Looking north from Steelhead Harbourside, I’m stood on a high mountain looking at the city that may ell be my new home soon. It is very beautiful

An Explanation

As you will have read in this earlier post, I intend to halt this tale as not only had it stalled very badly, but I’d also used its plot for The Lost Journal tale. I’ve had a recap and full post waiting as drafts in my blog for a whole year and rather than simply delete them, I’m offering you both below along with a potted ending with which to draw a veil across this brave, but doomed, attempt.

I have to say that this tale, in the beginning, was great fun for me to do – from planting my jungle to destroying the yacht and smashing it on the rocks I had a wonderful time making the props and taking the photos for this story. And the people who followed it and helped out! Janey making the buckets & TR sending the poor chap some warming hot chocolate; in its heyday it was a really fun thing to write indeed. For the record, my favourite posts are:

1) Shipwrecked where it was a simple pull away of the camera to reveal the professor washed up and unconscious on the beach with his smashed and burning yacht behind him – the last shot took ages to do in order to capture a lighting bolt striking the wreckage!

2) The Dream for the final set of images which I still feel are incredibly powerful – and were a testament to what someone could do with very limited resources and lots of creative thinking. I used two different ships in a pirate themed sim whose name I have long forgotten – the final image of the demon’s eye was one of the key events that led me to Osprey as she liked it so much she asked me to pose for one of her Combat Cards.

Thank you for reading along and for visiting the ‘set’ I built on my small island and exploring the Professor’s jungle. I’m very lucky to have readers who care what I write and follow along – I hope you like the tales I’m planning to replace this one

Recap

July 1930 and Professor Headonius Buroffski of Miskatonic U left Miami in his new yacht, the Telestro, expecting to be in Key West in plenty of time to celebrate the fourth of July with his friends. The sudden and fierce storm he encountered mere hours out from land had other ideas though. The good professor had a terrifying night clinging on for dear life as the seas threw his little craft around like a toy until, in the wee small hours, he struck rocks and was thrown ashore as the storm tore the Telestro apart.

When morning broke, the professor found himself alone on a small sandy beach, the ruins of his yacht scattered about him and lapping between the cruel rocks that lay just off the shore. The next few days saw him undertake a search for food and water, all the time keeping a diary of his days for his beloved wife, Rose. And then the dreams started…

Dreams of a wooden galleon, abandoned, adrift. Wandering the decks. Feeling the presence of someone… some thing else. Seeing the burning red eyes glaring at him from the makeshift prison of the hold. Each dream more real than the last, each more terrifying.

In a bid to escape both the dreams and, more importantly, the island he finally set off into the jungle to see if he could lean more about the island and find a way off his new, unwanted home. Through thick undergrowth he fought until, in an eerily deserted part of the jungle he stumbled upon a strange circle of standing stones where he decided to make camp for the night…

The Final Post

14th or 15th – Night.

I have made an amazing discovery! Oh Rose! I can hardly contain myself!

I fell into a deep sleep almost as soon as I finished my last entry and had the strangest dream. Thankfully it was not about the queer galleon or its menacing lone passenger, but instead I had the strangest feeling I was moving out of myself, floating out of my body and out of the tent. The night shrouded jungle was all around me; dark impenetrable walls beyond the edges of the clearing in which I had set up camp. Hovering somewhere above the tree line, I looked back down at the stone circle and was amazed to see people lit by a small fire where my tent should have been!

I counted a dozen of what I guessed to be native islanders (their skin tanned and toughened by the tropical sun) surrounding the five stones. As one, they began swaying and chanting as five of their number had their entire bodies anointed and painted with a dripping, sickly green liquid. Once covered, they moved into the circle and stood each facing a stone with their backs to the fire.

The swaying and singing increased in pitch and tempo whilst the five chosen stood stock still, rigid and unyielding to the beat and rhythm of the chanting around them. It grew faster, louder, more wild and furious. My head swam with it, my brain pulsed to its beat and my thoughts began to reduce down to a point far removed outside myself. Rose, I truly believe I would been lost if in the next second the terrible chanting had not stopped dead. The silence hit me like a slap and I stared down at the scene struggling to bring myself back from whatever brink I had been teetering on.

The islanders all stood still until, upon a barked command, the five chosen raised their right hand and touched the stone in front of them.

From each stone there was a crackle in the air and the same smell of ozone I had detected before. From beneath the surface of the stones radiated a light the same queer green as the slime the five natives had daubed themselves with. It pulsed, slowly at first, but began to increase in speed and power. Soon the stones were lit like beacons and the five chosen were writhing in agony, there hands seemingly stuck fast to the stone’s surface. Suddenly each stone exploded with a blast of green light; the natives attached to them unleashed a chorus of terrifying screams as I covered my eyes, almost blinded. The light subsided, narrowing down to a vertical beam emanating from the very top of the stone. Of the five islanders at their base, there was no sign; they had vanished completely. The beams began to tilt inwards, moving toward each other, to a focal point high above the centre of the circle. When they met, an unholy thunderclap was unleashed from the sky above and the sky above began to boil and roll as dark clouds appeared from nowhere. Big fat rain drops began to fall and a the entire scene was frozen by an enormous lightning bolt that struck the jungle thirty yards from the circle. They had somehow generated a huge storm from a perfectly clear sky!

I watched in awe as the natives began to chant and dance, this time weaving in and out of the stones and waving up to the clouds above them. The clouds seemed to respond, pulsing and moving with the dancers below until they suddenly shot off over the jungle and out to sea, lightning bolts leaving a trail of burning palms and scorched undergrowth behind it.

I awoke with a start. I was in my tent, confused by my sudden dislocation. Outside I could see my own fire still smouldering – hardly any time had passed since I had drifted off to sleep and witnessed the strange ritual. I rose, groggily making my way outside; everything was as it should be, aside the strange quiet that hangs over this place like a shroud. I moved into the stone circle, the stones silent and dark against the jungle behind them, to throw some more wood on the fire.

And that’s when it happened, Rose. I lent against one of the stones and at my touch, a small spark of green static arced out to my hand and I leapt back in surprise. My fingers tingled, but were otherwise fine, so I reached out and tentatively laid my palm against the cool, rough surface. A strange hum filled the air, not so much heard as felt and slowly the stone began to glow weakly with the eldritch green hue I had seen in my dream. I moved the next stone and touched it with the same result! And the next! And the next! All five stone, Rose! All five were glowing, barely perceptible I’ll grant you, but glowing nonetheless!

That was some ten minutes ago now. Within two or three minutes the glow had vanished and try as I might, I just haven’t been able to get them to glow again. Maybe the morning will bring some fresh insight into this mystery. I fear that I may be too giddy to sleep, but sleep I must if I am to set my mind to examining this conundrum.

Night night,
Your Doni x
**********

The End…

The Final Ending

The tale was to end in much the same fashion as The Lost Journal (sans nuclear missile & Jeremiah Mason) – in one version the Prof found a temple and was evetually hunted, caught and sacrificed to the demon; whereas in another ending the same thing happened to the Prof but then his great-grandson returned years later and faced the same perils but managed to destroy the natives and their temple. From there I was planning a futuristic version with the same demon, but that never got past the very basic sketch stage Thanks for reading guys – keep an eye on my new stories and catch up with all my tales on the Burro Tales page.

Come one, come all and see the unveiling of a great new act… Free admission and shows at 2pm and 2:50pm- bring friends and popcorn!

Due to popular demand, puppy-dog eyes and threats of violence to my person, I’d like to ask… Should Sall the crab return? Go to the brand new BB Poll page here and register your vote!

For those of you wondering who Sally is (where have you been?) she is the plucky crab from my island who I charged with launching the nuclear missile at the temple in the story, The Lost Journal – her fate is documented here.

I’ve been in SL for two and a half years now, man & gazelle, but I’ve never really had a home. Even my currnt home point is the Eleanor Theatre in Phobos because that means I can beam back there if I crash out during a show.

Best I can recall is:
I was born in Braunsworth I think – I can no longer remember as I never stayed there but went wandering.
I ended up in Nova Albion but only to camp.
I moved to an abandoned infohub in Murray.
I bought a small plot on a private island called Gembong East.
I finally made my home point the theatre when the show quickly became the most important thing in my SL.

Apart from Murray I have never been part of a fixed community, and even that was just standing around chatting and booting griefers. I don’t count the show as although the troupe are my friends, it’s not a fixed community and, with only a small number of exceptions, there is no interaction outside the show.

I guess what I’m suffering from is loneliness.

I have wonderful friends in SL, but timezones mean I rarely see them beyond the show. I need a purpose to come in-world and outside of the show I’m struggling.

I’m willing to bet that when Darien Mason contacted me about writing with him in The Lost Journal he had no idea what he would set in motion; I certainly didn’t. I want to be part of a wider comminty of roleplayers and writers. I want to feel the energy of creation I get from writing and taking photos. I want to have adventures and fun outside the show, and not just on my own all the time.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been exploring, on this blog and others, what it means to roleplay in SL and I’ve moved from a place where I wanted the perfect sim/RP experience served on a plater, to wanting to get in with a far more open and looser system. But where?

Caledon has always scared me because of its size – too easy to simply get lost I think and my views on it have been coloured by an earlier attempt to find a sort of home there. New Babbage is amazing but I don’t have the skills needed to be there – it’s a big boys place. Nova Albion/Bay City are places I have lots of love for but Bay City more about city life there and Nova Albion’s roleplaying days seem long behind it. Cowell/Kahruvel are places I simply adore but nothing goes on there. Outside of that it’s all film and book roleplaying and outside of a 1940s noir setting I’m not that interested (1).

But one name keeps coming up. One name that seems to involve community and lightness of touch that appears to allow a hell of a lot of creative roleplay to spring up despite not being a roleplay sim. It’s a place that takes in strays, a category I think I fall smack bang into. That place is called Steelhead.

I think this is it. I’m almost certain I’m going to move, abandon my beloved old HBA Island forever and find a new home with new stories to tell, ones where I’m not the only voice and player.

*******************

(1) Especially in frigging vampires.

Well, the tale just told (The Lost Journal) has really started something – it’s pretty much killed of one of my stalled stories (The Island – TLJ used its plot) and has forced me to question the Backpacking Burro tale.

Thing is, Backpacking Burro is kind of why I started this blog (or weblog, for Dale ) way back in July 07. I wanted to tell a tale that lasted only a few posts and then led me to a place where I could start publishing the notecard travel guides I was writing and distributing through my group in-world. Problem is the tale sort of got out of hand – I began to tell a grander story with a greater scale and soon I was in a place where I couldn’t finish it and move to the travel guides. Mind you, the travel guides petered out and stopped in early 2008 as I got more and more involved with other activities such as TSMGO.

So there I was with a story that was threatening to engulf me and if that wasn’t enough I had also started the tale of the shipwrecked man in The Island. Both were draining me, I couldn’t see either ending, I couldn’t see where they were going and, eventually, both stalled. I recapped Backpacking Burro a year ago and restarted it, but it soon stalled again. I also recapped The Island and had the next post written, but neither recap nor post ever made it out of draft folder in the blog.

Cut to last month and after I published a series of diary entries I had written two years previously to set the scene for a horror party I organised, Darien Mason suggested we work together to continue the tale. The Lost Journal seemed to unblock me and I poured words onto the screen. Even when poor Darien was cast out of SL by LL, I continued and within three weeks had written more on one tale then I had in a whole for the other two combined.

So what to do with those two tales? Well the easy one is The Island because as The Lost Journal just used its plot I’ve decided that I’m not going to continue with it. I will publish the final post written simply because it took me so bloody long to write it and set up the photos, but after that I’m afraid it’s gone. And you know how it ends anyway; the natives sacrifice the shipwrecked professor and then years later his grandson finds the temple and faces a similar fate but manages to destroy it. The End. I think The Lost Journal handled it better – it became more visceral in its action scenes and amusing in its dialogue, especially with having another person to bounce off in Jeremiah.

As for Backpacking Burro I’ve decided on a reboot, to use the popular jargon of the moment. I have three or four posts written and in the blog’s draft folder – I am going to harvest them for ideas and re-write. The new Backpacking Burro tale, free of the need to include aspects of a travel guide, will be harder and faster than before. I still don’t have an end mapped out, so it will be open-ended but I’m planning that it will branch off into short tales like The Lost Journal and then come back. In effect each tale will be part of the overall quest in the BB tale. I also hope that I can drag some other folks into this, replicating the involvement of Darien & Jeremiah as I really do believe that collaborative roleplay makes this more fun.

So there you have it – expect a flurry of posts as I wrap things up and restart, then I’ll be on holiday so I’ll take the opportunity to write and get back on track when I return

From the moment the arrow tore into my leg, the poison attacked my system. The adrenaline of the immediate attack held it at bay for a minute or so, but even as Mason leapt to my rescue I was fading and by the time he’d dragged me to the detonating plunger I had all but passed out.

I recall nothing of the minutes between when he rescued me (for the second time) and when he pushed me into the portal created by the Elemental, but in my stupor I knew enough to realise he’d been tricked. I grabbed him, tried my damndest to pull him through, but the portal closed and I fell backwards through it. I hit a wooden floor hard, in my hand I held Jeremiah’s own, sliced neatly off mid-forearm by the closing portal. It twitched briefly, then turned white before disintegrating, tiny red stars breaking free from it and twisting upwards like fire motes rising in the heat until nothing was left.

As it vanished my eyes began to close.

Somewhere I heard voices. I didn’t care anymore. Nothing mattered. They could have me. To hell with them all. The void closed around me and I knew no more.

The end for now, but to be continued…

Saturday 27th June saw the last of our two special RFL days organised by Elliebob Bean and Vessus Candour – and the great news is that with all the wonderful support of our fans and supporters of the RFL cause, we raised a huge 60,000L$! All four shows were brilliant fun with wildly enthusiastic audiences – unlike a lot of shows, the more audience participation the better with us!

Here are some shots from Saturday – I managed to get some of Osprey’s SL Man sketch and some of the rather beautiful & fragrant audience

He sat the rapidly fading gazelle on the ground and began to remove his backpack. To his credit, although virtually unconscious, Antfarm fought against it but the outcome was inevitable and soon Mason was holding the brown leather pack. He could feel its power, an energy running through it he recognised but couldn’t place. As he opened it, he half expected to see something looking back at him, but instead he was faced with a small gathering of rather mundane contents. He waited. Nothing. He waited some more. Nothing. A playful edge thrilled through him and it took him a second to realise the emotion was not his own.

*Hello* he thought.

*Hello* came the reply inside his mind.

*I want to ask a great deal of questions, but we don’t have the time* thought Mason

*You don’t*. Mason was sure he detected a small giggle.

*Please, I – we – need your help*

*You do*

*If you care anything for the man you have attached yourself too, please open a way. We need to get far away before the missile hits*

*Not long now*. Another small giggle.

*Then for pity’s sake, open a way!*

*There will be a price*

*I know. I will pay it*

Silence. The feeling that he was alone for a second. Then.

*It’s coming. Bye bye*

And it was gone.

“Dammit all to Hell,” muttered Mason as his mind moved back to the world around him. A small, high pitched whine could be heard from the sky above the temple. In the trees he could hear the natives circling, unsure and watching. He waited. No sign of a portal. He had no options left. This was the end of the line. He grabbed the plunger and shoved down with all his might.

Milliseconds felt like an eternity. Then the Temple erupted like a volcano.

A sound louder than then the end of time threw him to the ground and the air grew furnace hot.

All around him foliage browned and withered in the heat as a fireball consumed the stone structure, lumps of which tore through the jungle like cannonballs.

The Leviathan roared with impotent fury as the structure beneath it was sucked back into the vortex created by the binding spell. As it the great mass began to be pulled down, slowly at first but with an increasing force, Mason threw the scroll into the dread hole to complete the seal and the Leviathan sank beneath the ground with a scream he would never forget.

And then the jungle was silent, with just the ringing in his ears to remind him he wasn’t dead yet. He sat up and looked at the destruction he’d wrought. Any minute now the natives would reach him, he thought. Not that they’d have long for their fun. He almost smiled.

He became aware of an eerie light creeping across him from behind. He turned his head and found himself staring directly into a portal! He leapt to his feet with a yell of triumph.

*Me first, then the gazelle-man, if you please. That is the price*

Mason was astounded! He’d expected worse! *Of course* he stammered and threw the backpack through the portal. He turned and grabbed the barely conscious figure on the floor, “Come here, my friend. It’s time to go home!” he said and pushed him into the portal.

Antfarm suddenly opened his fiery red eyes, they were wide with terror as he croaked “No!” and grabbed Mason’s hand, pulling him into the portal. Mason had a brief second to register surprise before the portal closed with a snap, sending both men tumbling backwards, Antfarm into thirdspace and Mason back onto the jungle floor.

Mason blinked and looked at the hand with which the gazelle had tried to pull him into the portal. It was missing.

Behind him, on top of the still burning temple and as dozens of natives emerged from the undergrowth around him, a cone of metal fell from the sky and slammed into the ground. Inside it, a small amount deuterium fuel heated to incredible temperatures and several kilograms of enriched uranium began to compress and went supercritical. When it exploded, it did so with the force and fury of fifty million tons of TNT.

To be continued…

With almost inhuman wail of pain, Jeremiah tore himself free from the binding spell and leapt down towards Antfarm; the wounded man had downed two of the accursed natives, but the third was almost upon him. Behind him the binding field quivered but held; he had left enough of himself to ensure it would but he knew full well he’d pay for it later.

Without fully knowing how it got there, Mason felt his blade in his hand and smiled to himself as the blade sprang into life. With a final burst of speed, he threw himself shoulder first at the native and sent the cur rolling away towards the temple. The dog was up on his feet quick enough, but not as quick as Mason who, with practiced ease and incredible speed, drove his sword through the very heart of the man. For long seconds both men stood, locked in a grotesque embrace, until the dead native slipped backwards off the blade and to the ground, his torso smoking and ruined. As Mason turned and walked over to Antfarm, the dead body began to slide backwards, drawn by the vortex into the heart of the temple.

“Quick man, we haven’t much time,” Mason said as he sliced the arrow shaft off and pulled the limping gazelle to his feet.

“We. We need to get back,” Antfarm replied through gritted teeth, “This. This going. Going to be. Big bang.”

Mason half supported, half pulled the gazelle over to the plunger. Something was wrong with him, he was too heavy, too slow. “You alright there?”

“Sgruna b bg gruna bg,” came the reply.

Mason ran his finger through the blood oozing from Antfarm’s leg and sniffed. Poison! The foul locals had poisoned the arrows! There was no way that Antfarm would be able to teleport away now, meaning that he’d have to leave him to a certain death at the hands of either a nuclear explosion or the cruel and terrible natives.

Unless…

A plan formed in Mason’s mind. A dangerous plan. A plan with costs.

To be continued…