Micro-elementals

If coterminous or external elemental planes don't appeal to you, here's another idea that takes them in a different direction than the standard view or my previous posts. If we take the classical view that the four elements are the fundamental consituents of all matter, then (as science fantasy has told us at least since Ray Cummings' The Girl in the Golden Atom in 1919) there may very well be worlds inside those tiny particles. Elemental worlds.

Like Microworld, yeah, except that unlike its organic chemistry model look, elemental microworlds look like the platonic solids just like Plato told us they would. 

Maybe the world is on the interior of these shapes or maybe on their strangely-angled surfaces. Either way, they would be pretty weird places. Of course, this also may mean that elementals are microscope--even atomic level things. An elemental summoning would actually be growing a fractional bit of element to macroscopic size. The fact that size creatures have (rudimentary) intelligence might suggest that these microplanes themselves are intelligent. The implications of that, I'll leave you to contemplate.

Brother to Dragons

by David Lewis Johnson

The kuath are a near baseline human people in the territory of the Vokun Empire. The kuath live at an essential neolithic level in coastal settlements. What is most interesting about them is the symbiotic relationship they have with marine invertebrate collective intelligences that the kuath know as Naga Ma--Dragon Mothers.

Vokun probes had suggested a primitive planet with little to offer beyond resources to be stripped away. When their attempts to move the small native population to reservations was resisted by humanoid monsters rising out of the seas, they realized their was something more going on. Destructive scanning of the brains of captive kuath revealed the existence of the Dragon Mothers.

Vokun submarine attacks proved unable to bring the Dragon Mothers to heel. Only the threat of mass driver bombardment finally effected their surrender. The terms of their capitulation was to be paid in slave warriors: bio-armored soldiers.

Appearance & Biology: The kuath are dark-skinned, typically dark-haired, humans with endosymbiotic projections of the Dragon Mothers. (Among other places, these appear to stimulate areas of the brain associated with religious awe.)

The Dragon Mothers themselves are self-organizing colonies (perhaps superorganisms) of single cellular organisms capable of differentiating into a variety of forms. Colonies may extend for kilometers. Their intelligence is vast, but their thought "slower" than humans', and alien. There are numerous "factories" within their mass where they experiment with independent drones and probes of various morphologies.

Place in the Empire: The kuath serve as shock troops for the vokun. The Dragon Mothers found adolescents were best both psychologically and neurologically for serving as soldiers in their armored suits. (The Dragon Mothers appear to care for the kuath deeply, if in an alien way, but do not conceptualize human life as much different than their other creations, except that human's are more independent and therefore interesting.) They reluctantly agreed to provide a quota of soldiers to the vokun to save their world and synthesized a mix of psychoative chemicals for the kuath, both to ensure they fulfilled their role and to minimize their physical and psychological suffering.

Stats: Kuath have ability scores in the human range. Their bio-armor is equivalent to assault armor, but can only be used as a vacuum suit for up to 2 hours, unless specially modified (in which case it increases to 6). The bio-armor requires a dip in a special nutrient bath for at least 2 hours out of every 24 to be at maximum efficiency.

Wednesday Comics: Whis'par

Here's the next installment of  Jim Starlin's Metamorphosis Odyssey. The earlier posts in the series can be found here.

"Whis'par (Metamorphosis Odyssey Chapter IV)"

Epic Illustrated #2 (Summer 1980) Story & Art by James Starlin

Synopsis: In an alien forest, Whis'par's father calls to her. As the winged one most in harmony with their world, she has been chosen to fulfill their race's destiny and serve their god --who now waits at their village.

Whis'par has doubts. She knows what is to come, as do all her people. Her father reassures her, then sends her off to her destiny. Alone, he asks the great spirit to be with her and to forgive them all.

The god of these folk is Aknaton, who waits with Za and Juliet. He tells the uncertain Whis'par that they are there to: "herald the end of galactic madness and the birth of something never before seen under the stars." Each of those he has gathered plays a part:

Coupled with his Aknaton's magic, such a creation would be able to stop the Zygoteans. Whis'par wonders at the cost, and Aknaton realizes she knows his plan. He suggests that to do nothing would be worse.

Za wants to know what they're talking about. Aknaton responds:

Whis'par will join them. She has no choice, really.

Aknaton says he will take them to an out of the way planet to hide from the Zygoteans. He has to go find a man on Vega. Whis'par says she though they were to be a trio. Aknaton replies: "A trio that will need protection."

Things to Notice:

• The story shifts into color when Whis'par meets her creator.

Commentary: 
While we've seen several hints as to the lengths Aknaton will go to to end the Zygotean menace, this is the first hint we have that there may be something frightening about his plan. The reaction of Whis'par and his people certainly suggest it.

As far as executing his plan, Aknaton seems to be stacking the deck in favor of its acceptance in building his "coalition of the willing." He has two beings that almost worship him as a god and an adolescent he rescued from certain death.

Serpent in Paradise

The official vokun assessment of Yantra was that it had little to offer the Empire. It's natives were primitive (at best they had mastered iron) and demonstrated a pervasive culture of nonviolence so ingrained that they were insuitable for military conscription. The ibglibdishpan analysts verified that there had once by an advanced civilization on Yantra: the environment had been finely tuned, nanotechnology (though dormant) still permeated the biosphere, and seemingly primitive stone structures (shrines, mostly, for the superstitious Yantrans) actually showed complex femto-level engineering.

Obviously, the primitives had no knowledge of these technologies, and there was no indication they ever did. The vokun are an incurious species. They assumed some great pre-Collapse civilization had left its mark and moved on. Yantra was only usefully as a pleasure world; it's mostly tropical clime and pliant, simpleminded, and exotically attractive populace provided an ideal place of relaxation for vokun nobility.

The ibglibdishpan were vexed by the anomalies. It only took a few in the continuing series of seemingly random network and equipment failures that have plagued the Imperial conquest of Yantra for them to deduce the truth. They were not at all surprised when vokun junior officers began to disappear or have unusal accidents--never frequently enough to arouse suspicion on the part of the vokun, but a detectable statistical signal, nonetheless. For reasons known only to them, the ibglibdishpan have kept their conclusions to themselves.

Noah

Afronosky's Noah resembles the Biblical account of his life and exploits in a roughly analogous manner to how the original Clash of the Titans resemble the story of Perseus--and it's all the more gameable for it.

Like the Biblical narrative, the film takes place in a mythic Antediluvian past, though the film's is decidedly post-apocalyptic with barren landscapes thanks to rapaciousness of the descendants of Cain. All in that roughly made yet unusually modern-looking clothing seen in post-Apocalypse's from the Planet of the Apes TV show to Waterworld. Noah and his fellow descendants of Seth have been hunted and killed by bands of the more technologically advanced tribes of Cain. Noah is the last survivor, trust trying to hideout with his wife and kids, living a low-impact, vegetarian lifestyle.

Then the Creator decides he's had enough. He starts sending Noah prophetic dreams (Noah's gets a bit of help in interpreting these after (possibly) being slipped an entheogenic brew by his grand-dad, Methuselah). There's going be a world-killing flood, and he's got to build a boat.

Noah gets some help from the Watchers, imprisoned in giant, rocky forms, and a the last seed from the Garden of Eden, which grows an instant forest for lumber. Then the odd, not-quite-the-animals-we-know, start showing up in droves.

All does not go smooth though, as hordes of human refugees under the command of the warrior-king, Tubal-cain show up to try and storm the ark, and Noah's wifeless son begins to have second thoughts about this "only family left on earth" thing.

I won't spoil the ending, but I suspect you know how it turns out.

While a lot of this film is devoted to the sort of drama than Afronosky is typically known for, a lot of the elements the film adds to the tale seem like the sort of thing Jack Kirby would have done, even if they're not wrapped in typical Kirby presentation: fiery angels trapped in misshapen rock bodies, a post-Apocalyptic prehistory, zohar stones that provide light and fire.

If it's more your thing, there's also a graphic novel version.

First Strange Stars Art

As I've mentioned in comments, but I don't think I've explicitly said in a post, I'm putting together a book on my Strange Stars setting. This is the first (mostly) completed piece of artwork for it by the talented Waclaw Wysocki: This is Stella Starlight, captain of the Motherless Child, just one of many starship captains operating in the galaxy.

More to come.

Apotheosis Quest

Some adventurers are content to be earthly rulers, basking in the rewards of their past glories. But some yearn for a further challenge and the greatest of all rewards.

Like concentric spheres, the higher planes surround the Prime Material. Beyond them all is the Empyrean, where dwells the Increate Source. This supernal presence is said to bestow godhood on those who reach it.

Getting there is the hard part. The paths are hidden in the lower astral, where there are monsters, godlings, devils, and beings on the same quest to get in the way.

Andrew Ross MacLean

Beyond the astral are the ascending levels of the Outer Planes, iconic realms ruled by (or perhaps manifesting) gods. Each is a challenge, perhaps designed to cause seekers to falter and fail, and possibly even be cast into the Abyss for their audacity.

All of reality is a mega-dungeon that goes up.