Jairus Starvald
Eidoloclast
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: To submit a weird place and make the Galaxy just a little bit more interesting. Also, space whales.
- Image Credit: Cylo’s Research Base.
- Canon: /
- Dev Thread: X (I'm Jairus)
- Credit: Made with [member="Irajah Ven"]
- Links: Purrgil | Cylo’s Research Base.
- City Name: City of Wake
- Classification: Metropolis.
- Location: Usually the Chiloon Rift, but not always.
- Affiliation: The City of Wake rules itself, until a judgement among its citizens needs to be reached. Then the Hidden Leaf (Yes, that would be Cerbera) passes hers.
- Demographics: Qo’saarai Tuk'ata, Kilva Collective, Kissai, Anans’ai, Bereth-Aku, Thirriken, Nezumi, Other weird species.
- Wealth: Medium. In the City of Wake there are two currencies that truly matter to those living there. One is reputation and the other one hasn't been found as of yet. Wake is rather poor by the standards of the Galaxy, credits, nova crystals and everything in between is rarely seen here. Instead those of Wake seek value in other commodities. The weight of a promise, your name, a first born. This means that while Wake might consider itself rich, its commodities and resources are only ever accepted in similar settlements of the occult across the Galaxy.
- Stability: Low. The City regulates itself for the most part, there is an eb and flow of power within the streets. Most entities of power don't concern themselves with things like turf, territory and the basal forms of dominance. Those that do… often find themselves destroyed when they reach too far. The Hidden Leaf enjoys this constant struggle for power, and especially the price they pay in return for it. She only rarely intervenes and when she does it is often only during disputes that has the potential to become an existential threat to the City as a whole.
- Description: In the City of Wake, the occult, the strange, and the occasionally uncomfortable make their home amidst the stars. As the Leviathan swims through the ethereal wastes of the Chiloon Rift, the denizens of the city find new (and frequently disturbing) aspects of their chosen residence as easily and commonly as someone else might stumble across litter in the street. Equal parts metropolis and eldritch horror, cobbled together with cybernetics and the darkside, the City of Wake is a confusing amalgam of features that leave rare visitors not entirely certain if they are dreaming it all or not. Until they leave and it is relegated, if it is remembered at all, to the realm of nightmares.
The Floating Bazaar: Occuring at irregular and difficult to predict intervals, the Floating Bazaar is a cobbled together marketplace where one could buy anything from a cybernetic eye to their neighbor’s fresh bottled nightmares (or not so fresh, those are cheaper anyway). Always occuring in a public place somewhere in the city, the Floating Bazaar is never planned or scheduled, it simply happens. Those with something to sell find their way to a particular location, while those with something to buy (usually) end up in the same spot.
Since the Bazaar will usually last several days, word of mouth tends to attract others less driven by the whims of commerce. It will disperse as casually as it arose, simply when enough vendors have packed up their goods and gone home, or purchasers have given up all hope of finding anything more useful than Matsu Xiangu’s right sandal or the gold tooth of Kaine Zambranos first incarnation (wait, how much was that again? Sold). The longest Floating Bazaar lasted two full months before it finally melted away into the mists, while occasionally frenzied drawn crowds of buyers and sellers will be gone again inside of an hour.
Bring something to barter with, because frequently the vendors aren’t looking for credits. They are much, much more interested in things with actual value. Of course, what is valuable to whom may vary greatly, so barter wisely.
The Spite: Not technically a single location or district, the Spite is the collective name for the series of wooden boards, catwalks, handmade rope bridges and metal scraps strung along from rooftop to rooftop across the tops of buildings all throughout the city. Used as an aerial highway by cutthroats, sneak thieves and pickpockets, the Spite is a secret yet functional passage above the city- in “spite” of it being in plain view to those who look up at it from below.
The walkways themselves aren’t a secret, of course, but navigating them safely, that is where the mystery and danger lies. Many of the makeshift bridges are false or deliberately broken to prevent the uninitiated from being able to move about safely. At least once a week someone with less sense than hubris finds themselves plummeting down after a misstep, wondering ‘wait, what?’
The only way to learn the safe passages along the Spite is by gaining the trust of someone who already knows them. For someone in the know, it is possible to traverse the entire length and breadth of the City of Wake without ever setting foot on the ground. But you have to know someone. Or you’ll meet the ground far sooner than you intended.
The Tubes: It has a technical name. Technically. It’s very official sounding and everything. But the denizens of the City of Wake refer to the public transportation system merely as “The Tubes” because it’s simpler and less concerning.
No one really wants to think about it. Of course, it’s hard not to once you are there.
The Tubes are actually the surface layer of blood vessels of the Leviathan, held open at set points by cybernetic apertures. One purchases a ticket from the booth, and enters one of the passenger ‘pills’, elongated metallic ovals. Cheap tickets are available several times a day for more crowded pills without seating, while more expensive, ‘luxury’ pill rides are available. Of course in this case, luxury means not shoved in like sardines and with a bench, but hey, it’s something.
The movement in the Tubes is uncomfortable at best, disturbing at worst. Because the pills are forced along with the moving blood, they are subject to the natural pulse of the creature’s heartbeat. Frequent Tube riders learn to ignore it (mostly), but those new to the mode of transportation are often unsettled by the sensation and alternating speed (from fast to slow to fast again) of travel.
On rare occasions, if for some reason the city’s Leviathan feels threatened (and what indeed could threaten a floating space whale of these proportions?) the increased rate of its beating heart has been known to suck a passenger pill out of the standard vein and artery ways….. Not one has ever been recovered. But then, no one has ever been particularly interested in such a rescue into the depths.
Levis Colony: Sometimes, when a Pill gets dislodged from the normal routes, instead of being crushed in the Heart it survives. Hopefully along with its occupants (for their sake), though the denizens of Levis colony aren’t fussy either way. These Pills usually end up in the Lungs (‘usually’- no one really has any idea of how often it happens), and in the hands of a colony, unknown to the Citizens of the surface city.
The strange, phosphorescent glow of the inside of the Leviathan’s lungs is green and eerie. Likely from the Clouson-36 gas that the creature breathes in to allow it to jump to hyperspace- those living in Levis Colony have quite a bit of time to study its effect after all. Of course, the whale breathing that in is no good for the people living there. A system of warning bells, created from intact Pills, are rung to warn the populace when the first tremors of deep breath are felt. Rushing to their homes, the citizens wait, hoping that this is not the time the gas penetrates the homes they have created out of the Pills that have reached them.
The green light from the gas washes over everything it touches, giving the colony another nickname. The Emerald City. Unable to find a way (so far) to reach or contact the surface city, those who survive the failures of the Tube system to end up here have simply shrugged and put down roots. There are of course, stories on the surface. But those are stories from an old children’s book, no? Certainly not of a real place, hidden within the very Leviathan itself.
The Gardens: The few who know Cerbera are not surprised, when they hear that her home within Wake… is a garden. Hanging Gardens suspended and build against the base of the skull on the spine of Wake. Alongside the Botanical Gardens of the Curator, the Hanging Gardens make up the only significant greenery gracing the City of Wake.
It was a tricky problem to figure out its initial growth. How to supply it with water, from where and how to sustain its cycle of life. Until the realization came that even Wake had ducts (relatively huge ones) that supplied the leviathan with its tears.
This was the first stepping stone of the Gardens.
One of the tear ducts was diverted- a large obsidian aqueduct. It led the tears straight from the source to the place, where Cerbera would tend to her gardens and her home. The aqueduct itself was a creation of the Force, a large construct which had the interesting ability to filter out the salt from the tears as it flowed past.
Swaying transport tubes, archways, and other exotic creations hang over the Spine of the Leviathan and make even the high society of Wake feel envy. The more years pass, the larger the gardens become.
Who knows what the Lady of Wake does there?
The Spine: More officially The Spine of the Leviathan (which those who live there call it, rather self importantly while everyone else just rolls their eyes), the Spine is a line of the tallest buildings right down the center of the city. Spanning the length of the Leviathan’s backbone, the Spine is the high point of both the city and its society. It is a mark of status to live here.
Which most people without the money or social strata to afford it don’t really understand.
The Spine is one of the least stable places on the surface of the city. Every time the Leviathan changes direction in anything but the slowest of arcs, the buildings built along the Spine flex. Those who live there have gotten into the casual habit of simply reaching out in those moments- reaching out to brace against a wall or to snag a vase as it falls through the air off of a shelf- and then continue on their conversation as if nothing had happened. The skill in making it look effortless and external capacity to convey that it is simply no big deal is prized among the rich of the City. Everyone else thinks they are raving lunatics. But then, the poor often think that of the foibles of the rich.
Usually, they are right.
The Fleshgarden Slums: Sometimes, the citizens of the City like their euphemisms, such as with the Tubes. Sometimes, however, a place is precisely as advertised. Such is the case of the Fleshgarden Slums.
Burrowed into flesh of the Leviathan, the Slums are located toward the base of the tail. The steps down are always slippery, so be careful if you visit (though why would you?). The poorest of the denizens of the city live here; not poor in credits but poor in other ways- be it creativity, drive, or simply the ability to spin a tale or scrounge that left sandal.
Layers of skin, fat and at the base, muscle tissue that can be seen shifting and pulling with the Leviathan’s motions, the nearly three meter drop from normal street level into the gardens is a grisly sight. The homes and businesses located here are stinking edifices with little to recommend them other than that no one owns them (who, after all, would want to?) and thus those who live here can do so without any other claim besides their desperation.
The district, such as it is, reeks of the half decaying flesh of a wound left open and without attention. Which is, essentially, what it is after all. The denizens here occasionally have to cut back the edges as they attempt to scab and heal over, but that’s okay. It does make excellent roofing material. And hey, it’s free.
The Dorsal Botanical Gardens: Unlike the Fleshgarden Slums, the Dorsal Botanical Gardens are actual gardens. Like the Slums however, they are deeply disturbing and rely on the flesh of the Leviathan to bring life. Located in a large oval around the back dorsal fin, the central location of the Gardens in the middle of the Spine but also accessible from other parts of the city by Tube make it a popular destination location.
The terraced gardens march in an elegant staircase both up the sides of the dorsal fin as well as diving down into the back of the Leviathan, creating a number of microcosms that allow for a truly dizzying array of flora to be grown under the careful eye (singular, she only has one of the eight she started with) of the Curator. A Shear Mite, the curator is one of the few denizens of the Leviathan remaining from the earliest days of Wake. Most believe she was here even before the Hidden Leaf. Only Cerbera knows for sure. No one is certain if she is sentient or not.
It seems rude to ask.
But she lovingly tends the gardens, finding homes for plants that are brought to her from far reaches of the galaxy. The terraces are expanded and crafted by her mandibles and the acid she produces, creating elegant but baffling patterns and designs that are difficult to follow for those with more euclidian expectations. Pathways follow the curves of the landscape, the walk spongy but solid. Switchbacking up to the very top of the dorsal fin, visitors to the Gardens can look out at the whole of Wake from one of the highest vantage points in the city, below only the Citadel.
Bursting with life, the strangest and rarest of plants from across the galaxy, it attracts visitors as these flowers might once have attracted pollinators on their own planets. With no such helpers here, the flowers bloom anyway- ultimately futile, withering before they can create seeds. But what better metaphor for the City of Wake?
Mind of the Leviathan: Far down from the main district through numerous catacombs, suburbia and winding veins lies the head of the space Leviathan and within its slumbering brain. The alchemists long since replaced the whale’s thinking facilities with more efficient means at the heart of the beast, but the brain remains. It is large enough that a regular sized human can walk through the many folds and other membranes without much issue.
In the past it used to be an amusement park of sorts. More inclined towards horror and the macabre. When the denizens of the Wake wanted to feel alive and their hearts racing, they’d explore the crevices of the brain. At least until people started to disappear. Once the count ran up and they were incapable of finding them?
The park closed down.
The longer it remained abandoned… the stranger the brain became. As if the long long slumber without anything to occupy its mind to demented it more. Nobody enters it anymore. Except for the Hidden Leaf herself.
The rest either disappear or return different.
Mad.
Speaking of strange shapes and shadows and horrors beyond their recognition.
- Nexus Name: City of Wake
- Nexus Alignment: Dark
- Location: Swimming in the Chiloon Rift
- Affiliation: The City of Wake
- Size: Medium - as a Medium Nexus, it cannot be destroyed as a whole- but if one were to destroy each loci, piece by piece, the Nexus, as well as the City itself, would perish.
- Accessibility: The City itself is difficult to find, difficult to reach as it is always on the move. Once there, the totality is easy to navigate (for those with the pluck and strong stomach necessary). The individual focal points that empower the Nexus are challenging to reach, but not to find. They are, after all, where the needs of biology dictate.
- Description: While the effects of the Nexus Loci cover the entirety of the city, it is the living, breathing organs of the space whale that are the heart (heh) of the Nexus. Located deep within the body of the beast, they work together to form the whole.
- Memories: The Memories of the City of Wake are held by the Nexus. Not just of the city itself but of everything that happens in the city. Those that leave the City of Wake do not carry the memories created there out with them, they are kept safely by the Nexus instead. While the memory of the existence of the city can remain, depending on a person’s nature of arrival and departure, they will not regain their memories of what occured in the City of Wake until they return, at which time they will remember everything. Some people may remember snippets, seen only in their dreams- dark and twisted, more nightmare than an ordering of a tired mind- vanishing once again with the morning’s light.
- Pulse: The pulse of the City runs deep. Those of a neutral or dark side alignment are more difficult to kill within the Nexus sphere of influence. Not more difficult to WOUND mind you- that remains the same. But those that receive wounds that ought to kill a normal sentient find themselves able to rise and hobble off to get attention and aid. Citizens of the City are used to this, and have a tendency to make well and CERTAIN a body is dead before they walk away from it. Always double check or you may come face to face with a ‘dead’ enemy next week with a new scar and a grudge.
- Vision: There is truth in Madness. This effect is what causes the various weirdnesses inherent to the City of Wake. It is a passive effect, uncontrollable and untappable. Unexpected things happen in the City- individuals, places and events that strain credulity, but are, nevertheless, very real. For those that find the Loci of Vision from the inside, through the Mind of the Leviathan, it is possible to look through the Loci from within…. There is truth in Madness, after all. But there is also sometimes simple insanity, and those who look directly through the Eyes of the Leviathan risk that in truth. Some experience it temporarily, while others succumb for far longer. Perhaps there is enlightenment in that madness. Perhaps not. It depends on the faculties and nature of the individual. Do they find Truth in their Madness? Or did the vision of Truth cause the Insanity? Each person is different.
POINTS OF INTEREST
- The Brain: Deep within the mad and terrifying landscape that is the Brain of the Leviathan, there is a place that few find and even fewer enter. Nearing the center there lies the Loci of Memories. This focal point of the Nexus produces the effect on its denizens memories. It keeps them safe, preserved, untrusted to outsiders- and everyone who does not currently stand in the City of Wake is an outsider as far as the slumbering mind is concerned. It is not a conscious act, but a subconscious reaction to retain what it can, the greed of a sleeping mind.
- The Heart: The center and power behind the City’s Tube mass transit system. This is the Loci of Pulse. Perhaps the continued heartbeat makes up for the slowing of those with grievous injuries, superseding the weakened heart of the damaged. It’s one theory anyway. The Heart can be reached through the Tubes, though not on purpose usually. The Transit system specifically avoids this area, and only during times of stress to the Leviathan itself are riders libal to end up here. You COULD attempt to trigger such a thing…. But why would you? The rapid beating of the heart is dangerous to Pills within it, and frequently those that find their way here are crushed by the pressure. At least, that is the assumption. No one alive has ever been willing to check.
- The Eyes: Milky white and blind, the eyes of the Leviathan are the Loci of Vision. Those who live in the City, permanent denizens, consider it simply a view into truth. Those who merely visit the city view it as Madness. Some people are only given a little spark of madness in their lives- here, apparently, is the balance that remains in the pool. The longer one remains in the City, the less strange it all seems. This is not an effect of the Nexus, this is simply the only method to cope with the continued presence of the strange. Easy to reach from the outside with a small ship or climbing gear, the pathway through the Mind of the Leviathan is much more difficult if one wished to reach it from within. Fortunately, few desire to.
SECURITY
Low. Most of the safety of the City of Wake is in the difficulty of finding and reaching it. The city has no official defensive force, though the individual denizens would certain rise to its defense in the case of attack. The Leviathan itself would also defend itself. One word: Tailflick. (Wake, that’s two words. That is EXACTLY what a non-whale would say, hrmph)
HISTORICAL INFORMATION
The City of Wake was created years ago, when Cerbera had only taken a few steps into the mantle of her former Masters.
It began as her solitary redoubt. A place to do studies, experiment and research in peace without the trappings of modern civilization holding her back. The fact that the leviathan around her was constantly on the move assisted with all of it remaining private. But as the years passed Cerbera began adding to the whale.
Wake, the Leviathan, was slowly being transformed under the watchful eyes of Cerbera. The Kilva Collective tinkering on the living creature. Making it more like them. Alive, but mechanical.
As more of the Leviathan became available for passage? Cerbera began inviting individuals. First for explorations, later for settlement.
There were always the odd and the rare and the outcasts in the Galaxy. People of power or ingenuity or curiousity. Those that wanted peace. From the endless wars and squabbles of the galactic nation-states. This is where the City of Wake helped them. Giving them a place where they could leave all of that behind.
The more time passed the more people joined.
They were attracted by the prospect. The reputation. The supply of curiosa that seemed to flow easily from the roving city.
This is what the City of Wake is today.
A mysterious place of the occult. Microcosm of creative madness. Where you can join, but when you leave? You forget all about it. Only leaving a fleeting memory of its existence. Just the hints that makes you curious once more.
Curious enough to seek it out again.
