There is a sharp snap from above, and dim light begins to flicker behind Scoria's closed eyes. Another snap, and another, and the rush of cool air as rock is chipped away. "wait a minute, wait a minute. this ones got eyes, and legs. We need more light over here!" someone shouts. The voice is rough, and not geon, Scoria is sure of that. There is another shift in the rock as the hammer in your grip is stirred, someone trying to move it out of your grasp

Scoria stirs from his... dreams? It's been so long in the dark, time became abstract, irrelevant. His massive bulk shifts slightly. Moving is a strange sensation Voices? Who? How long has it been? How? I'm not actually sure where I am anymore. I understand the language, though. Scoria feels the hammer moving and squeezes hit hand around the handle. Not like they would be able to move it much anyway considering it's nearly solid corundum An eye opens and peers at the nearest digger "Hello there"

The miner falls back onto his bottom "the rock talked! It's alive!" More lights surround you, and hands scrabble at the loose rocks around your body, pushing gravel and millings aside, trying to free you

"Hello!? Hello can you hear me?!

Scoria looks to the fallen miner "Indeed! your voice is quite sonorous and is generally pleasant to hear. " The rock man seems rather chipper for having been buried alive for who knows how long They are quite friendly it seems. This is good "My name is Scoria" He looks around "I must say thank you all for unearthing me. It is most appreciated. May I ask who all of you are, and what caused you to unearth me?"

"We're miners working for the Greystar Confederation. We knew there was a possible way to tap into a new geothermal power source here, and you happened to be along our path to the lava flow."

"Is that what trapped you? Do you remember anything?"

Flashes to snippets of memories. Lava gushing around him. someone else. Is he helping? No, pushing him down? Scoria slowly shakes his head "Lava flow, yes. This sounds feasible." Were the memories lost, or are they being suppressed by my own mind? "I regret to say that I do not remember why I was in this area, however. I must commend you all on your digging effort. It was expedient and resulted in negligible damage to my crust" Scoria begins pulling himself from his hole. He stands nearly has tall as the miners; a giant in Geon standards. He places the handle of his hammer on the ground above the hole, using it to assist his ascent. The two handed stone behemoth is nearly as tall as Scoria and Celtic knots around its head and handle glow dimly as his grip around it tightens. "This question may sound far fetched, but what year is it?"

"It is February 2668 right now, you just missed new years, hah!" one of them shouts, as he moves the last of the rocks free

Scoria stops completely and looks to the miner "2668..." Goddess above "It seems I have been buried for approximately 35 years. I must contact the Temple, they will be pleased to hear I have not perished. Would any of you please direct me to the nearest Interstellar Communications station? I must contact Mariam"

"Mariam, well, you can get a message out, but I wouldnt expect to hear anything back from all the way out there for at least a month, maybe more"

Scoria tilts his head "A month? That seems several orders of magnitude too long for a simple message. Are you sure this estimation is accurate?"

"Ever since the whole entire galaxy fell apart, yep, pretty confident in that"

'We're lucky that we got communications back at all in the last 4 years"

Fell apart? By Vandar, what happened? "It seems I have been trapped in this lava flow since 2633. You may need to elaborate"

"Easier to show you this" he says, and a movie shown to cryosleepers, the isolated, and other groups coming into the confederation begins to play. It is several minutes long, covering the scream, the still lady, the liberation, founding greystar, and now, this new age of relative progress, all with a segment dedicated to each.

"There's more information once you get your own pad, and do some digging on local channels, but thats what they show all the new folks"

"I see... Thank you for your patience. If there is anything I can do to repay you, please do not hesitate to ask" Seeing how things are now, it may simply be best to go to Mariam myself. "I also must ask if you could direct me to the nearest space port at your earliest convenience. I have a long journey ahead once I have grounded myself"

"You're polite for a rock man. Hmm. I'd say check in with Greystar admin, in the middle of Ash City here. Let them know what's going on, and see what you can do for orbital passage. There's a number of shuttles and traders heading into United Nations of Worlds space, you should be able to hop a ride on one of them"

"thats on them though, I break the rocks and get the minerals, they sit on their asses and push papers around"

Scoria bows his head in thanks "I am in your debt. I wish you much luck in your geotechnical endeavor" Scoria moves to head towards the Admin

Approaching the edge of the city, several cars and a few city busses are hard at work getting vast numbers of workers to their jobs, or home from them. Above, the permanight sky opens with lightning and rain. Most people on the bus seem relatively unconcerned. Admin is a large building , built into the shape of a crescent moon with out buildings and several floors on the main one. Mushrooms and bioluminescent plants grow in specially constructed plant boxes, and the area is busy with functionaries, clerks, and the lower cogs keeping the admin machine running

Scoria walks through the building, hammer covered by some cloth and rope the miners were generous enough to spare to keep it relatively unthreatening looking I hope the order is alright. I wonder what they thought happened to me He heads to the receptionist at the transport authority "Is this the correct location to seek transport off-planet?"

"Destination, and number of travelers?" the bored looking clerk asks, popping some gum. He begins getting his keyboard out, unfolding it with a snap

Right place at least "Mariam, one"

"And reason for travel?" There is some clattering of keys, and another snap of the gum. The clerk has not looked up from their screen even once, this entire time.

Scoria looks around at the bioluminescent flora and fungi before settling back on the clerk "Sunblade Business"

There is a pop, as the bubble bursts, and he finally looks down from over the desk at you. "I...I see. " he says, trying to comprehend what he is looking at.

"I...We can bring you as far as...Olar...You'll need to get transit with the UNW the rest of the way.."

Scorria affects what he thinks is a smile, but looks nothing like one "Your assistance is greatly appreciated. Would you please direct me to where I need to go to board the departing vessel?" What in the name of the Goddess is the UNW? I must procure a datapad post-haste

"There will be a lifter coming down to bring you to the starhab in...three hours. Your transit tickets to the landing field are here" he says, handing you a stamped thin metal wafer

"and once you're at the field you can wait, there are usually vendors there"

Scoria takes the ticket and nods his head in thanks "Thank you. Have a pleasant day, and Goddess protect you" He turns and heads toward the field. On the way there, he looks for any news screens or info kiosks to see if he can find out what the more recent history is like?

There are many public access terminals scattered around the transit hub and admin space here, free to use for all. It contains all non-classified information, and you see there are a few other people idly browsing other terminals as well

Scoria spends the remaining hours reading up on everything he's missed as his time as a rocksicle. It seems empires fell and new ones arose. His home planet now the capitol of of the Greystar Combine and the temple being within the United Nations of Worlds. After a bit of reading it seems even Greystar is a relatively new government, having taken the place of a local cult after UNW intervention. Hopefully there would be no unruly politics or conflict at the border between the two polities. He just wanted to reunite with his brothers and sisters in arms at the temple

Outside there is a hiss of air brakes, and the bus pulls up to bring you to the starport, and out to your next destination toward home

(there wouldnt be any reason you don't get to the spaceport, or the shuttle to Buey, but its up to you how slow we take things)

(I'm OK with speeding things up a bit)

Scoria boards the bus. Just the first leg of a long journey

The trip up to space is quiet, no one bothers you on the way. though you and your wrapped bundle to attract some stares. The shuttle is waiting on the landing field, under the acastus night sky. It continues raining

He gives friendly looks to those that stare openly, and hopes the expression doesn't scare anyone Scoria looks up at the rain as he walks, feeling the drops on his face. It's good to finally feel something that isn't just more rock after so long He moves to the shuttle and takes a seat (edited)

The shuttle heads to buey as it’s first destination, and as you arrive you see a Greystar agent , Chris Fury is requesting aid on a sensitive issue. He is currently in the old enclave on the planets northern side, with his family and a small security team.

Scoria looks at the request I'm sure they won't mind if I take a bit of a detour. It's helping someone in need. Plus what's a few days on top of 30 years Scoria finds a help desk how one might respond to this aid request

(Level to 3 HP Roll 17 [{1+6+1}+3x1+3x2] 3pts Sunblade 1-->2 Foci: lvl 2- Savage Fray (Stab 0--1) Partial Sunblade 3- Universal Speech(Talk 0-->1) (edited)

From above, the world of Mariam is frost locked as ever. The storms rage less frequently and intensely now judging by the height of some of the snow drifts, but most importantly, the temple grounds themselves are entirely different. A dome now covers the campus, and most of the grand buildings are recently rebuilt, or no longer standing at all. Only a handful of Justicar's seem to be present here now, far down from the hundreds that used to live, train, and deploy from this campus. An ice road now connects the campus to other settlements and their domes on this planet , another facet of development that never existed before.

By the goddess, what happened here? Was there a natural disaster? Did they perhaps relocate to a new base? Where are all of the justicars? What is all of this? Scoria walks through the grounds, taking in all that has changed. He makes his way to the main temple and enters

Knight-Commander Calidorious Odenburg sits in the main chair in the temple, looking out over the wide meeting room and it’s rows of chairs. There are only six other justicars here now and judging by the room itself and their appearance , they may very well be all that there is. There are no trophies on the wall but you can see that they each sport the hammer of the order. Cal himself carries Sunderhead, the hammer of the first ever justicar- which he recovered from a far off tomb

The six others have their own hammers though they’re more utilitarian like your own. Each also sports a pistol with wolf like iconography on it, and you can sense it is also a sunblade weapon but of a different purpose

Pistols? That's... Strange Scoria appraches the front of the temple, confusion and concern sculpted on his face "My brothers...what has happened here?"

"That hammer you carry, you are one of us, traveler?" (none of the faces here would be people you'd recognize, aside from Elder Kenmore, but he's aged 30 years now, and likely doesnt remember)

"I am Scoria Foehammer of Acastus, Justicar of the Knotted Wheel. A lava flow trapped me some 35 years ago. I apologize for my prolonged absence"

“This must be very shocking for you then. There was a schism and we are now all that’s left. I’m sure you’d like the full story though “

Scoria finds a place to sit. It was a long time since he was able to rest himself in this temple "Please. Proceed"

Tensions within the order flared for years, reaching its peak in 2645. Civil war erupted and the corrupted faction, who called themselves the Brothers of Fenrir, led by Knight Commander Dagget struck down Patriarch Mattias, head of the Justice of Vidarr. The Brothers of Fenrir decimated the Temple of the Knotted Wheel, before leaving to find their power and riches in untold space. Only 5 of Vidarr’s Justice survived the attack. Elder Kenmore managed to hide himself and the other survivors away in the temple vault, emerging a week later to find their home a ruin and their planet frozen. 20 years passed, with Calidorius and Viola being trained as the future of the Shaori. During this time the temple had no contact with the outside world. Luckily their habitation shield protected them from the worst of the elements. They managed to make the ruins livable again, although barely. For 20 years the mystic arts were passed on by the elders to the younger generation, readying them for a day when the Shaori could return to the sector at large and begin repairing the damage done over the last 20 years.

"Several months ago I was able to kill Knight-Commander Dagget, and the rest of the Brothers of Fenris with the help of both the United Nations of Worlds, and the Greystar Confederacy. The tale there is another lone one, and I lost a dear friend of mine doing it, but the traitors are all gone now, and what remains is to go forward and begin to rebuild"