Patchwork Universe

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Tue Apr 13, 2004 12:53 pm Post subject: On getting thoroughly lost

A middle aged madman dressed entirely in soft leather of eye-hurting reds and blues strode confidently through the ticket barriers, before stopping exactly where his immobile figure caused the most difficulty for anyone trying to cross the space of the ticket hall.

"Fascinating," he said to himself, loudly enough for almost anyone to hear. "Certainly a discontinuity, no doubt about that. Hmm." Visibly restraining himself from dancing with delight, he eyed the confusion of exits leading from the hall before choosing one apparently at random and heading eagerly down it.

Three left turns and a series of escalators later found him happily scribbling complex equations on a piece of paper. "Hmm. The maze layout is suggestive of a variant of the Warren, which validates the web hypothesis of connected realities. Though..." He halted, as if suddenly struck by something, oblivious to the curses of those behind him. "Woven cloth! Of course!"

He turned around to the nearest member of the crowd. "Is woven cloth a standard form of dress in this reality, would you happen to know?"[/code]

John Angelis · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 7:15 pm Post subject:

The crowd member rolled his eyes, and feigned not to have heard the strangely dressed man.

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 9:47 pm Post subject:

As the resident moved on, eager to be getting on with whatever business he had, Loresan examined with fascination the handkerchief he had expertly purloined from the man's pocket.

"How extraordinary. And they seem to feel no ill effects whatsover. Hmm... I wonder if this discontinuity has been caused by an accumulation of weaving in a place of power in this reality? But logically that would be at the join, unless the effect has been shunted along by a half-Birdcage..."

He continued walking as he speculated wildly to himself, oblivious to the strange looks the crowd gave him. At last he found himself in another large hall, where the crowd flooded through barriers that opened at the feeding of a piece of card to an odd metal beast.

Loresan dug around in his pockets briefly, then wandered to the side of a hall, where a busker was watching him with the caution of the sane-and-wanting-to-remain-that-way.

"You wouldn't happen to have a piece of cardboard on you, would you?"

John Angelis · Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 9:03 am Post subject:

The busker took his penny whistle from his lips.

"Yer, hang on," he said as he hunted through his pockets.

"There ya go," he said, and handed Loresan an empty cigarette packet, "that do ya?"

As Loresan accepted the packet, the busker said "Any spare change?"

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 9:55 am Post subject:

Loresan accepted the packet and started tearing it into the shape of a ticket with neat, precise motions. At the busker's request he tucked the packet into the crook of one elbow and considered.

"Change? Let me see..." He reached into a pocket and pulled out a handful of string, a small folding knife, a ginger biscuit and some odd-coloured coins. "I never had much use for the stuff, so if you can use it you're welcome to it. Unless you meant some other kind of change, in which case I'm not sure whether the laws of this reality will allow me to oblige, but I would be absolutely fascinated to try."[/i]

John Angelis · Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 10:35 am Post subject:

The busker accepted the pocket knife with a gracious nod of his head, then went back to playing the penny whistle.

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Fri May 07, 2004 12:46 am Post subject:

Loresan scarcely seemed to notice the loss of his pocket knife as he turned eagerly to the barriers, inserting his piece of card in the machine and watching the reaction with the solemn air of a scientist conducting a delicate experiment.

The barrier took the card, examined it, then, in an insultingly short space of time, spat it out again into Loresan's waiting hand. He examined it carefully, then walked briskly back to the busker and placed it in his hat.

"Marvellous, thankyou. Now, if I could just borrow that pocket knife for a second..."

Some minutes later there was something of a jam at the ticket barriers as passengers tried to get as far away as possible from the madman who had entangled a single machine in a complicated array of knotwork. Loresan had just stepped back and was eyeing his creation with not a little satisfaction, when there was a polite cough from behind him.

John Angelis · Posted: Fri May 07, 2004 6:33 pm Post subject:

Behind Loresan was a guard. A thin faced weasel of a man, who addressed Loresan with a reedy voice.
"Excuse me sir, could you move along, you're causing a disturbance."

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Fri May 07, 2004 7:53 pm Post subject:

"Certainly, certainly." Loresan leaned forward to adjust the position of one of the strings, then stepped back again, tilting his head assessingly. "By the way, you wouldn't be able to tell me what lies beyond this infernal creature, would you?"

John Angelis · Posted: Sat May 08, 2004 5:28 am Post subject:

The man said nothing for a moment. His nose made a slight whistling noise as he breathed through it, but nothing else.

Eventually he simply reiterated his request, "Could you move along, sir?"

Two more guards appeared, and one of them began attempting to remove the knot structure around the gate.

In the meantime, the backlog of people had mostly worked itself out, and the crowd was using other ticket gates.

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Tue May 25, 2004 11:04 pm Post subject:

As one of the guards began to untie the knots, Loresan stepped quickly forwards in a swirl of bright colours to put a hand on his wrist. "No, no, no, no, no! Don't do that, you could destabilise the local reality, and that seems to be unstable enough as it is. Really, you shouldn't even think of undoing a knot that you haven't studied in depth for three years. Unless, obviously, you're archmages yourself. Still, consider this a practical demonstration - if you've got a light?"

John Angelis · Posted: Wed May 26, 2004 1:55 pm Post subject:

The guard gave Loresan a withering glance, and continued to tug at the knot.

The other two guards moved to interpose themselves between their fellow and Loresan.

"Move along please" reiterated the first guard.

Eventually, the guard busy at the gate yanked the knotwork free.

There was an unpleasant sensation of the mind, not unlike the sounds of screaming or tearing. The Guard at the barrier, and indeed the barrier itself seemed to be less detailed, less precise than they had been. The effect progressed, until both were merely the barest impression of a man and a barrier, until at last, in the space where they had been, there was nothing - not an empty space by any means. A gap would have been something at least. The area was a physical and conceptual blank.

The two remaining guards seemed alarmed at this. They muttered to each other, in the strange unintelligable language heard over tannoys in stations the universe over. They came to a consensus of some sort, and one of the guards strode into the area. The same fate befell him, becoming indistinct, then the barest suggestion of a guard, before becoming nothing at all. The other guard seemed satisfied. Clearly people without tickets wouldn't be getting through there.

A few minutes passed, and a pair of guards arrived carrying a portable barrier, such as one might see erected around a food spill in a supermarket, and arranged it around the area of nothingness. Upon the barrier, one of the guards had hung a warning sign reading "Warning: Spatial Instability" and underneath "Danger Of Erasure From Existence." Satisfied with their work, the two wandered off.

That left only Loresan and the original guard.

"Move along please, sir"

John Angelis · Posted: Wed May 26, 2004 2:16 pm Post subject:

[It is worth noting that the ticket hall is currently not in use - no-one is coming in or out, and the lights seem somewhat dimmed.]

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Wed May 26, 2004 5:00 pm Post subject:

"I do wish you hadn't done that."

Loresan sighs and shakes his head. "But if you're happy to deal with the spatial unravelment yourselves then I suppose I should be moving along. You wouldn't happen to know if there's anywhere in particular I ought to be moving along to?"

He gave the area of nothingness an interested glance, then as the guard began to move towards him with the evident aim of helping him on his way he shrugged, a trifle sadly, and moved off.

As he passed the busker again he paused, fumbled the penknife out of his pocket, and handed it back. "Thankyou very much. If you ever decide what to be changed into just give me a call, and I'll see what I can do."

Then he chose a door at random, and disappeared again into the bowels of the Underground.

Loresan Knotreaver · Posted: Thu May 27, 2004 10:08 pm Post subject:

Some time later, the crowd on Caliper platform was slightly perturbed by the somewhat random motion of an increasingly familiar lunatic.

Loresan's notepad was now filled with maps, diagrams, equations, and the rather fine profile of a startled busker, to the extent that a certain amount of overflow jottings could be seen on the back of his hand.

He started to put his pen away, looked up, raised his eyebrows and fished his pen out again at the sight of some rather familiar mists.

"Hmm. Well, theoretically there does have to be a reciprocal discontinuity to complete the Moebius twist, but it really shouldn't be here." He glared at the mists. "I don't suppose you'd like to consider moving yourself about..." he glanced at his notes "two hundred and three yards up and right, assuming we're using Tcholsky's laws of orthogonal vectoring? No? Well then, you leave me only one option."

He stepped through.