From: richk@tekeda.PEN.TEK.COM (Richard C Kurschner)
Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn
Subject: [L&S] Run-away 7
Message-ID: <9877@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM>
Date: 7 May 93 22:02:35 GMT


Kell'an had heard the legends of the Shunned Center of Generica when she
grew up in the city.  The stories were mostly designed to scare little
children with tales of Creepy Charlie, and what he would do to little boys
and girls who were bad.  For the most part, the stories worked.  She had
never gotten into too much trouble, and when she did, she never repeated her
mistake.  The tales had also servered to keep Kell'an out of the Center; she
never wanted to risk meeting Creepy Charlie.  No way.  Not with what he
could do to little girls.  Pull all their hair out.  Turn their faces black.
Break all of their bones.  Make their dolls scream and bleed.  She never
wanted to go near the Shunned Center.

Now, as a grown woman, here she was, blindly following her dogs through the
deserted streets and passages of the Center itself.  It was like a foreign
city.  Nothing was recognizable; the streets and buildings were unlike
anything she had grown up around.  Some of the streets were little more than
courtyards.  Others were so surrounded by buildings that they became tunnels.
The street directions were just a bizarre; many a time it seemed that the
building was sited in the middle of a street, forcing a detour and change of
direction.

And those buildings.  Many were destroyed, but by what force was unknown;
weathering and erosion could not produce those piles of rubble.  But the
collapsed buildings were the easy ones to look at.  Those still standing were
a disgusting combination of garish and ghastly.  In design, in trim, in style
they were old.  So old even the ghosts had forgotten that it ever existed.
Windows and doors were out of proportion.  Stairways went nowhere, or worse,
in wrong directions.  In this place a gargoyle on a roof top would out of
place, yet it would be an improvement.  It all made her head hurt.

For comfort she looked up to the well known stars of the Generican Spring.
But the patterns she saw were not the ones she expected.  Somehow the stars
had re-arranged themselves into patterns that were lewd and disgusting.  She
stumbled as she fought down a rebellious stomach.

She kept telling herself that it really wasn't so bad after all.  It could be
a lot worse.  No sign of Creepy Charlie.  No sign of anybody.  No sign of
anything at all.  Just decaying buildings.  Most of them with black, empty
windows.  Staring at them like skulls with empty eye sockets.

Empty.  The entire area seemed so empty.  There was nothing here.  Nothing
alive.  There were no sounds other than they and Lestack.  There were no
lights other than those horrible stars.  No people, no movement other than
themselves.  No one, nothing.  Not even Creepy Charlie.

Ha!  Creepy Charlie probably didn't even exist!  Ha!  What a joke.  Just a
bunch of stories to scare a little girl.  Ha Ha!  What's the big deal about
the 'Shunned Center'?  Ha Ha Ha!  I could come here any time!  Ha Ha!  I
could take this place on alone!  Ha Ha!  I could make this place mine, Ha Ha,
wander at will, Ha Ha! I snap my fingers at Creepy Charlie!  Ha Ha!

The last of her thoughts broke through and found voice.  "Ha Ha Ha Ha."
Kell'an's high-pitched, nervous laughter grated on the silence of the Center.
Her laughter seemed to attract the attention of an unseen army of watchers.
It was as if the buildings themselves turned and looked at her.  She knew the
Shunned Center had taken notice of her.

"Quiet guardsman!"  came the Captain's quick whisper.

She must be feeling some of the pressure he thought.  Ever since they
crossed what she called 'The Edge', he had felt something.  First it had
only been a tickle at the back of his neck.  He slapped at it, but nothing
was there. That had gotten him thinking about the stories Kell'an had
mentioned, and others...

He had heard rumors and whispered conversations about the 'Shunned Center'
since he first arrived in Generica but had dismissed them as old wives tales.
Besides, before this he had no reason to check them out.  Then the tickle
moved up into the back of his head.  His mental shields slammed into place.

It had been a long time since he had needed those.  Since before he had
arrived in Generica.  They were a little slow from lack of use, but they
seemed to be strong.  He pulled Kell'an close to him as they trotted down the
twisted ruins of the street.  If he could keep her close, in physical contact,
he could partially shield her as well.  Her nervousness subsided, and her
laughter stopped.  She seemed to be focusing more on her dog now.  Good. 
Stay focused.  Don't think.  Follow Lestack.  Find Trina.

Something was exploring his shields.  Something was trying to find a way in.
The shields kept the intruder out of his mind, but they didn't change what he
saw in this Hell-hole.  This was almost as bad as... Well, as that place
before Generica.  Shadows moved on their own.  As if going about some unknown
business.  Sometimes they would stop and watch the party's progress.  At
other times they seemed to do their best to stop the party, to turn them from
the path Lestack was tracking.  And now they watched, recorded, and reported.
Every move made was being sent back to some unseen commander.  Every action
was being evaluated, plans were made, outcomes assessed.  The shadows were
the eyes of this city.  And the eyes of the intruder in his mind.  Soon they
would become the agents of change.  If he didn't open his shields, the
shadows would attack.  Swallow them up.  Never let them see another sunrise,
to be left for eternity in this twilight state.  Being one of them.  There
was no escape from the shadows.  They followed.  As he followed the twists
and turns of the trail, so too they followed him.  There was no escape.
None, except to let down his shields.  To allow the intruder full access to
his mind.  To be examined.  To be used.  To be changed.  To be absorbed. 
Absorbed into the shadows.