roll.

Infiltrator's Spellcasting (Innate): Velka casts the following spells, using Charisma as her spellcasting ability (spell save DC 16, +8 to hit with spell attacks):

At will: Disguise Self, Minor Illusion, Message

3/day each: Charm Person, Counterspell, Invisibility

1/day each: Greater Invisibility, Fear, Phantasmal Killer

Legendary Actions Velka can take 2 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time, and she can only use them at the end of another creature’s turn. Velka regains spent legendary actions at the start of her turn.

Sneak Attack: Velka makes a Rapier attack against a creature she can see.

Veiled Step: Velka teleports up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space she can see. After teleporting, she has advantage on her next attack roll until the end of her turn.

Silent Sabotage: Velka makes a Sleight of Hand check to disable a magical device, trap, or artifact (DC 17) within 30 feet. On a success, the item is disabled until Velka chooses to undo it.

Reactions Unnerving Strike: When a creature hits Velka with a melee attack, she can use her reaction to impose disadvantage on the attack roll. If the attack misses, Velka can immediately make a melee attack against the creature.

Equipment Rapier (Finesse, Piercing)

Hand Crossbow (Ranged Weapon)

Leather Armor

Cloak of Invisibility: This cloak allows Velka to become invisible for up to 1 hour per day, with the effect automatically ending if she attacks or casts a spell.

Tactics Velka would remain hidden as much as possible in combat, using her Sneak Attack to deal substantial damage with each hit.

She would likely begin the fight using Invisibility or Greater Invisibility to gain advantage on her attacks and avoid being targeted.

If the situation gets dangerous, she’ll make use of Veiled Step to teleport around the battlefield and maintain her advantage.

Her Silent Presence and Unnerving Dodge abilities make her difficult to pin down or retaliate against, while her Legendary Actions give her flexibility to stay ahead of her enemies, especially in high-stakes scenarios.

Some random people in the bar:

1. Vokhara, the Infernal Chronicler Race: Tiefling (Fallen)

Description: Vokhara is a Fallen Tiefling, their infernal heritage twisted by the bloodlines of ancient devils and a mysterious pact. A former scribe of an ancient infernal library, they’ve traded their loyalty to the Nine Hells for the pursuit of forbidden knowledge. They sit alone in a corner booth, surrounded by worn tomes, always writing and recording secrets from across the planes. They are highly sought after for arcane knowledge and can broker deals with fiendish patrons in Sigil’s underworld. Their knowledge of the Infernal Hierarchy and dark rituals is unparalleled, making them a valuable ally—or a dangerous enemy.

1. Syrixan, the Shadowmancer Race: Shade (Native to the Shadow Plane)

Description: A Shade, Syrixan hails from the Shadow Plane, where they learned the art of manipulating darkness to their advantage. Syrixan has shadowy skin and eyes that flicker like starlight. Once a high-ranking agent in the Shadowfell, they are now a freelance operative with expertise in espionage, assassination, and dark magic. They’re known to frequent The Gilded Gutter seeking to hire those skilled in stealth or arcane sabotage, often leaving with rare, cursed relics to hide in the dark corners of Sigil.

1. Korlath Goren, the Eternal Warlord Race: Githyanki

Description: Korlath Goren is a seasoned Githyanki warlord, a battle-hardened veteran who has led countless raids across the Astral Plane. With their imposing figure and powerful psionics, they are a frequent visitor at The Gilded Gutter, usually in search of mercenaries to bolster their forces in the never-ending war against the Githzerai. Though Korlath's loyalty lies with their militaristic clan, they are pragmatic enough to broker temporary alliances with other powers, even if they involve covert operations and shadowy dealings. Korlath’s appearance is often a symbol of danger to those who cross their path.

1. Lia’naerra Veylora, The Planar Nomad Race: Aasimar (Protector)

Description: An Aasimar who was born to wander the multiverse, Lia’naerra is an unassuming yet radiant figure who has traveled across the planes in search of balance and truth. A gifted divine healer and seeker of justice, Lia’naerra often finds herself in the Gilded Gutter, speaking to the lost and broken souls who find themselves in Sigil’s labyrinthine streets. Though she exudes an aura of divine protection, her ability to remain unseen among the powerbrokers of Sigil is a testament to her wisdom. She’s often looking for information on lost relics or divine revelations, though her true goal is to understand the mysterious forces that govern the multiverse.

1. Boragoth the Mutilator Race: Yeti (Transplanted from a Far Plane)

Description: Boragoth is a Yeti, once a wandering guardian of the frost-covered mountain planes, now a mercenary for hire in Sigil. His once noble and protector role has transformed into a dangerous career as a headhunter who specializes in retrieving individuals for the highest bidder—no matter how morally questionable the task. Despite his terrifying presence and immense strength, Boragoth is an intelligent tactician and often seeks to broker large bounties or nefarious contracts in the Gilded Gutter. His massive fur-covered frame and sharp, gleaming teeth are an intimidating sight to anyone daring to cross him.

1. Fyren “Sable Fang” Durnesh Race: Tabaxi

Description: Fyren, known as Sable Fang, is a cunning Tabaxi who once served as a spy for a powerful faction within the city. Now, they operate as an independent mercenary who takes on jobs involving subterfuge and smuggling. Known for their stealth, sharp senses, and feline grace, Sable Fang is a fixture at The Gilded Gutter, often playing cards in the corner with other smugglers and black-market vendors. Sable Fang thrives in the shadows of Sigil, using their network to acquire both forbidden knowledge and rare artifacts, which they sometimes sell to the highest bidder or use as leverage in future negotiations.

1. Zorathis the Mad Mage Race: Human

Description: Zorathis is a powerful but insane wizard who has lived through countless lifetimes, having made many dangerous pacts with interdimensional beings and elder gods. His magical prowess is staggering, but his mental state is fractured from all the dark knowledge he's accumulated. Often accompanied by strange artifacts and mystical creatures from across the planes, Zorathis is both feared and respected for his spells and unpredictable nature. Many come to him for arcane secrets, though few leave without a sense of dread and discomfort. His muttering prophecies often hint at the coming of some unfathomable catastrophe.

1. Ozanith, the Serpent Lord Race: Yuan-Ti

Description: Ozanith is a Yuan-Ti who seeks to expand the influence of the serpentfolk in Sigil. A former high priest of the serpent gods, Ozanith now operates as a mercenary and political manipulator, pulling strings in the background of Sigil's power struggles. Their charismatic and seductive nature allows them to infiltrate high society, influencing decisions and causing subtle chaos. Ozanith is known for trading in magical relics and arcane curses, often engaging in high-stakes dealings with those who seek to increase their own power.

The Decommissioned Foundry

In a depressed part of the Industrial District, a massive foundry sits mostly idle, though heat and smoke do rise out of one of its smoke stacks. After sitting idle for a year, stuck in a contract dispute, a cult started squatting there. The Cult of the Everflame is a hodgepodge mix of fire elemental adjacent creatures who have put aside their differences to worship “The Everflame”

The Truth- A Mind Flayer conjured up this fire elemental and is using it to control the group. Destroying the Fire Elemental or the Mind Flayer will break the spell and the group will leave.

The Cult has two Azer guards standing outside one of the entrances to the foundry, but the back entrance is unguarded. Inside there are a number of Azer, Magma Mephits, fire versions of Kolbolds, Salamanders and an Efreeti captain ordering them around. They all have a glazed look in their burning eyes as they slave away feeding metal to one of the foundries.

The Efreeti, Flazar, will address the group. He will introduce his organization as a religious movement. To join, one must be “baptized” by the “Everflame”, a greater fire elemental: https://www.5esrd.com/database/creature/elemental-fire-greater/

He will assert that the group has squatters rights and they will become hostile if threatened. He is happy to introduce the group to the Ever Flame.

The Foundry

Players must make a Con save DC 15 or take 1d6 fire damage every minute they spend in here.

In the bowels of the facility is a massive foundry, heated in part by the Everflame, a massive fire elemental. It does not speak and will “baptize” the players (2d10 Fire Damage). As soon as they are baptized, the largest one will attempt to be dominated by A Fire Elemental Mind Flayer. The Mind flayer can be seen with a perception check (DC 22) hiding in the shadows obscured by the foundry smoke.

The Mind Flayer is using the Everflame Cult to pirate precious metals out of Sigil while building itself a small private army. It will fight the group but if the odds seem at all stacked against it it will escape with Plane Shift spell.

Treasure- Ransacking the Foundry will reveal 5 Platinum Ingots, 17 Gold Ingots, 36 Silver Ingots and 143 Copper Ingots (36000 gp value).

The Mind Flayer himself is wreathed in flame, so most items would burn off of him, but he does have Amulet of Invisibility, Ring of Mirror Image, Ring of Mounteback

Ignithar will try to escape if he feels he is in mortal danger, using mirror image, dimension door and then plane shift.

Ignithar- Fire Elemental Mind Flayer (Adjusted) Large aberration, chaotic evil

Armor Class 17 (natural armor) Hit Points 180 (16d10 + 96) Speed 40 ft., fly 60 ft. (hover)

STR 18 (+4) DEX 16 (+3) CON 22 (+6) INT 20 (+5) WIS 18 (+4) CHA 16 (+3)

Saving Throws Int +10, Wis +9, Cha +8 Skills Arcana +10, History +10, Insight +9, Perception +9, Stealth +8 Damage Resistances Fire, Lightning, Thunder Damage Immunities Psychic Condition Immunities Charmed, Frightened, Paralyzed, Petrified, Poisoned Senses Darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 19 Languages Deep Speech, Infernal, telepathy 120 ft. Challenge 14 (11,500 XP)

Traits Innate Psionics. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can cast the following spells, requiring no material components:

At will: Detect Thoughts, Mage Hand, Minor Illusion

3/day each: Levitate, Fireball (self-cast at 4th level), Counterspell, Fly

1/day each: Plane Shift (self and one willing creature), Meteor Swarm, Dominate Monster (3/day, creatures taking fire damage have disadvantage on saving throws)

From Items: Dimension Door, Invisibility, Mirror Image

Fire Immunity. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer is immune to fire damage and has advantage on saving throws against fire effects.

Mind Blast (Recharge 5-6). The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can use its Mind Blast to deal psychic damage. Each creature within 60 feet of it that can see it must succeed on a DC 18 Intelligence saving throw or take 45 (10d8) psychic damage and be stunned for 1 minute. A stunned creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

Fiery Form. A creature that hits the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer with a melee attack takes 8 (2d6) fire damage as its body is wreathed in flames. Additionally, any creature that starts its turn within 10 feet of the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer takes 8 (2d6) fire damage.

Psychic Flame Resistance. While the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer is within 10 feet of fire, its psychic powers are heightened, granting it advantage on saving throws against being charmed or frightened. Additionally, when it makes a Psionic Attack, the damage is treated as fire and psychic damage instead of just psychic.

Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.

Actions Multiattack. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer makes two attacks: one with its Fiery Tentacles and one with its Mind Blast or Firebolt (a ranged psionic attack).

Fiery Tentacles. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 22 (3d8 + 4) fire damage. The target must succeed on a DC 17 Strength saving throw or be grappled. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can only grapple one creature at a time.

Mind Blast. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can use Mind Blast as a bonus action, targeting one creature within 60 feet that is already grappled by its fiery tentacles. The target must succeed on a DC 18 Intelligence saving throw or take 27 (5d10) psychic damage and be stunned until the end of its next turn.

Firebolt (Ranged Psionic Attack). Ranged Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, range 120 ft., one target. Hit: 18 (4d8) fire damage, and the target must make a DC 16 Dexterity saving throw or catch fire, taking 5 (1d10) fire damage at the start of its next turn. A creature can use its action to extinguish the flames.

Legendary Actions The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time, and the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer can only take a legendary action at the end of another creature’s turn. The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.

Tentacle Lash (Costs 1 Action). The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer makes a melee Fiery Tentacle attack.

Fire Orb (Costs 2 Actions). The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer launches a Fireball from its mind at a point it can see within 120 feet. All creatures within a 20-foot radius must make a DC 16 Dexterity saving throw, taking 27 (6d8) fire damage on a failed save, or half as much on a successful one.

Psionic Shift (Costs 3 Actions). The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer teleports to an unoccupied space it can see within 60 feet.

Lair Actions (If Applicable) If the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer is fighting in its lair, it can use the following additional actions on initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties):

Flame-Wrought Walls: Walls of fire form within a 60-foot radius of the Fire Elemental Mind Flayer. These walls are 10 feet tall and deal 14 (4d6) fire damage to creatures that pass through them.

Psychic Heatwave: The Fire Elemental Mind Flayer radiates intense heat, causing psychic waves. Each creature within 30 feet of it must make a DC 18 Intelligence saving throw, taking 22 (5d8) psychic damage on a failed save, or half as much on a success.

Possible Outcomes to Eviction Plotline

-The group succeeds but the Mindflayer escapes -The group fails and otherwise barters with Velka -The group somehow convinces The Lost Titan (or another powerful ally) to do it for them -The group contacts the Gythanki after scoping the place out. They work together with the Gythanki taking down the mindflayer and the group handling the fire worshippers -The group kils the Mindflayer

The last two options will lead to the group being considered Va'guul-taas (“Servants Beyond Oaths”). This means two things: -Future work with the Gyth -Help accessing a hard to find portal (not strategically significant to the Gith) or items if the group wants it

Once Velka agrees to help, she will introduce the players to Rojur, a small gnomelike creature with green skin and small venus fly trap like creatures covering his body. He routinely pours insects on to himself to eat them. Rojur is obsessed with the inner workings of Mechanus, and particularly the Dabus. He tracks their motions as much as he can, and has an entire bunker underneath a massive textile mill. The walls, ceiling and floors are full of beautiful mind style maps, coordinates and such. He is particularly fascinated by Tock-Tock and trying to determine his erratic appearances. What he knows:

1- The other Dabus immediately descend upon and destroy Tock-Tock when he re-emerges

2- Tock-Tock seldom, if ever appears in the same place, and there is no predictable pattern about how often he appears. Sometimes twice in a day, other times it may take months

3- No matter how many times Tock-Tock is killed, he reappears later. Debate if it is Tock-Tock from another timeline, a clone, or just the original reborn.

4- Tock-Tock seems fixated on etching glyphs and is willing to entertain others (Dabus ignore people completely normally)

5- Tock-Tock seems like it is trying to speak, but can only make noises (Dabus don’t talk)

Rojur is working on a chaotic, time-independent non-deterministic algorithm that can track Tock-Tock’s movement. He has been missing the non-determinism element but the players can help with that. Once it is set up, he will alert them to Tock-Tock’s location, but they will need to move quickly before Tock-Tock is erased.

Tock-Tock will be found in a town square in an affluent part of Sigil with a large fountain, gardens and several cafe’s. He will be circling the fountain and occasionally trying to write a glyph into the water but it disappears before it finishes.

Tock tock will seem very excited to see the players but can’t talk to them. If they mention Xalatra and trying to find her, it will lead them to a stone wall underneath a causeway. Tock-Tock will roll back time to reveal what was there before it– the entrance to the Gutworks.

Tock-Tock is found in a town square next to a large clock tower. It is etching glyphs into the clock tower. Soon after it emerges, Dabus will start to converge. After a few rounds, enough will have rallied to try to surround and erase Tock-Tock. Most of the denizens of Sigil present will clear out when they see this occurring, but some will come to gawk and exclaim “Holy shit that’s Tock-Tock”.

Dabus

Medium Humanoid (Dabus), Lawful Neutral CR 2 (450 XP)

Armor Class 13 (natural armor) Hit Points 27 (6d8) Speed 30 ft., fly 30 ft. (hover)

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA 8 (-1) 14 (+2) 10 (+0) 13 (+1) 12 (+1) 14 (+2)

Saving Throws Wis +3, Cha +4 Skills Arcana +3, Insight +3, Perception +3 Senses truesight 60 ft., passive Perception 13 Languages understands all, communicates through silent gestures/thought fragments Challenge 2 (450 XP)

Traits

Reality Maintenance. A Dabus is drawn to unstable magic, structural damage, or planar anomalies. It has advantage on checks to detect illusions, invisible objects, and hidden weaknesses in structures.

Magic Resistance. The Dabus has advantage on saving throws against spells and magical effects.

Synergy — Custodial Chorus. When multiple Dabus are within 30 ft. of each other, their powers grow in efficiency:

2+ Dabus: Magic Missile darts deal +1 damage.

4+ Dabus: The group can collectively cast Mending on structures within 30 ft. as a bonus action.

6+ Dabus: Once per round, they can erase an anomaly (as dispel magic, 3rd level).

10+ Dabus: They can reshape the environment in a 30-ft cube (as stone shape).

20+ Dabus: They enforce a Custodial Edict — creatures of their choice within 60 ft. are restrained by animated infrastructure (DC 15 Strength save at the end of each turn).

50+ Dabus: Their actions call the attention of the Lady of Pain, ending the encounter on narrative terms.

Self-Erasure. When a Dabus is reduced to 0 hit points or chooses to sacrifice itself, it collapses into nothingness. At that moment, it casts Magic Missile at 5th level (7 darts, 1d4+1 force each) targeting hostile creatures within 60 ft. If 4 or more Dabus self-erase in the same round, their effects merge into a Mass Erasure, dealing 21 (6d6) force damage to all creatures in a 30-ft radius (Dex save DC 13 for half).

Actions

Innate Spellcasting. Charisma is the spellcasting ability (spell save DC 12). The Dabus can cast the following spells innately, requiring no material components:

At will: Magic Missile, Mending

1/day: Levitate, Dispel Magic

Magic Missile (1st-Level Spell). Creates three darts of force, each dealing 1d4+1 force damage to a target within 120 ft.

Structural Repair. The Dabus repairs up to a 1-ft break in an object instantly, or restores 10 hit points to a damaged structure.

Reactions

Custodial Intervention. When a creature within 30 ft. attempts to damage Sigil’s infrastructure (walls, doors, gates, streets), the Dabus can impose disadvantage on the attack.

After several Dabus are killed, they will form a swarm:

Mob of Dabus

Huge swarm of Medium humanoids (Dabus), Lawful Neutral CR 10 (5,900 XP)

Armor Class 15 (shifting defenses) Hit Points 180 (24d12+24) Speed 30 ft., fly 30 ft. (hover)

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA 12 (+1) 14 (+2) 12 (+1) 13 (+1) 14 (+2) 16 (+3)

Saving Throws Wis +6, Cha +7 Skills Arcana +5, Insight +6, Perception +6 Damage Resistances bludgeoning, piercing, slashing (from nonmagical attacks) Condition Immunities charmed, frightened, grappled, paralyzed, petrified, prone, restrained, stunned Senses truesight 60 ft., passive Perception 16 Languages understands all, communicates through thought-fragments Challenge 10 (5,900 XP)

Traits

Swarm. The mob can occupy another creature’s space and vice versa, and it can move through any opening large enough for a Medium creature. The mob can’t regain hit points or gain temporary hit points.

Synergized Casting. The mob counts as 20 or more Dabus acting in unison. Its Magic Missile attacks represent dozens of beams merging into concentrated barrages.

Reality Custodians. At the start of each of its turns, the mob automatically ends one spell of 5th level or lower within 60 ft. (as dispel magic).

Actions

Magic Missile Barrage (Recharge 5–6). The mob unleashes a massive salvo of force bolts. Every hostile creature of its choice within 120 ft. automatically takes 28 (8d6) force damage.

Erasure Crush. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 22 (4d10) force damage, as the mob collapses reality around the target.

Custodial Reshape (1/day). The mob restructures a 60-ft cube of the battlefield as if casting wall of stone or move earth. Structures reform, doors appear or vanish, and enemies may be walled off.

Reactions

Self-Erasure Surge. When reduced to 0 HP, the mob detonates in a wave of collapsing force. All creatures of its choice within 60 ft. must make a DC 16 Dex save or take 42 (12d6) force damage (half on success).

Once the Mob is hurt or defeated, the Lady will come and send the rest away. At this point, Tock-Tock is free to interact with the group. It won’t be difficult to persuade, it wants to take the group to the entrance to the Gutworks.

The Gutworks- (inner workings of Sigil)

Tock-Tock will lead the group to a smooth wall, and then using glyphs reverse it to reveal an entrance to the underbelly of Sigil. If the group invites it along it will travel with them.

The Nameless One will not enter unless given a really compelling reason (tome of torment, someone’s soul, etc).

Room 1- The Spiracle Engine

A massive series of pipes, tubes and conveyer belts weave around this room like a spiderweb. The array is dizzying and seems to not have any discernable order, yet it is all functioning. Massive pumps from overhead drop a slurry into a series of mechanical separators. Fluid is drained down a tunnel in one direction, with solid materials sent down a conveyer in a separate direction. A third tunnel, elevated above, seems to be some sort of a vent maintaining airflow. Periodically a Dabus may come by to inspect the system, but for the most part it runs self-sufficiently.

Investigation (DC 20)– This single stream facility is designed exclusively for materials reclamation. It is sourced from garbage chutes, drain pipes and other sources. Most of the material is refuse but if there is a type of garbage the group is looking for, it will eventually come through.

Room 2- Ventilation Tunnels

To enter these, the group will need to stop a massive fan that is spinning or remove it from the wall entirely (strength DC 25- it is really in there). Something very strong can stop the fan blades, but if it dislodges whoever is in the fan must make a dex save DC 20 or take 6d8 (27 damage) as the fans cut into them.

This tunnel is wide, large and conspicuously empty and sterile. There is a strong constant flow of air, giving disadvantage on anything audible, ranged weapons and flight is impossible.

These tunnels are stalked by Pipebound Hounds, large mechanical dogs the size of Dolly with an eerie resemblance to Dolly as well. Once the group is deep in the tunnel, they will be stalked by 3-5 that will try to drive the group to room 3.

Pipebound Hound Medium Construct, Unaligned

Armor Class 17 (hardened alloy plating) Hit Points 105 (14d8 + 42) Speed 40 ft., climb 40 ft., burrow 10 ft. Can run on ceilings and walls.

STR 16 (+3) DEX 18 (+4) CON 16 (+3) INT 3 (−4) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 6 (−2)

Saving Throws Dex +7, Wis +5 Skills Perception +5, Stealth +9 Damage Resistances piercing, slashing, force Damage Immunities poison, psychic, thunder Condition Immunities blinded, charmed, deafened, frightened, poisoned Senses blindsight 60 ft. (while in pipes), darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 15 Languages — Challenge 6 (2,300 XP) Proficiency Bonus +3

Traits Echo-Hunter. The hound cannot be blinded or deafened and can “see” via echolocation while inside metal or stone pipes. While in a pipe, it has advantage on attack rolls and Dexterity saving throws.

Sound Triggered. The hound automatically detects any sound within 120 feet, even through walls. On each creature's turn, if it made a noise (spoke, cast a spell with a verbal component, moved more than half speed in armor, etc.), the hound can use its Reaction to move up to its speed toward the source through walls or vents, ignoring difficult terrain.

Pipe Phase. The hound can enter or exit metal or stone pipes as if using Misty Step. This movement does not provoke opportunity attacks.

🛠️ Actions Multiattack. The hound makes two attacks with its Vibrating Claws.

Vibrating Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 12 (2d8 + 3) slashing damage + 5 (1d10) thunder damage. The target must succeed on a DC 14 Constitution saving throw or be deafened until the end of its next turn.

Resonance Pulse (Recharge 5–6). The hound emits a focused burst of sound in a 30-foot cone. Creatures in the area must make a DC 15 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, they take 21 (6d6) thunder damage and are pushed 10 feet and knocked prone. On a success, they take half damage and are not moved.

Room 3- Pipebound Den

This large chamber has an Alpha Pipehound and the bones/parts of others who wandered the ventilation tunnels. It seems their task is to keep the tunnels clear of any obstruction. A number of inanimate objects are here as well, carriages, barrels, crates, nets, anything that could have accidentally ended up in here. Also loot if they can defeat the alpha and its pack. In total there are 5 pipebound hounds and 1 alpha patrolling the vents.

Loot (investigation check):

DC 11- A sack full of fine silverware, china, and other things clearly robbed from a house. The bones of the thief are probably somewhere in the pile. (GP value- 3500)

DC 16- Gloves of Greasewalk (Wondrous Item, uncommon) These alchemically treated gloves allow you to move across grease, slippery surfaces, or muck without penalty. Once per short rest, you can cast grease centered on yourself as a reaction when hit in melee.

DC 19- Wand of Counterspell with 3 charges remaining (does not recharge).

DC 23- The deed to a property in Sigil is in a sealed velum tube. It is a deed to a defunct Zoo.

Natural 20 Coin of Reversal (Wondrous Item, rare) Once per day, you may flip the coin (bonus action) when you fail an attack, check, or save. Heads = treat the roll as a natural 20. Tails = treat it as a natural 1 and something unintended happens. The coin slowly changes weight over time.

Pipebound Alpha Hound Large Construct, Unaligned CR 10 (5,900 XP)

Armor Class 18 (reinforced plating) Hit Points 210 (20d10 + 100) Speed 40 ft., climb 40 ft., burrow 20 ft. (can run on ceiling or walls)

STR 18 (+4) DEX 20 (+5) CON 20 (+5) INT 5 (−3) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 7 (−2)

Saving Throws Dex +9, Wis +7, Con +9 Skills Perception +7, Stealth +11 Damage Resistances piercing, slashing, lightning, force Damage Immunities poison, thunder, psychic Condition Immunities charmed, frightened, poisoned, deafened, prone Senses blindsight 120 ft. (in pipes), tremorsense 60 ft., passive Perception 17 Languages — Proficiency Bonus +4

Traits Sonic Predator. The hound automatically detects any sound or vibration within 240 feet. If a creature speaks, casts a spell with verbal components, or moves quickly, the hound can sense it perfectly through solid material.

Pipe-Phase Mastery. The hound can teleport from one pipe to another visible or known location within 60 feet as a bonus action, passing through walls or floors as if under etherealness. While inside a pipe, it has total cover and regenerates 15 HP at the start of its turn.

Vibration Feedback Field. When hit by a melee weapon attack, the attacker must make a DC 16 Con save or take 9 (2d8) thunder damage and be deafened until the end of their next turn.

Anti-Magic Acoustics. Spells cast within 10 feet of the hound require a DC 15 Arcana check to succeed (free action by the caster). On failure, the spell fizzles as its sonic resonance is disrupted. Magical silence disables this trait.

Actions Multiattack. The hound makes three attacks: two with Vibrating Claws and one with Sonic Fang.

Vibrating Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (2d10 + 4) slashing + 9 (2d8) thunder. DC 16 Con save or deafened and knocked prone.

Sonic Fang. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 22 (4d8 + 4) thunder damage. On a hit, the target must succeed a DC 16 Strength save or be launched 15 feet into the nearest wall or object (take 2d6 + 4 additional bludgeoning damage and fall prone).

Resonance Overload (Recharge 5–6). The hound emits a focused pulse in a 60-foot cone. Creatures in the area must make a DC 17 Con save.

On a fail: 42 (12d6) thunder damage, deafened for 1 minute, and knocked prone.

On a success: half damage, not prone or deafened. This burst ignores total cover but not magical silence.

Legendary Actions (3/round) Phase Skitter. The hound teleports up to 30 feet through pipes or walls. Disruptive Bark (Cost 2). All creatures within 60 feet who can hear must succeed a DC 16 Wis save or lose reactions and have disadvantage on concentration saves until end of their next turn. Echo Slash. The hound reappears from a wall and makes a Vibrating Claw attack against a target within 10 feet of any metal surface or pipe.

💡 Optional Lair Effects (if in home territory) While in its Gutworks chamber, the following effects occur:

Resonant Hum. Every minute, a harmonic surge causes one random magic item to glitch (DM’s discretion: charges flicker, fail to activate, or surge).

Pipe Confusion. Maps and pathfinding fail in a 60-foot radius. All attempts to track or locate the hound are at disadvantage.

Echo Reverb. Spoken words echo unnaturally. Each time a PC casts a verbal spell, roll d6. On a 1, the spell is delayed until the next round.

Room 4- Refuse Conveyer

Players will need to delicately ride/balance on this to make it to the next room. An acrobatics check DC 15 will do the trick. If the fail, must make a dex save DC 10 + however much they failed by. Success and they are able to make another attempt at the acrobatics saving throw. Failure and they fall between the gears, taking 8d6 damage (28) per turn and getting stuck until they make an athletics check DC 15 to get out or someone else helps them. On a natural 1, they fall face first into a pile of rusted metal covered in an identified greasy substance alchemcial in nature. The substance is a Black Pudding that immediately latches on to them.

Room 5- Sorting/Processing

Biomechanical insects the size of bulls monitor an array of materials going by on a dizzying array of conveyer belts. They appear to pull anything metal from the belt and eat it, vomiting up the non metal components back onto the conveyors which head to the next chamber. This room is massive, the size of an aircraft hanger. If the group has any metal on them… they will be targeted. More will show up to combat as time passes. Initially there will be two more than as many members of the group (including NPCs). They will ignore the players until they sense metal or one of the termites is attacked, in which case a hive mind will kick in.

Giant Scrap-Eater Termite Large Beast, Unaligned

Armor Class 16 (natural armor, hardened scrap chitin) Hit Points 85 (10d10 + 30) Speed 40 ft., burrow 20 ft. (can burrow through stone and metal at half speed)

STR 17 (+3) DEX 12 (+1) CON 16 (+3) INT 1 (−5) WIS 10 (+0) CHA 2 (−4)

Saving Throws Dex +4 Damage Resistances piercing, slashing (nonmagical) Damage Immunities acid Condition Immunities charmed, frightened, paralyze Proficiency Bonus +3

Traits Metal Hunger. The termite instinctively seeks out metal. It ced Senses darkvision 60 ft., tremorsense 60 ft., passive Perception 10 Languages — Challenge 5 (1,800 XP) an detect worked or refined metal within 120 feet. Magical metal items glow faintly in its vision, and it prioritizes these if attacked.

Scrap-Digesting Maw. When the termite hits a target wearing metal armor or wielding a metal weapon, the item must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or take 1 level of erosion. Three levels destroy nonmagical items. Magical items instead lose properties for 1 minute (1d4 rounds if attuned).

Burrow Collapse. When the termite burrows through walls or floors, the terrain becomes unstable. The area becomes difficult terrain, and creatures moving through it must make a DC 13 Dex save or fall prone.

Actions Multiattack. The termite makes two Mandible attacks.

Mandibles. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8 + 4) slashing damage plus 4 (1d8) acid damage. If the target is wearing metal armor or shield, they must succeed on a DC 15 Strength saving throw or have the item partially shredded — granting attackers advantage until the armor is mended (or disadvantage on blocking with the shield).

Acid Spray (Recharge 5–6). The termite sprays digestive acid in a 30-foot cone. Each creature in the area must make a DC 14 Dexterity saving throw, taking 27 (6d8) acid damage on a failed save, or half on a success.

Metal equipment worn or carried is affected as if hit by its Scrap-Digesting Maw.

Room 6- Organics Digester

Remaining non-organic material is conveyed to chutes, and the organic material is sent to a massive stomach that digests it. There is a one way membrane separating the previous chamber from this chamber that lets things through but not out. It has 50 hitpoints and an armor class of 16. Once on the other side, players will be targeted by the Digester.

The Digester Gargantuan Ooze (Unique), Neutral

Armor Class 17 (thick bile membrane) Hit Points 280 (16d20 + 112) Speed 0 ft. (but see Peristalsis) Proficiency Bonus +5

STR 25 (+7) DEX 1 (−5) CON 24 (+7) INT 10 (+0) WIS 15 (+2) CHA 6 (−2)

Saving Throws Con +12, Wis +7 Damage Resistances bludgeoning, piercing Damage Immunities poison, psychic, acid Condition Immunities blinded, deafened, frightened, prone, stunned, charmed Senses blindsight 120 ft., tremorsense 60 ft., passive Perception 12 Languages Understands Common, Dabus-Sign, and Undercommon, but cannot speak (communicates via tremors, contractions, and bile-writing) Challenge 13 (10,000 XP)

⚙️ TRAITS Digestive Locus. The Maw does not move, but its interior is larger than its exterior. Anything thrown in is slowly digested unless protected by magic or granted a passcode (maintained by the Dabus).

Semi-Sentient. The Maw cannot leave its chamber, but it remembers those who feed it, and may selectively refuse or eject certain offerings. It bears grudges, especially against necromancers who feed it undead.

Magically Sterile. The Maw is surrounded by a 40-foot-radius antimagic zone, except for enchantments or transmutations that speed digestion. Spells cannot be cast within this area unless they bypass antimagic effects (e.g., wish).

Waste Assimilation. When the Maw digests organic material, it can occasionally spit out transmuted sludge-creatures, useful compost, or mutated slimes (DM's discretion).

🪓 ACTIONS Peristaltic Pull. Recharge 4–6. Each creature within 60 feet must make a DC 17 Strength saving throw or be pulled 20 feet closer to the Maw and knocked prone. On a failure, they must also succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or be stunned until the end of their next turn due to internal pressure.

Digestive Spray. Recharge 5–6. The Maw ejects acidic bile in a 90-foot cone. Each creature in that area must make a DC 18 Dexterity saving throw, taking 45 (10d8) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much on a success. This also dissolves all nonmagical organic material (cloth, food, paper) instantly.

Swallow Whole. If a creature is within 10 feet and incapacitated or prone, the Maw can absorb it directly into its interior. The creature is restrained, blinded, and takes 21 (6d6) acid damage per round. A creature can escape by dealing 40 damage in a single turn from inside.

Room 7- Gristle Rest

A sagging, moist, fungus riddled structure has been cobbled together between some decommissioned pipes. It seems mostly put together from refuse and the air around it doesn’t seem entirely safe to breathe. A massive sign outside has written on it the house rules in several languages:

1- No Names 2- No violence or fighting of any kind 3- No spell casting 4- You were never here 5- Death for anyone who brings the Lady’s eye

The sole proprietor is a Night Hag who doesn’t bother to hide her true form. She accepts many forms of payment– including, and preferably, living payment. The group can either stay in the main flop room where a number of putrid creatures seem to be laying low. There are also three “private rooms” available, though holes in the cobbled together insulation make these rooms fully visible from the flop room.

Staying here are:

-A few mercenaries that keeps their faces shrouded. Their armor is in disrepair and have emblems that have been scratched out. They are remnants from the Faction War and technically undead, now completely leaderless. They aren’t much for talking, but if somehow persuaded will mention that their are surviving followers of Vecna far deeper under the city.

-A large group of discarded Homunculi are in a corner, playing some sort of game of marbles.

-A half summoned demon, missing several of its limbs and horribly deformed eats a bowl of rendered sewage stew.

-A couple of diseased people are lying in the corner, dying.They are covered in old bandages with sores underneath that ooze out pus rot and decay. The smells is horrific. They will eventually be added to the stew.

-A large warrior with a scar across its face, body completely covered in matted, dirty fur, sits in the center of the room drinking engine coolant. He is not one for company.

-Perception check or nature will reveal that one of the large mold colonies on the wall is actually sentient. It can communicate telepathically and is connected to the other mold colonies in the area. If wooed or properly motivated will say it has seen Xalatra months and months ago and will give directions.

Libations include: Rendered Sewage Stew- Con save or causes illness Warp Rat Skewers Engine Coolant Whiskey Fermented Fungus Wine

If wealth is offered, the Hag will produce a “feast”. She has a halfling tied up in the pantry that she will start to roast for the players.

Room 8- Cistern Flow

A mixture of storm water, sewage, industrial runoff, and other things forms a moderately moving river. It can be followed for several kilometers before coming to rapids. There is one platform the group could get off on (room 11). Must make an athletics check (DC 14) to swim in the early part and another one to get off at the platform.

Room 9- Sewage Rapids

The Cistern flow becomes incredibly fast and violent as the tunnel narrows. Swimming becomes nearly impossible, and group risks drowning. Athletics DC 22 to navigate. Failure and player is submerged.

Room 10- Reclamation Vortex

The fluid is running into a massive whirlpool, with a portal at the bottom. Going through is certain death as this “purifies’ the water before sending it back to sigil. There is a maintenance door and ladder if the group can somehow reach it leading to room 13. Players will have 3 rounds before they are completely sucked into the vortex. Athletics DC 22 to swim out and to the maintenance door, which requires a perception check DC 14 to notice. If the players reach the center of the vortex, they must make a con saving throw (DC 23). Success and they resist the effects of the vortex and are rejected. Failure and they take 10d8 (45) damage each turn as they are “purified”

Room 11- Maintenance Platform/Couriers Rest

There is a maintenance platform with the skeleton of a boy snagged on the edge of it. The ghost of a friendly courier, a Vulpin named Amicus. He was delivering a parcel and was swept up by a dabus street sweeping team and knocked down a storm drain where he drowned. His spirit is stuck in the Gutworks but he has a friendly attitude about it. He is happy to assist the group in any way he can. He didn’t see Xalatra directly but overheard people at Gristle Rest discussing it before the mean lady kicked him out for being annoying.

Room 12- Junction

Connects Gristle rest to several other locations. Dabus move through here with regularity, but otherwise nothing of interest.

Room 13- Electrical Nerve Puzzle

A series of biomechanical nerve-like structures spread about this room like a spiderweb. It is clear that electricity runs through them, and making contact will cause a static shock (2d6 electric damage). The path is blocked by a nerve growth that is sparking. Going near it will cause an arc (2d6 electric) and contact with it will cause a massive shock (20d6 electric and knocks the player back). Investigation, nature, or arcana will reveal a node that if connected, will ground this growth and render it inert. However, it can only be connected using living nervous systems. If players hold hands in series, it will increase the resistance and decrease the shock. Divide 20d6 by the number of sentient beings connected and that will determine the damage taken.

Room 14- Abandon Creation is here

The remains of several Dabus lay near a heap of large gears and scrap. The heap will come to life and attack– it was a failed war machine constructed by half-mad engineers.

http://dndroll.wikidot.com/creatures:gearkeeper-construct

Room 15- Lift Access

The exit couldn’t be clearer. A massive lift that leads down to the lower levels. Next to it, one of the pipebound hounds has been bent into a glyph and fused with the wall. Touching or otherwise activating the glyph will cast Prismatic Spray on the entire group.

Group will need to make an intelligence check (DC 18) to figure out how to operate the lift. Otherwise they can wait and eventually a group of Dabus will come to use it.

As the lift moves downward any Dabus on it will disappear through walls, a path that the players can’t enter. It will descend for quite a while, and the group will notice a building pressure and generalized discomfort as they get lower– a feeling that something isn’t quite right. The lift will open up to The Reconfiguring Channel.

Reconfiguring Channel- A staging area for shifting landscapes/construction in Sigil. Players must make a dex save to avoid getting smashed up by moving buildings. Insight can help.

Sections of buildings, road and natural features flying through the air at high speeds, spiraling in factal patterns as they move upward and are absorbed by portals in the ceiling. This area is the size of a small city. The group must navigate through to find Xalatra’s next Glyph.

-Include dex saves (DC 15) to avoid being struck by large chunks of building (6d8 bludgeoning damage). 3 checks total- one missed is 3d8 damage, two missed is 6d8, three missed is 12d8 damage.

-Insight save (DC 15) can give advantage on Dex saves.

A glyph is burned into the ground, perpetually smouldering, around a manhole cover. An arcana check can be attempted to disable to glyph, but touching it or failing this check will cause the glyph to go off, creating a massive explosion (Dex Save DC 19 for half damage) dealing 8d6 Fire and 8d6 Bludgeoning as a shockwave of magma explodes outwards in 40 foot radius. 200 feet away from island of stability to the manhole.

Once the glyph is deactivated, the group can move their way down a ladder to the lower levels.

Substructure Warrens- The air underneath has an unnatural chill to it, like a winter night. It is very dark down here, and without darkvision of some kind players will have trouble seeing. Unless they are stealthy, the players will be detected by Doom Guards, former soldiers of Vecna hiding deep underneath the city to avoid The Lady’s wrath. The group will be brought to what looks like a court room, adorned with bone and glyphs. The “Judge” is a lich, and the jury is an assortment of undead. The group will be interrogated and if they are deemed to be servants of the Lady of Pain, will be summarily executed. However, if the group can convince the judge they are not aligned, he may show mercy if they can exchange information about what is happening on the surface.

Patrol Encounter: 2 Elite Doom Guards, 4 Deathclock Masterminds

Court Room: Lich, patrol (if they survived), Wights, Wraiths, and a number of Cultists. A spirit Naga, a vampire

The Judge and his lackeys won’t mention Vecna by name, but there should be signs.

**The Lich will demand a speaker be appointed to represent the group. Let them fight over it.

***If the Judge becomes impatient or believes the group to be withholding information, he will simply cast Dominate Monster on the speaker and then demand they tell him everything truthfully. The truth will intrigue him enough to allow the group to live— if they consent to a modified version of Geas to insist they free the master and not tell the Lady of Pain of this intent.

Xalatra passed through months ago. They will indicate her mental state is “fractured” and her magic extremely dangerous and unstable– so much so that even the undead were keen to avoid her, so they let her pass through. She was last seen heading deeper, towards “The Maw”.

The group will find their way to a tunnel with another glyph– this one has been deactivated by the Lich but a massive hole is burned into the wall by a disintegration beam as part of the deactivation.

The Group is “The Whispered Ones Faithful”

If questioned about the Maw, the followers of Vecna will reveal it is the border of reality with Sigil.. Anything that comes close enough is broken down on a metaphysical level. They don’t know how it works but it serves as a defensive measure, construction hub and energy source for the city.

Doom Guard: https://5e.tools/bestiary/doomguard-doom-lord-mpp.html

Shock Troopers: https://dr-eigenvalue.github.io/bestiary/creature/deathlock-mastermind

Lich: https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Lich#content

This encounter should not come to combat, but if it does, a few possibilities:

1- The group, against all odds, triumphs. They would find the Liches phylactery along with a Book of Vile Darkness, Staff of Power, Robe of Archmagi, Wand of LIghtning Bolts, Cloak of Invisibility, Crystal Ball of Mind Reading, about 4000 gold in coins and gems (times were tough).

2- The group dies. They are brought back… this time by the Lich, and bound to the will of Vecna. Their new goal is to find and free Vecna from his prison (in the deepest depths of Pandemonium)

3- The group is able to escape. They head down towards Xalatra… diminished. The Whispered One’s Faithful wont go beyond a certain point, fearing The Maw.

The Maw

-successive layers where reality starts to bleed away -effects like losing memories, languages, skills, etc become apparent -spells, magic items, etc, start to act erratically as they get closer -Dolly won’t proceed past a certain point, wimpering and hanging back

Have all players roll Charisma saving throws, lowest roll merges with second lowest roll, their head attached to the others body

Uzo makes Wis saving throw (15), failure and he thinks he is a prince who has been captured and transformed into a monster. Forgets how to fight

Domilia makes int saving throw (15) , failure and becomes a 7 year old (limited access to abilities and magic, simplistic view of the world)

Thogg makes int saving throw (15) or forgets all language and must make animal noises to communicate. Psychic damage (6d6) for any words in character

Rotlog makes str save (15) or becomes a turtle (roll d20, on 20 a Dragon Turtle)

Bruce makes con save (18), failure and all feathers fall off along with skin, looks like skeleton with muscle and sinew. Can’t fly, can’t use weapon, but may make melee attack that deals 2d6 physical + bonus and 4d6 necrotic

-languages forgotten, skills forgotten, magic forgotten, aging and deaging all possible.

They will find Xalatra in a classroom that is protected from the effects of the Maw. The walls of the classroom are covered in protective glyphs. Any changes that happened before can potentially revert here (dm discretion). She is friendly and appears non magical and lucid. She will explain that she “separated” from her madness down here, but the madness took all of her magical ability and she is trapped. If the madness can be defeated– she could help the group.

This was by design, she came down believing the Maw would cure her madness… and it did, just not as she expected.

Madness of Xalatra

A twisted version of Xalatra, covered in glyphs with bright green arcane fluid oozing out of her eyes and mouth is closer to the center of the Maw… seemingly able to somehow feed on its accretion. Killing the Madness or somehow curing it will see the magical ability return to Xalatra who can then help the players.

Xalatra came down here believing the maw could achieve this separation and cure her, but did not anticipate her magic would be taken with it.

If the players decide to gather information and hatch a plan, potentially reward them with a way to avoid combat.

-to avoid combat, they must appeal to her desire to completely catalogue the cosmos. “Work unfinished” will require a persuasion check of DC 20.

During the fight, the Maw will periodically hinder the group or xalatra to balance the encounter. Anyone who dies can be brought back by Xalatra if the group triumphs.

Madness of Xalatra Medium Humanoid (High Elf), Chaotic Insane Armor Class 20 (Glyphskin Runes) Hit Points 263 (35d8 + 105) Speed 30 ft.

STR 10 (+0) DEX 16 (+3) CON 16 (+3) INT 24 (+7) WIS 18 (+4) CHA 20 (+5)

Saving Throws: Int +13, Wis +10, Cha +11 Skills: Arcana +13, History +13, Insight +10, Perception +10 Damage Resistances: Psychic, Force, Necrotic Condition Immunities: Charmed, Frightened, Confused (but causes it in others) Senses: Darkvision 60 ft., Passive Perception 20 Languages: Common, Elvish, Deep Speech, Glyphic (a language only she can read) Challenge: 20 (25,000 XP)

---

Legendary Resistance (3/Day): If Xalatra fails a saving throw, she can choose to succeed instead.

Bleeding Glyph Aura (30 ft.): The air around Xalatra is laced with unstable living runes. Upon entering the aura, character must make a Wisdom saving throw (DC 20). Failure and they suffer confusion. They can remake this save each turn until the succeed.

Unweaving: Any spell cast that would affect Xalatra requires the caster to make an additional Arcana check (DC 21). Failure and one of the following happens (1d6):

The spell effects the caster instead (if AOE, centered around them) The spell fails, nothing happens. The spell has the opposite effect (damage heals, etc) The spell has a completely different effect (dms discretion, something absurd) The spell acts normally The spell is twice as effective

Spellcasting: Xalatra is a 20th-level spellcaster. Her spellcasting ability is Intelligence (spell save DC 21, +13 to hit with spell attacks). She requires no material components.

Cantrips (at will): Mage Hand, Minor Illusion, Prestidigitation, Message, Mind Sliver 1st level (4 slots): Mage Armor, Shield, Detect Magic, Chaos Bolt 2nd level (3 slots): Mirror Image, Misty Step, Detect Thoughts 3rd level (3 slots): Counterspell, Hypnotic Pattern, Glyph of Warding 4th level (3 slots): Dimension Door, Phantasmal Killer 5th level (3 slots): Wall of Force, Synaptic Static 6th level (2 slots): Mass Suggestion, Contingency 7th level (2 slots): Project Image, Forcecage 8th level (1 slot): Maze, Feeblemind 9th level (1 slot): Psychic Scream

---

Bonus Action: Glyph Pulse (Recharge 5-6): Xalatra detonates latent glyphs within 60 feet. Each creature she chooses within range must make a DC 20 Constitution saving throw or take 6d10 force damage and be silenced for 1 round. A successful save halves the damage and prevents silence.

Reaction: Unwritten Fate: When targeted by an attack or harmful spell, Xalatra may instead declare it “was never written” and cause the attack/spell to miss. She must roll a d6 — on a 1, her memory fractures and she becomes incapacitated until the end of her next turn.

Unwilling Assimilation Up to 6 targets in a 50 foot radius of Xalatra must make a Con Save DC 20, failure and they take 8d6 (28) necrotic damage and Xalatra heals for that amount.

---

Legendary Actions (3/round): – Glyph Skip (1 action): Teleport up to 60 feet to a space she can see. – Manifest Word (2 actions): Choose a noun or verb (e.g., fire, silence, pull). That word becomes reality in a 10 ft. sphere (DM determines effect). Maw Feeding (2 actions) draws from the Maw to cast an additional spell of up to 8th level – Rewrite Target (3 actions): Target one creature she can see. They must make a DC 20 Charisma save or be affected by modify memory (as if cast at 9th level), but the change must involve their perception of reality.

Cure

Once the Madness is defeated or otherwise neutralized, the players can return to the school house. Xalatra will study them and determine a method of “rebinding” the group to this reality. It will involve them being covered in glyph-like tattoos (a process that will take many hours). Once they are covered, they are to jump directly into The Maw. They will be broken down, but the glyphs will prevent them from being consumed and repurposed. Instead, they should reform in Sigil as themselves but able to travel linearly.

If the group would like, Xalatra will stick around and meet them somewhere. Otherwise, she has had her fill of mapping the Far Realm boundaries land instead will focus on finishing her cartography of the lower planes (Abyssal layers below 500, Pandemonium, Carceri, etc).

Mechanical hounds stalking the vents:

Pipebound Hound Medium Construct, Unaligned

Armor Class 17 (hardened alloy plating) Hit Points 105 (14d8 + 42) Speed 40 ft., climb 40 ft., burrow 10 ft. (only through metal or stone)

STR 16 (+3) DEX 18 (+4) CON 16 (+3) INT 3 (−4) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 6 (−2)

Saving Throws Dex +7, Wis +5 Skills Perception +5, Stealth +9 Damage Resistances piercing, slashing, force Damage Immunities poison, psychic, thunder Condition Immunities blinded, charmed, deafened, frightened, poisoned Senses blindsight 60 ft. (while in pipes), darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 15 Languages — Challenge 6 (2,300 XP) Proficiency Bonus +3

Traits Echo-Hunter. The hound cannot be blinded or deafened and can “see” via echolocation while inside metal or stone pipes. While in a pipe, it has advantage on attack rolls and Dexterity saving throws.

Sound Triggered. The hound automatically detects any sound within 120 feet, even through walls. On each creature's turn, if it made a noise (spoke, cast a spell with a verbal component, moved more than half speed in armor, etc.), the hound can use its Reaction to move up to its speed toward the source through walls or vents, ignoring difficult terrain.

Pipe Phase. The hound can enter or exit metal or stone pipes as if using Misty Step. This movement does not provoke opportunity attacks.

Actions Multiattack. The hound makes two attacks with its Vibrating Claws.

Vibrating Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 12 (2d8 + 3) slashing damage + 5 (1d10) thunder damage. The target must succeed on a DC 14 Constitution saving throw or be deafened until the end of its next turn.

Resonance Pulse (Recharge 5–6). The hound emits a focused burst of sound in a 30-foot cone. Creatures in the area must make a DC 15 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, they take 21 (6d6) thunder damage and are pushed 10 feet and knocked prone. On a success, they take half damage and are not moved.

Legendary Actions (Optional for Elite Variant) The Pipebound Hound can take 2 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature’s turn.

Phase Skitter. The hound moves up to 20 feet through walls or pipes.

Disruptive Bark (Costs 2). Each creature within 30 feet that can hear the hound must succeed on a DC 14 Wisdom saving throw or have disadvantage on concentration checks until the start of the hound’s next turn.

Pipebound Hound: Echo Executioner Large Construct, Unaligned CR 10 (5,900 XP) Intended as a solo threat or with 1–2 weaker support drones

Armor Class 18 (reinforced plating) Hit Points 210 (20d10 + 100) Speed 40 ft., climb 40 ft., burrow 20 ft. (through metal or stone)

STR 18 (+4) DEX 20 (+5) CON 20 (+5) INT 5 (−3) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 7 (−2)

Saving Throws Dex +9, Wis +7, Con +9 Skills Perception +7, Stealth +11 Damage Resistances piercing, slashing, lightning, force Damage Immunities poison, thunder, psychic Condition Immunities charmed, frightened, poisoned, deafened, prone Senses blindsight 120 ft. (in pipes), tremorsense 60 ft., passive Perception 17 Languages — Proficiency Bonus +4

Traits Sonic Predator. The hound automatically detects any sound or vibration within 240 feet. If a creature speaks, casts a spell with verbal components, or moves quickly, the hound can sense it perfectly through solid material.

Pipe-Phase Mastery. The hound can teleport from one pipe to another visible or known location within 60 feet as a bonus action, passing through walls or floors as if under etherealness. While inside a pipe, it has total cover and regenerates 15 HP at the start of its turn.

Vibration Feedback Field. When hit by a melee weapon attack, the attacker must make a DC 16 Con save or take 9 (2d8) thunder damage and be deafened until the end of their next turn.

Anti-Magic Acoustics. Spells cast within 10 feet of the hound require a DC 15 Arcana check to succeed (free action by the caster). On failure, the spell fizzles as its sonic resonance is disrupted. Magical silence disables this trait.

Actions Multiattack. The hound makes three attacks: two with Vibrating Claws and one with Sonic Fang.

Vibrating Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (2d10 + 4) slashing + 9 (2d8) thunder. DC 16 Con save or deafened and knocked prone.

Sonic Fang. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 22 (4d8 + 4) thunder damage. On a hit, the target must succeed a DC 16 Strength save or be launched 15 feet into the nearest wall or object (take 1d6 additional bludgeoning damage and fall prone).

Resonance Overload (Recharge 5–6). The hound emits a focused pulse in a 60-foot cone. Creatures in the area must make a DC 17 Con save.

On a fail: 42 (12d6) thunder damage, deafened for 1 minute, and knocked prone.

On a success: half damage, not prone or deafened. This burst ignores total cover but not magical silence.

Legendary Actions (3/round) Phase Skitter. The hound teleports up to 30 feet through pipes or walls. Disruptive Bark (Cost 2). All creatures within 60 feet who can hear must succeed a DC 16 Wis save or lose reactions and have disadvantage on concentration saves until end of their next turn. Echo Slash. The hound reappears from a wall and makes a Vibrating Claw attack against a target within 10 feet of any metal surface or pipe.

Optional Lair Effects (if in home territory) While in its Gutworks chamber, the following effects occur:

Resonant Hum. Every minute, a harmonic surge causes one random magic item to glitch (DM’s discretion: charges flicker, fail to activate, or surge).

Pipe Confusion. Maps and pathfinding fail in a 60-foot radius. All attempts to track or locate the hound are at disadvantage.

Echo Reverb. Spoken words echo unnaturally. Each time a PC casts a verbal spell, roll d6. On a 1, the spell is delayed until the next round.

A satirical view on today’s social media culture – 😆

I’ve seen some people lamenting the lost integrity of the NBA, which is now partnering with gambling sites Kalshi and Polymarket. Sorry—not gambling sites. “Prediction markets.” Where you can put money on your prediction and get more money back if your prediction comes true! Not gambling at all!

Anyway, I thought I could tell you a story of the NBA’s integrity and what’s been lost here.

Once upon a time, there was a very good basketball player. Some say the best basketball player ever! He even led his team to three championships!

But then: uh-oh! Stories started to come out that this player was a compulsive gambler! Did he bet on basketball?

Of course not! Why would you say that a compulsive gambler would wager on an event whose outcome he had more influence over than any other? I can’t believe you’d even suggest that! Anyway, the NBA investigated and found no evidence of wrongdoing!

Shortly after this basketball star’s gambling problem became public, he checked himself into a treatment center for his addiction. Just kidding! Actually, this hypercompetitive man whose entire life had been defined by basketball decided that he just didn’t want to play basketball anymore, and he’d retire and play minor league baseball instead!

He wasn’t a very good baseball player, and after a year out of basketball, he decided he was going to unretire and play more basketball after all! Suspension? Why are you talking about bridges? This was a retirement!

After a year in professional baseball, where steroid use was endemic at the time, he came back to the NBA with a bulkier frame and a much thicker neck! This was probably caused by all the times he looked at called third strikes! What else could it have been?

He came back to the NBA and won three more championships! He was even in a movie with Bugs Bunny!

If it wasn’t for the NBA’s storied integrity, this might be a very different tale! See what they’ve taken from us?

Train to Vancouver

// All AI use strictly prohibited

The sixty minute warning buzzes.

Klack, klack, klack.

Erich gets out of bed. He does a few stretches and some knee bends to get the blood flowing.

Klack, klack, klack.

The steady rhythm of traveling over the tracks had induced yet another nap. He missed a lot of beautiful Canadian forest scenery.

Erich inhales a deep breath through his nose and holds it. The lingering smell of the forest had been filtered away while he slept. No nature scents remain, just sanitized air and the metallic aroma of the train.

He lets the breath out. At least there will be hiking tomorrow.

Klack, klack, klack.

After a quick pee break he makes a pot of maple tea for the final leg of the journey. A pinch of lavender from the greenhouse adds a light floral touch.

Erich turns on cabin noise dampening to block out most of the train noise.

While drinking his tea he makes toast with butter and jam as a snack. Now his container pod has a nice breakfast aroma. Erich smiles.

He sets the tea kettle on the locking magnetic holder, so it won't shift during transit. He makes a smoothie with some yogurt and the last of yesterday's greenhouse harvest: strawberries, blackberries, dragon fruit, mint, carrots, beets, kale, and various lettuce leaves. He includes a little protein powder to add some longer-term satiety.

The damp chair's beverage unit will keep it cold for him just as it will keep the tea warm.

He places the smoothie cup in the magnetic receptacle as the train moves on.

He settles into his new, more comfortable damp chair. Straps automatically tie down his legs and hips after his body weight hits the seat. Erich extends and adjusts the chest strap. Totally unnecessary to do by hand, but it's reassuring. Once it's tight he sets the padded strap for his forehead and tightens it as well.

Train cars are seldom dropped by the transfer drones, but you don't want to fly around in one if it is dropped.

He sets up his drinking straws and puts his tablet in place for some light reading. He places his arms on the armrests making sure he can reach the releases then triggers the arm straps as well.

All strapped in he engages the dampening.

Erich's chair raises several centimeters and levels with gravity rather the train car. Now riding on magnetic waves he no longer feels the movement of the train whatsoever. A dome on the chair blurs out visual references.

Transferring his container from long rail to city rail shouldn't be bad. The long haul rail will make sure it's a smooth transfer. It's city rail transfers that incentivized him to finally upgrade the damp chair.

Automated transfer from city rail to hail-a-chassis and the robot driving are not the gentlest of operations. Unfortunately the huge ride hailing companies killed off the good local services, so now it's unsteady automated systems or nothing.

The final hotel transfer should be fine, but the city street driving always has tons of sudden momentum changes. In the chair he mostly just sinks into the seat a bit once in a while.

Time for some mood music. He kicks on some Max Webster and continues with the book he's been reading.

Yes Merry, they come in pints.

Best to read about Ringwraiths stabbing into beds while safe in a locked room where he controls security. Aside from train wrecks or huge explosions no need to worry about safety in his own container.

His pod is locked to the train car multiple ways, so he doesn't even have to worry about someone snatching the pod mid-trip like in some action movie.

After about twenty minutes of relaxing reading Erich switches to conference proceedings. Bye my furry-footed friends, we'll continue on the way back home as I too will return from a journey in the mountains.

Next up is conference prep. What's on this year's schedule? The astrophysicists always have cool new stuff.

Hmm, here's one from a mathematician. Ooh, math for detecting transit in gravitational lensing. That's gonna be fun. Pretty pictures of equations and also space eye candy.

Craig has a talk about the characteristics of the new alloys he's experimenting with. Erich will ask about those after the talk.

There's also this year's bad math in the news. It's always funny, but the topic is so depressing. If the math is wrong, then everything built on it is wrong.

Erich chuckles thinking about last week's corporate messaging platform encryption hullaballoo. If it isn't open to review, then it can't be considered secure and they sure proved that axiom with their bad math. Wonder how many private messages and transactions the Americans and Russians are sifting through this week.

He grins to himself, “None of mine since some friends keep me on the right track.”

A small ding informs Erich that they've arrived at the train station.

As he reads the gravitational lensing paper he barely notices the second chime to let him know he and his container have been picked up and moved from the heavy rail car to a city light rail car.

If he hadn't been concentrating on the full view screen to read the paper he would have noticed the room rolling and shaking about him during the move. The damp chair kept him from feeling any of it.

He finishes his smoothie. Down to tea and whatever's in the damp chair coolbox for the duration.

The penultimate alert comes as his container is moved to a rental chassis for transport to the hotel suite. The container around his chair shakes and jolts, it strains the tie downs in one direction, then another. Can't use magnetic locks on the hail-a-chassis transport trucks.

The transport company trained the robot controllers on the worst taxi drivers. Thanks to his damp chair he doesn't need to remind himself it's only a couple blocks in light traffic.

Erich will be fine. Not only is he in a shipping container, but his is an ultra-strong titanium alloy. That's why he likes riding the rails, he has a very safe mobile mini-apartment.

Train is much cheaper than flying since oil prices got as high as commercial aircraft. It also gives him time to charge his social batteries before the conference.

A deeper toned bong lets him know he's arrived at the hotel. Max Webster is almost done, so good timing for the music.

Definitely going to have dinner with Craig to ask about the new materials. Rigid without brittleness and with only 90% of the weight of what Erich is using now. Just research, so not ready for use, but maybe he can start testing with it next year.

Erich's project can also help fund Craig to keep the research going if it looks promising. he could really use a boost right now, but might not want the commitment of extra work. Erich hopes Craig is OK, but knows he isn't.

A disembodied voice tells Erich he's now attached to his hotel suite and welcomes him to Vancouver.

Vancouver Afternoon

// All AI use strictly prohibited

Now that his container is sealed to his hotel suite Erich executes the preliminary safety checks. His container reports a good anchor and a secure seal. He triggers the hotel's suite wall to open and surveys suite with his pod's external cameras.

Next he hooks up to the suite's control center and verifies its public key matches what was given in the booking confirmation. His security automation scans the room.

His console indicates all clear, so he moves his suitcases to the container's outer hall and closes his cabin door behind him. When in suite mode the internal cabin locks automatically.

Upon opening his pod's external door he is greeted with the smells of orange blossoms and cardamom from the hotel suite. That's pleasant but rather incongruent with Canadian Winter. He takes his main suitcase into the suite and closes the container door.

It takes just a few minutes to empty the suitcase, placing the contents in drawers or on the bathroom counter. Same room as last year. Erich is glad to see there are some upgrades.

He has the afternoon to visit Vancouver before meeting up with friends tomorrow for pre-conference activities. He'll also see the hotel manager this evening, so no need to delay getting out into town now. Staying low key now will help him avoid people and continue charging his social batteries.

He slips on his overcoat and grabs his hat. Erich leaves the hotel via a side exit, putting his hat on as he steps outside.

It's cloudy today. The shoreward wind is wet and salty. Even in early afternoon the wind is a bit biting, but he leaves the coat open anyway as it's relatively warm compared to Toronto.

He keeps his hat on to avoid recognition as he enters the bubble tea place next to the hotel. The café tempts him with sweet air from the pastries, but a mango boba suffices.

Erich keeps trying to grow mango in his greenhouse, but building a tropical rainforest in Canada is a bit much for a hobby project. At least he's figured out how to string dragon fruit cactus arms and that grows well enough.

Cold drink in hand, Erich walks up Burard St. to Pender, then takes the 19 towards Stanley Park. He gets off early at Denman and taps his hat at the lady on the park bench. All these years in and she's still searching her purse.

He drops his empty boba cup into the recycle bin next to her then heads uphill past all the bike rental shops to the Ukrainian restaurant. Pirogies are little gifts for the soul and the cabbage rolls are a gift to his stomache. Both are fantastic for his taste buds.

After a small, yeah right, plate Erich heads back down Denman to Georgia Street and then left into the park. He tips his hat again at the purse search statue.

There's a wide sidewalk leading into Stanley Park. Erich enjoys the view up the bay on the way to the peninsula. The park has many tree lined trails. It also has several flower gardens. The shoreline on the far side looks across the bay.

Stanley Park's trails are also great for runs and biking, but today he just needs some walking. Traveling by pod is great, but you don't get to move much.

Erich hasn't walked all the paths in the several years he's been visiting. He hasn't even made to to both lakes. This afternoon He sticks to trails in the trees for an hour.

When it's time for a break he heads for the shore. At a bench, he stops and sits to watch the seagulls enjoying the winds. He can also see the seaplanes taking off and landing. Tourists are getting a new experience.

The gossiping ducks override almost all sounds except departing sea aircraft. He closes his coat as he sits in the chill shore wind.

Erich wonders how Craig is doing and thinks, “I need to check in on him today.”

Erich gets up and follows the shoreline for a bit before taking a path back up into the trees. He makes his way to the park club house where he can use the bathroom. Then, he walks the last few dozen meters to the bus stop.

It's the 19 bus again back towards the Gas District. After exiting the bus he walks down to Canada Place and watches tourists for a few minutes before heading back into the hotel to unofficially, but not completely reluctantly rejoin society.

Inside the hotel, he sees Craig sitting alone at the café. Erich waves and heads over to join him.

Hugs, then Erich asks how Craig is doing.

“Doing OK,” Craig pauses, “Losing Sam was hard.”

Erich nods.

Craig says, “So much of that going around.”

“Yeah”, Erich frowns.

Craig shakes his head, “The restaurant swore they didn't use US supplies, but one of the providers was taking bribes to slip Sewer Industries greens into the shipments.”

Erich, “So stupid that they stayed with the autocorrect spelling of s-e-w rather than s-o-w.”

Craig, “Well, Parable of the Sower Industries is also quite on the nose for what they're bringing about down there.”

Erich laughs despite himself, “True, a self-own whichever way they went.”

Craig says, “Yeah, but it's hard to keep a sense of humour when your spouse's dinner commits murder and it becomes an international incident.”

Erich nods once more. What do you say when confronted with such an incident?

Craig quietly rants, “The cheap assholes who bought the black market infected lettuce, the greedy fuckers who smuggled in the taint of the week and the cob-licking rat-bastards who mismanage that farm are collective murderers.”

Erich winces, but says, “Cob-licking is safe, corn grows above the water line.”

Craig retorts with, “Yeah, you're right. They should have to lick their own lettuce instead!”

Craig shakes his head, “Man, 'The sous chef in the dining room with the salad.' just doesn't make sense. I mean, cabbage maybe. A head of cabbage has some heft, you can do damage with that.”

Erich smirks, “You've still got your sense of humour.”

Craig says, “Guess it's built in.”

Erich, “Yup, you're still Canadian, eh?”

Craig gives a tired smile, “By choice no less.”

Erich retorts, “Well, see you've been smart since you were three.”

Craig smiles, grimaces and frowns, then settles on a wan smile.

Craig shrugs his shoulders, “Well, we've got 5 days of geekdom, so let's ignore reality except the maths and physics.”

Erich nods, “An anti-Hollywood affair it is.”

Erich asks, “You up for tom-”

The hotel manager walks up to talk to Erich. Erich turns to Merideth and Craig says he needs to get back over to conference setup. Volunteers run the conference now so they can reject counter-scientific nonsense from sponsors.

Merideth says “Hey Erich nice to have you back. Um, sorry about interrupting.”

Erich says, “It's OK. He was only on a short break.”

Merideth responds, “Ah. So, how is the room? Did we get it setup the way you wanted?”

Erich says, “Haven't given it a thorough check, but the docking and check-in ran like I suggested.”

Merideth, “Good.”

Erich, “Thanks for adding upgrades I asked for!”

Merideth smiles, “Hey, thanks for your advice! We now have the best pod suites in the province.”

Erich grins, “On the continent.”

Merideth's eyes widen, “Really?”

Erich nods vigorously, “Yup”

Merideth's face lights up, “Cool, going to update some promo materials!”

Merideth, “By the way, how do you know all this security stuff? Aren't you a physicist?”

Erich shrugs, “I did computer security in college. More relavantly, friends of mine are still in security.”

Merideth, “Ah.”

Erich says, “You're the first to make a real go at implementing their suggestions.”

Merideth says, “You made a compelling case and it's paying off.”

Erich cocks his head, “Oh?”

Merideth nods, “Yeah, the pod suites booked out an entire year the week we made them available.”

Erich “Cool.”

Erich gives Merideth a skeptical look, “Wait, if they were booked a year out, how did I get one?”

Merideth responds, “The week of your conference we reserved both suites for you.”

Erich mentions, “I only need one.”

Merideth, “You really drove home the lesson about high availability, we kept the second room back for you in case there's a problem with the first. Technically it's waiting for an inspection,” Merideth shrugs, “but for some reason the inspector is on vacation this week.”

Erich laughs, “You are learning from us!”.

Merideth cracks a knowing smile, “Yup.”

“But there are limits,” Merideth frowns, “corp wont let me comp you your room, so we invented some new discounts to get it pretty close.”

Erich puts up a hand to waive that off, “No need, the security is worth more than the money, besides work pays for the room.”

Merideth responds, “Well work is essentially your own company, so it's your money.”

Erich shakes him head, “Not quite, but I do have some influence on how profits are used.”

Merideth beams, “We also started permitting for approval to add two more pod suites.”

Erich looks surprised, “Really? That's gotta be expensive! Especially since you can't have yet paid for the first two conversions.”

Merideth nods, “True, but they're selling and we want to establish ourselves as the premier hotel for pod suites before other hotels start adding them.”

“We're also working on partnerships with the cruise lines. They love it because we can make it much easier for them to get passengers on and off. Saving them time and effort on that is pure Yukon gold.”

Erich laughs.

Merideth smirks, “Heck, Canada rail says they've seen a slight uptick in pod tickets since we announced the suites, so they're talking to us as well.”

Erich smiles, “Give people what they want and they might actually pay for it.”

Merideth nods, “Yeah! Customer service FTW.”

Merideth says, “Look, I need to get going, but check the welcome packet for some very exclusive area discounts, including on your boba this morning.”

Erich does a double-take, “You're helping Yvgeni?”

Merideth holds up a finger in front of her lips, “Sssh, he's supposed to go out of business and have to beg for his job back!”

Erich cackles, “Ha! I wish he could do both!”

Merideth winks and walks away saying, “Gotta get back to day and night job, please let me know directly if you have any feedback.”

Erich waves goodbye and heads up to his suite to call the family.

Once in the room he checks the security logs. Nothing of note, so he does some more container unloading.

He places his hand on a pad next the container door for a hand scan, then when pushing the pod's outer door a contactless key from his ring lets him open it. Once inside the outer chamber a PIN unlocks the inner door.

He disconnects his short fridge from its magnetic coupling and wheels it in to the suite.

He finds the magnetic coupling in the suite where he'd recommended they buid it and verifies electricity is working after hooking up the fridge.

It won't be expensive to use the mini bar in his room.

His nice cutlery and pans can wait until Monday as he and his friends make a communal brunch before heading their separate ways.

He brings out a couple suits and puts them in the room's stand up closet.

Finally he grabs his day bag and outfit for tomorrow.

He closes his pod for the night.

He grabs a band themed golden ale from a Toronto brewer out of his fridge and heads to the bedroom balcony.

The kids like to watch the seagulls flying in the background when he calls in from Vancouver.

Group Hike

// All AI use strictly prohibited

Erich rises early for the geek hike.

The hotel breakfast nook smells like waffles, bacon, toast and eggs. He gathers a quick breakfast in the hotel café: a waffle with maple syrup ( brought his own better quality maple syrup thank you very much ), some scrambled eggs and a tea.

He fills a thermos with hot water and drops in a couple tea bags. That'll be nice and strong for the hike.

As he's eating Erich sees the annual conference brought science week back to the hotel. The TV is tuned to a science channel, rather than some scaremongering news station. Today's coverage has updates on findings from several telescopes. It's good that some countries are still funding that work.

Astronomy pictures make for great eye candy that even non-scientists can enjoy.

He finishes breakfast with a banana, then grabs two apples, an orange and a bagel for the trip. Craig always forgets to bring snacks, then complains of being famished.

Back in the room he grabs his hiking backpack. It's main compartment already has some sports bars, a change of undergarments and three flashlights: red light, UV and normal. It also has an emergency pack including a couple solar blankets, a fire starter and a first aid kid. Another pocket gets a spare battery and a couple cables for charging whatever might need charging.

Erich puts a book along with a paper map of the area they'll be hiking into a waterproof bag. There's a back panel on the backpack, the waterproof bag and it's weight goes there, so they'll be up against his back.

A bottle of water is on one side pocket and the thermos of tea goes in the other. The bottom compartment has a rain poncho with various pieces of rope and string to keep it company.

The umbrella goes on the top ready for quick draw. Erich can reach back, grab the brella and have it open above himself in a couple seconds. Getting soaked with cold winter rain is no fun.

He carries a multi-tool on his belt and has a compass attached to one of the backpack straps.

Back down in the lobby he finds Craig talking to a thin, pale woman Erich doesn't know. She looks to be at least a decade younger than they are.

DQ will likely be down momentarily, always being almost, but not quite, late. Emily will be last because she's got a video call with her kids before she can come down. It's her ride, so the rest will wait for her.

Erich approaches the pair and they wave. Craig introduces Erich to Marina.

Erich says hi.

Craig says Marina is up from the states. They a couple days ago as they both came in early to help with conference setup.

It takes a lot of work to prep for crowds of science nerds enthusiastically geeking out. The conference center workers move everything in and get the infrastructure in place, but the volunteers setup the displays and science experiments.

She really liked Craig's stories of hikes from years past, so he invited her.

Erich frowns at Craig, “You know you're supposed to run it by the committee first”

Craig stares at Erich, Marina starts to say something.

Erich continues, “We only allow peer-reviewed entries for our hikes.” then smiles and turns to Marina, “Just pulling his chain. Welcome to the gaggle of misfits.”

Marina laughs. Craig pretends to scowl at Erich, then also laughs.

Craig “Told you, we're just a bunch of science geeks right down to our humour.”

Erich “Or lack thereof.”

Craig “No, we definitely have a sense of humour, but it's often a form the non-geeks don't recognize.”

Marina “It's like life on other planets, they can only see forms of humour they already know.”

Erich nods, “Exactly.”

A wave of sparkle and brightness approaches the three from the elevator.

Erich calls out, “Hey DQ, looking fabulous as always.”

Craig shakes his head, “You'll never make it as an undercover agent.”

DQ laughs in a falsetto and says, “Oh, I go undercover all right. I fall asleep reading fashion mags all the time.” DQ is several years younger than Erich and Craig by age, but decades younger in passion, the love of life and the desire to make an entrance.

DQ continues, “Now who is this lovely specimen? Have we determined where she fits in the geek taxonomy?”

Marina blushes.

Craig points at DQ, “She's our exobiologist, which is why she's always dressed so offworldly,”

DQ curtsies, “You flatter me.”

DQ steps over and pulls Erich in for a hug.

After embracing for a moment Erich says he's suffocating in taffeta.

DQ jokes that it's a lovely way to go.

Craig draws a sharp breath.

DQ turns to Craig in shock.

“Oh, honey! I am so sorry, I didn't think,” exclaims DQ as she disengages Erich and quickly envelops Craig in a tight, full body hug being careful to keep his head uncovered.

Craig embraces DQ and cries just a fights back some tears before he can say it's OK.

They hug as DQ holds Craig tight almost swaddling him with her dress. Craig sobs a few moments, then starts taking deep breaths to calm down.

Erich leans over to Marina, “DQ hugs are recuperative. They are warm, comforting, calming. They're an essential part of the Canadian healthcare system.”

DQ sways back and forth while holding onto Craig, then slowly releases him. DQ stares into Craig's eyes, “I'm sorry about being insensitive.”

Craig nods, then stammers, “I-i-it's OK. I n-n-needed that more”, he pauses to take a breath as his eyes well up, “more than I realized.”

As Craig steps back from DQ his hair stands up.

Erich, “See, DQ hugs give you energy. We think DQ hides a static energy generator somewhere in her outfits.”

DQ says, “It's the layers.”

Erich shakes his head, “Definitely more than that.”

DQ jokes that she won't divulge any secrets, but her dress does have a USB-C port.

DQ beckons Marina and gives her a welcome hug.

After the hug Marina stands still for a moment a little shaken as she looks down at the ground, then takes a deep breath and looks up to DQ to say, “Thank you, that really did feel good.”

Erich, Craig and Marina all have hair sticking up.

Craig points and giggles at Erich and Marina, then touches the back of Erich's hand with the resounding zap of static electricity. Erich yanks his hand back too late, winces, then shakes it off.

The elevator dings, they all look over. Emily rushes out and hurries to join the group. She starts to apologize for being late, but Erich says, “No need to apologize, how's the family?”

Emily says they're great. Partner is doing better as lone parent this year, the kids even got breakfast before leaving for school.

Craig laughs, “Glad to see the training is finally taking.”

Emily shoots him a look and turning to Marina says, “My partner usually works nights and only switches to daytimes a couple times a year as I go to a conference or we go on vacation.”

DQ says, “Honey, we all love him and are grateful he switches from the heavens to earth, so you can join us for a few days. Now let's hop in that magnificent ride of yours and explore this section of the galaxy!”

“First some coffee,” says Emily.

“Ooh, yes girl, good idea,” DQ concurs.

DQ gives Emily a revitalizing pre-caffiene hug, then they turn towards the breakfast area. Emily holds out her arm, DQ takes it, they saunter off as Emily sings something that mentions daybreak. DQ hums along in accompanyment.

Marina asks the other two if Emily has experience driving.

Craig responds, “Yeah, she's been driving since before she could reach the pedals on the tractor.”

Marina looks at him in disbelief, “Really?”

Craig nods, “Absolutely, they gave her platform boots and a periscope so she could reach the pedals and see over the dash as she helped her grandparents on their farm.”

Marina looks dubious.

Erich concurs, “No, really, they did. It explains a lot about some of her interests.”

Still dubious Marina asks, “Really, a kid?”

Craig nods again, “Yup, initially she just drove the wagon on the fields that had already been harvested. They'd start before sunrise, so while she was waiting for them to come load the wagon she could have her telescope out for some stargazing. That was the deal. Drive responsibly and use the telescope or stay back at the farmhouse and feed the animals.”

Erich chimes in, “She says animals are cute, but stars are magnificent. She also learned to repair the tractor because right to repair was finally legalized when she was an early teen.”

Craig jumps back in, “She maintains the car we're taking today. Heck, she put in a new transmission over the Summer.”

Erich smirks, “She also juiced the car's computer.”

Craig grimaces, “Nuts, I forgot my neck brace!”

Erich laughs, then says to Marina, “We named her car Whiplash.”

Marina gets big eyes, “Oh.”

Craig laughs, “No worries, both car and driver are perfectly safe.”

Marina says, “But she looks the same age as my younger sister and no one our age drives in the US, much less owns a car. Since the techbros tanked the US economy no one can afford a car. The big 3 combined to make the rather small 1, the foreign companies closed their US plants and Americans can't afford to buy something imported.”

Craig frowns, “That bad?”

Marina nods, “Not just for cars, for everything. Even though the tariffs finally got removed it was too late. The tariffs had done their intended damage and destroyed the value of the US dollar.”

Marina's head shakes, “Now, even those who get a car from their parents can't afford the gas. Only billionaires can afford cars or gas, mostly because they had money in other countries. They don't drive because they have foreign drivers.”

Craig sputters, “Foreign drivers?”

Marina responds, “Yeah, with the current economy they don't trust US residents to not be bribable, so they hire drivers from countries that are still doing well.”

Erich snarks, “Or from dictators that control the techbros.”

Marina sighs, “Yeah, that too.”

Emily and DQ walk past with travel cups of black gold in hand. They head out to the parking lots, the other three follow them out.

The car is a wide old diesel as they can still get diesel on the farm. The paint job is faded and there are dents in several locations.

Emily takes the driver seat. DQ takes the passenger seat, ostensibly to make room for her frills, but really so she can control the radio.

Showtunes again this year.

Craig hops in the middle in the back with room for Erich and Marina on either side of him.

As DQ closes the passenger door Marina notices graffiti on it. Someone used a spraycan with sparkling pink to write “DQ was here” and draw a tiara over it.

Once on the road the music starts.

Emily sings along and has a wonderful voice. Her grandparents taught her how to play a fiddle and sing during long nights on the farm.

Everyone else sings just loud enough to mostly drown out everyone else's mumbled bad singing. DQ practices miming and emoting, but Emily says it's too much of a distraction for the driver.

After an hour and songs from several musicals they arrive at the trailhead. Emily parks and they all get out.

DQ sheds her outer layers to reveal a thin, tight jumpsuit wholly inadequate to Winter cold in the mountains. She quickly dons a bright yellow cold weather jumpsuit that obviously had several hot dates with a bedazzler.

Erich muses, “And the iridescence metamorphizes back into a strikingly handsome caterpillar. What are you looking for this year DQ?”

The group heads towards the trail. Their boots crunch on the ice as they cross the pavement.

DQ calls back, “I'm hoping for some gigantic insects, maybe a rolypoly that fills up my hand or some ten centimeter ants.”

Craig asks, “Some ants?”

DQ grins, “Well thousants at least.”

Emily sighs, “You had to leave her open for that pun.”

Craig doesn't grin, “Yeah, I'm the straight man.”

DQ makes a wide flourish, “In this relationship honey, you most certainly are.”

Erich, Emily and Marina laugh while Craig grins.

The trail has entered the forest, covered in a detritus of tree droppings including leaves, acorns and sticks.

Here the oaks and maples continue their eternal combat to grab some sunlight. Further in the pines and cedars have definitely won that battle, but here the contest for second place is slow moving bough on bough jockeying.

Craig calls forward, “Also, we're visiting a data center, not Chernobyl. No mutant insects.”

DQ responds, “Heavy metals and lots of heavy metal pollution.”

Erich laughs, “Ah, so you're hoping for hair bigger than yours and lots of badly done make up?”

DQ turns back and winks, “Yeah! Don't know if I'll name them after Dee Snider or Nancy Wilson.”

Craig says, “Well, ants would all be female, so Nancy might represent better.”

DQ shrugs, “Depends on whether they look more like barracudas or rocks.”

Craig makes a show of breaking out an air guitar and giving a solo.

DQ smiles, “You may be the straight man, but you're all right.”

Craig finishes his solo, throwing the air guitar to the side of the trail and says thank you while taking a bow.

Erich mumbles about how mimes are the worst litter bugs.

The forest currently getting littered with non-existent guitar now consists of trees under their white winter blanket. The only signs of humans are the trail and those currently following it.

Craig spots a moth and asks DQ what species it is.

DQ breaks out a multi-corder, it's like a tri-corder, but she claims it operates across a wider, more joyous spectrum. She scans the moth.

DQ exclaims, “Oh, it's Cygnaeian Moth, the delicate wings developed through evolution in the gravity well of Cygnus X-1.

Emily adds, “In the lab we're studying how it extrudes the titanium struts for its wings.”

“Titanium struts?,” asks Craig.

Emily nods, “To support the delicate magnesium crystal wing structure under the gravity of the black hole.”

Marina looks from person to person, astonishment in her face wondering what she's witnessing.

DQ notices a deer, “Look, a phantom pierre from the foggy forests of Pflobotor.”

Emily asks, “Pflobotor? Should the P be silent?”

DQ laughs, “Of course not, the P should live its most pfabulous pself.”

“Pierre? Why is it a rock?,” asks Craig

DQ belts out, “I am a Rock, I am an Iiiisland.”

The deer spooks and bolts away from the loud, shiny human.

Erich wails, “Oh no! It was a trap! You've triggered Simon and Garfunkle, now we won't be able hear the Sounds of Silence.”

DQ turns up the trail and continues the song.

With her voice everyone is glad she didn't continue up the trail and turn up the song. Emily joins in with DQ.

Craig asks, “I thought we were only doing Canadian music?”

Narrator: “Only required to be 35% by law.”

Craig looks around, “Who are you? This story doesn't have a narrator!”

Narrator: “I'm only used for cheap effect.”

Craig: “And why do you sound like Ryan R-”

Narrator: “Uh uh! We can't afford that licensing and we don't have phone plans to sell.”

Craig can tell Narrator wagged a finger at him even though Narrator is not visible.

Craig: “What about his sometimes co-star Le Pierre?”

Narrator: “That's definitely outside our budget.”

Marina turns to Erich, “Who's he talking to?”

Erich says, “Don't know” while shaking his head. “I think it's a Scottish tradition, long soliloquys and conversations with unseen witches. There's a play nicknamed after the phenomenon.”

Marina asks, “He's Scottish?”

Erich nods, “His dad is, mom's Canadian, the family moved here when he was a kid.”

“And who is Pierre?”

Erich smirks, “Pierre is the french word for rock, DQ used it as an excuse to move us away from the moth. Well, and to sing some Simon and Garfunkle. Well, not sing, there's a reason DQ only mimes when she performs. And I'm so bad they won't even let me mime lest I forget and start singing along.”

Erich grins and hurries up the trail to catch up with the please-don't-sing-a-long. Marina follows.

A few moments later Craig starts back up the trail, still gesticulating in a conversation with someone who isn't there.

Emily sounds wonderful. The others are a little jealous, but mostly just enjoy listening to her sing. She's the real Simon and Garfunkle fan. In this instance DQ has merely been the willing muse.

The forest has turned more to lodgepole pines with needles and cones covering the ground under the snow.

The group marvels at the tall, straight trees as they walk among the giants. Cresting a hill they see a nursery where seedlings are re-establishing density after a couple old trees have fallen.

There's a squirrel on one of the fallen trees.

Erich asks DQ why there are earthly squirrels on this planet.

DQ says humans have found normal squirrels on every planet with an oxygen rich atmosphere.

No one is sure how, but there is some evidence that squirrels have a multi-dimension existence. Physicists haven't determined how the squirrels harness the energy necessary to overcome physics as we understand it. Some people speculate it's just because they don't know any better.

Are squirrels connected via deep root entanglement? Do they travel on some long wave form wider than humans have been able to detect? Both of those could explain why squirrels twitch and fritz when the make sudden rapid movements or just freeze in place.

::: note Squirrel Side Quest :::

Marina looks on mouth agape as her new friends discuss various theories of inter-dimensional squirrality.

A few minutes later Craig spots some buildings through the woods. They are separated from the park by a fence.

---

// © 2026 Plot Experiments, all rights reserved // All AI use strictly prohibited

@plot_experiments@bookstodon.com

#PlotExperiments #PodLife #LSMB #AIuseforbidden #noAI

Plot Experiments © 2026 Plot Experiments, all rights reserved All AI use strictly prohibited

This is a work of fiction, created by a human for other humans, but feel free to read it to your dog, cat, gold fish or other animal companion.

The characters, events, and scenes in the work are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.

Dedication

This work is dedicated to a couple inspiring drummers that we lost.

Their beats go in. Their legacies are in the lives they touched.

Introduction

This story has side quests. They are unnecessary.

Speed run blazing directly from start to finish and ignore the side quests if you wish.

Choose a couple of side quests for characters or plot backstories if you prefer a leisurely stroll through the adventure.

Or read all the side quests and explore every room in the dungeon of this plot.

---

@plot_experiments@bookstodon.com

#PlotExperiments #PodLife #LSMB #AIuseforbidden #noAI

Eliminer.

Garder ce qui fait sens.

Rester fidèle à mes valeurs.

Et même au-delà de ça, rester fidèle aux choses auxquelles je crois malgré mes peurs, mes scénarios négatifs.

Dépasser mes schémas. Ceux qui me freinent. Les comprendre d’abord, et avoir le courage de les affronter.

Un jour après l’autre.

Having answered the first and second questions, the third and last question remains: how. How do I explain the inexplicable? How do I describe the indescribable? How do I share the unsharable? This may at first glance appear to be just a superficial, craft, or logistical question, but that assumption would be far from correct. The very question about how is, in fact, the most difficult question of the three. There are several reasons for this that I believe are intrinsic to the sharing of anomalous experiences.

First is the nature of method. Selecting the method to share your anomalous experience is shaped in part by the medium itself. The medium is, after all, the message. How we deliver a message, any message, shapes and determines the form and scale of human connection, cramming the actual content of the message itself into a small conceptual corner. For example, a short simple story, when told three ways, is no longer a single story but three that, once told, escape the confines of the witness, the teller, and the lived experience itself.

When we speak of an experience to a single listener from the comfort of a living room or coffee shop, the account stays rather soft as it can be corrected mid-sentence, laughed away, or even denied by the speaker the next day. When we write it down, the experience then hardens into narrative and message. The ink, whether physical or digital, solidifies that which memory held fluid and amorphous. Once written, the experience becomes a non-negotiable record. And when shared publicly, either online or in print, it is completely surrendered by the author, metabolized into the body of the internet, where it becomes indexed, searchable, logged, and permanent—passed to readers the author-witness never imagined, including the indifferent and malicious ones, to be interpreted and manipulated in whatever way the receiver chooses. Meaning is, after all, subjective and meaning-making is quentessentially human. In this way, the method isn’t just a container or mode of conveyance, it is also the dice roll that decides the experience-turned-narrative’s fate.

The method may provide some degree of shelter, such as the anonymity of a pen name or the veil of fiction, which try to screen the witness from exposure and likely ridicule or censure, particularly online. But this kind of shelter isn’t free, and usually costs the author-witness a degree of credibility and immediacy, forfeiting the raw power of direct testimony. Most witnesses, I suspect, once they’ve decided to share their anomalous experience, never consciously think through these costs and the chain of consequences resulting from them.

There is also the matter of closure. A journal, for example, is to some degree always unfinished as it is an ongoing record that follows the witness until their passing and never quite completes their integration. A published book, however, demands an ending that the experience likely never provided. Thus, choosing the method is also choosing which truth is told and the degree of completeness that truth embodies. It presents a paradox where the story goes on through the author-witness even as it has ended with publication. And neither is ever totally true.

Second is the nature of narrative. Selecting the narrative model is really a choice of form which, in turn, helps decide what claims the narrative makes about itself. Point of view, for example, shapes whether the narrative says “this happened to me” versus “this happened to someone else” versus “I’m just sharing what I heard.” None of these are correct or incorrect, but each has different weights and impacts on the receiver that the author-witness may or may not be aware of. This goes beyond simply stylistic choices since each one hides an epistemology without the author-witness’s knowledge or consent. So no matter the choice of POV, fact or fiction, diary or drama, the lived inner experience is always left incomplete and inexact in its telling.

One of the main reasons the question of how is the hardest of the three is that narrative models force the author-witness to commit to a particular truth among several possible truths that are each and all not wholly true. For example, first-person non-fiction must make a declaration of what the events actually were insofar as the author-witness understands them at the time of telling. Fiction lacks this obligation by holding the uncanny experience as both psychological and spiritual without collapsing one into the other. It can, I hope, honor the possibility that the truth is enigmatic and elusive beyond the witness, and perhaps even to the witness himself. Whether the witness is diarist, memoirist, or novelist, he is trapped in the reality of having to choose how to tell his lived experience knowing that his way of telling is itself an ontology inherent to the method. Three different narratives then become three different ontologies from the very same experience — a dynamic, I feel, that is far stranger than the anomalous experience itself.

Finally comes the cumulative domino effect. Having already answered questions one and two doesn’t mean that there aren’t impacts on the way one shares their experience. In fact, the way one answers questions one and two, and the underlying motivations behind them, have a direct impact on the way one will share their experience, and leave an indelible mark on the final output one shares. This is in many ways unavoidable and, in turn, can be viewed as a feature, a flaw, or both of the decision to share the anomalous experience fully or in part.

Though I’ve presented the three questions in a sequence, the reality is that all three are interconnected, creating a loop where any change to one has a domino effect on the others, and, as a result, the final output. The sequence is subjective and once undertaken becomes unimportant.

Because of this, I find myself frequently getting lost in the labyrinth of my responses to each of these questions and the dynamic it creates among them. And I’ll admit that I’m continually struggling with my responses. I recently answered questions one and two completely, only to get mired in question three, falling deep into a rabbit hole I still can find no way out of.

And I’m certain that the more complex one’s anomalous experience, the more difficult each of these questions becomes. But for those who have integrated their experiences, even somewhat, they’ve come to realize in their own individual way that none of this is simple or straightforward, and I would doubt the testimony of anyone who presents their story as such. Not because the narrative of their experience isn’t simple, it may very well be, but any contact with the anomalous is far from simple both in terms of its substance and its effects on the witness, both short and long term.

I’m uncertain how long I’ll remain lost in the labyrinth of my own reasoning, but I hope that there is an end soon. The cognitive overhead is already overwhelming, only making the challenges of living between worlds all the more difficult.

But I also know that buried deep inside these coveats and cautions are my deepest self-doubts and fears of failing to manifest my own experiences in a world that might likely mock and reject them. I guess that is why there is courage, though I do not know how I shall find it.

#Intermundia #Excultio

---

By D. Bowman | Nomina Numina is a journal of my reflections, moments, and meaning-making between worlds. Reply by email.

My throat has been kicking my ass since Friday night, I think. It's all a little unclear. I'm pretty sure it was Friday. All of the things capable of pushing me to the edge have combined together to make me utterly miserable. I'm good until I feel like I can't breathe, then the test of my mental strength begins. I am not enjoying it.

While watching a movie as distraction last night, political ads kept popping on. I wasn't surprised by the brutality nor the lying. What did surprise me was the network airing the nonsense. I don't care what someone's beliefs are as long as they're not harming anyone, but I do care about decency. I'd also like the people in charge to have at least half a brain cell that still works or ever worked to begin with.

OK, brutal honesty here — I think everyone who tries to hold a political office should have to pass a challenging test that covers more than the basic requirements of their job. I don't care if that means Billy, Peg, and Sue aren't qualified. They can educate themselves on the topics if they wish to be qualified. Furthermore, they need to demonstrate the ability to be able to separate church and state in their mind. I do not think billionaires should be allowed to hold such positions because they do not live in the same reality as everyone else. Nor do millionaires for that matter. What would be the cut off? Maybe around $10 million. Senators and Congressmen could hold two terms max on rotation. Don't get me started on Supreme Court appointments. Most on it now wouldn't qualify under how very strict my policy on that particular branch of service would be.

There wouldn't be known donors. You want to donate to the cause? Great! It's anonymous and all goes to the same place...to help your fellow citizens. How incredibly disgusting is it the amount of money being spent on ads and campaigning that equals the idiocy of an elementary school bully.

I'm really just over the adults with so much power behaving like absolute and complete imbeciles. In fact, keeping this totally real, if you can support MAGA anything after listening to the hateful bullshit coming from the horse's mouth, it is impossible for me to have any respect for you because condoning the most hideous and disrespectful of actions out there. It's as simple as that. At first, I gave leniency because most people are uneducated and ignorant on the various topics of government. At this point, if someone's still supporting all of that, they have some serious mental health and hatefulness issues as far as I'm concerned. And if someone dares to tell me they support it because they're Christian, I will laugh in their face. Sure you are. Sure you are. Rocking that old testament hate and bigotry, are you? Who am I kidding? MAGA looks very much like the Christian world I've known. It's nice to see the true colors flying. (There's exceptions to this, though few and far between. They do shinewhen seen.)

Those commercials really annoyed me. I muted them each time, but it's not the point.

I am trying to motivate myself to be busy today. It's challenging at the moment. I should go take a cold shower. That would pep me right up. I had high hopes my allergies weren't going to ride me too hard this season. The season has barely started and I've already cut and blunted my nails. That's ok. At least it's a familiar fight. Time to go make some bone broth.

© 2026 AnOublietteofThought. All rights reserved.

Not proofread nor edited.

Rook, Bishop, Knight Combination Checkmate

One of the Correspondence Chess games I won playing as Black over this past weekend finished with my h3 Rook, f4 Knight, and b6 Bishop combining forces to Checkmate the White King. Position of pieces at game's end is shown above, and our full move record follows: 1. d4 h6 2. e4 a6 3. b4 e5 4. c3 Nf6 5. Nf3 Nc6 6. h4 exd4 7. cxd4 Bxb4+ 8. Nfd2 Nxe4 9. f3 Ng3 10. Rh3 Nf5 11. a3 Ba5 12. Bb2 O-O 13. g4 Nd6 14. d5 Re8+ 15. Kf2 Bb6+ 16. Kg3 Ne5 17. f4 Ng6 18. h5 Re3+ 19. Kf2 Rxh3+ 20. Kg2 Nxf4#

And the adventure continues.

There is a powerful image in the shape of: maimed dove feet in Paris, due to the hostility infrastructure towards birds, so that people below won’t get shat on! It’s the same faceless evil as these benches made unable to sleep on, to ward of poor people.

And the thing with doves, is that they carry the message of, and are the symbols of peace!

I know that is no coincidence, having experienced this first-hand

In Gamla Stan, I was having an argument with my wife. I’m sure I was being an ass.

Before the situation could escalate, I was shat on the head by a dove however, and the argument was brought to an abrupt stop.

This would never have happened in Paris.

In the discussions over whether the chatbot is “intelligent” or “super intelligent” or “artificially intelligent” (No.), let's not overlook the actual conclusion: “Intelligence” has always been a mostly useless concept, since it is so poorly defined and overwhelmingly a social construct of white supremacy. We should have gotten rid of it long ago, and everyone using “intelligence” as a concept should be viewed with suspicion.

It is an interesting speculation by what means the Book lost its old position in this country. This is not only an interesting speculation, but one which nearly concerns a vital matter. For if men fall into the habit of neglecting true books in an old and traditional civilization, the inaccuracy of their judgments and the illusions to which they will be subject, must increase.

To take but one example: history. The less the true historical book is read and the more men depend upon ephemeral statement, the more will legend crystallize, the harder will it be to destroy in the general mind some comforting lie, and the great object-lesson of politics (which is an accurate knowledge of how men have acted in the past) will become at last unknown.

— Hilaire Belloc, “On the Decline of the Book”

#history #reading

Arvoisa Kirjailijaliiton hallitus,

Yksi suhteellisen tuoreen kirjailijanurani huojentavimmista ja onnellisimmista hetkistä oli se, jolloin sain postilaatikkooni Kirjailijaliiton hyväksymiskirjeen. Se tuntui viralliselta leimalta passiin, jolla alan ovet oikeasti aukenivat: nyt minä olin ammattimainen kirjailija. Sain päätöksen alkukesästä 2025, kolmen julkaistun kirjan jälkeen.

Hain itse liittoon kahdella korkeafantasiateoksella ja yhdellä viihdekirjalla. Kävin toimittamassa kirjat henkilökohtaisesti ja sain ovella kuulla ystävälliseen sävyyn, että hakemustani oltiin jo odoteltu. Se ilahdutti, ja koin tulleeni kohdatuksi, vaikka missään nimessä mitään takeita siitä ei annettu, tultaisiinko hakemusta hyväksymään. Hakeminen itsessään otettiin kuitenkin ilolla vastaan, ja niinpä odottelin päätöstä levollisin mielin. Vähän kuukautta myöhemmin se tulikin postissa tiedoksi, ja koska olin kuullut huhuja liittoon pääsemisen vaikeudesta, nosti tieto kyyneleet silmiin: minäkin olin oikea kirjailija.

Sittemmin mielikuvani on valitettavasti muuttunut, sillä kun kriteerit ovat salaiset, olen joutunut hämmentyneenä seuraamaan useaan otteeseen, kuinka lahjakkaat ja minua rutkasti pidempään alalla olleet kollegat ovat jääneet ulkopuolelle. Yksi heistä on esimerkiksi asiasta julkisesti puhunut Pontus Purokuru, jonka Haavamaa ja Keskeytysten arkisto ovat kumpikin kaunokirjallisina teoksina inspiroineet omaa kirjoittamistani suuresti.

Toinen kollegani puolestaan opettaa työkseen kirjoittamista yliopistossa ja on kirjoittanut jo useamman erinomaisen lasten- ja nuortenkirjan, mutta hänellekään ovet eivät ole auenneet.

Tästä aiheesta on vaikea puhua julkisesti, sillä kukapa meistä tahtoisi kirjailijana polttaa siltoja järjestöön, joka pitää puoliamme, on arvostettu toimija, ja väsymättä nostaa yhä uudelleen ja uudelleen esiin kirjailijan työhön liittyviä haasteita, jotta ne eivät pääse päättäjiltä ja lukijoilta unohtumaan? Kuka tällä alalla tahtoisi tai uskaltaisi olla hankala, kun apurahoista, kustannussopimuksista ja työkeikoista pitää muutenkin kilpailla kollegoiden kanssa? Kenellä meistä on siihen varaa?

Ei minulla ainakaan, sillä olen vasta urani alussa, ja kirjoitan fantasiaa ja viihdettä, joita ei kirjallisuusalalla Suomessa perinteisesti usein pidetä korkeakirjallisuutena. Kirjoitan pienehkölle kustantamolle (joka tosin on ihana, enkä sitä hevillä vaihtaisi), eivätkä kirjallisesta työstäni saamani tulot riitä elämiseen, joten teen kirjallista työtä päivätyön ohessa. Vaikka olen siinä mielessä onnekkaassa asemassa, että minulla on paljon sitoutuneita lukijoita, hyvät verkostot ja paljon pieniä keikkatöitä, onpa jopa ensimmäinen puolivuotinen apurahakin, kirjoittamisella en mitenkään tule (vielä) toimeen.

Tarvitsen siis ehdottomasti Kirjailijaliittoa, aivan kuten tarvitsee kirjallisuuskenttä ylipäätään. Koen silti, että ei ole oikeudenmukaista, että jollakin myyttisellä tavalla olen onnistunut luikertelemaan sen sisään, vaikka samaan aikaan kokeneemmat ja vähintäänkin yhtä pätevät kollegat ovat jääneet ulkopuolelle. Ajattelen, että arviointiperusteissa tarvitaan lisää läpinäkyvyyttä, jotta liiton toiminta on aidosti oikeudenmukaista.

Yksi taiteen tärkeimmistä tehtävistä on rohkaista ihmisiä ajattelemaan ja keskustelemaan. Sen tehtävänä on herättää kysymyksiä ja kyseenalaistaa. Kirjailijaliiton jäsenarviointikriteerien sen sijaan ei kuitenkaan pitäisi tuntua mystisiltä tai monitulkintaisilta, vaan sääntöjen pitäisi olla selkeät, yhdenmukaiset ja reilut – ja samat kaikille.

Suhtaudun Kirjailijaliiton toimintaan mitä suurimmalla arvostuksella ja kunnioituksella, mutta haluan olla jatkossakin ylpeä jäsenyydestäni, ja jotta niin voi olla, jonkin on muututtava. Haluan kuulua sellaiseen liittoon, jossa koen jäsenyyteni olevan aidosti ansaittua – ja niin en voi kokea, mikäli vaikuttaa siltä, että minua aiemmin alalle tulleet, aivan yhtä pätevät kollegat eivät pääse ovista sisään.

Kunnioittavin terveisin,

Vehka Kurjenmiekka kirjailija

The essayist's task is not merely to notice what is broken or uncertain. It is also to recognise those rare moments when the world quietly discloses that things are, for now, enough.