OPEN ↠ FALSE GODS, GREAT DEMONS (OPEN LOG 1)

[faderifting]

WHO: Living Residents of the Horrible Future
WHAT: Ah ha ha ha stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
WHEN: ALTERNATE FUTURE, 1-15 Cloudreach 9:48
WHERE: Anywhere, but especially Orzammar
NOTES: This is the first open log for False Gods, Great Demons. Anything that happened prior to Cloudreach 9:48 should go on the flashback meme. Most members of the TTT and their friends in Kirkwall will be arriving in Orzammar on approximately Cloudreach 7. In the meantime, feel free to make your own adventures. If you want to blow up an bridge, assassinate an NPC of your own invention, steal supplies, or anything else--it's all yours, go for it!

SOUTHERN THEDAS is a wasteland. The Blight crawling across the Orleian countryside and into Ferelden leaves nothing alive in its wake, scarring the land like an insatiable fire until no birds sing and the only things that grows is the Red Lyrium that speckles cliff sides and crawls up dying trees until they look like rows of jagged bloody teeth. And where it's still green, where people can still survive, the atmosphere is nearly as stifling. Every city and settlement is watched over by a Venatori or trustworthy collaborator. Those who don't keep their heads down and their dissent a whisper may vanish without warning. They may take their whole families with them. There are flashes of hope--an assassinated lordling here, a village rousing itself to brief and doomed rebellion there--but for every man the Imperium loses, they seem to find two to take his place.

NORTHERN THEDAS is at war. The worst of it doesn't reach west into Tevinter or the Anderfels; the line between the Qunari and the Imperium is drawn straight through Antiva, with Nevarra and Rivain on either side quiet and calm as only lands under martial law can be. The Free Marches vary between complacency and rebellion, but the rebellious ones risk ruin--there are murmurs it won't be long before a whole city is made an example. A steady stream of desperate refugees is fleeing north to the Qun, but plenty are picked off and punished as traitors before they can cross into Qunari-controlled territory. Your best best for a clean escape are the pirates who still hold Llomerynn free from both sides of the conflict.

ORZAMMAR is the only kingdom in Thedas that looks much the same--and Kal-Sharok, but they're not accepting outsiders. The heavy doors at Orzammar's entrance are sealed and guarded, as much against the steady flow of refugees asking for help as against the Venatori. The refugees are turned away. There's no way to know who can be trusted, and even if there were, there's not food enough for people who can't fight. Orzammar Thaig is still the dwarves' home--though with stealing shrinking numbers and poor prospects, King Bhelen has been amenable to allowing casteless surfacers some leeway--but the once-abandoned Ortan Thaig is the Inquisition's. Quietly. The only things stopping a full assault on Orzammar is the Venatori's need for dwarf-mined lyrium and the plausible deniability that the Inquisition's remaining rebel bands are using the Deep Roads with Bhelen's consent.

An hour's walk through caves and deepstalker swarms, Ortan is a city in its own right. A crammed city, one where cots and bunk beds crammed into shared housing are the norm no matter how important someone is and you occasionally have to protect your dinner from a restless, swooping griffon, but one where you can still find a pint of ale or a game of cards if you've time to waste on them. It's just that not many people do. There's the watch to keep; the tunnels that creep further into the deep teem with darkspawn who are held back at barricades, while the hidden, narrow tunnels that lead to the surface are watched at all hours so anyone coming or going can be identified. There are weapons to forge and sharpen. Plans to make. Bands to lead. Maybe you weren't a leader five years ago, but these days, there aren't that many people with more than five years' experience still alive to give orders. Fewer every week.

And so we burned. We raised nations, we waged wars,
We dreamed up false gods, great demons
Who could cross the Veil into the waking world,
Turned our devotion upon them, and forgot you.
Threnodies 1:8

Comments

[conqueredhearts]

"Have they?"

Of course he followed after her to see what it was that she'd found. Leaning down when he got there, he looked over the drawings, sort of recognizing some. However, it was the big one with the muscle and smile that made him burst out laughing.

"Look at that! They even found a way to have my red hair there!"

Crouching now so he can see it even better, he grinned at the drawing of himself. "Too bad we don't know who did these! I should love to thank them for their portrayals!"

[sistertohermen]

Dusters will always get creative with their dust. "I could find out. Might not be too hard." The kids--because they've got to be kids--will want to come back to their handiwork if for no other reason than to erase and start again. Her brand, however marred, is still apparent and makes her more welcome, even with her time on the surface, than any of the nobility. More trusted.

She's never wanted kids of her own, but she kind of digs the tykes here. She wants better for them. Sometimes better means help the Inquisition out.

"What I really want is a way to preserve this. It won't have the same...feel, but a little spared paper and some chalk or charcoal might do the trick to replicate it."

[conqueredhearts]

"Is there paper to be found? I'm sure we could find something to grab the drawing with but it is the paper I'm not sure of." It wasn't like they had easy access to things that would allow them to make the stuff these days. Unless the dwarf people were using something he wasn't familiar with for paper in that library of theirs. He'd been spending his days keeping so many people up in spirit he hadn't really had the time to go and look through it.

"If there is I could fetch it and bring it to you. Then we'd be sure to have it!"

Yes, he was all for this idea.

[sistertohermen]

She huffs a little sigh. "I know, parchment is a little...hard to spare these days." Not when they use what they can for updates, secret encoded messages, attempts to get through to anyone else not ransacked or turned or killed out there, drawing up battle plans. And kids probably don't even care enough to keep their drawings preserved like that. It's not like it'd be something they're used to.

So she kicks up a little more dust, expanding the 'canvas' as it were, and plops down on the ground. "How are your drawing skills?"

[conqueredhearts]

"Mmmm. Possibly not the best but I could say I'm at least as talented as these fine artists."

He laughed softly and went to sit down on the ground with her, not at all minding the fact that he would now be filthy. Pondering for a moment, he studied his 'canvas' then put his finger to the dust to start drawing. "So even if I am not very good at least I can enjoy the act."