Walkers of Worlds

[Maharg67]

QUESTIONABLE HISTORIES OF CENTRALIA

FLORA, FAUNA AND OTHER CRITTERS OF THE LAMPLIGHT CAVERNS OF CENTRALIA

 

How could one define the quasiliving silicon entity that was the glowcrystal which was one great interlinked entity formation stretching through the Lamplight Caverns and beyond? One the known peoples, the Clansfolk had come upon it first, many thousands of years ago, but their oral and other records mentioned much older and in some cases, very exotic species that had dwelt in such places in Centralia. Most of those had long vanished from the Lamplight Caverns, the most famous of them being such as the viperfolk, the jagraptors and a few others.

 

Flora and related items were mostly basic such as mosses, mossgrass, fungi of various kinds including the exotic mushroomtrees. In some areas there were more modern grasses, watergrasses, bushes and trees but many others had only types of ferns. Many exotic and very useful, ver valuable, herbs grew amongst the plant population of the caverns as the Clansfolk had long found out and even the Little Lamplighters took advantage of.

 

Fauna was mostly smaller lifeforms being fish, meatworrms, worms, insects of many kinds, cavedeer, lizards, lungfish, frogs, scorpions, spiders, cave squirrels, bats, coyotes, foxes, cavedogs and much else.

 

Then there were the so called creatures, the beasties, like the cavelurks, the mirelurks, the radscorpions, the radroaches, the radspiders, the radants and many others including the rare direlizards, hulkers and cavedragons.

 

There were many stories, whispers, of other things lurking in the huge three dimensional maze of the Lamplight Caverns froma form of Bigfoot hairy humanoids to ghostly blue shimmering figures, to small savage dinosaur raptors, bizarre robots and even bizarre lurching monsters made up of patchworked bits of corpses.

 

Yet people found most scary the idea that hidden inside the Lamplight Caverns might be a secret colony of the tripocs, the Aquatic Martians, that had come so close to totally dominating the Earth when they had learned of the treachery of their puppet humans and had tried to flood the world by melting the icecaps.

[Maharg67]

CHANGING NUMBER SYSTEM FROM '0' TO '2'; I HOPE THIS DOES NOT CAUSE ANY TROUBLE

 

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OLD ENEMIES, NEW FRIENDS (SORT OF)

 

The Pangermanic military forces came first in powerful, sophisticated but overly complicated battletanks and other vehicles. Hulking Tiger battletanks thundered along but following them cam nervous horse drawn wagons full of exhausted and often wound soldiers. Halftrack vehicles came also and more tracked machines. Many wheeled vehicles came from what had been occupied Paris and other areas but which had become once again ruled by the French soon after Hitler and all of his cronies died so dramatically. The Germans, Austrians and other Axis forces simply gave up rule of Paris and fled in a more or less orderly fashion, back to their homelands. To appease the French and other formerly occupied peoples, they took no great amounts of loot, even openly putting back stolen artworks of great value and a heap of golden ingots to the French Treasury; this was to make sure that the retreat remained quick and orderly, that the various resistance forces would not cause problems.

 

Now the Pangermanic forces, refugees and others were coming through a great sparkling shimmering gateway provided by mysterious powerful forces. The Enclaven forces were invading Germany, were marching through France, were conquering other areas around the world. Oten the Enclaven forces used new or improved forms of older technologies but also at times the tripocs assisted them.

 

The Americans, Centralians, French, British and other Alliance forces already in the region were war of the Pangermanic newcomers despite the wide spread and brutally successful pogram launched against the a long list of Nazis, a form of hunt that used Gestapo and SS tricks against those who had previously used them.

 

Field Marshal Rommel was there, was climbing out of a large armoured halftrack vehicle on a high hill, was looking around with a large pair of powerful binoculars. With him were bodyguards, high ranking officers, aides and also some civilian refugee leaders. He was one of the few experienced very high ranking officers who had survived from the brutal fighting with the Enclaven traitors and the Aquatic Martians.

 

A group of scientists and other specialists, a few of them German, were working together in a large cluster of tents. With them were Brotherhood of Steel Sages and Scribes. They were heavily guarded by a taskforce of the new, secretive FreeAlliance Scientific Research and Development Guard, the FASRDG. It was sometimes called the Fasridg. Fasridg soldiers had power armour and other fancy gear but a pick of more standard weapons and other equipment. This far from pleased the general fighting forces of the FreeAlliance who were suffering from many kinds of shortages despite the assistance of the same mysterious forces that had brought the Brothers of Steel to assist and was utilising the big energy gateways.

 

From the distance drifted the noises of a great battle being waged. The sounds of artillery mingled with the disturbing sounds of heat beam weapons as overhead FreeAlliance fighters, fighter-bombers and newer helicopters attacked the enemy. Enclaven forces came with helicopters of their own, with jet-fighters that also dropped bombs, with heat-beam battletanks called Torchers and with Stormtroopers in power armour or hulking mecha power armour.

 

People were generally tense, frightened and upset at having to leave their old homes. Even Centralians were on the move including the Clansfolk who tended to keep to themselves, who moved in convoys of motor vehicles and with other equipment as good as anything their allies had. Indeed the Clansfolk were better equipped than many other groups and had assisted others, changing the wide held belief that Clansfolk were little more than crazy half-savages based on a primitive tribal culture. Clansfolk were bitter also for they were leaving behind lands that they felt were part of them, that they were part of.

 

Where were they all going, even the fighting withdrawal of FreeAlliance military forces? They were going to the Lamplight Caverns!

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

CHANGING NUMBER SYSTEM FROM '0' TO '2'; I HOPE THIS DOES NOT CAUSE ANY TROUBLE

 

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TWO FIELD MARSHALS TALKING

 

Field Marshal Ambrass turned and looked at Field Marshal Rommel. "We have evidence you joined the plot against Hitler."

 

They were on top of yet another hill but one that was part of the Lamplight Foothills leading up to the Lamplight Mountains, only one of which was truly large in size, it being a great tabletop mountain that might also be called a mesa.

 

Rommel nodded. "The failed plot, you mean, the one to blow Hitler to pieces with a briefcase bomb. I was being taken to be horribly killed by the Gestapo when everything changed, when some great terrible blast killed off Hitler and all of the highest ranking members of the Nazi Government, including the military and the SS. Soldiers came and shot the Gestapo officers. Then we were withdrawing our forces back to the Pangermanic Territories. My most difficult task was to protect Pangermans from reprisals from formerly occupied peoples and to stop our soldiers from looting anything. We left the French, Polish and others many pieces of military equipment, many supplies of ammo but that was partly for the sake of speed."

 

Yes, Rommel was not going to pretend that the Pangermanic forces had suddenly turned into saints or anything of the sort. The decapitating of the Third Reich had left much confusion in the Motherland and the rise of the tripoc threat had soon convinced the Axis that they needed all of their forces back home to defend Germany and Austria along with other Pangermanic Territories. Rommel was sickened by what he had learned of the great crime against the Jews and others deemed not fit to exist by the Nazis and deeply inside, glad that the Final Solution had been ended before it had really begun. He had horrors at the idea of just how many Jews and others could have perished if the Final Solution had gone ahead. Yet Rommel knew he still had antisemetic conditioning and he was not going to pretend to be a saint about helping to save many Jewish lives when he had ordered military forces to attack concentration camps and to free the inmates but also to help care for them.

 

Stalin was overthrown but what led to that was also a mystery, a complicated and little known series of events that had seen the transformation of the USSR into a looser, less centralised, less autocratic federation of peoples. Now Soviet peoples were coming to Centralia through other gateways, along with peoples from around the world.

 

In the distance Australian stockmen on horseback were driving large herds of cattle towards the Lamplight Mountains.

 

Japanese people had come past earlier on, mostly civilians on foot, carrying what every they could with them. They wore mostly Japanese style clothes, of course, and were many ways tradtional Japanese in their ways. A few tired Japanese soldiers marched along with them.

 

Ambrass snorted. "So you dared to turn against Hitler when so many Prussian Officers refused to do so."

 

Rommel lifted up his powerful set of binoculars to better study the Australians and their animals. "There was something wrong with Hitler and his cronies, that is even stranger than they used to be. Their personalities seemed to shift. They became monsters. The Eagle's Nest became a place of torrid debauchery, of terrible crimes against... well the whole thing was incredibly bizarre and horrific. Even Prussian Officers started to turn against Hitler who would never have dared to question the orders of surperiors before. Yet I have my doubts that any of my Prussian comrades had anything to do with the total destruction of the Eagle's Nest."

 

Ambrass nodded. "Some amongst us are suggesting that there are powerful invisible forces waging war and that we are mere puppets, playthings of them. Perhaps even those tripocs, those Aquatic Martians, are puppets."

 

Rommel gave the other field marhsal an odd look. "Yes, many of our officers think the same."

 

Also in the distance a temporary railway line was taking yet another train of soldiers, refugees, equipment and supplies to the Lamplight Caverns but whispers were saying that the caverns were little more than a staging post for the journey did not end there, at least not for most.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

X-FILES REPORT (BRIEFING REPORTS) HISTORIES

X-FILE #123/325-YA1 S/SIGHTING, CONFIRMED 2nd JANUARY 1942

 

Location: Jacobs Town, Jacobs Cove, North-Eastern Centralia. Semiprofessional Astronomers' Club of Northern Centralia (SACBC) Observatory Greenhigh. Sighting of multiple small green flashes on the surface of Mars. Confirmed by smaller telescope users in the area and then by other observatories able to view the phenomena clearly enough. Report was made to Centraliian Federal Ministry of Science, Department of Astronomy, but the report was not officially accepted. Instead, unofficially, it was passed onto the X-Files Archival and Investiigations Agency, the XFAIA.

 

X-Files agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully then further investigated the case with unofficial assistance from various government agencies and also non government agencies including fringe groups and individuals. Contact was made briefly with a man who was identified only as Mr Smoker or the Smoking Man. The X-Files investigation came to the conclusion that though there was no obvious sign of threat to the Earth or humanity, that the phenomena was of such concern that organised observations of Mars should be instigated from then on. There was also good scientific reasons for keeping an eye on Mars in case of any repititions of the noted phenomena.

 

For further information see related X-Files, Information Below.

Edited November 12, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

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A GRIM DISCOVERY OF LOST CHILDREN

 

What they found of the lost three Little Lamplighters of the first group that had gone missing, was their clothing, boots and other gear plus some bits of flesh and skin. Yet as Johnnie crouched close to the gory remains, he had doubts that the victims had fallen to a normal attack. He picked up fragments of cacoon like material and globs of slimy jelly substance in his special gloved hands, sniffed softly at them and ran instruments over them.

 

Super87s, armed older Little Lamplighters, androids and robots were on guard along with some dogs that were obviously on edge in that small cavern. The three Alsations kept clear of the gory remains as if not wanting anything to do with them.

 

Lucy was also there and was wearing some light body-armour. She was looking a little pale as she examined the scene. "What ate them?"

 

Johnnie shook his head. "Something ate their bodies from within while their bodies were wrapped in a form of cacoon filled with this substance here, the jelly stuff and yet I do not know if it was inserted into them as a form of attack or if it was inside the three children before the process began. I am taking everything that I can and am going to OrbisTransZia. Since equal exchanges are best when balancing travel to and from OrbisTransZia to the normal time-space realm, I would also take many more local samples such as from those odd looking plants over there."

 

Lucy shrugged. "That stuff. We have never found any good from those plants but only stinging thorns that bring out horrible itchy rashes."

 

Despite this, samples were taken from the strange plants known as stinging ivy as they were from many other plants in the area. Earth, water and air samples were also taken. When Johnnie vanished, going off to TransOrbisZia, about a minute later a couple of big MrPortys appeared with a goodly amount of equipment and supplies for Little Lamplight. Soon the whole group, including the new robots full of prizes, were returning to Little Lamplight. Only the androids and robots seemed unhappy about leaving that cavern with its strange 'aura' of dark disturbance.

 

Soon after the group was gone, with a sparkling shimmer Johnnie returned in stealth power armour and with him came three androids also in stealth power armour plus special lightly armoured, compact backpacks. Why was he doing this secretly? Because he was starting to suspect that something very odd, dangerous and deceptive was going on in Little Lamplight and that not all Little Lamplighters were what they seemed to be. He did not want any information of his mission getting back to MotherHub or to the mass of Little Lamplighters though he was not sure why this felt like such a very good idea.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

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SEEKING SECRET HORRORS

 

Johnnie and the replicant androids paced through caves, pausing only now and then for Johnnie to study some clues, to pick up the trail again, to do some data recording but none of these pauses were longer than a minute. Johnnie was able to track even under hard conditions, was moving through the water at times with out making very much noise at al and the replicants did the same. They made good time but Johnnie was dreading what they would find for he was starting to suspect that nothing had attacked the three children, that something buried inside them had been triggered and it had been inside them before the three had gone out away from Little Lampight.

 

There were many lifeforms in the Lamplight Caverns and in theory one could easily imagine it to be full of life but in most places there was only a basic environment of mosses, fungie and the strange mossgrass along with swarms of bugs and other crawlies. The group found itself moving through areas with only basic flora, fauna and other lifeforms. They passed the decaying wreckage of World War Two refugees fleeing from the Aquatic Martians and treacherous Enclaven humans.

 

Johnnie was coming to love the Lamplight Caverns despite its more bizarre features and the dark hidden secrets that he strongly suspected dotted the maze. The history of the Lamplight Caverns went way back before that of the Clansfolk to the Ancients who had left ancient temple cities carved out of the very rock of large cavern walls, ridges and floors. The Ancients had been more than one people and their carved cities reflected those differences. Clansfolk did not willingly speak of the Ancients, not even to each other and especially not to Outsiders.

 

Once they met briefly some mirelurks, savage and powerful with their big claw-arms, but there was something about Johnnie and the creatures fled away with out any attempt at aggression at all.

 

They found a dead mirelurk, its head and chest ripped open, but also a dead thing that looked like a glistening black metallic leather monkey creature with a great mouth gaping to show metallic fangs, a long tail ending in a metallic spearhead-stinger and retractabe metallic claws in feet and hands. Yes it had hands. It was also a male, was a she, and had been inside a boy child that was one of the three dead ones. Yet inside the alien mind had been the boy's mind, not trapped but at peace there in a savage, merciless alien fashion.

 

***

 

Lucy sent a message to Johnnie from where she was still in OrbisTransZia and admitted to something that she had not wanted to speak of earlier. There were, amongst the hundreds of Little Lampighters, some who the majority did not like. They looked the same as other chidren but did not quite 'sound, smell or feel' the way that other children did. These Cold Lamplighters did not seem to have much emotion, did not seem to care, and MotherHub seemed to keep an extra 'eye' on them. The Cold Lamplighters dwelt in three large groups and many smaller ones in their own area away from the main part of Little Lamplight in the Cold Lamplight area not named on any of the maps. Or at least not the common ones. Mayor MacCready kept a big map with that and other marked places that none of the common maps had on them.

 

The metallic-leather monkey creature was a human-alien hybrid of some kind but it was known to him. He quietly cursed himself as fragments of memory informed him that he had been one of the scientists who had experimented with alien genetics taken from dead alien monsters found in a crashed alien starship embedded into the surface of Uranus. Three huge robotic probeships had been sent out to Uranus at nuclear rocket driven speeds no human crew could have withstood and had brought back data-recordings, samples and even whole machines. Only two robotic probeships had reached home, that is Earth lower orbit, to drop special pods at the Centralia Research, Development and Exploration Spacebase Alpha-Omega. The Alpha-Omega Research, Development and Exploration Agency, the AODEA, was not part of the TekCorporations but was a direct part of the Patriot Presidium, the central government behind the larger Patriot World Government.

 

Hivaca! The alien monsters had been named the hivaca and it was pleasing that they had never reached Earth for they were monstrous creatures, merciless predators that would swarm across worlds to devour anything they could. How they had gone from world to world remained a mystery but the alien ship the dead hivaca had been found in was certainly not of hivaca nature. The great dead alien creature embedded into an exotic control chair with some kind of scope instrument, had certainly not been anything like hivaca.

 

He had the human-hivac hybrid and the dead mirelurks vanish with a sparkling shimmer as they were sent to TransOrbisZia and then were replaced, seconds later, by three MrSneakys. These were stealth altered MrBots (as stealth as anybody could make such bots) that gave the group added armour, arms, sensors and stored equipment plus supplies.

 

:sweat: I don't want to meet one of those hivaca things.

 

:geek: Some kind of silicon lifeform variant, I think. One can only wonder how they got so close to the Earth, in universal terms.

 

:sweat: Ooohhh, I don't want to think about it.

 

8) Don't sweat it. They are not here and we don't have to care about them.

 

:devil: You have to admire their brutal efficiency.

 

:sweat: Nnnoooo I don't.

 

:ninja: Ninja the hivaca!

 

Johnnie smiled just a little to himself in response to the Voices and then the smile slipped away. The secret of the hivaca-human hybrids was linked somehow to the basic nature of the Lamplight Cycle Settlements, as he was starting to call them. He needed to find the other two that were aready so dangerous that they could kill mirelurks though it seemed this time one had also been killed. He wondered why the other two hivaca-human hybrids had not eaten the mirelurk but then figured that they had been chased away by other mirelurks. He soon backed up this theory with evidence, as subtle as it was, that he found in that place.

 

:excl: The hivaca genetics were linked with the creation of the Forced Evolutionary Virus that was in truth not a normal virus at all despite the name.

 

:nuke: Also with the development of the various mutagenic tools such as gels, serums and other products. Radiation induced mutating influences were also part of it all.

 

:excl: The same was true of tripoc genetic material.

 

:nuke: Along with genetic material taken from the huge dead alien pilot-navigator in the alien starship embedded into Uranus.

 

Johnnie needed more information as much as he need to catch up to the hivaca-human hybrids before they did what ever they were planning to do for he sensed powerful genetic programming was driving them to do something. Anyway he had glimpses of knowledge from his being a so called super scientist of the Beautiful Ones when he had been part of a team doing extensive studies of the hivaca including failed attempts to clone hivaca back into existence. The attempts had failed because he and two other super scientists had sabotaged the cloning research which was one of the reasons that he and other rebels had become declared as Prime Traitors by President Jack Patriot Jackson.

 

Then both he and the androids picked up the distant, cave muffed noises of a savage firefight taking place.

 

http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt9/Dragonpen61/Forum%20Terminal%20Pix%201/TERMINAL-IT-Workit-00016.jpg

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

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GUIDEMARA VERSUS HIVAHUMANS

 

Guidemara Tribals were loosely known to Little Lamplighters as their roving hunter-gather-scavenger groups had met on ocassions and had peacefully traded with one another. Now the tough, Wastelander style garbed and body-armoured tribals were fighting from a larger corner of a cavern. Two were shooting lasers and two were shooting rifles but the other four were using strong shortbows with amazing skill. Two big cavehounds stood there in specialised body-armour and growled, ready to attack with big teeth and powerful jaws.

 

The two hivahuman younglings, a name that had popped up in Johnnie's mind but not by accident, were darting around the place, back and forth, driven by raging hunger to find sources of rich meat beyond the few meatworms, fish and other things they had managed to get on their way through the caves. They hungered and the hunger drove them to do foolish things like forget to look out for other possible threats than the tribals.

 

Johnnie came down hard and fast on one hivahuman youngling even as two androids took down the other. The tribals ceased shooting as their leader realised what was going on.

 

Caratrina, the roughskin leader of the tribals, brushed fingers over the multiple small ridges of her 'roughskinned' face. Even as she stood there in typical Sublander Wandering Gear as used by many peoples but in this case clearly marked with tribal symbols, she held her single barrelled shotgun, a monoshotter, with readiness to use. She was looking down at the capture-capsule bound creatures who were semiconscious and at peace thanks to the substances inside the very tough capture-capsules.

 

Johnnie had removed his helmet and was mildly grinning at the hairless roughskin leader. "You ever seen anything like these before. I get the sense they are familiar to you. By the way, my name is Johnnie."

 

She nodded. "You already know my name. We are all descendents of those who survived from Doomsday, who were in or close enough to the Lamplight Caverns to find shelter here. My ancestors were subcontract enslaved to TourTek who ran the Lamplight Caverns Tourist Resort, most of which is now ruins outside of the official main entrance to the caverns. I wonder what they would think of my appearance. You, you look like a norm or neonorm or demighoul but by the way you attacked one of these monsters you are perhaps one of those superhumans or maybe an AlphaCaste android or perhaps some kind of mutie metahuman."

 

Johnnie realised he had made a mistake by using amazing speed and other physical abilities to take down one of the hivahuman younglings so easily, though it had only been easy because they were inexperienced younglings taken by surprise. Still there was nothing he could do about it now. He gave another mild grin. "Call me Johnnie Lightening." It was a name that had come out of his distant past but which he had little idea of the origins of. Perhaps they had something to do with the clothing and other gear he had first appeared in the caverns with?

 

The woman frowned. "One of those things wounded one of my people lightly but venom got into her."

 

***

 

The victim, a young roughskin woman, was looking pale and sweaty with the approach of illness. Johnnie scanned her with a portable instrument and then he gave her a stimpak shot, some more obscure serums and some psychic healing. As he worked with the tribal healer, he gave the young man four stimpaks, two radaways, two rad-Xs and a med-x along with a hand-mediscanner with a spare rechargeable battery, RB, for it. Tribals preferred their own cultivated and gathered medicines but the healer was too wise to turn away the valuable gifts despite possible side-effects and addictions of some of them.

 

Johniie crouched against one wall along side the group leader as he carefully sorted out his compact medical toolkit. "That was easy enough. I have written out instructions for your young healer and have shown him what I did as I did it. Any more of your people get stung by those human-alien hybrids, you will know what to do about the venom. Very nasty stuff. It does not kill but keeps the victim trapped in a semiconscious state of helplessness but getting to that painless state is often painful. No, I do not wish to tell you how I happen to know this."

 

She frowned at him. "You have a dark past, then, but who doesn't in these times? Still, Johnnie Lightening, I would be careful who you speak to of such things. You may find yourself being attacked by those who still seek out somebody to blame for Doomsday and the horrors that came before and after Doomsday." She paused before she went on speaking. "My people have never directly encountered any of these hivahumans before, thankfuly, but the Clansfolk have done so. At least some of the many thousands of Lamplight Clansfolk have done so. Even their nearest outpost is a long distance from here, especially as it comes to cave travel, and yet we send expeditions to trade with them because they are honest, fair and have many goods and services to offer, sometimes for free. In exchange we take such as samples of life, information and any listed artefacts we find in the caverns. Yes, they gave us a list of what they want."

 

He had quick look at the long, comprehensive list and then passed it back to her. "Very good then, I have taken in the data. They even want those teddybear robots and baseball bats in good condition along with some other odd items. Indeed they seem to want much."

 

The woman shrugged. "Many of my people wish our tribe to go and join with the Clansfolk either semiautonomously as other tribals have done or to be fully absorbed. With every passing days there seems to be increasing threats coming into the Lamplight Caverns from the Wastelands or arising in the caverns or coming from some deeper place that we do not know much about. The Clansfolk speak of it as the Source of Menace or the Source of Monsters but they refuse to explain what they mean. They are becoming increasingly warlike and are even blocking off parts of the caverns with walls or great metal grills that allow water, air and smaller creatures through. Even they seem to be having increasing problems with dangerous creatures and warlike peoples. We are going to our tribal outpost of SheGaroTuill that also has historic and mythical-spiritual importance for us. We normally do not invite strangers but you and your androids, yes they move like androids, can come with us for you may well find something very interesting at SheGaroTuill."

 

Johnnie agreed but before he went with the tribals he made the capture-capsule enwrapped hivahuman younglings vanish off to OrbisTransZia and returning from there, to appear with another sparkling shimmer, came three MrPortys loaded down with gifts for the Guidemara. Yet even as he was friendly with the tribals, he was also wary of them for he sensed that Caratrina was not telling the whole truth and that she had a secret agenda that might not totally bode him well. Yet he also strongly sensed it was important that he go to the place called SheGaroTuill and check out what was there.

 

:sick: Those hivahumans are enough to make my guts all queasy.

 

:wink: You aint got any guts and everything makes you queasy. I don't trust that Caratrina fully. Her eyes are too close together or is that her eyebrows?

 

:ohmy: but she doesn't have any hair, let alone eyebrows.

 

:yes: Johnnie knows what he is doing.

 

:no: I am not so sure.

 

:excl: Yes, Johnnie knows what he is doing.

 

Soon Johnnie, his androids and his MrPorty robots were moving through the caverns along with the Guidemara Tribals and their new MrPorty robots full of goodies.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

QUESTIONABLE HISTORIES OF CENTRALIA

GUIDEMARA TRIBALS OF THE LAMPLIGHT CAVERNS OF CENTRALIA

 

Guidemara were first formed from those who had survived as employees, tourists and others who survived on Doomsday by being in the Lamplight Caverns or close enough to get there in time to avoid the mostly organic destructive effect of the N-bombs and N-warheads along with other super weapons unleashed upon the world by the tripocs, by the Patriot Presidium and by other, mysterious forces. Yet the Guidemara Tribe was large and was divided clearly into five factions.

 

Tekkusto: descendents of TekCorp workers

 

Govarusta: descendents of Local or Regional Government employees.

 

Tourista: descendents of tourists and some others.

 

Elendsta; descendents of those who escaped from the Elend Luxury Housing Estates.

 

Duvuosta: others who did not fit into other factions.

 

Factionless: those who could not or would not belong to any faction.

 

Of the five the largest and third most powerful were the Tourista Faction. (S = 1/5) (P = 3/5) (T = 5/5)

 

Of the five the most powerful but only third largest were the Tekkusto (S = 3/5) (P = 1/5) (T = 1/5)

 

but close behind in power were the Elendsta who were the smallest faction. (S = 5/5) (P = 2/5) (T = 2/5)

 

Govarusta were the second smallest and were fourth most powerful. (S = 4/5) (P = 4/5) (T = 3/5)

 

Duvuosta were the second largest but least powerful. (S = 2/5) (P = 5/5) (T = 4/5)

 

None of the factions were very advanced but of them the Tekkusto, the Elendsta and the Govarusta were easily the most advanced in skills and other resources and yet, amongst them, the Tekkusto were more advanced and resourced in tech than were the Elendsta who were in turn better off than the Govarusta while the Duvuosta were way behind the Govarusta but ahead of the Tourista. The Factionless were largely an unknown in relation to all of these factors except that it was guessed that they were easily as large as the other factions combined, had hidden resources of many kinds and had great potential of power.

 

In theory there was a democratic process that ruled the Guidemara Tribals through the Three Elected Councils, the lowest elected by chosen faction representatives, the smaller middle council by the lower council and the top and smallest council by the middle council. In practice the three most powerful of the factions controlled what went on in that period leading up to the Big Troubles.

[Maharg67]

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ON THE WAY TO SHEGAROTUILL

 

Caratrina became far less talkative and giving of information about her people. She also tried to keep Johnnie from speaking with the other Guidemara Tribals in her group of eight though she tried to hide what she was doing with no success. Johnnie picked up surface thoughts and feelings with out any real effort. He would not attempt to probe deeper on a telepathic-empathic level because of his personal ethics unless it was an emergency. There was no need for he soon learned that this group of Guidemara were of the Tekkusto Faction whose ancestors had been employees of TekCorps though mostly of WorkTek and VaultTek. While this faction did not see themselves any more as belonging to the TekCorps or having any loyaty to them, they did see themselves as being inheriters of a proud tradition of disciplined skilled workers and being surperior to the other Guidemara Factions.

 

Caratrina wanted to trick Johnnie, wanted to trap him and force him to give access to his powers of making things vanish and appear so mysteriously. In other words she wanted to know about what was OrbisTransZia and if she did learn of it, how to control it. It turned out that Caratrina was not only the daughter of a powerful Tribal Elder and Faction Elder but she had power in her own right amongst her own faction members. Yet Caratrina also wanted to show Johnnie something amazing at Shegarotuill that was named by the Clansfolk and was the site of a very old Clansfolk carved rock wall settlement.

 

The journey was a fairly quick one through fairly quiet cave tunnels and chambers. They went through an area full of crumbling remains of Great World War construction work that had probably been part of the Grand Exodus of FreeAlliance to who knows where. Twice they heard the echoed territorial cries of mirelurks and once those of cavelurks, monstrous cousins of the mirelurks. Radroaches scuttled through the caves and relatively small radscorpians but something about Johnnie caused them to not approach but not out of fear but some odd sense of respect.

 

Caratrina got more and more agitated. She increasingly glanced at Johnnie and looked away quickly when he went to look back at her. Then suddenly she stopped the group from moving and turned to him, standing in front of him. "Damned you, Johnnie Lightening, but I can not go through with this. We were not in that place by accident. We were told that you would appear as would the hivahumans as you chased them through the Lamplight Caverns. This is a trap but I do not know who or what is behind it, only that my tribal faction is getting a big lot of PreDD valuables, including Emergency Issue Dollars, for leading you into a trap that is the Clansfolk settlement. You were supposed to show up in tattered PreDD gear, not in advanced stealth power armour, and not with androids and robots with you. You also showed up about a day later than we were told you would show up, which shows the Shadow Elder is not all knowing, which is pleasing. We call him the Shadow Elder. He has too much power in our tribe, amongst our factions, but he has access to resources that we need and want, that is mostly want out of greed. He is also charming, cunning, brilliant, ruthless and he has dangerously threatening, seductive or manipulative followers known as the Shadow Slashers, the Shadow Seducers and the Shadow Satisfiers. Yes, all of his followers are weird shadowy women."

 

Johnnie suddenly had an alarming sense of familiarity and of danger. This Shadow Elder was a force that could too easily threaten him despite his link to OrbisTrasZia. He could have assumed weakness in this enemy because of a false prophesy of Johnnie's action but did not because foreseeing the future was an amazingly difficult trick to carry out; even if one attained information of sorts, interpreting it was also difficult. Johnnie realised, remembered, that he could glimpse the future but he would not rely on this trick too much.

 

Johnnie smiled at Caratrina. "So you want to get rid of the dark influence that the Shadow Elder has gained over the Guidemara Tribe, that has caused much more trouble in the tribe and much greater tension, unfairness and suffering in the tribe. Then I suggest you call foreward anybody you trust who can help us do this and have them come and meet me when we get to SheGaroTuill and I find a place to settle in for a while. What was the final straw that caused you to tell me the truth."

 

She frowned softly. "Firstly, you did not hesitate to save my foolish first cousin from the hivahuman youngling venom. Secondly, you gave us those three MrPortys full of prize goodies. Thirdly, you did not act like somebody who was taken in by my ruse or worried by it. Fourthly and lastly, when I mentioned the Shadow Elder a deep look of concern and even fear came onto your face and this reminded me just how much I want the Guidemara to be rid of that monster."

 

They kept moving towards SheGaroTuill.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

22 of 1 (027)

 

A DETOUR ON THE WAY TO SHEGAROTUILL

 

Lucy sent a message from OrbisTransZia that a steady trickle of Little Lamplighters had been going to the forest-haven transbubble and that in return a steady flow of equipment and supplies had been going the other way. The growing community of Little Lamplighters was happier now the new cave system was complete beneath the forest for the Little Lamplighters most often felt comfortable living in caves though they would visit the surface. The caves were almost identical to a large section of the Lamplight Caverns and were called the Newlight Caverns.

 

So Johnnie made a decision and took the whole group, with the Guidemara Tribal permission of course, to OrbisTransZia for outer time of five minutes and inner time of five hours.

 

The Guidemarans met with Tod, who was much more at peace with himself, and with Lucy who was preparing to return to Little Lamplight after what had been for her a long stay at the forest and the caves beneath. She had aged according to outer time but had experienced much more according to inner time, as was normal. Johnnie found himself giving Lucy a hug and a kiss, much to his own surprise but not to hers, it seemed. He hugged and kissed other Little Lamplighters.

 

Lucy and the young tribal healer were soon discussing the healing arts. All of the tribals were amazed to experience a forest with out mutated plants, especially deadly mutated plants such as giant carnivorees or stealthy crushervines or even moving, lashing triffids.

 

The tribals all slept for a while under the healing influence of TransOrbisZia and then they had a feast of sorts that consisted mostly of fresh fruits, grilled fresh caught fish and other fresh foods gathered from the forest.

 

Caratrina and Johnnie were swimming nude in the lake, the tribals not being a very modest people when it came to communal bathing, and they talked about philosophy, history, technologies and a few other subjects. Caratrina spoke of the factional politics of the Guidemara Tribe that, under the influence of the Shadow Elder, had become factional warfare with too many victims, most of them innocent.

 

Johnnie spoke as he floated in the water, slimly muscular and quite handsome but covered in dull multicoloured exotic tattoos of small size. "The Shadow Elder is somebody from my past, an old enemy who is very dangerous, very evil and who would only be amongst the Guidemara if he wanted something or if he had no other choice. Do you know what he has had other factions done for him other than your own?"

 

She looked frustrated. "I am a powerful member, supposedly, of the most powerful faction of the Guidemara, the Tekkusto, but recently I have found myself being excluded from important meetings and cut off from important information. My own parents, damn them, would rather listen to the Shadow Elder's charming lies than to my own words. Yet I have picked up some important clues to something big happening, a project of sorts, in one of the big secondary caverns controlled by my faction. They appear to be building or growing something there. Another factor is that people of the Factionless have been vanishing. About half of the tribe are outside the factions with no real power or security. I have a strong sense that the Shadow Master and this damned project have something to do with those disappearances."

 

The five hour stay at TransOrbisZia came to an end with the young healer having learned a good deal and having gained a new healing tool kit that was portable, compact but of good quality. The group also gained new arrows, ammo, weapons, tools and other gear along with repairs and upgrades to older stuff. As for Johnnie, he was rested and restored, was more prepared to confront the Shadow Master having with him many small, concealed but powerful items. To his surprise, Lucy wanted to go with him to the tribal outpost of SheGaroTuill and he at once accepted though it meant taking one less replicant android.

 

Lucy would not speak of it but he sensed that she had gained new 'powers' of the psychic form including empathic-telepathy, telekenetics, healing, limited teleporation and some others including telenergetics though she was nowhere near his own high level of such powers that he did not like using.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Maharg67