your shriveled husk floats into the uncertain sky. you are grateful for the chance to sustain your animal with your final fluid\n\n[[begin|Start]]

victim of some mass skirmish or another, one of those engagements so far from the heavylands that it never got a name, only absences in trade route account books, a dimpling of borders\n\n[[reet|core]]

useless for harvesting. even the tool that could cut through their cadmium bark would only reveal a layer of caustic sap\n\n[[reet|core]]

<<set $why = either("utterly obedient","hungry","thirsty","curious")>>you have an animal\n\nyour animal follows you because it is <<$why>>\n\n[[commence|core]]\n<<silently>><<set $speed = either("sluggish, padding movements","fleet and mincing steps","scurrying movements","a solemn stepping of hooves")>><<set $distance = 0>><<Set $vita = 0>><<endsilently>>

flip phone, and two of the numbers glow red\n\n[[reet|pack]]

WebFontConfig = {\n google: { families: [ 'Gabriela::latin' ] }\n };\n (function() {\n var wf = document.createElement('script');\n wf.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https' : 'http') +\n '://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/webfont/1/webfont.js';\n wf.type = 'text/javascript';\n wf.async = 'true';\n var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0];\n s.parentNode.insertBefore(wf, s);\n })();

your animal nuzzles the stretched fabric between your breasts\n\ngive how much milk?\n\n[[scant]] | [[mid]] | [[all]]<<set $distance += 1>>

calculates the mass of anything in the blink of its eye. this is an older apparatus so you have to give it a few flicks before it'll focus.\n\n[[reet|pack]]

one of the few independent heavy settlements, reclusive scaleheads with precious mass in their skins and bladderstones. righteously suspicious of outsiders, considering the history of skinning and gutting by lightboned skyfalling humans.\n\n[[reet|core]]

plastic tubing sticks from the wound in your pet\n\nbrushing along the reeds like a finger along a fence\n\n[[reet|animal]]

<<if $password is "vereor">>the hunter steps back through a hulkroot arch streamered in vines, and is seen no more\n\n[[the way is unobstructed|core][$distance += 1]]<<else>>the hunter takes your life and uses it for ballast\n\nin the meantime, your animal disappears\n\n[[begin|Start]]<<endif>>

your flow is fair and lilting in the throat\n\n[[la|core]]<<set $vita += 1>>

wrapped in old yellow bandages, pendulous bracelet on the wrist, a couple joints too long\n\n[[reet|circle]]

<<if $vita is 0>>you rub your animal's flank with your gloved hand, consulting your phone with the other.\n\nthe contact list is growing new numbers - myopic, stunted digits wending through pixel afterbirth.<<endif>><<if $vita is 2>>your animal's head turns into a sun. the light's breeze wags the leaves.\n\nyour phone rings. you shush your animal, and it dims enough for you to hear the voice on the other end. you cling to a branch as the cold sky licks your feet.<<endif>><<if $vita is -2>>your animal is not heavy enough to stick to the earth. it disappears through the canopy in a slow splash of leaves.\n\nyou delete the numbers from your phone and they make a sound like dying caterpillars. the milk in your breasts weighs both of your feet to the ground.<<endif>>

[[tube]]\n[[remove collar]]\n{{{*}}}\n[[reet|core]]

your animal laps listlessly at the miserly drops\n\n[[la|core]]<<set $vita -= 1>>

Ballast

you hand over the shipment into the darkness. an [[arm]] reaches through and [[takes it]].

could be caches left by someone with too big a catch to bring back in one trip. could be a small village of drifters, chains anchoring box homes. could be traps with their jaws sunk into the kind of thing that the land would pay good money to bring from the sky.\n\n[[reet|core]]

you flip your phone free, pressing the red buttons that warp the whorls on your fingertips. no ringing comes from the speaker, but some time later, a [[circle]] grinds open in the side of the temple.

\n::-moz-selection { /* Code for Firefox */\n color: #B19CD9;\n background: none;\n}\n\n::selection {\n color: #B19CD9;\n background: none;\n}\n\n\na {color:#6d95d0!important;font-size:110%!important;}\n\na:hover {\ncolor:#D4CAD1!important;text-decoration:none !important;}\n\n#passages{font-size:24px;\nborder-left: 0px !important; margin:50px 0px 0px 50px !important;}\n\nbody {color: #DFB0FF;background-color:#432E3D !important;font-size:130%!important;font-family: 'Gabriela', serif;\n/* Permalink - use to edit and share this gradient: http://colorzilla.com/gradient-editor/#14253e+0,182232+41,191f29+100 */\nbackground: #14253e; /* Old browsers */\nbackground: -moz-linear-gradient(top, #14253e 0%, #182232 41%, #191f29 100%); /* FF3.6+ */\nbackground: -webkit-gradient(linear, left top, left bottom, color-stop(0%,#14253e), color-stop(41%,#182232), color-stop(100%,#191f29)); /* Chrome,Safari4+ */\nbackground: -webkit-linear-gradient(top, #14253e 0%,#182232 41%,#191f29 100%); /* Chrome10+,Safari5.1+ */\nbackground: -o-linear-gradient(top, #14253e 0%,#182232 41%,#191f29 100%); /* Opera 11.10+ */\nbackground: -ms-linear-gradient(top, #14253e 0%,#182232 41%,#191f29 100%); /* IE10+ */\nbackground: linear-gradient(to bottom, #14253e 0%,#182232 41%,#191f29 100%); /* W3C */\nfilter: progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.gradient( startColorstr='#14253e', endColorstr='#191f29',GradientType=0 ); /* IE6-9 */\n background-attachment:fixed;\n margin:0;width:600px;}\n\n.passage{background-color:none;font-size:130%!\n}\n\n#sidebar #credits:hover{color:#333;visibility:hidden;}#sidebar #credits a{text-decoration:none;visibility:hidden;}\n\n#sidebar {visibility:hidden!important;}\n\n#footer{display:none!important;}\n\n#toolbar{display:none!important;}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n.transition-in {\n\topacity:0.1;\n\tposition:absolute;\n}\n.passage:not(.transition-out) {\n\ttransition: 1s;\n\t-webkit-transition: 1s;\n}\n.transition-out {\n\topacity:0.1;\n\tposition:absolute;\n}

<<if $distance gt 10>>\nyou press on to the temple towering, next to which the swamp is a carpet of damp moss.\n\nthe [[walls]] of the [[temple]] pass beyond sight into the mist.<<else>><<if $distance is 3>>{{{*}}} //Petrified Palisades// {{{*}}}\n\nstakes in the earth\n\nthe [[hunter]] has been watching for some time, but you only just noticed, when your animal moaned low at their presence<<else>><<if $distance is 0>>{{{*}}} //Limace Gapera// {{{*}}}\n\noozing [[shapes]] flow [[mud-sweating]] ravine<<endif>><<if $distance is 1>>{{{*}}} //Lanthornway// {{{*}}}\n\nemerald [[lanthorns]] radiate from [[metal branches]] in the canopy<<endif>><<if $distance is 2>>{{{*}}} //The Cess// {{{*}}}\n\nreek of bog vents, dire plumes<<endif>><<if $distance is 3>>{{{*}}} //The Basin// {{{*}}}\n\nbig [[water]] with an isle at the center bearing a [[wax fountain]]<<endif>><<if $distance is 5>>{{{*}}} //Chaingla// {{{*}}}\n\n[[chains]] trail into the sky.<<endif>> <<if $distance is 6>>{{{*}}} //Gangrove// {{{*}}}\n\nbony, noduled [[trees]] clasped together like pale wringing hands<<endif>><<if $distance is 8>>{{{*}}} //Bayr Yus// {{{*}}}\n\nThe maniprowed outline of the [[gator fortress]], grinding with the pipeline.<<endif>><<if $distance is 9>>{{{*}}} //Sylrines Apikitr// {{{*}}}\n\nthe [[torn]] out [[foundations]] of an old town<<endif>><<if $distance is 10>>{{{*}}} //Styg Gleans// {{{*}}}\n\npilar [[mounds]] heaving darkly, suckers in shadow<<endif>>\n\n<<if $distance is 4 or $distance is 7>>your animal settles on its haunches and looks up at you\n\n[[milk]]<<else>>your animal moves through the swamp with <<$speed>>\n\n[[{{{>>>>>}}}|core][$distance += 1]]\n\n[[animal]] | [[pack]] | [[trinks]]<<endif>><<endif>><<endif>>

jquery:off\nhash:off\nbookmark:on\nmodernizr:off\nundo:off\nobfuscate:off\nexitprompt:off\nblankcss:off\n

a breeze of paper money wafts through like a flurry of feathers. you quickly snatch at them before they flit into the sky.\n\n[[smoke curls from your phone|phone]]

rhythmic exhalations\n\n[[reet|core]]

pages thin as rolling papers\n\nyou might use them for that yet before the night is through\n\na lens hangs from the binding on a pewter chain\n\n[[hold it to the tiny text]]\n\n[[pocket|trinks]]

the blazing barbs of the lanthorn burn your hands\n\nthey will not give up their precious fire, nor their mite of sentience\n\n[[core]]

the hunter drags its weapon on the ground, but you know that weapon can leap in an exhalation\n\n"password."\n\n<<porpinput $password>>\n\n[[just so]]

you unbind the collar from the neck of your animal\n\nyour animal is sucked into the sky\n\n[[begin|Start]]

a baroque tube of enameled red-yellow cardboard and ivory encrustation\n\n[[tiny book]]\n[[poison urn shard]]\n[[grasp the cursed locket|locket]]\n{{{*}}}\n[[fade from material things|core]]

abyssal oilmire, a smell that lubricates your nostrils\n\n[[reet|core]]

you drop your phone, burning with a black fire, and fish another from your pack as the old drifts away in ruptured crusts.\n\n[[walk along the shadow of the temple]]

a silvery thicket of scratches all along the base, from mass scavengers ignorant of the ancient hardness of adamas.\n\n[[reet|core]]

hollow like the bones of birds. only tenacious roots keep them clinging to the undermuck, and when a tree dies they ungrasp, sending it into the sky like a vegetable uprooted by unseen fists\n\n[[reet|core]]

//requires jquery\n \nversion.extensions["porpInput"] = { major: 1, minor: 0, revision: 0 };\nmacros["porpinput"] =\n{\n handler: function(place, macroName, params, parser)\n {\n try\n {\n var variableName = params[0].substring(1),\n id = "porpinput-" + variableName;\n \n $(place).on('change', 'input#' + id, function(ev) {\n var v = $(this).val().toLowerCase();\n state.history[0].variables[variableName] = v;\n });\n \n new Wikifier(place, '<input type="text" class="porpinput" id="' + id + '"></input>');\n }\n catch (e)\n {\n throwError(place, "<<" + macroName + ">>: " + e.message);\n }\n }\n};

the rubble of that town is now ballast in some ship. deep in that dark hold, can you see shoes, coins, stuffed animals strewn through the bricks? \n\neverything is mass.\n\n[[reet|core]]

a false fountain. there are many round these parts, giving your mass calc a sorry read of 0.\n\n[[reet|core]]

crypto-jettisonist screed, with an underlined phrase:\n\n"vereor"\n\n[[thumb close|trinks]]

two heavy metal balls leashed with chains\n\n[[reet|pack]]

mass leeches scrounging for trace minerals. fall asleep and you'll wake up with lighter bones\n\n[[reet|core]]

you get on your hands and knees\n\nwhen you touch the ground with all fours it has a lasting change on your limbs\n\nit signifies to the earth that you are an animal\n\nand the quintessence of base matter courses into you\n\n[[begin|Start]]

confers protection from a fraction of poison\n\n[[reet|trinks]]

mud clouds the air like a nightmare of shit\n\n[[reet|core]]

Porpentine Charity Heartscape

your pack, blue burlap, contains:\n\n[[burner phone]]\n[[mass calc]]\n[[shipment]]\n{{{*}}}\n[[reet|core]]