Patchwork Universe

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

[Arriving from "Setting Out" in Hareton]

Sorrel emerged from the mists and found herself almost swept away by a fierce, hot wind. Her eyes locked shut in pain as a thousand gritty bits of sand scoured her face. The heat was intense. Staggering forward a few steps, she dropped to her knees. "What is this place?" she shouted aloud. The desert gave no reply.

Huddled over her bags, she peered into her sewing basket. "I'm sure I had a nice big piece of cotton in here," she muttered. Sure enough, there it was, a nice wide strip of white cotton, and much longer than she had thought. Pulling it out, she wrapped it around her head, shielding her eyes a bit and protecting her nose and mouth. She held the ends together with a safety-pin at the front.

Grimly, she rose to her feet. She could turn back, but she had to find out what had happened to Sheepfold Farm and why. Forcing one foot in front of the other, the small figure advanced northwards.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

At the sight, Sorrel was dumbfounded. "It looks like something out of the Arabian Nights!" she thought. There was no question - she had to find out what those buildings were. Maybe there were people there! And maybe they could tell her why all this sand had been dumped all over the fields! Excitedly, she hurried onwards towards the pastel domes.

Karl Groever · Posted: Thu Jul 22, 2004 6:56 pm Post subject:

As the whistling wind died down for a moment, Sorrel was enabled to see something more of her immediate surroundings. The level sands appeared to strech onwards inexorably. Seeming to rest but lightly upon them, she could make out many humped, dome like shapes, each with a marbled texture, in a variety of pastel colours - delicate eggs nestling in the folds of the picnic cloth that was the Desert.
And beyond these, at the point at which the sands seemed to mometarily halt, a shape towering upward, dizzingly upward, level by level, into the lowering sky. The jagged grey outline of the pinnacles, turrets, balustrades, crenel walls, outer and inner stairways, that comprised the City's carapace.

Karl Groever · Posted: Fri Jul 23, 2004 5:12 pm Post subject:

Sorrel had continued to walk for quite some time. She had seen no - body else hove into view on the horizon, and heard only the sound of the wind whistling past, picking up and then fading away again, at irregular intervals. Just occassionally, she felt that she might have heard faint voices being carried on the breeze, snatches of odd words and distant conversations, but they were too obscured to make out what was being said, or where the sound was coming from. The great City was, nonetheless, coming ever closer as she took each step, and, by now, she had reached the outlying circle of domes, which had earlier seemed so remote itself. Sorrel saw, close to, that a number of the domes were particularly eye - catching: a cyan coloured egg, one in crushed pink and white, and another that seemed stark white against the desert sands. But all were remarkably breathtaking. It was almost hard to believe that anyone had ever 'built' these structures at all. Sorrel felt as if they might have been placed in this landscape since the start of time.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

"Hang on a minute," she thought. "These things look like they've been here forever - but they weren't here yesterday! What's going on?"

She hurried towards the nearest dome, the cyan one, wondering if they were perhaps dwellings or religious monuments. She arrived and found a tiny patch of shade on one side of it. Sinking down with her back to the dome, she rummaged in her bag, and then pulled aside her makeshift facemask to take a swig of lemonade.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

"Ah, that's better!" she announced (to no-one in particular). She tucked the bottle back into the picnic-bag and stood up. She circled the dome, trying to find some kind of entrance, or any sign of life.

Karl Groever · Posted: Mon Jul 26, 2004 4:38 pm Post subject:

As Sorrel circled the cyan dome, she became aware that an entraceway appeared to be set into the Dome, recessed a little into the stonework.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

Gathering up her bags, Sorrel peered into the entranceway. "Hello?" she called. "Anyone in there?" She tentatively stepped inside.

Karl Groever · Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2004 8:34 pm Post subject:

There was no reply to Sorrel's shout, and her voice echoed hollowly around the dome. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim light of the interior, although, after a time, she could clearly see that, from the inside, the walls of the dome looked vaguely translucent, as if the light was passing through them from outside, tiniting everything with a pale blue glow. She began to notice that there seemed to be niches arrayed along walls of the dome, four on each side to left and right. They did not appear to lead anywhere, but were merely recessed into the walls. Following the line of niches, the line of sight was brought to converge on what seemed to be a lectern of some sort standing at the opposite end of the dome. Dust motes drifted hazily through the tinted, heated air.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

"Wow!" exclaimed Sorrel, gazing about her in wonder. "What a fantastic place!" It seemed slightly cooler inside than out, and the hot, gritty wind cound not reach her inside the dome, so she decided to break her expedition there, and rest for a while.

The room seemed deserted, which disappointed Sorrel. She put down her bags inside the door, and circled the dome, examining the niches. What could they have been for? Statues? Candles? Seats?

She approached the lectern, and peered up at it. A strange thing to find in a deserted dome, certainly. She couldn't quite see if there was anything on it, as the slanted portion was level with the top of her head. She jumped up and down in an attempt to see better, but the hazy light filtering through the walls made it all the harder. There was probably nothing there - who'd leave a book in here anyway?

Karl Groever · Posted: Tue Aug 03, 2004 9:06 pm Post subject:

Much to Sorrel's surprise, as she attained a little more height, she saw that there was, indeed, a book sitting on the lectern, and that its pages were open. She didn't catch much of an initial glimpse, so, with her curiosity piqued, she attempted a few more jumps in order to try and see more.
After a minute or so of further leaping, Sorrel had begun to form a clearer picture of the book in her mind. It was smaller than the lectern top, although still on the large size. but could, conceivably. have fitted within a carry - all. It looked discernably old, if not, perhaps, quite as ancient as she might have expected. The pages of the book seemed brown and brittle, and it was clearly some kind of manuscript. Some sort of odd calligraphy dotted the pages, and she could have sworn that she had glimpsed a drawing of something in amongst the dots and swirls.
Sorrel looked down at the floor of the dome, as she caught her breath and rearranged her thoughts. She was mildly amused by the fact that the dusty floor of the building now bore the imprints of her feet all around the lectern where she been jumping, and that her footprints tracked a line back into the distance, from the direction in which she had come.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

"If there's a book left in here, there must be someone who left it!" thought Sorrel excitedly. "But it's so old, maybe they haven't been here for a long time..." She went over to her bags and rummaged around in an attempt to find something to stand on. In the end, she took her picnic-bag over to the lectern. Although it was squashy with the rolled-up rug inside, it gave her just enough extra height to see the book better. The markings were very strange indeed, and in the half-light of the dome, very hard to decipher. Sorrel decided that if she were going to make any sense of it at all she'd have to carry the book over to the door. She grasped it and lifted it carefully down, wobbling slightly on her perch. What could that drawing be of?

Karl Groever · Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2004 8:10 pm Post subject:

As Sorrel lowered the book down to her own level of vision, she glanced once again at the pages she was still holidng open. She could the mysterious writing close - up now, but the strange curlicues and arabesques, dots, slashes and assorted diacritical marks that crawled across the musty pages seemed indecipherable. The drawing looked more promising. Close to, she could note that it seemed to be a stylised rendition of a sun (or perhaps it was a glowing jewel), radiating light onto a much more realistically drawn flower of some sort, complete with a wide stem, fleshy leaves, veined on the underside, and bell shaped petals. Beside the flower lay a small bowl, filled apparently with some kind of viscous liquid. She began to wonder what else this strange book might contain.

Sorrel Sparrow · Average Joined: 20 Jul 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Hareton

"What a curious book!" thought Sorrel. She carried the volume towards the doorway of the dome, to look at it in the light. It was no easier to understand then. She perched on a ledge by the door to leaf through it some more.

Sorrel was disappointed the book was not more legible, but intrigued by the unusual script and strange drawings. And then the book itself seemed so old; but the desert landscape had been there so short a time! No matter how she looked at the situation, Sorrel was completely unable to understand it. She'd just have to find someone to ask. If there were no people in this dome, maybe there was someone in one of the others. Or perhaps she could reach the shimmering towered city visible through the swirling sands. Sorrel sighed happily. What an adventure!

She regretfully decided that it would be wrong to take the book with her as she left - it wasn't hers, after all - but she realised that there was no way she could put it back on the lectern. Guiltily, she put the tome down in one of the niches near the door. Collecting her bags, she peered out into the bright sunshine, and decided that she would go and look into each of the other domes, one by one, before setting out for the city. Surely she'd find some people somewhere soon?

Karl Groever · Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2004 7:43 pm Post subject:

As Sorrel got ready to wander out across to the other mysterious domes - wondering to herself just how many of them there might be yet to explore, for she had already counted more than thirty - she was stopped by a harsh shout, coming from nearby. Sorrel was struck by the sound; it was clearly somebody's voice, and it sounded somewhat grating; she picked up on the odd sentence 'who the hell are you?', but noted that it seemed to be given in a tone suggesting it was some kind of informal greeting. And then she heard some less coherent jibbering in response. It sounded as if her wish to meet some interesting new people was about to be granted, as these voices were clearly not far away. But would greeting them mean that her further investigations of the domes would be cut short? She had instinctively leaned up against the entraceway, pressing her ear against the hot, cyan stone to hear these sounds more clearly, but keeping herself, for the moment, out of sight - after all, there was something exciting about keeping herself hidden for a little while, the better to surprise these others - and, as a slight smile of anticipation stole across her lips, she considered what her next option was to be.