westwhere | sand in your eyes

And onwards, through the cursed desert. The mini-journey Arc covers 6-21 January and doubles as a test drive meme. Participants do not need an invite to apply this round. Have fun!

SAND IN YOUR EYES

TEST DRIVE TOURISTS | ONE SAND WASHES THE OTHER
A HOUSE UNITED WILL SAND | SOILMATES | A PYRAMID SCHEME

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A SANDING OVATION

Sand in your eyes, down your throat, stifling. You wake half-buried in high dunes, crawling towards helping hands. Thirst vanquishes you.

You are quickly offered a translation and communication pendant and introduced to the leader of the caravan that saved you — good Mazyar, who thanks the stars for your most incredible luck to be rescued by his generous and humble self. For he is not a man for idle praise, but he has sold salt to salt makers, he was courted by seven of the five great trade guilds and brought peace to the Stairs of Sighs…

Mazyar reveals you are in Akhuras, where undead lieges seek to weaponise you in their war for dominion. Mazyar’s good but less successful friend, the elusive Merchant ferries otherworlders east, where ancient beacons can transport them home.

Retire for now and regain your strength. Come morning, further otherworlders will arrive from Serthica — and your journey may begin.

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ONE SAND WASHES THE OTHER

The veteran party reunites with newcomers in the desert, and with the merchant Mazyar — who once guided them through the Stairs of Sighs. His caravan is protected by the Scavengers —deathly a tribe of hardened desert raiders. They bring water flasks, supplies, cooling suits and tents to share. Their snail-like carriage mounts can transport the weak.

You are bound for the seized citadel of Alem, swarmed on each side by undead battalions. To access it, you must obtain one of the enormous sand worms that trawl the deserts, which can be deployed to create underground passageways.

The Scavengers will lead the caravan through haunted dunes, the worms’ traditional hunting grounds and temple-fortress Uruksithar.

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A HOUSE UNITED WILL SAND

The group first reaches the Valley of Unchaining, bordered by high cliffs and fang-like stones. Here and there, discover bloodied footprints, half-buried shackles and red chains. You might even stumble upon an eroded tombstone inscribed, H R SL EP THE UNCH IN D. At its feet are dulled dagger blades and rough calcar stone.

COULD DIE FROM LAUGHTER

You fool, never eat alone. Happen by the camp’s outskirts with your dinner, and you might glimpse the silhouettes of starved desert hyenas, their eyes glistening green. They will come close if you bear raw meat or bleeding wounds.

■ Scavengers say, if you see the hyenas, throw them food or a cloth drenched in fresh blood, then run without looking back until you no longer hear their cruel cries.

■ Some hyenas mimic rasped human voices, begging help or calling your name. One feeble hyena wears a chain of red shackles around its neck.

■ If you look back while chased, you find the green stare of the hyenas fixed upon you. You are gradually overcome by starvation, violence and the urge to dismember prey and feast on raw flesh. Player’s choice on whether characters can resist this compulsion, which disappears at dawns, or if they taste blood.

■ Scavengers will deny you entrance into the camp if you appear possessed in this way.

SANDIMENTAL VALUE

You walk the Valley, Scavengers say, and Mother Death walks with you. A once handsome crone might appear beside you, bare-footed and dressed in clean linens. She remains silent unless spoken to and flinches if you move suddenly, as if she fears being struck.

■ Treat the Crone kindly, and she entrusts you with a small pouch holding a fraction of her ashes, which she wants scattered from the hills.

■ Use rope and climbing hooks and take cover behind stone formations. Beware the violent sand whirlwinds that batter the cliffs, threatening to plunge you down or choke you with sand.

■ If you succeed, the Crone appears to watch her scattering ashes and bless you with good luck for the rest of your journey. Your kindness, she says, reminds her of her daughter.

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SOILMATES

The three-day walk to Uruksithar traverses the sand worms’ hunting grounds, where dunes shift periodically in sharp, tectonic waves. Watch your step and don’t be surprised if your tent sinks at night.

■ The Scavengers organise daily reconnaissance parties in the desert hills. Stay with them to unbury dune treasures.

■ The brave & brazen can try to catch sand worms. The massive creatures erupt overground periodically, catching prey in their large mouths, or crushing it beneath their heft as they plunge in the depths — creating large sinkholes in the process.

■ On its back, each sand worm has a few darker scales that draw the shape of a rune. To tame a sand worm, you must find its rune, then write the symbol on the worm’s back using blood from your hands. Report your catch by 23:59 on 17 January!

■ The sand worm bonds with you for three weeks until the next full moonrise, or until you draw the same rune on your cut hand.

■ Those who secure a sand worm find it grudgingly follows them underground for the rest of the journey. The creature can only be steered or ridden.

■ Some sand worms are vicious, old and sufficiently magical to retaliate by taking the link over and forcing their bonded humans to experience their lives — briefly sensitive to light and strong sounds, or unable to speak. Some might experience mild fevers. All symptoms disappear when the bond breaks.

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A PYRAMID SCHEME

At last, welcome to Uruksithar, former jewel of the desert — now reduced to rusted gates and tattered walls of wind-lashed stone.

The abandoned palace-fortress features a row of minor temples and barren gardens that surround a great, ruinous pit. The state of residential furnishings suggests the grounds were lived mere years prior. Walk north to find a a large pool of thickened black water that exudes a cold, unsettling presence. Veteran party members know what to expect.

Nail scratches on some temple walls read, we, who did not sleep or i ask the wind to grieve our chains. By the pit, a stone plate helpfully says, drop by drop, even base water turns to poison.

The Scavengers disperse to raid the temples, advising you to carry water everywhere. One raider mentions that the local Temple of Ra’esh stores silver waters that can woo sand worms.

OCTOPUS PRIME

Uruksithar’s great gong strikes every two hours, to groans and shudders from the abyssal pit. Scavengers immediately take cover behind walls, bind themselves to columns or rush into crumbling residences.

■ For five minutes, as the gong sounds a pathetic dirge, a bouquet of tentacles erupts from the pit, sweeping nearby streets to capture living things.

■ Throwing water on the tentacles forces them to retreat, while black liquid from the northern pool burns them down. Further tendrils emerge until the gong quiets.

■ Should you fall into the pit, use your climbing hooks to latch onto the walls and don’t look down. A grotesque, sharp-toothed mouth awaits below to devour you, amid the squelching sounds of the tissue and material it has been masticating for decades. It won’t give up its lunch easily.

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TOMB AND GLOOM

Ra’esh the Bright-maker, he who saw but peace beneath the skies. His humble temple is anonymous among numerous worship grounds. Scavengers say, four years ago, a wanderer sculpted an eye with a sun for a pupil on the entrance door. Take a torch and head in.

■ Long-stripped of its glory, the maze-like Temple of Ra’esh is now cold stone, stale window-less corridors and heavy doors that snap down from the ceiling.

■ Distant susurrations of water point you towards your destination.

■ As you walk in, pay attention to the engravings near the entryway of each temple room. Some depict arrows, forecasting spikes will burst up from floors tiles. Sculpted drops hint pouring water in this spot will open a door. Open a door with an engraving of large serpents, and… well. The engravings can help characters navigate the maze and completely avoid its traps. Feel free to make up your own engravings & traps, if you want!

■ The altar room contains a pool with pearlescent waters that surround a woman fully bandaged in gauze, her sight obscured. She is bound to a column with chains and shackles akin to those found in the desert. Rare peeks of her skin show it rotting or sickly pale.

■ She asks either if you are her mother, come for her at last. Do you engage?

■ Take water from the pool, and you can lure a sand worm to you once you have exited Uruksithar. Hazed, but sweet-tempered, it will follow you underground and allow you to ride it for the three weeks until the next full moonrise. These sand worms won’t give you a hard time during the bond period. Report your worm too by 23:59 on 17 January!

NOTES

■ Test driving & in-game characters can top level logs here — test driving characters can also put up network posts in this space c:

■ Feel free to investigate the mystery of the chains and shackles, but no pressure — it’s not critical to Arc V.

■ Hit up NPCs!

■ Navigation top.

QUESTIONS

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Buffy, being so accustomed to finding herself in terrible—or merely strange, if lucky—situations, settles in the brittle sand and dry wafts. She isn't physically alone, but her fragmentary patience came out through a warning tone laced in her words (after her genuine thank yous, of course) to the helping hands. Clawing her way out of a pit tends to make her grumpy.

So, there she sits, slouched over with her arms folded atop her knees, lost in thought when she hears a familiar voice sounding from behind her. Her head tilts and she wears a look of perplexity as she takes in the voice.

Then, without looking back: ]

...Spike?

[ There is hope in her voice. Surprising, even to herself. ]

That you?

Buffy?

( uttered in that same punched out tone he reserves for her actual name ( not pet names ) after a point. he almost doesn’t believe what he’s seeing — namely, that he hasn’t seen her for so long, but also because he’s who knows how many realities away from theirs, and the last thing he remembers of being in her presence is how she looked lying to give him something sweet to die for.

spike stops short, six feet from where she’s sitting in the sand like he doesn’t want to disturb the mirage that the desert has gifted him.

( but he’s also never wanted to sod something up more. )

he doesn’t approach her. he can’t. spike stands frozen in his own indecision, unable to count off the amount of times he’s envisioned this reunion and the hundreds of ways it could go.

there is a prayer on his lips for her not to turn around. he can’t take being wrong about her. )

[ Hearing his voice hits her distinctively when it's her name it utters. He had called her by Buffy only a good handful of times, and hearing it now reacquaints her with the reality of his presence. Very slowly, she turns her head until her profile faces him, her chin hiding behind her shoulder. A short beat passes by—a mere moment—where anticipation hangs in the air. Interrupting it, she rotates her body enough to see him for herself.

The residue of the panic she felt having to take herself out of a hole vanished at the sight of him. ]

Spike. [ She repeats his name for herself. Her mouth parts when her jaw loosens in slight astonishment.

It really is him.

Mixed feelings of caution, blunted delight, and wonder paint themselves on her face like splatter on canvas.

Isn't it? ]

I... can't believe this. [ Once again, she takes in her surroundings, then glances below at her hands in the sand as she speculates if he's even tangible. ]

Yeah. It's- bollocks, you can say it, Slayer.

( shit, he means, but won't say.

it's an utter crapfest, the two of them, drawn into the sands. the dirt, the earth, the heat. here they are, billions of miles from her scooby squad, thrust into some new reality. spike questions it, but he also recognizes that nothing he asks after can be acted upon. he crouches, some feet behind her as if it's the most consoling behavior he can offer. here, i am, non-threatening. )

Are you hurt?

[ Some questions exhaust her ruminations, all of which pertain to whether or not he has a soul. Right now, her instincts are telling her to keep these questions to herself.

Buffy is very much aware of his consoling gesture, as she'd grown to be wary about the actions of a soulless Spike. It's a position she doesn't favour herself in, and she wants so badly to believe that this is the Spike—the man—she was beginning to believe in. A want so strong, it looks like need.

At his voiced concern, she shakes her head, taking her time as she slowly peers up at him. ]

No. [ Her voice is small as she searches his beryl blue eyes. They aren't yellow, so that's a start, she figures. ]

You?

[ A Buffy of few words almost always implies a very busy mind. ]

No. Other than the sun. I think I've found a way around that, however unreliable. It's a working procedure. ( which is... it's not a request to make of someone that has been healing so many losses on her own, so he isn't. the challenge is his to solve. not hers. it isn't buffy's. )

It doesn't matter. What I want it to mean. What do you need it to be? Tell me. Mine will be some sort of opposite. Or some- unrelated tidbit. Anything that will disenfranchise you.

Right. Sun. [ Her brows furrow into a muddled expression as she stands from her spot. A bead of sweat runs past her jawline and she futilely pats away the grains of sand peppered over her clothing. At last, she escapes her musings and notices the pendant Spike dons. ]

Is that your loophole?

[ She takes a moment to consider his question and can only reply with a loose shrug. ] Maybe ask me again when I know left from right. [ Buffy is so very lost. ]

Loophole for what? The sun?

( for being back from the dead? it isn't as if he has any indication to assume she's from another point in time. he discerns buffy with the kind of scrutiny reserved for strangers. if only because, for him, it's been such a long time since he's seen here face-to-face. he has no scope for what she's been through since. )

Can't say any of this makes a lick of sense, one way or the other. The only thing I do know comes from experience. You and I must be needed here, or else we wouldn't be.

( magic, it's pesky, but it has its reasons. usually. )

sand in your eyes

A SANDING OVATION

sorry for the wait, i am slowly cherry-picking today

sorry for the wait, myself!

<3

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