You were testing out a new video machine at the local Radio Shack when there was a power surge.  Things went dark, emergency lights tripped on in the mall, girls screamed, and the lights went on too bright.  Lightning leapt from the console in front of you, and flung you...

You don't remember what happened after that.

You feel sand under your face, and a steady pulse-pulse of water hitting your calves.  Your feet are soaked.

PT

"What happened?" muttered Paul as he got up and started walking inland, "I should have been fried or killed. Even wierder, that was the first time in my life I've visited an arcade. Why'd I visit?" He began looking at his surroundings to get some bearings and at the position of the sun to see which way is East and which is West.

As your mind clears, you remember it was an electronic store, a Radio Shack.  You'd been sent to buy a piece of gear, and gotten sidetracked by looking at a game running on a PC.

You're on a narrow beach with thick jungle starting but ten feet from your nose.  And your nose can smell the rich rot, the blown sand, and the the scent of what is thought to be the sea.

The sun is low in the sky to your right, down the beach.  It feels like morning, although it is warm and humid.

PT

"Official, when I get back to civilisation, if there is any, I'm going to buy rubber gloves and always wear them when I'm in an electronic store," muttered Raul to himself, "I'm on the south coast of somewhere I can presume is a relatively uninhabited island, since this prime stretch of beach is completely uninhabited. So there are probably very few people living here. I'll try going North first." Using the sun as my guide (Rises in east, sets in west. You can figure out all directions with that) I begin to head North, keeping an eye out for signs of civilisation.

You hike into the jungle. At first, it is very dim among the fronds and giant ferns.  Soon, your eyes adjust so that you can see the six inch long ants, the slithering yellow-striped snake dripping from a spine covered vine, and the hand-sized cloven footprint in the mud of a creek bank.

You pass over the creek, and continue up a gentle slope that suddenly reverses itself. A mile after you've begun, you face a thinner stretch of sand, and a vast ocean.

PT

"So the area isn't very wide North-South, I may be on a deserted island, this is just great," said Raul as he looked around, "Better get my exact bearings. Time for a walk around the beach." Raul began to walk around the island circularly, seeing how long it is in circumference.

You walk along the beach, sweat dripping from your forehead.  Starfish, clams, and dying jellyfish block your path until you leap over them.  A porpoise leaps out of the water, and arcs back home.

You feel...nothing, no presence of man, or anything.

So it is with some relief that you turn a corner, and in a cove underneath a low volcano you see a frond hut.

A dark skinned man is sitting out front of the hut, and he is tending a campfire.  The palm tree above him diffuses the minor smoke so that nothing is visible above the tree tops.

He's a good hundred feet away, and you're having a hard time making out more detail, but he does seem to have a rifle.

PT

"Hello there!" called Raul to the man, he held his hands up to show he wasn't armed, "Do you know where we are?"

The man raises his head slowly, closes his eyes for a second, and then nods as if he had confirmed something that he expected.

"Come join my fire, stranger."

He waits until you get closer.  He's dressed in blue jeans, and a brown khaki shirt.  His hair is straight and dark.

"My name is Whispering Winds.  I do not know where we are, but the Sorceress says this is the only island in this hemisphere."

He motions toward the fire where a wrought iron skillet sizzles.

"Rabbit? Beans? A spicy local tuber?"

PT

"Some tuber if you don't mind, I'm Raul" said Raul as he sat down, "So who is this sorceress person? And what is going on here exatly, I don't know how I got here and would like to figure out how."

He pulls a plate out from a K2 brand backpack.  More precisely, he pulls out a tube of plastic, taps it with his finger, and it unrolls to form a plate.  He scoops hot tuber onto it, and puts alongside it a slice of white cheese, and a packet of black pepper.

The long, slender tuber is very hot, sticky, and tastes like something between a mild horseraddish and a potato. You can feel a burn up into your nose as you bite into it.

"You are a worldwalker. The Thunderbird chose you.  Now you die a thousand times, but never really die. You truly do not know this?"

He waves at your food.

"Eat."

He gets himself some.

"The Sorceress is a great magician. She has many powerful spells, and a good heart.  She pulled me from my world just before I was about to be lynched. She helped kill many wicked things, but she does not like to do it. I do not mind killing wicked things."

The last is accompanied by a sharp glance just to make sure you got the message.

"Okay, I'm not going to do anything. You know, I really have no idea what you're talking about, I was at radioshack and something went wrong and I got..." said Raul as he made the connections, "We move when we die don't we. I bloody died! Oh god that can't be good. Well, thanks for the food. Magic exists on some worlds. Thats something, so is there anything I should know as I travel around?"

"Our power, the scriff, is in our blood so be careful of spilling your own blood. In some worlds, the spirits speak, and in others they are distant, and in others they are very, very quiet, and we can only hear them deep in our hearts. In other worlds, this is like that with crafting skills as well."

He pauses.

"The Sorceress spoke of something similar to your story. I have heard others speak likewise. So, you are but a fledgling bird. Be wary, Little Bird, for the Multiverse is vaster than you can conceive, and there are many traps for the unwary.  Be bold, Little Bird, because you are truly immortal. You will not age, and when you die, you travel to another world for the spirits have chosen  you for some great work."

He thinks for a moment.

"Take this."  He hands you a knife with a scabbard decorated with bead work in the shape of an eagle. "The knife is man's first good tool that can be used to do everything a man needs.  That, and fire is what you need. If you like, I can teach you how to hunt later. Once you know how to fight, how to hunt, and how to cook, you will be well prepared for the Great Journey."

A woman with long, brown hair sticks her head out of the hut.

"A little magic wouldn't hurt either."  She has a rolling southern accent. "Do you know how to program in Charioteer?"

PT

"Nope, no idea, sorry. Magic sounds good, as well as learning some survival skills," said Raul, "Besides the fact that we travel between worlds fater we die and don't stay dead is their anything I should know? You mentiond dangers? What kind?"

The Sorceress and Whispering Winds both look at each other, and then slowly Winds turns back to you.

"What are you afraid of?  Because it, and a dozen things you've never thought of are out there."

The Sorceress nods.

"I've killed a vampire and a werewolf, helped slay an evil god. Crossed swords with a samurai, and gotten into it with gunfighers."  She smiles. "I can prepare an area for magic while Winds here takes you on a quest..."

Winds stands up.

"Indeed. A quest for roast pork. Have you ever hunted with a spear?"

PT

"No, but I've used a gn two to three times for hunting, and I'm a decent shot at least," said Raul, "Well, I'll at least try not to get myself killed while hunting. And I hope that I don't run into giant spiders. I could deal with a lot of stuff but not giant spiders."

"We do have a rifle, and Colt six-shooter, but for wild boar, a spear is better.  besides, we like to save ammo.  You never know what your next world is going to have."

He tosses you a boar spear that looks freshly made.  He takes one himself.  They are both over ten feet tall.

As you walk up the beach with Winds he smiles at you.

"Key thing to remember. Boar hate you.  His dying wish is to rip your throat out.  Boar is mean.  Not as mean as wolverine or Ptchak's Monster, but plenty mean.  Stand your ground, plant the spear butt in the dirt, and let him kill himself if you can."

PT

"I'll try to remember, and I'll remember not to get myself killed," said Raul grabbing onto the spear and following Wind, "What's a Ptchaks monster?"

"The Sorceress described them as 'giant rats on speed'.  Their meat is poisonous, they move like lightning, and they don't die until you cut their spinal cord.  They don't know how to run away, except from another of their kind. They come in waves, killing everything in a line half a mile wide, and up to ten miles long, or until their heart explodes.  But they drop off lots of little 'clams' to breed the next generation."

Whispering Winds replies.  He doesn't seem to be pulling your leg.

"You hunt them from small towers with long spears."

PT

"That would be a very short trip for me methinks," said Raul following, "Low tech world then? How common are the boars by the way? And do they move in groups? And would it be odd for someone to move al the way across the island without noticing any of them?"
OOC: I get thrown there next don't I?

"I think there is only one pack on the island, and as noisy as you are, it is not surprising that you missed them."

He shows you a bit about walking quietly.

And then you spot a large, black, hairy pig near the easternmost tip of the island.

"I will be the concealed striker.  You circle around, and drive them toward me."  he flashes you a nervous grin.

PT

"Right," said Raul begining to circle around. He tried his best to drive them towards Whispering Winds and keep them away from him.

You circle around, breaking a couple sticks in your roundabout travel under the palm trees and the pines.  Reaching the beach, you look north, and see the pigs drinking from the ocean.

With a yell, and a clang of your spear against a tree, you play the part of a beater.  They startle, and run towards Winds.

All but one.  A young male, perhaps two hundred pounds, turns toward you with curiousity in his eyes.  He looks like he is measuring you.

You can see the thoughts beginning to congeal in his mind.

PT

"Oh, this isn't going to end well," said Raul pointing his spear forward at the boar, he'd sidestep it when it came close if it didn't impale itself and try to impale it then, he was more conerned with getting this thing away from him than killing it.

You jab toward it, and it bolts.

Weak with relief, you hear a THUNK from down the beach, and force yourself onward.  You arrive in time to put the coup de grace to a two-fifty pound porker that was climbing up Winds spear, and snapping at him with its mouth as Winds danced out of the way.

Shortly thereafter, Winds is showing you how to gut, skin, and slow cook a very large pig. You get the idea of butchering after your second try, but you can't seem to hold the knife right to do a proper skinning.

"It would be nice if we had pineapples, could make a good bbq sauce."  The Sorceress says as she comes up from the pentagram she's drawn in the beach sand about fifty feet away in order for her to examine the product of the hunt.

"Whats a pineapple?" Winds replies.

OOC: Spearfighting 1@1, Large animal butchering 1@1.  You failed on your Skinning roll to learn that skill.

"Fruit, it grows on the world I lived on, tropical," said Raul, "Has a hard shell but the inside is edible. Also makes a quite good tool for throwing at people if you want to make it appear like an accident. but that's quite irrelevant."

Winds burst out laughing, and the Sorceress snickers.  After they stop, she waves you over.

"It will be most of the day before the pig is done. Now, let me teach you magic. First," She walks beside you down the beach to a triple stranded circle, embedded with a dozen Greek letters in its curve. "Do you believe in the existence of things not seen. God, love, the spirits, the Powers Above...If you don't, then you can't work magic because magic is based on faith. If, as Yoda denied..we are just crude matter...well crude matter cannot do magic because magic doesn't exist to it. I am a Christian and have done miracles. I've also been trained in, and experimented with Magery. This is the use of visualization, physical icons representing the forces, verbal and written symbols representing the forces I am trying to manipulate.  There are other ways to do magic, and indeed Whispering Winds is a Shaman of his people, and a follower of the Thunderbird, and he holds respect for the Creator and His Son. But, I've got a gift from a Greek goddess, and served as her Champion.  And I've heard of a great variety of other magic, even if I've never learned them. But, in a way, this brings me to my second point."

She turns, brushes her long, brunette hair from her face, and regards you seriously.

"I cannot teach the Greater Magics to someone who is not committed to...shall we be vague, and say The Light. I don't want to give magic to someone committed only to themselves or to Evil. Regardless, I will teach you the basic magics I know, as I would not send anyone out without some magic, but before I teach you how to make war, I will need your Oath."

She smiles gently.

"Now, follow me..." She begins to teach you how to light a campfire by sympathetic magic, and visualization.

PT

"Yes, most definitely. Stuff like this doesn't happen as a freak of nature. Somethings behind it. I've been raised to believe in god and I still do," said Raul as he followed, "Considering I don't know what the light is I don't think I can eb considered part of it. Are we assuming good?"

"You've answered my question. Both of them. I meant the Light as the most vague, and general sense of Good. I don't have a problem teaching a Pagan my Magery, its only those who want to use Magery to destroy with no good cause that I would not teach."

She bends down.

"Gather some firewood, and place it in the middle of the circle as for a campfire."

Later, she shows you some straws.

"As above, so below. These represent the ones in the protected circle. Speak these words...she speaks a long string of tongue-garbling sounds...and hold your hands to the straw as if it were a fire you warm yourself at.  Meanwhile, visualize, as clearly as you can...a crackling campfire in your mind.  don't be afraid, you can do this, and I've made the circle to help you."

Indeed you find your mind falling into concentration with extraordinary ease...

PT