Two Travelers' Journals

Two Travelers’ Journals

Record of Traveler Elliott, Liminalis Pathfinder

| I’ve fallen in with a band of young valley folk, from what I can gather dispersed en masse from the settlement that is their home. I’d place them mostly in their early twenties, and at the limit of my discernment they go to some place or are in search of some collective achievement, then home again. Their words have come surprisingly easy to me. The transit’s drain on my animus and its substrate wire is, it seems, immediately evident.

This shard, out of many, across a noteworthy stretch of absolute time, mirrors First Earth most hauntingly of many recent destinations. I assign it an idiosyncrasy of modest refraction, but they call me an old man. They say “Geyser,” but I think they mean “Geezer.” Absence of Latinescu precludes another manifestation of the Imperial Cult, and rules out ‘Caesar’ or Kaiser as the word they’re aiming for. Intrinsic stratum analysis reliably indicates no Yellowstone event in this sequence; allowing for a decoherence threshold within acceptable deviation, either the timeframe or the verisimilitude of the loss of the caldera achieves TeVaye falloff and outlies material usefulness as a reference frame.

I don’t think this crowd is dangerous, or headed to danger, but I’ll only be with them a short while longer. Means of broader agency are necessary to access the mandatory dataset, and may present themselves as we traverse the valley.

For reasons unknown to me, eating green beans is considered among the most extreme possible feats of boldness here. They grow plentifully, and putting aside their acclimation to the biosphere of the Sonora-Liminal, they are not more noteworthy than my home and relatively typical Eighth Earth green beans in any measurable way. It is possible some tradition or mythology exists to which I haven’t been exposed, or perhaps there underruns some scaffold of cognitive geometry to which my intellect is yet unconformed. It is also possible that that some things people do are just stupid, and persist in the self-causative revelry of that logic-defiant carnival for their own sake.

To point, I made a show out of eating a handful of them at the bonfire three nights ago, and now I wake every morning to find green beans piled at my pillow.

+++

Record of Seeker Vraze, Liminalis Vanguard

| Did battle with a cactus man this morning. It was a decisive victory.

For the sake of vital clarity, it was not with the druid protector of some sacred cactus grove whereupon I had unknowingly trespassed that I faced in contest, or some other individual possessed of some other belligerent affinity for cacti, moved to strike against me for reasons of his own. Literally speaking, it was a cactus, clad in spine-torn garments that read “#1 Cactus,” wielding a bat made, if I were to guess, from another cactus, who came up out of the morning haze swinging on me with a purpose.

The torch sword of Seeker Vraze, and the animus that commands it, are counted among a higher order of battle, and we have proved it this day.

May the #1 Cactus lie in peace, and its kind like be assuaged of their loss, to find betterment at the end of what grief they might so undertake.

| This afternoon I was set upon by three cactus folk wearing articles of wildly-varying, inescapably human raiment. The questions beg the asking; Whence these cactus folk? Were they once humans, transmuted suddenly and without opportunity to don cactus clothing, or at least remove whatsoever human cloth they already wore? Did they emerge as mobile, self-aware cactus people spontaneously, and acquire their human clothing by scavenge, or predation?

Regretfully I must report that no resolution presents itself. As fell the #1 Cactus, so fell “Cactus Boi,” “Sassy Cact,” and “I’m With Cactus.” So shall fall any among their brood who menace my passage west. For it is given me not for flesh nor mineral to trouble my blade, nor lance to harry my coat, nor storm to eclipse my cannon.

Long may they rest.

| Today a band of cactus folk numbering perhaps two dozen, seeming mightily to have diverted from another branch of the canyon to ambush me on my way, met me with honor on the field of strife, and again, were cast down motionless into the rocks of this high desert, save for the tumbling of dislodged cactus fragments and the dust stirred thereby.

Nail boards, table legs, steel shuriken, bats of oak and cactus, these are the weapons of those assembled to fall before the reaping wind out of the cryptlands of the north which is I, Seeker Vraze. While their arms are of lesser make and diminished design, for their numbers to continue ballooning so presents a problem-function that at some point may reach criticality. I can feel weaves in the animate bulk that underlies the wire, that their numbers and intentions do grow. They gain focus. And beyond mistake, they are angry.

Here are recorded what names I could glean or fashion from the remains of the twenty-some fallen today, long may they rest.

-”Fickle Spine,” manner of death: Cloven by torch sword.

-”Desert StyleOnYa”,’ manner of death, Cloven by torch sword

-”I’m Bored,” manner of death: Sundered by cannon and spread to the four winds.

-”#297 Cactus,” manner of death: crushed by ambulatory stump of “I’m Bored” at completion of ballistic arc.

-”Big Jim,” manner of death: pierced by Blackfrost Bolt and cloven by torch sword.

-”I’m sarcasm. So nice to meet you.” manner of death: severe trauma at terminus of 70-meter drop from cliffs bordering field of contest.

- Say Something Sliced Today (Picture of Bread),” manner of death: Caught in gravity trap.

-”Alpha Spine,” manner of death: executed by comrades for desertion.

-”Cac-20”, manner of death: Struck by glancing blow from cannon, pinwheeled extravagantly onto group of three comrades, impaling one on sharpened tether-ball pole and materially disrupting remaining two. Crushed in resulting stampede.

-”Sad boi-7,” manner of death: intended recipient of cannonshot incidental to “Cac-20’s” demise. Impact dispersed target over 70x40-meter cone downrange of firing position.

-”Dad Joke Possum,” manner of death: impaled on own weapon, sharpened tetherball pole. Attached ball painted to look like a human skull as a cactus might view one.

-”Unsafe at any Size,” manner of death: Shared cleaving stroke with assisting combatant following dramatic death of “Cac-20” (torch sword)

-Unheard Spork Rattle,” manner of death: Shared cleaving stroke with assisting combatant following dramatic death of “Cac-20” (torch sword.)

-”Az,” manner of death: Thumped on with a big rock.

-”Morv is Bae,” manner of death: Thrice-punctured with glyph cannon shock munitions, automatic feed.

-”Plain White Cap”, manner of death: Unknown. Possible cardiac event/anaphylaxis or cactus equivalent. Buried in unmarked white sun visor.

-”Two Bats,” manner of death: glyph cannon/predicate cursebolt; lethal radiation dose via secondary detonations.

-”Three Bats,” manner of death: Animus expulsion by torch sword, cognitive sweep.

-”Nope. Not in This Lifetime,” manner of death: Fixed to canyon wall by glyphcannon gun arrow.

#FCactus,” read “Hashtag FCactus,” manner of death: Struck by Blackfrost Bolt, less than 50% cellulitic structure intact. Inferentials trawl resulted in no content attached to hashtag. Linguistic encoding of cactus noetics vs. Old Ancestral flagged for review.

-”Seven Gold Rings,” manner of death: Punctured by glyphcannon shot. Buried with rings out of respect for fallen adversary.

-”Trouble With a Capital ‘C’,” manner of death: multiple non-penetrating wounds from torch sword culminating in lethal wound following disarmament of gasoline-powered flame trident.

Names given based on t-shirt slogans or other identifying remarks as circumstances allowed.

| Audible moving through the foothills directly obstructing my path to Orender. Great numbers. Preparing entrenchment and redundant firing positions via material synthesis. Microfactury at capacity. Quicklink transit between fallback positions established and verified. Best-guess event progression sequenced and assigned to kinesthetic profile, title “Battle of Cactus Valley.”

Estimate less than forty minutes before contact with the enemy.

| Enemy force in view. Too many to count. Mostly rudimentary weaponry with some prevalence of early postindustrial ballistic inducers. Chances looking good so far unless a hardened, regular force is present somewhere in the approaching column. Estimate 400-500 ambulatory cactus folk in civilian recreational clothing corresponding to late-First-Earth popular styling, minus fluid thematic alteration to suit cactus market segment.

Will initiate engagement with automatic-feed pressure variance barrage, followed by electroactive cluster dispersal and followup lightwire lumothermal disruption bombardment. Glyph cannon will pick off targets in mobility phase, regressing through firing positions and drawing torch sword for cleanup of enemy forces such as may breach final fallback line.

Not long now.

| Another force approaches from the canyonhead, multiple fallback positions may be compromised. Ambush force appears unaware of my current location.

| Reinforcements, at least twice their number. They fall quickly but do not easily surrender momentum.

| Hit by an inducer bolt. Radiological. Taxing substrate. Suspect Thorium-Polonium APHE. Administering countertoxin.

| They hit the mines. They keep coming but what a show

| Artillery. Mortars, I think. Maybe lithium-graphite electrocatalyst by their whining. And something else, heavy, slow

| Enormous detonation. ⅔ of firing positions compromised on discharge. Sighting in

| NO SURVIVORS. THE WIRE HAS BEEN GOOD TO ME TODAY.