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Prologue: No Time Left

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Post by LightOfDawn Wed Jan 21, 2015 1:57 am

On an ordinary Marsday in Yu-Shan, Chejop Kejak is walking down the street between his palatial manse and the Forbidding Manse of Ivy. Though he does not need it, he holds a simple walking stick in one hand, the regular thocks against cobblestone his only company. His pace is quick but unhurried, the walk of someone who knows the meeting will not start without him.

Around him, Yu-Shan goes about its business. Gods scurry about to and fro, some on official business and some on business more personal. Gondolas sail about on canals of quicksilver, the sky shifts from night to day as the Unconquered Sun takes the lead in the Games of Divinity. Clouds scud across the sky, some of them carrying riders.

The venerable old man stumbles, catching himself with his stick. Looking down, he sees nothing he could have stumbled on, and for a moment all he feels is confusion. He takes another step, only to stumble again; this time, the walking stick is not enough, and he twists as he falls so that he lands on his back. Thinking is oddly difficult. Above him, the sky shifts again - this time to a starry night.

The Maidens' Constellations loom, Saturn burning brighter than ever before. He understands.

His eyelids drag themselves slowly, inexorably downward. "So," he wheezes on the last breath to escape between his slack lips, "It is time." And as the oldest Sidereal passes away, alarms ring out all over Heaven.

Alarms not heard since the Primordial war.

Every Sidereal strains to remember his or her training, trying to remember what it means. Some of them have more success than others - and those who remember drop everything and run for the Loom chamber.

It's the time dilation alarm. The flow of Creation's time is under attack.
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Post by CodexGigas Thu Jan 22, 2015 12:12 am

Mountain Taunts the Lightning, Chosen of Mercury, was aggressively meditating when she heard the alarm. Passive meditation had its place, but sometimes you had to seize enlightenment by the throat, rip out its heart, and devour the still-beating organ to digest the insights within.

The rising primal scream of frustration at being interrupted left Lightning's lips a mere sigh. Yu-Shan society (especially the city watch) didn't look kindly on blood-curdling screams without a very good reason, a lesson Lightning had taken many years to internalize.

Another lesson, learned very long ago on the frozen plains, was to first consult with the chief in times of impending crisis, in this case, Ruvia served as Lightning's ad hoc chieftain.
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Post by AlaskanWyvern Sat Jan 24, 2015 4:52 am

"If I'd known the Bureau of Secrets was going to be this upset when I followed their written instructions, I never would have agreed to cover that job for them," Xiangfan said, casually taking a drag from his pipe. The functionary god he was talking to glared at him and tried to wave away some of the smoke with a kerchief.

"You were supposed to keep the Dragonblooded turncoat from telling his Solar contact about the Legion deployment-"

"And I did, I don't see the problem."

"Eyewitnesses report that shortly before he was due to leave for his meeting, there a 'thunderous crashing sound' and the window of his third-floor room exploded, shortly before the target flew violently out of said window, on fire, at sufficient speed that he was fatally impaled on a banner-pole, through his armor."

"He should have gone with jade; bronze just doesn't cut it for the challenges Exalts face. His own fault, really." Another drag on the pipe, another dirty glare.

"Do you really not see the problem here? You were sent to shut him up, not blast him with that infernal contraption."

"And I did both. Look, if the Bureau wanted a quiet assassination, they should have asked an Endings, and if they wanted a memory wipe, then-"

Klaxons and cloister bells cut Xiangfan off. His eyes go distant for a moment, then he places an action to the sound. He didn't remember exactly what that specific alarm meant (those esoteric sections of the emergency warning manuals, who expected to actually use those anyhow), but one particular option was always a safe bet. He hurriedly dumped his ashes in the god's wastebasket and started for the door, snagging his overgarment off the coatrack. "Don't think this is the end of this discussion!" the god yelled after him.

"Unfortunately, I'm rather certain it is," said Xiangfan, as he waved down a passing cart. "Official business, take me to the Loom immediately."
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Post by Ji Sat Jan 24, 2015 4:40 pm

Mistress of the Ravenous North was engaging in what she referred to as light meditation. That this was partaking in her strict regimen of obnoxious quantities of wine and a rich breakfast was hardly worth noting for the outside observer. Mentally she was preparing herself for her brief scheduled vacation in the coming days, though she'd simply be using it to further her own agenda in the League.

She was busy with her second slice of Demon's food cake when the alarms pierced her calm 'meditation', and her flighty instincts immediately threw her upright violently, toppling her table and chair for her servants to take care of as she sprinted out of her manse.

It wasn't until she'd been running for seven minutes that she realized she didn't actually recall what the alarm meant, but she couldn't stop running now or she'd look like an idiot! Faced with this dilemma she doubled back along side-streets to her manse, and did the logical thing, commanding one of her wiser and more importantly stronger driving servants to take her to the Loom in her personal rickshaw.

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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Lightning

Post by LightOfDawn Sun Jan 25, 2015 2:51 am

Ruvia's "office" was being swarmed - a handful of gods had had the same idea as Lightning, and were already seeking orders from the Division Head. Ruvia had already silenced them and ordered them into a queue, his appearance as a kindly old man belying the speed and efficiency with which he assigned new tasks to his subordinates.

As soon as Lightning entered the room, though, Ruvia's head turned toward the Sidereal, wordlessly pausing the queue. "Get to the Loom, see what's happening, put a stop to it if you can. Greyfalls is already ten years out of sync with the rest of the East."
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Post by Mederic du Pons Tue Jan 27, 2015 2:03 am

Departing from the Bronze Faction had left Susanu Riita with a number of enemies. The most recent slight involved delaying the processing of the ownership papers for his new Manse-Home only after he had moved out of his old one. Thankfully Righteous Tsunami had offered him a room while the processes 'got rolling;' his only other option seemed to be that hostel on the Charnel Yards. Not that she felt any better about his departure, but it isn't prudent to throw away a three hundred year friendship over a little political animosity.  

At this precise moment, with Saturn apparently ahead in the games, Riita moved his training to the roof to meditate under his Patron’s stars.  Meditation of course meant repeating basic kata. The Terrestrial forms were simple enough that he could let his mind focus on other things.

“The issue at hand was lunar essence,” he thought to himself, “It is powerful enough, but far too protean.  If it could be better harnessed, then they could easily surpass the level of Celestial Martial Arts.”

His kata ended with a Kick: still, straight and imperfect. More training was necessary; always more training.  He had not forgotten the lessons of his father.

The Alarms blared overhead. A moment later Tsunami burst through the roof entrance. “Time Dilation Alarms! We need to get to The Loom Chamber!” she shouted. Riita nodded silently. They hailed a passing cloud and were away.

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Post by LightOfDawn Tue Jan 27, 2015 6:30 am

The rides were quick, but not so quick that the alarms were still ringing when Xiangfan, Mistress, Riita, and Righteous Tsunami arrived. Some three dozen Sidereals were already there, with more arriving every few minutes. Notably absent was Chejop Kejak, the person many would have expected to see there first... but Ayesha Ura and the other Convention heads seemed to be doing just fine without him. They listened to the reports and assigned search teams to the Loom as the spiders scuttled about, looking surprisingly panicked for faceless automatons. Lightning arrived a few minutes later.

Strings twanged here and there, Ending before their time, as Sidereals moved about and reports came in: something outside Fate was chewing on time, pulling it toward the east like one might suck in a mouthful of noodles and causing time to pass more and more slowly everywhere else. The resulting "wrinkles" were leading to an ever-multiplying set of Fate glitches as some people lived "faster" than others and failed to travel, meet, fight, talk, or even die at the right time.

Then, just as several Fate-planners were beginning to worry that the Loom would snap under the strain, the disturbance stopped. A hole, chewed ragged at the edges, was left in the East's timeflow, and the thing causing it vanished. Yu-Shan, not being part of Creation, was stuck in an odd sort of limbo where exiting different gates could cause travelers to come out at different days, months, or even years.
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Post by AlaskanWyvern Tue Jan 27, 2015 7:10 am

Xiangfan watched the reports on the Loom as they came in. Utter chaos and pandemonium was going on, then, as mysteriously as it started, stopped. Cleaning this up was going to be hell... but, before he could even think about repair, damage would have to be assessed, and for him, the place to start was obvious. He stepped up to the Loom and began looking through near the disturbance, checking for the present state of Lookshy; next, he'd probably need to check Thorns, then see what had gotten consumed by the hole entirely. Some reports had probably gotten made whilst it was happening, but a more detailed writeup would take time.

Finding Lookshy's thread was a simple matter of looking for the label; tracing it to get any sort of state of affairs was much harder. The warped timelines had caused the threads nearest the rift to bend erratically, tangle, and generally break continuity in ways he had never seen before. After but a minute of looking, he stepped back and rubbed his eyes, then grabbed a slate and some chalk, charting the distortions freehand to clear out the meaningless clutter. Before too long, he had a more or less usable map and turned his attention to that. With a suitable big picture, he'd know how urgently intervention might be needed there and of what sort - at least relative to the rest of Creation; there were probably a lot of places that needed putting back together. But Lookshy was first and foremost to him, and he wanted to make sure his homeland was okay.
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Post by AlaskanWyvern Tue Jan 27, 2015 7:43 am

per-lore
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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Re: Prologue: No Time Left

Post by The_GM Tue Jan 27, 2015 7:43 am

The member 'AlaskanWyvern' has done the following action : Dice roll

'd10' :
Prologue: No Time Left Avnj  Prologue: No Time Left Xkux  Prologue: No Time Left 3k4o  Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6   Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6  Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6   Prologue: No Time Left Nkws
Prologue: No Time Left P8c2  Prologue: No Time Left J118

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Post by LightOfDawn Tue Jan 27, 2015 10:37 pm

Lookshy was... alright. It had been caught in one of the "wrinkles," but a relatively small one - it was only a few months ahead of the original timeline. Its interactions with Nexus and Great Forks would be affected, but it was still "on the same page" as its closer neighbors and trading partners. The Gunzosha would probably be upset about the time lost.

The hole was, from a glance and a rounded-off estimate, some three hundred miles wide and just east of the city of Denandsor. More reports about the nature of the disturbance were coming in now: the flow of time in the East was vastly accelerated compared to Yu-Shan's frame, while time was nearly unaffected in the West. An away team could spend an hour in The Neck and come back to Yu-Shan an hour later, while an away team spending an hour in Nexus would find that nearly an hour and a half had passed when they returned. The effects grew stronger as one approached the hole, but dropped off completely once one reached it - everything inside was frozen, unable to move.

((Second paragraph is for everyone. Int+Lore rolls, savant very definitely applies.))
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Post by AlaskanWyvern Tue Jan 27, 2015 11:00 pm

[int-lore+savant 3]
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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Re: Prologue: No Time Left

Post by The_GM Tue Jan 27, 2015 11:00 pm

The member 'AlaskanWyvern' has done the following action : Dice roll

'd10' :
Prologue: No Time Left J118 Prologue: No Time Left Nkws Prologue: No Time Left Xkux Prologue: No Time Left P8c2 Prologue: No Time Left Avnj Prologue: No Time Left 5hoy Prologue: No Time Left M202 Prologue: No Time Left Xkux Prologue: No Time Left Nkws

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Post by Mederic du Pons Wed Jan 28, 2015 12:47 am

His specialty was the flow of essence not time but they're essentially the same, right? Riita followed strands of fate across the east, trying to dissern whatever he could about the... hole.

INT+LORE = 10.

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Post by The_GM Wed Jan 28, 2015 12:47 am

The member 'Mederic du Pons' has done the following action : Dice roll

'd10' :
Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6 Prologue: No Time Left Xkux Prologue: No Time Left Nkws Prologue: No Time Left J118 Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6 Prologue: No Time Left P8c2 Prologue: No Time Left Ssb6 Prologue: No Time Left Nkws Prologue: No Time Left Qazn Prologue: No Time Left P8c2

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Post by LightOfDawn Wed Jan 28, 2015 7:29 am

As it turned out, time was flowing steadily (albeit too fast in some places) now that the chewing had stopped. Apparently something about the chewer (whatever it was) had caused additional glitches, like the one that had thrown Greyfalls ten years out of sync, because even with the Scavenger Lands' accelerated timeframe, there shouldn't have been that much distortion. There was already much argument about how the hole in time was going to be fixed and the "wrinkles" ironed out.

This was further complicated by the fact that Essence-users appeared (based on preliminary testing) to drag their "home" timeframes with them a little - meaning that a potential paradox could happen if a fast-moving Exalt were to travel from a slower timeframe to a faster one and then change something that had "already happened" in the faster one. There were no reports of such an occurrence, yet, but it was a concern.

Of course, time repairs were not something anyone had needed to do for a long, long time, and so the exact methods were a matter of much debate. This was why many Sidereals found themselves racking their brains, trying to remember what tools Heaven had at its disposal.

Xiangfan recalled only the most basic, important information: much of Yu-Shan was shielded from temporal interference by the Games of Divinity, through a mechanism no one had really ever fully understood. But, there were also several storage rooms full of non-weapon artifacts that hadn't really seen much use since the Primordial War, like suits that allowed one to swim in Kimberry unharmed... and devices that created stable time bubbles around the wearer even in no-time zones.

Riita's recollection was somewhat more detailed. Yu-Shan had a handful of small "Calibration engines" that could force a small area to enter Calibration for a day; they were meant to be used on city-scale fate glitches, and acted more like a "detox" that forced all the problems to manifest at once than an actual repair mechanism. Perhaps one of them could be modified to fix the wrinkles... though the modifications would need to be extremely careful so as to avoid aging nearby things or people with surplus time energy, and would probably still need to bleed that energy off somewhere.

As for the hole itself, Riita thought of the same time bubble generators that Xiangfan had. Riita knew enough, though, to realize that the generators wouldn't fix the problem - only allow Sidereal operatives to function in an otherwise timeless environment. But, he was pretty sure that Heaven had something that would allow them to restore time to the damaged area - whether an artifact of some kind, or simply permission to use Neighborhood Relocation Scheme to "stitch" the hole. He didn't remember exactly what, off the top of his head. He'd remembered a lot, but this wasn't his field of expertise.

There was one more possibility that occurred to every Sidereal there: if Heaven was ready to give up on Fate-planning and try "winging it" for a while, they could try to persuade the Maidens to disengage the locks on the Loom. Repairs would happen much faster... and more disruptively.
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Post by Mederic du Pons Wed Jan 28, 2015 4:47 pm

'Winging it' was not a possibility. With the Solar's return and the rising power of the Underworld, Creation could not withstand any more chaos.

A better plan would be to try to rebuild the calibration engines to alter the flow of essence-time and drain off the excess time into the hole. The dragon lines could be used as magnetic rails, so long as we can have teams of savants ready at major demesnes. In the meantime the younger Sidereals should get fast to work fixes as many glitches as they can. There would be paperwork for years to come, but it should fix the problem quickly and subtly.

The bigger issue is what caused the problem in the first place. There are not many creatures or artifacts that could cause this kind of disruption. The obvious answers made him shudder.

He brought the plan to one of the Bronze Faction inner circle, one of his immediate superiors in the Violet Bier of Sorrow.

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Post by CodexGigas Thu Jan 29, 2015 1:24 am

Once Lightning had gathered the basics of the situation, she sought out Ayesha Ura. With a tribal salute, she approached the Convention Chair.

"Wise one, before we put out any fires, we need to take care of the firebreaks. Every member our Fellowship keeps a weather-eye on at least one of Creation's mighty. Our earthly contacts must be warned of the dangers in travel or wielding magic in the East."
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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Riita

Post by LightOfDawn Sat Jan 31, 2015 11:53 am

Medea Tarbis was her name, second-in-command to Chejop Kejak (in the Bronze Faction) and not much lower than that in the Division of Endings. At first she almost dismissed him, claiming she had more important things to do, but when he explained his idea in a little more depth, she actually stopped to think. "That might work," she said, and nodded to him. "Go and start trying to requisition the generators. I'll talk to the Division heads and try to coordinate this."
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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Lightning

Post by LightOfDawn Sat Jan 31, 2015 11:53 am

Ayesha Ura nodded, pursing her lips. "A wise precaution. I suspect the Division heads are already incorporating it into their plan, but I'll make sure. Meanwhile-" there was a small commotion from one of the Loom's entrances, and she turned to see what had caused it.
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Prologue: No Time Left Empty Everyone

Post by LightOfDawn Sat Jan 31, 2015 11:53 am

Like ripples in a pond, the commotion spread out from the doorway until every Sidereal had looked.

A pair of Maidens stood in the doorway, one in green and one in purple. "We each require five Sidereals for a mission," they said in unison. "Age and rank are of no matter. Who shall volunteer?"


Last edited by LightOfDawn on Mon Feb 02, 2015 10:19 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Post by AlaskanWyvern Mon Feb 02, 2015 9:16 pm

Xiangfan recalled some artifacts that may be of some use, ones that he would need to requisition to do his job, and ideally do so soon before everyone else got the same idea... but the maidens' entrance disrupted his own internal planning. A mission was more or less exactly what he needed; they probably had the closest thing to a coherent plan. Saturn and Jupiter weren't necessarily the ones he was in best standing with, but again - it was the best they had.

He stepped forwards and bowed respectfully. "I volunteer," he said simply.
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Post by Mederic du Pons Mon Feb 02, 2015 10:14 pm

Riita raised his hand. "I will also volunteer."

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Post by Ji Mon Feb 02, 2015 10:21 pm

Mistress frowned and fanned herself as the maidens entered. This was unusual, jobs typically came from the vine and trickled down, but then, it seemed the speed of bureaucracy could no longer be tolerated in this temporal crisis. She lingered, waiting for others to volunteer for as long as she could before it shook her... If the maidens were asking, and not ordering... even they didn't know who was best suited for this, and fate had gotten drastically out of hand. Collecting herself, she thrust her fan into the air. "I as well." she shouted triumphantly, hoping to lead an example for yet more others.
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Post by CodexGigas Tue Feb 03, 2015 12:02 am

Lightning respectfully waited for Chosen of the two Maidens to volunteer before she stepped forward. When it appeared that the cowardly Secrets were just going to lurk in corners, hoping to not be seen, she made her way to the Maidens.

"I volunteer."
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