The nights grow a little bit shorter now. The winds blow a little less bitter. The arctic air threatening to slowly freeze your guts with every breath becomes a little less dry, a little less biting. It always starts so slow, with only these small changes, but day by day Revival comes. Scavengers emerge from their shelters, their winter hoards depleted, and begin to find more scrap buried in the slowly-thawing ground. The last spiteful snows bring a promise of future rain. (A promise and perhaps a threat – a snowflake caught on the tongue carries a faint but unpleasant tang….) Food is found again – the fungi and mold take root once more; the greedy Buzzards no longer consume every last shred of dead Sandworms or Sand Hippos. With a little more food and less need to hoard, will trade pick up, or will people be more able to meet their own needs? Will we find new things hidden in the sands? Who or what will come and go as the cold months fade away? Only time will tell.
THIS WEEK IN THE WASTES:
WEDNESDAY
Guerilla Learning @ TBA 4:00-5:00 SLT
Thematic documentaries and post-apocalyptic television, at a different spontaneous location every week.
This week: The Colony, followed by two episodes of Thundarr, The Barbarian.
DJ Diamanda Gustafson @ BAR! ~7:30 SLT
Early music, folk, metal, folk metal, and random.
FRIDAY
Squeekertag @ Pipsqueek Hall, Cape of Ruin 2:oo pm SLT
Tag-team Wastelands combat for fun and prizes.
SATURDAY
Fight Night @ The Arena at the Old Potato Farm, Hambone Slash 3:oo – 4:00 pm SLT
One-on-one combat in a brutal, trap-filled combat arena. Occasional guest DJs!
Fight Night Afterparty @ Harvey’s Bar, Cape of Ruin 4:00 – ??? pm SLT
Texas Hold-‘Em poker for Rare scrap, along with unique drinks, dances, and DJs.
Apo’s Audio Atrocities @ TBA 5:oo – ??? pm SLT
Mashups, bizarre covers, retro, silliness, and whatever sounds like fun at the time.
This week: a St. Patrick’s Day theme of Irish music and alcohol!
SUNDAY
Pathfinder: Curse of the Crimson Throne @ Hambone Slash 10:00 am – 2:00 pm SLT
A high-fantasy tabletop role-playing game related to Dungeons & Dragons. Spectators welcome!
MONDAY
DJ Giuseppe Spicoli @ The Boat House, Burnt Oak 6:00-7ish SLT
Audio collage, bastard pop, obscurities, oddities, and old-school vinyl.
Movie Night @ Burnt Oak Drive-In, Burnt Oak 7:30 SLT
Absurd comedies, so-bad-it’s-good relics of the 80s, occasional documentaries, and things un-categorizable.
EVENTS HIGHLIGHTS:
Barkeeper’s Brawl (3/10):
On the shores of the Cape of Ruin, Wastelanders danced inside the Great Hall of the Pipsqueeks, home to Scouts Pack 108, for a grand party celebrating Harvey Jillybean’s birthday. Jordy Parkin, leader of the Squeeks, hosted the event for his good friend and gathered the talent providing musical entertainment for the occasion. DJ Madam Terror, the Circus Mistress..aka Azkadellia Triellis, spun a web of riotous music for the first hour while the second hour was reserved for Antonio Galloway, a professional live singer who serenaded the gathering with classics from the 50’s and 60’s…from Sinatra to Elvis.
Movie Night Haiku:
2/27 – Exterminator City (2005)
Robot cops track down
God-crazed killbot who’s slaying
Buxom braless broads.
3/5 – Titanic: The Legend Goes On (2000)
So long and so bad
Why does this even exist?
Two words: Party Time.
3/5 – Tribulation 99: Alien Anomalies Under America
Video collage
Of bizarre conspiracies
Like Android Castro.
3/12 – Bloody Birthday (1981)
Conscienceless children
Born during solar eclipse
Spree-kill in small town.
Guerilla Learning:
Held near the docks in Malady Bog, this week’s documentary was Tesla: Master of Lightning. A PBS special, it profiled the life and legacy of the visionary Serbian inventor who developed alternating current, radio, neon lighting, and x-rays — and whose investigations into wireless power and death rays still sound like the stuff of science fiction.
The Wastelands Table-Top Gaming Horde Sessions:
Korvosa has all the uneasy peace of the air before a thunderstorm. No riots, no fires, but a martial law that seems to keep most people indoors. It’s also spawned a literally-underground rebellion. However, a self-styled “hero of the people” is around, claiming to be the shadowy populist Blackjack — and trying to quash the rebellion. Clearly, someone in the castle is trying to manipulate public sentiment against the rebels. Iagul, the rogue of the party, IS Blackjack, however — and does not look kindly on this impostor. The party set forth to find and dispatch him, but on the way ran into the Grey Maidens, vicious enforcers of the Queen, and a three-faced magician named who was more than he appeared….
ESTATE NEWS:
The new salvage spawn dynamics allow crates to appear in the water – including the deep waters of the Cape. Since swimming is underwater flying, and breaks the HUD, and since the use of vehicles while scavenging is still not permitted, these crates have been inaccessible. To fix that, Neo is working on a ferry system, with a boatman who will be able to take scavengers out on the deep water in pursuit of scrap. How this will work, exactly — whether the boat will be guided by the user, whether the ferry boatman will be able to identify and aim for the crates, or whether he’ll follow a set course — is still unknown.
Sandusky Kayvon has recently erected small shelters around the exposed Healing Machines in Fort Stygian and Hambone Slash, to help protect users from distant snipers — and against the precipitation. Just as with the Salvage Machines, combat is not permitted around the Healing Machines. Do not start fights there, and do not take fights there. The machines are not “SAFE” bases for retreating fighters hoping to escape a fight. No matter whether you’re nearby or not, attack nobody near there. Or else: Bad Things.
The Mutant Witch ((Ccindy Pfeffer)), like most Mutants, has a hunger for stories that’s matched only by her hunger for the faces of her enemies. Therefore, she’s created a new monthly storytelling contest on the Wastelands Forum called Savage Tales. Open to all comers, Savage Tales is a way for Wastelanders to tell whatever strange stories their ancestors passed down — or to make up something clever on the spot. Each moon’s winner earns a prize! The first story prompt was to tell why there is day and night, which Apo won with a tale of the Sun Sisters. For the second prompt — tales of the oldest being — Bartleby Ricantaur won with a story of the Stone Mother. For anyone who’d like to test their tale-telling mettle, this moon’s prompt is to for a story about a Ghoul and a Sandworm. If participation remains low, though, this threatens to be the last contest, so step up!
RP NAME-DROPS: The strange saga of the Key and the Courier continues. All Wastelanders are advised to keep watch for any man calling himself Ozgram. There’s been no description of him yet, though others have referred to a mysterious man in black who seemed to be looking for the Digger. Perhaps Ozgram and the man in black are one and the same. This man’s intents are unknown, his alliances unclear. But he seems the dangerous sort who doesn’t take his personal business into his own hands, and will manipulate others into doing his dirty work — work which has included at least two murders. So keep your eyes and ears open for shady Outlanders, and if someone tries to give you a job, make sure you know who they are and who they’re working for — no matter how sweet the deal may seem. Common sense, aye, but there’s times it’s even more dangerous to be complacent.
((EDITOR’S NOTE: If anyone has any photographs of the characters involved in this RP storyline, please drop them on Sandusky Kayvon or email them to [email protected]. Additional information can be read here regarding my request. – S.K.))