Day 4

After a quickly cooked dinner of beef chunks over boiled noodles, Demus had gone outside to visit the little closet with the crescent moon on its door, cleaned up, and back in to warm up and go to bed. He was asleep almost before he finished lying down. It had been a busy day.

He became aware of a golden glimmmering, and then he was standing, dressed, in a large room. The floor was black and somewhat "spongey".

...'What's "spongey"? How do I know it's "spongey"?'

---'It means "like a sponge".'

...'What's a ' sponge'.'

---'It means 'kind-of soft, but not diggable'. System-note: Adjust description- vocabulary to fit NPC education.'

...'What's a "system-note".'

---'Don't worry about it.'

Jellica appeared before him, clad in leather trous and tunic.

μ¥μ 'Don't wake up all the way! I'm sending you this dream to teach you how to use the clockwork wagon, and what to do in Far-Gone.'

...'This is a dream?'

μ¥μ 'Yes.' She gestured and a large empty wagon made of dark wood appeared. Suddenly she and Demus were standing on it.

μ¥μ 'This is the seat. If you aren't sitting on it, the wagon won't move. This 'bar of wood' is called a "joy stick". I don't know why, it doesn't directly make you happy. But it has 5 notches. It's in the second notch now, "neutral", which means not trying to go anywhere. The first notch makes the wagon go slowly backward. The third notch is slowly foreward. The fourth notch is horse-galloping foreward. The fifth notch is as fast as it can go. On the front of the top of the joy-stick is this switch, with another five notches. In the middle is straight. First to the right is 'soft right', second to the right is 'hard right'. First to the left is 'soft left', second is 'hard left'. If you're going backwards, only the soft notches will work, and the right one will make the back of the wagon go to the left, while the left one will make it go to the right. Understand?'

...'I think so.'

μ¥μ 'While seated, this foot-stick is called the "breaks". I don't know why, it never breaks anything. It makes the wagon slow down. The harder you step on it the faster the wagon will slow.

μ¥μ 'Okay. When you want to get started, sit down on the seat, and put this tube-key onto the joy-stick, and pull the right side toward you. Keep turning it as it clicks until you hear a "ding!" and it won't turn anymore. You'll have to do that at least once a day. Then put the tube-key in your pouch. Are you ready?'

..."Sure!", 'It's just a dream, right?'

---'I guess so.'

She disappeared. Demus stepped down, sat down, and used the key as she had taught him. Looking around, he didn't see any walls or obstacles, so he put the joy-stick into the third notch. The wagon started rolling forward at about the speed of a walking man. After a few minutes, Demus got bored, so he moved it to the fourth notch and it started going quite fast. Suddenly there were horses galloping along both sides, and riders yelling "Stand and Deliver!", but after about ten minutes their horses slowed down and the wagon kept going. Then a road appeared under the wagon's wheels, and it wasn't completely straight. At first Demus didn't care, but then the sides of the road were a bit higher than the road, so when he didn't steer, the quickly-moving wagon went harshly bumpity-bump, rough, rough, bumpity-bump, smooth, smooth, smooth, bumpity-bump, rough... Over and over again. It wasn't much fun. So he began using the switch on top. Soft turns at that speed made quick, 20 degree turns, and the wheels away from the direction of turn would lift off the ground for a moment or two. Sometimes when going over the bumps anyway, the movement made Demus move the switch more. After trying to stay on the road with a soft right, the bumping made Demus move the switch into a hard right, and suddenly Demus was flying. He hit the 'kinda soft' ground and rolled. Looking up, he counted all of his hurt spots until he could think straight.

---'Many of those hurts would be broken bones if the ground was hard. I don't want to do that again.' He stood up, and walked back to where the wagon was frozen in the air, tilted halfway over. He reached up to touch it, but it wouldn't move. Carefully he climbed onto it, and up toward the seat. Slowly, leaning far left, he eased onto the seat, and the wagon stopped rolling, stopped moving foreward, and just landed back on its wheels with a tremendous thump. Demus was almost thrown off to the left.

Demus put the joy-stick into the first notch to get back on the road. He had to twist his body around to look backward while using the joy-stick in front of him and keep sitting on the seat. Then, he used the switch with his thumb, but had to remember that switch-right made the wagon go left.

After a while, he was back on the road. Third notch, moving and happy to be bored, Demus noticed that the turns started getting sharper, and the road started going up and then down these little hills. All of that took some concentration to stay on the road. Uphill was fine, but downhill went faster than a walk, so if there was a turn at the bottom, Demus had to use the breaks or maybe the wagon would roll again. As he got used to that, the hill the wagon was going up got longer, there was a sharp left turn at the top, so Demus stopped. Hard left turn when stopped actually lifted the wagon off the ground about a foot, and it spun, then set down facing left. The road went sharply down, with a cliff-face going up along the left side, and a cliff-top at the right. Of course it wasn't straight. Not only were there niggles and noggles along the way, but at about 300' there was a right-hard "hair-pin" turn into a switchback. Demus started down at notch three, but within 50' the wagon was going almost as fast as notch four.

This began a series of experiences where Demus would do some wrong combination of things, everything would go black and he'd be at the beginning again. After the eighth time through, he made it around the first hairpin-turn. And beside the road there was a sign:

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

....."Good job! Zorian says 'Hello!' "

...'Who the Buff is 'Zorian'?'

---'Nevermind! Bad joke.' There were several more switchbacks. Demus had learned to stop the wagon about every twenty feet, breathe a few times and then third notch forward again. At the bottom, after a sharp right turn, there was a straight section, then a three-way fork. He went left, the road-sides gradually came up to about four feet, and he came to a dead-end. No way to turn around, so he had to go backward for about 250 feet. Then he went right. Suddenly he was in a town, the road was cobblestones, and even at 'slow', everything was bumpy and jerky.

Jellica appeared before him, pointing left. That happened several times, and he followed the direction, until she had him stop in front of a wooden dock, and then back up to it. When he did and stopped, several guys started loading the wagon.

Things got hazy and faded away.

Demus woke up and stretched in bed. He'd slept well, but he felt mind-tired. Then he remembered the dream.

... 'Oh dung!'

   Demus got up, did his stretches, the few Qi Dance moves he knew, and got dressed. The once resplendent Traveller's garb was looking dirty and worn. While he was frying up a quick breakfast, Jellica sailed in through an interior wall.

μ¥μ "Oh my! That won't do at all! First off..." She gestured and a shower of lime sparks enveloped Demus. When they faded away he was clean, down to the skin under his chestnuts! And his garb was clean as well!

..."Wow!! Thank you!"

μ¥μ "Think nothing of it. Can't have you traipsing about in our clockwork wagon dressed as a beggar! Or a wandering con-man. So! On the table you will find the tube-key, a pouch of 20 coppers, and leaning against the table is a backpack with hammock, pegs, hammer, sleeping sack, six pemmican pouchettes, and two waterskins. Sleep under the wagon at night, and make sure that's just off the road. Three days there, three back, buy fresh food for yourself in town. Just go where I showed you in the dream, and they' ll load you up and get payment from my Lord. The wagon will fall apart if you take it farther than 5 days' travel away. Understand?"

..."Yes! Thank you!"

Demus put on the backpack, heavy when he picked it up but all the weight faded away when the straps settled onto his shoulders. He picked up the key and the pouch, and followed Jellica out to an exit he'd never found before. She showed him how to open the big outer door, and disappeared. He opened the door, letting the cold morning light stream in, climbed up on the clockwork wagon, and sat on the seat. He put the backpack down behind the seat, and stashed the pouch of coppers in it. Then took a deep breath.

...'My first wagon-ride! And I'm driving!! No mules, can't be a "mule-skinner", haha! Whew!! Why am I so excited and happy?'

---'It's my first wagon-ride. Also, powerful people trust me, give me a nice place to stay safe, and loan me magifacts as well as let me learn very effective things, and have access to a wonderful garden and magnificent lab!! What's not to like? It' s a wonderful, magnificent life!! I did an excellent job manifesting this life, aren't fairies amazing? I should breathe deeply for a little while, use the key, and get going. When things are going well, I should revisit these feelings and do blisswork.'

Demus inhaled deeply, feeling that if he smiled any wider, he would crack his head open. After six breaths that faded into a calmer but 'wider' joy. He put the key on the stick and turned it. Clackety- clackety- clackety- clackety- clackety- clackety! Clack! -ity -clack! -ity -clack! -ity -clack! -ity -clack! -i -ty Clack!! -i -ty Clack!! -i -ty Clack!!! --i ---ty -----Clack!!! ---------i, DING!!!! and he couldn't turn it any more. Now he felt a vibration in the seat. He took the key off the stick, into the backpack, secured the backpack, took a deep breathe, and eased the stick into the third notch. The wagon rolled foreward, and as he left through the big door, it closed on its own. He rolled onto the road, and gradually turned right, facing away from the village where he had been born and spent most of his life. At first the road turned a bit every hundred feet and was going up a bit, so Demus kept it at third notch. Then it got straight but went up a bit more. The wagon came to a flat section, with a wide turn left, and then started down. The down slope was sharper than the up slope had been, and the road went 200' straight down slope, flat into a wide right turn, 190' straight down slope, flat into a wide left turn. It continued on like that until 50' straight down slope, flat into half of a wide right turn, and pretty flat and straight. Demus could see miles ahead of him, the road becoming a thin line that would go up and over a hill, and much farther away, up a taller, blue- ish hill. He continued in third notch for a while, got comfortable, and put it in fourth. Things got bumpier, but soon settled into a rhythm.

Demus breathed deeply, smelling something wild, green, and spicey in the morning air.

--- 'High desert sage. Nice touch!'

Demus looked at his feelings again, he'd never felt better in his entire life!!!

...'Life is so good!!! I love life hugely much!!! I thank life!!' Thinking and feeling these things lead easily into blisswork, but this time Demus didn't have to 'work at' any feelings! It all felt much deeper and stronger. The wagon rattled starting up the hill in fourth, and shook Demus out of his blisswork trance.

...'It's afternoon! Wow, I'm thirsty! Like I hiked for an hour or something!!'

---'I should put the stick in third, drink from a water skin, and look for a spot to stop, stretch, piss, and maybe have a snack.'

So Demus slowed the wagon, and at the short flat on top of the hill, he stopped. It was a bit difficult to get off the seat for a moment, but then Demus got down, stretched his legs and upper back, found a sage brush off the side of the road, and pissed on it. For a while. Back at the wagon, he was even thirstier. He squirted cool water into his mouth and then on his face. He rinsed his hands. That all took half a waterskin. Looking in the backpack, Demus took out one of the pouchettes. Inside was a two fist-sized amount of a dark brown, pebbley, damp substance, and three palm-sized sections of pinkish-grey leather. He picked one of those up.

...'What in the world?'

---'That's a dried peach slice! Tear off a bit and suck on it.' It was very dry, almost salty, but then the flavor blossomed in his mouth as it sucked up his saliva.

...'So tastey!'

---'Hunger is the best sauce! Do I need to dung?'

...'Nope.'

---'Get back on the wagon, then!'

Demus climbed back on the wagon, and this time it was a bit difficult to finish sitting down for a moment.

---'Hmp. Magic safety belt?'

...'What?'

---'Nevermind!' He put the stick in third and they were rolling again!! Straight-ish down slope for half an hour, then flat-ish again. Demus alternated musing about how amazing life was, and noticing that the Sun was in a different position and it was a long ways back to that hill.

As they neared the bottom of the taller hill, which wasn't blue at all, the Sun was within two handspans of the far mountains.

---'I should slow, find a flat spot off the road, turn onto it, stop, and set up for the night.

...'Good idea!!!'