Mitch at the Mountain, Again
Michael
This will be Mitch's second visit to Nola, and the first without implicit or explicit SANDMAN approval and provision. Is Mitch going solo or bringing Mary-Lynn?
Jeff
I think it'd be better for him to go alone — if he was gonna bring a second person it'd probably be Roger and that seems impractical w/ the goal of dealing with it quickly and quietly
Michael
Mitch comes to the porch and threshhold of Nola's tiny homestead for the first time since he was here about six months ago with Lynn and Sheila, and knocks on the door. Within a few seconds, Nola's home health caretaker Mary comes to the door. "Can I help you?" It's evident she doesn't remember Mitch.
Jeff
"Hey, Pete around?"
Michael
Mary stammers a little bit and looks at Mitch with suspicion and a little bit of fear. "Uh, n-no, there's no one by that name he—" A tremulous voice from inside the house: "Mary. Let the Master Jesus in. He's probably hungry and in need of our charity again." Mary looks at Mitch again, this time more subtly, conspiratorially. "Do you … do you know Nola? She's … she's easily agitated and she clearly thinks you're … one of those mystical figures she idolizes." The penny still hasn't dropped with Mary that Mitch has been here before.
Jeff
Mitch flashes a pained smile. "Me and Miz Nola go way back, it's fine." He raises his voice. "Hey, Vera, how're they keeping you?"
Michael
Nola is in her wheelchair, and by the looks of her, she's in a similarly physically-debilitated condition as she was back in February. But Mitch can see a new steel in her, a fire in her eyes, even if her voice is weak and cracking. "Mary. Please leave us for a little bit. A little privacy. Please." Mary looks again at Mitch, and nods. "All right, Nola dear. You just shout if you need me for anything at all, okay?" Given that the house is very small, Mary gets her sweater and heads out through the kitchen to the back porch and backyard. When the two of them are alone, Nola leans in close to Mitch. "My Lord, I am struggling to hang on. Every day the past gets closer, and even the meditation can't keep it away now all the time."
Jeff
Aura check, probably followed by detect.
>>>> ACTIVATE … SUCCESS by 2
>>>> DETECT … SUCCESS by 2
>>>> ANALYZE … SUCCESS by 4
Michael
As I recall, back in Intermission 1, Mitch failed the Aura Sight roll so he doesn't have the previous visit to compare this to, but the information he gets here is pretty clear: Her aura shows that she's Illuminated. It's a complicated melange of colors and energies; her soul is strong but her body and more importantly mind are so weak that they are impinging on her soul's great reserves of power. She definitely had psychic abilities at some point even if her aura is not lighting up with them now. Physically the scan shows some pretty obvious parts of her brain that aren't lighting up with cognitive ability; Mitch again is no doctor but it seems she is dealing with real-deal medical dementia. And her emotional state is also bouncing back and forth: between adoration and suspicion, between awe and fear, between a knowledge of and respect for the numinous surrounding her, and a raw fear that her life is in danger. Mitch knows Nola has that awe and adoration for him, or Mitch's doppelgänger, or even both... but what is she afraid of? Death? Losing her mind? Or something else?
Jeff
Hoo boy
I feel like I know the answer but still gonna Detect History B.
>>>> ACTIVATE … SUCCESS by 4
>>>> DETECT … SUCCESS by 6
>>>> ANALYZE … SUCCESS by 1
Michael
Last time up here, Mitch's Detect (History B) did work. And showed that Nola had been suffused with History B energy, or exposed to it, for a good long time, enough for it to penetrate her being and that maybe it was a nearby reality shard, a second, steadier source of History B energy that did it. None of that has changed. Nola is still suffused in History B energy, there is still a secondary source nearby. But now Mitch has more time to consider this, with Nola not breaking into unintelligble Sumerian that scrambles his short-term memory. The reality shard, whatever this source of History B energy this might be, is in the backyard. If Mitch's instincts are right, it's buried in the ground near the center of the yard. Somewhere between six and ten feet deep.
Jeff
Mitch sits down in a handy chair (something rattan, perhaps) so he's at close to eye level with Nola. "That sounds tough, Vera. You've had to deal with so much, and you've been a trooper, for so long. What's the trouble on your mind, what's keeping you from peace?"
Michael
"Do you remember what you taught me fifty years ago, Master? I remember your odd words, just as sure as I heard them yesterday. You said to me, 'Time is fungible. There are all kinds of different nows.' My eyes couldn't see, and my mind couldn't understand what you meant back then. But now I see, and I understand."
"They know. They know I've been touched. The Radiant School. It was all their idea. I went along because I wanted everyone to know about the lessons of Phylos, and all the joys and triumphs of the Ascended Masters, their holy immanent message for all of us, the better, more enlightened world they offered. But it wasn't until recently I'd begun to realize... the Masters are us, aren't they? And they knew. They knew that those of us who are touched like this, we draw followers to us, like a moth to flame. Like the unique particle of grit at the center of a snowflake, their belief accretes around us. We are the... queen at the center of the hive. Sending out signals, scents, pheromones to capture the drones. Our power and their belief: together, we build the hive. And they all want to believe, so badly. It's really so easy."
"They've been watching me for ever such a long time. They used me. I don't want to be watched anymore, Master. I don't want to be used anymore. I want to go away. I want to leave this house they've bought me, this safety they've vouchsafed me, this lifelong 'mission' they've given me. I want to go back inside the mountain. I want to see my teacher again. I want to see the golden halls, I want to glimpse once more the loom upon which the world's fate is woven. I want to be... who I was made to be." Mitch isn't sure if Nola said "world's fate" or "worlds' fate."
Jeff
Pyro 1 flares up on a 15+, here's hoping Mitch doesn't light Nola on fire.
>>>> SUCCESS by 3
"Oh, Vera... that's tough. That's real tough. 'Fungible,' huh? Sounds like something I'd say. And yeah, absolutely, everybody wants to believe." Mitch's tone darkens. "But getting you to Telos, girl, that's... I don't think I can swing that. I'd carry you there on my back if I could, but that's just a no go. I can get you out of here, if you want. Out of this world, your body, you can let that go, if you want. Or I can get you out of this house, to another place... but not inside the mountain. Someplace accessible by car."
Michael
Nola looks at Mitch. Mitch feels a crawly sensation in his brain. It's not entirely unpleasant, not wholly obtrusive, but Aura Sight tells him it's coming from Nola. A weak psychic push. Nothing near enough to penetrate Mitch's training. "So you're still one of them, then. The sandmen. One of Sheila and Lynn's. The ones who've had me writing letters to spiritual shut-ins the past 25 years. Typing away on my throne, keeping them chasing their own tails. Why is enlightenment so scary to them, O Lord?"
"I'm not stupid. I know the Anunnakku aren't kittens, I know they demand... things of us. But this world, this life... it's so dull and brutal and gray. My Lord, you promised me one day everything would be sunny again. That the skies would be filled with wondrous holy silver vimana. It's like everything you promised me has come true in this wicked, twisted way." Silent tears coming from Nola's wizened eyes now. "This world has no magic."
Jeff
"Yeah, I know." As he passes her a tissue, Mitch wonders whether Nola writing letters of anti-Kings propaganda to targets selected by the Beehives (or SANDMAN in general) is something he was told about and didn't hear or if it was kept secret from him. He guesses the latter, simply because they only tell him things when they think they had some reason to do so. "They did us all dirty. I don't think I can get you to Telos. I wish I could, but things aren't different enough yet, and it's going to get worse before it gets better."
Shasta Lore-14, trying to remember Nola Van Valer's stance on drugs and alcohol.
>>>> SUCCESS by 3
If she's not traditionally a teetotaler, Mitch asks if he can get her anything, if there's something they won't let her have, tequila or marijuana or peyote.
Michael
Nola holds up her hand dismissively at the idea of her needing any substance to alter her mind right now. But she does take the proffered tissue and dabs at her eyes. "I can be patient," Nola says. "If the moment is not right, O Lord, it's not right. I've waited this long. But my love for you has never died, which is why I shared the Mysteries with the correspondents of the Radiant School. I know they had an agenda for me, but even with their supervision and censorship, I thought it was valuable for people, seekers, to know. But I also kept your holy secrets. That's why I... interrupted your visit last time with those two women. I was afraid you—or I—would give away the secret of the treasure. You remember where we buried it all those years ago? If the walls of Jericho fall, my Divine One, you know what to do." Nola eyes the doorway to the kitchen and the back porch with real concern; whether this is meant to give Mitch the reminder about the "treasure," or she's concerned about Mary overhearing—Mary is still well outside in the backyard—Mitch isn't quite sure. Probably a little of both.
Jeff
Mitch nods, trying to reassure her. "Of course. Of course." She seems to have a lot she wants to get out, so he'll sit and listen.
Reaction roll for how much ol' Vera wants to get out.
>>>> 3d6+6 … 16
Michael
"There is a confluence occurring. A gathering of the disciples. I won't be allowed, for I am feeble, and as we've spoken about, compromised. But I am glad you returned, Master. But in the end, this mountain is a magnet. The center of the mountain, its spine, its axis mundorum, its poles extend up and down and into tomorrow and yesterday and beyond. It draws the tribe of the Masters to it, inexorably. None can resist the pull. You will meet many more of them this visit. And of course the Comte."
Jeff
Mitch scowls. "Man, that dick. Why you bringing up that asshole, Vera?"
Michael
"He is worshipped. Idealized and idolized. He is the quintessential magus. Guy and all his successors adored him, served him. It is said he will usher in a new age, establish the civilization to come when the equinox proceeds from Pisces to Aquarius in 2025 A.D. The ashrams of our future-world will vibrate along the Seventh Ray, in peace and harmony. The Comte will help bring about Shamballa. I suppose I can understand some of this tension... his being charged with ushering out your Age and ushering in the new, but he is like you, is he not? Made of the same stuff?"
"Go to my bookshelf," Nola nods at the small rickety three-foot-high shelf with an array of Theosophist and other occult books from the first half of the century on it, "and take down Alice Bailey's The Externalisation of the Hierarchy. Read what she said, full of wisdom, about the Master Rakoczi's role in the times to come." Mitch flips through the book and very quickly finds the pertinent passage.
Jeff
"Yeah, I mean, we're talking about the same guy. Not Guy, I mean, not Guy Ballard...?" Mitch chuckles awkwardly. "Comte and I aren't friends, Vera, we're not on the same side. I'm over here..." Mitch holds up his right hand, fingers parallel to the ground and pinched to thumb like he's pantomiming a duck head. "And he's over here..." Mitch holds up his left hand, making the same sign, like he's got two invisible puppets glaring at one another. "The version of Shamballa that Comte wants to bring here, it's not the version that...that you and I want. He's acting cross-purposes. So many of the people who're trying to work the will of the Anunnakku are. It should be easy, right? We should all be on the same side. Everybody wants peace and joy, freedom and wealth, enlightenment and security from want. But somehow it's always twisted. Little, greedy men, like the ones the Beehives work for, like the Comte, they're all assholes. You've been here, Vera, this whole time, you've met how many assholes? And you've tried to help them, and maybe sometimes it's worked, but there's always more assholes coming down the pipe. Comte thinks what he's working for is a restoration, or he claims that. Like things were good before, and then somehow they became bad, and we've got to make them good again. But if they were so good, the bad stuff couldn't have come in, where would the bad stuff come from? No, no, it's all lies they tell themselves to justify their crimes. That's human nature. An old man lying to himself about how the wicked things he did were actually heroics.
Mitch shakes his head. "Sorry. Sorry. I just...Comte and I don't get along."
Michael
Whatever potentially destructive or disruptive effect this set of thoughts might have on Nola's worldview, she seems settled enough to keep them to herself. But she does show some fire in responding to Mitch's impassioned speech. "It's all very well that you might not agree with what he was sent here to do. That is your prerogative, O Master. Your machinations and plans are not vouchsafed in their entirety to me, your humble servant. He is supposed to work for you, so I obviously do not understand fully. Perhaps... perhaps time has something to do with it and I am too limited to see the fullest manifestation of your plan. It is not my place to speculate," Nola says, even as she openly speculates. "But others do believe in the Comte and what he represents. Many others. And that belief gives him power." The screen door at the back of the house, squeaky with age, creaks open. Mary signals from the kitchen that she is coming back in. "Nola dear, you should rest now. This has been a long visit."
"I'm not tired," Nola snaps at Mary. "I'm not tired!" Mary looks somewhat accusingly at Mitch. "I'm sorry... it's just she's not supposed to be upset like this. You should leave."
Jeff
Hmm, so, how does Mary look? She's not possessed by a memetic demon, is she?
Michael
She's not a source of History B energy, for one. Her emotional aura is tired, frazzled, bored, frustrated, and angry in that order of intensity. No psychic ability, no foreign presences, no entities attached. Basically she looks the level of tired that someone who takes care of an old lady with a tenuous grasp on reality for multiple hours a day would.
Jeff
"I should be going, anyway." Mitch rises to his feet. "It's good to see you," he says to Nola. "I'll try to come back soon."
To Mary, he adds "I should call first, though, next time."
Michael
"My Lord..." Nola says as Mitch heads for the door. "Be safe. Carry my devotion with you."
Jeff
"You take care, Vera."
(Now Mitch just needs to find Peter Mt Shasta, dang it, he seemed to have a steady thing going but maybe he's living rough again)
Michael
(I'm assuming Pete left Mitch both a number and an address? If Mitch wanted to swing by before heading to the campsite, we could do that before tomorrow night's session.)
Jeff
(Yeah, makes sense. Mitch was hoping he could kill two birds and find Pete at Nola's. What will actually happen no doubt is that Mitch will go to Pete's, find it locked and empty, then go meet Mary-Lynn and discover that her Serendipity means she and Pete are sipping Cokes together outside the general store.)
Michael
I figure by this point it's about 10:30 in the morning on Friday and Mitch pulls into the drive of the small rented cottage that Pete took on after getting his job at the excursions outfit. The beat-up used truck that Pete bought when he got himself settled is here in the driveway. The curtains are drawn. Mitch goes up to the door and knocks. He ends up waiting about a minute when he hears footsteps coming to the door. Pete opens the door, looks at Mitch with delight. "Brother!" He throws his arms around Mitch in a joyful embrace.
"I wish I'd known you were coming, come in, come in! You'll have to excuse the state of the place, I'm not here much anymore." Pete leads Mitch into a dark, dusty two-room cabin. "I've been on the move both physically and metaphysically lately. Lots of change, lots of growth, man. Sit down, how have you been?"
Jeff
I'm gonna declare, because I like Pete's energy why not, that this time Mitch has Mary-Lynn with him. He embraces Pete in return. "Hey there, brother!"
>>>> ACTIVATE … FAILURE by 2
>>>> DETECT … SUCCESS by 2
>>>> ANALYZE … SUCCESS by 9
Dang, that was a nice analysis roll. "Hold on."
>>>> ACTIVATE … SUCCESS by 0
>>>> DETECT … SUCCESS by 4
>>>> ANALYZE … SUCCESS by 6
Assuming Mitch doesn't see anything that provokes a fright check or something, follow it up with Detect
>>>> ACTIVATE … SUCCESS by 2
>>>> DETECT … SUCCESS by 7
>>>> ANALYZE … SUCCESS by 2
I think there's a bonus for physical contact but I dunno if it's through clothes and I don't think it would make a difference either way
Michael
Okay. First of all, nothing in Pete's aura that would make Mitch hold off on Detect (History B). He's physically healthier than he was even last time Mitch was here five or six weeks ago. Eating better, for sure. His emotions are a bliss layer cake: he has his original core aura of restless spiritual seeking, that metaphysical hunger, satisfied finally, it seems. It's layered over with a calm, placid, fulfilled spiritual satisfaction. His energy is powerful; Pete has been charged up by whatever or whoever he's discovered in the past month or so. At the center, though, he's still a seeker. He's hungry for even more bliss than he has already. He's still Illuminated. If Mary-Lynn is with Mitch, he will extend his hand to her. "Many blessings to you on behalf of the Ascended Masters and of the Chohan of the Seventh Ray, my Master, the Comte de St.-Germain. I'm Peter Mount Shasta."
Jeff
"Okay, brother, you're gonna have to..." Mitch trails off and turns to Mary-Lynn. "Pete here and me, we're in Skull and Bones together, so to speak."
Confident she'll take this in stride, Mitch turns back to Pete. "You're gonna have to unpack this stuff about Comte. I know Comte and the fact that you seem to think well of him, you're not spitting on the ground whenever you say his name, that tells me we're talking about two different guys."
Michael
"Oh, Mitch... you must, must while you're up here meet and speak with Pearl. She has..." he gasps out loud, sighs. "She has changed my life. On all vibrations and levels of reality. And it's all thanks to the Comte."
Jeff
"I liked Bigfoot Pete, but I gotta admit, Peter Mount Shasta suits you. I really should seen that coming."
Michael
"It was the Comte's command that I take the name of the mountain. I feared it was hubris but he said the mountain is a worthy name for me."
Jeff
"Well, we're meeting some folks this afternoon, going to do some camping this weekend. I dunno if we can fit in an audience with your new teacher... I'll have to see. What can you tell me about her now, how'd you find her? And how does Comte fit into all this?"
Mitch is thinking that if Comte has a full-on cult he's putting together up here, then maybe it's a good thing that Jo packed for bear.
Michael
"I checked into the local health food store pretty soon after getting settled in. Picked up some shifts there over this summer when the excursion business was slow. And recently I got to talking with the owner and I'd mentioned my... being drawn here, my experiences in the woods. He seemed receptive to hearing about it, and he knows pretty much everyone in town who's spiritually aware. When he mentioned Pearl, I got... this little tingle. Just an instinct, you know, that I should go see her? And when I got there, it explained... everything."
"She was a student of Godfre King years and years ago. She's their direct successor. She told me that all the awareness I'd displayed, all the manifestations I'd made happen up to this point... that I was a Child of the Seventh Ray. That I owed it all to the Comte's influence. His bringing the world into the New Age. And Mitch, it... brought everything together. The creature in the woods. The voices in Muir Wood. That day we climbed the mountain, and how I have this... memory gap on the summit. I was in my higher self, then, you see. Pearl said when she was young and could climb the mountain, the same thing happened to her."
Mary-Lynn's been quiet other than the very brief introduction. But at the mention of Pete getting a tingle that he should visit Pearl, she almost says something, Mitch can tell from her body language. But she holds back.
Jeff
Just to confirm, he's got no active History-B on him?
"Wow, she said that, huh?" Mitch had the affect of someone conflicted, like he's not sure what to think. Actually he's conflicted over whether to tell Pete what happened during the memory gap. "I remember when we were up there. It left a bad taste in my mouth... You remember."
Mitch glances at Mary-Lynn in acknowledgement of her stirring.
Michael
"I figured it was the altitude," Pete says, almost kind of dismissively. "Oh, I'm terribly sorry, Mary-Lynn, was it? I've been so eager to tell Mitch all about this... oh, Skull and Bones, haha," it's like Pete is processing things 30 seconds after they happen/are said, "I definitely didn't mean to leave you out. Both of you are obviously invited to meet Pearl."
"Weeellll," Mary-Lynn says cautiously, "like Mitch said, we should go back and double-check our itinerary for the weekend, but let me scratch down where Pearl is at and maybe we can call ahead before we visit if we've got the time?" Mary-Lynn takes a little notepad out of the pocket of her jeans to take down Pearl's address and phone number.
"Oh. Oh of course." Pete looks a little crestfallen but he freely gives Mary-Lynn the contact info. "I spend most of the time out there when I'm not working at the health food store or doing handyman work for some of the local landlords. I found the work taking people up the mountain was... a bit too strenuous." Now Mitch can tell with the help of aura sight that that's a lie. If he had to guess, Mitch would suppose that Pete left the agency because of what happened that day on the top of the mountain. His aura showed fear when he mentioned the top of the mountain.
If Mitch had a working theory, it's that the KI.AG glyph on the crown/stone that the Comte wielded to keep Pete out of their private conversation set Pete up for this kind of adoration of the Comte, primed him to "love Big Brother," as it were.
Jeff
Mitch nods, clasps Pete's hand. "Listen, we gotta run, gotta meet some folks, but I wanted to be sure to see you this weekend. Hopefully we'll manage to catch up later, our schedule is all in the air. You take care of yourself, brother, you hear?"
Michael
"Blessings on both of you and enjoy your visit, we would love to see you fall in love with it here just like we have." Pete's use of the plural first person is noteworthy.
Mary-Lynn waits until she gets back in the car with Mitch to unpack all that. "Well. Well. That young man seems quite... wrapped up in his spiritual journey."
Jeff
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm worried about him falling in with the wrong crowd, so to speak, but..." Mitch trails off and shrugs. "I don't have a lot of family in this part of the country. He's a lodge brother, not blood, but..." He trails off again.
Michael
"Aw, hey, listen. If you want to go check out this Pearl at some point, make sure she's not the 'wrong crowd,' I'll come with. Heck, you want to send me up there alone so he or she doesn't get suspicious..." Mary-Lynn pauses. "He may be a lodge brother of yours but he don't feel important to me. No offense. That Pearl, though? Now she does."
"Are you gettin' the feeling that a bunch of people and energies are being set up here, specifically for us, this weekend? Like someone up there is, uh, setting up their chess pieces on a board or somethin'. Because ever since the sun came up this morning, believe me, I've been feeling that. Not in a paranoid way, just in a way kinda... like, gravity, or magnetism. Something got switched on to activate all the kooks... and the sincere folks too! And bring them all here."
"And are we gonna visit your friend at the Zen abbey? Or are we gonna let her rest a while longer?"
Jeff
Mitch checks the time. "Let's call ahead, I don't want to show up and be a bother to her... that's a good idea, you checking out Pearl. I think."
Mitch finds a pay phone easily because it's 1973.
Michael
Michael the personal assistant at the abbey says Master Jiyu is doing better but is still too ill to receive visitors. But, he says, he has let Jiyu know that Mitch has called on her and that Mitch should call back if possible before he leaves on Sunday.