Chapter Text
Prologue:
Imagine a Western country after economic and social collapse. Disease and violence and climate change have reshaped the people and the land. Old orders have failed the survivors and fallen by the wayside as their weaknesses have come to light.
Pair this with a secretive spiritual order who’ve masqueraded as a rock band since the 1960s but have been preparing for this time of collapse for centuries.
Add to the mixture the current and rapidly growing emphasis on alternative religions and new, sacred pathways. The NYT has even covered this recently so it must actually be happening.
Squeeze these into a landscape shaped from Western and Central Wisconsin and Mid-Eastern Minnesota.
Shake well.
A Deliberately Incomplete Cheat Sheet (please feel free to return to this as needed so all that typing was not in vain):
Gods/deities: too many to note, most not very important to the plot, except for you-know-who. No one knows why they woke up.
“Called for”: deities may lay claim on a person’s service or worship (kind of ‘I licked it so it’s mine’), the person can refuse them but usually doesn’t.
Magic:
-Small energy and/or short range/limited use = Gift. Bigger energy and/or longer/wider range = Talent.
-Known Gifts: Growers, various Healers, Truth Seers (Eyes), Water. It is not uncommon for a person to have more than one Gift but these are usually weak.
-Known Talents: Shields, Energy, Water, Growers
-Multi-talents: very, very rare individuals with more than one Talent
-Limits to the use of Talents: humans are not gods. The use of Talent is limited by (a) creativity and (b) available energy. Overusing energy results in exhausting burnout.
-“Sparking”: the first time someone realizes they have a Gift or a Talent
-Old-school types of magic users: sorcerers, mages, necromancers, magicians, etc. Usually in service to a deity.
Batteries: Talents can draw from energy that has been stored in silver if the silver touches their body. Only multi-talents (specifically Grower/Shield or Grower/Energy) can store energy in silver. Stored energy can be locked/keyed to specific Talents so that no one else can use it. Most of the energy to be stored is drawn from ley lines or similar sources. No one knows why any of this works.
Papa Emeritus Five/V’s current household as of start of Part 1:
- Five (the dude in charge, human, was an Army Ranger and an Army Chaplain, favorite color purple, Water Talent… you have seen the Skeletour posters, one assumes)
- Storm (ghoul)
- Haze (ghoulette)
- Mountain (ghoul)
- Mary (human, scavenger/looter, connected, busker)
- Zepar (human, Grower Gifted, kinda just hanging around)
- Ose (scientist, partnered with Amy, under-utilized)
- Amy (archivist, partnered with Ose, under-utilized)
- Bel (chef, dancer, Water Gifted, over-utilized)
- Alex (fashionista, hair stylist, Healer Gifted, never other than perfectly balanced)
Papa Emeritus 1/ One (Primo): fav color white, Grower Talent, married to a multi-Talent
Papa Emeritus 2/ Two (Secondo): fav color green, classic mage, a bruiser
Papa Emeritus 3/ Three (Terzo): fav color blue, Energy (not Shield) Talent, smarter than he acts
Papa Emeritus 4/ Four (Copia): fav color red, scholar/necromancer/classic mage, very shy
The Ledger: a localized barter system