An immense towering collection of ceramic tubes, metallic pipes, crystalline panels and all manner of construction materials, many of would defy the expectations of any engineer worth their salt. The front of the structure resembled a grinning demon, or a highly stylised lion. Mendean could not decide.

His first thought was that it was some kind of ancient airship, brought down to earth by the arcane sapping effect of the dead zones. It was not large enough to rival a city like Tarishitar, but it was certainly larger than most war airships he had seen. It was foreign, possibly not of human origin at all?

It lay there, grinning, part-embedded in the mud and dust of the land. The darkness of the soil and broken trees lying as though discarded by some gigantic child, indicated that whatever it was, it had crashed in recent months. He continued around the flying machine, searching for signs of life. There must have been a crew. Perhaps some survived inside? Almost stumbling over the horned skeleton of a devaka, a kind of camel-like animal indigenous to this region, his sharp eyes spotted nicks all over the bones of the long-departed creature. Scraps of dried flesh and hide clung to the bones. Mendean narrowed his eyes. It was not just scavengers who had consumed this poor creature.

Wind and dust would have covered over any tracks left by predators. But there would be other signs. Diminished as his power was in this land, there were still many resources at the god's disposal. One of them being the land itself, for he knew it well. He knew the Elvembek people, the Tloyebog and the phlogiston collectors. And yet the Siva Zemlyst still held many secrets.

He was weaker because he was a god and the power of gods was diminished in Parvpora. Added to that were the dead zone effects of the Siva Zemlyst, which prevented the use of magic. But that was why he liked to come here. Here, he could at least pretend he was human.

But that was not why he had come here. He had come in search of someone. Someone who had gone missing. As he gazed up at the roughly pyramidal crashed airship of unknown design, his suspicions that this was where his lost quarry would have ended up. He would have been unable to to resist.

It wasn't very hard to make his own way in the world, and Liam found himself actually enjoying the hard search.  Here, he could not use magic.  But that was fine.  It was a chance to use his other skills.  The mages from Wyllmochvar paid handsomely for recovered artifacts and airship pieces, and there were plenty of rumors in the Siva Zemlyst area about all manner of interesting things that might be found.

The only truly hard part was having to carry all his own supplies.  But Liam looked at this as a challenge, and faced it with a grin.  He knew his mother would have been proud.  Checking the map and compass once more, he peered into the distance.  Searching for a lost structure of some kind in the middle of a desert was just up his alley, though he would have to figure out what to do once he found the place.  The first sign he found was a disruption in the desert of the mostly smooth soil, and Liam noted the strange pieces of metallic substance formed a trail.  And it led to a large mound on the horizon.  That seemed as good of a place as any to start. 

Picking up a small piece of the material, Liam tried to figure out just what it was.  His best guess was some kind of alloy of metals, but it was much lighter than he expected.  Which did make sense for an airship.  Once he got closer to the airship, his head tilted to one side.  He wasn't quite sure of what he was seeing, the design was strange to his eyes.  And there was someone else already there.  Interesting.  Liam wondered if it was a fellow scavenger.  He approached, taking care to make enough noise so that he would be noticed and not sneak up the man.  The young man, Liam realized.  They looked fairly close in age.

Raising his hand in greeting, he spoke in the tongue of Tarishitar.  It was the closest one to what he had learned at home, and Liam was pretty sure this guy would not understand Draconic.  "Hello, I didn't expect to see anyone else out here.  Name's Liam," he said, offering a bow of greeting.  He had learned that acting polite tended to start off encounters on a much better footing.

Mendean was aware of the other man approaching, but he did not turn in acknowledgement until he heard the other man speak. The accent did not match the language, but he understood well-enough what the young man was saying. When he turned, the other young man bowed. A curious gesture, which Mendean did not reciprocate. Instead, he narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the new arrival, studying him carefully.

Something familiar about this one. But only slightly so. A native of Tarishitar, he was not. No epicanthal folds over the eyes, hair all wrong. Even his clothes indicated he was a traveller from elsewhere. Although where that may have been was not immediately obvious to the god.

He realised he must appear even stranger to the young man. After all, Mendean travelled with minimal supplies. He was perfectly capable of living off the land, especially this land, given the time he had spent as a child, travelling with the indigenous Elvembek nomadic peoples. But he carried no weapons either. It was rare in these lands to find any traveller unarmed.

Turning without speaking, the deity returned his attention to the crashed airship. He had a good idea as to the reason for its presence here, even if he was unaware where it had come from. Slight distortions in the aether all around the area indicated that a substantial rift in the world had occurred here during the Timedeath. It might well turn out this vessel had fallen here from another time, or perhaps even another world.

He had tracked his quarry to this region. Such a man would not have been able to resist exploring something like this, so it was likely he was here. And yet…

“You can call me Mendean,” answered the young god. “I am here to find a man. I came across this.”

He inclined his head toward the newcomer. “Why are you all the way out here? It is dangerous for an encumbered traveller. More likely to attract the attention of a Tloyebog that way.”

Now that he was close enough, Liam noticed a few odd details about this young man.  But he had also learned that he couldn't take things at their appearance, so he would have to learn as he went.  The young man nodded when Mendean mentioned searching for someone, though he paused for a moment.  He knew that name.  It was one that his mother had spoken well of, and the name of someone he had met very briefly on another world.  This person even looked similar, very similar.  "I think… I think I've met you before.  Or someone very like you.  It was in another place though, one I don't think exists anymore," he said, shaking his head.  Liam didn't really want to talk about that part of his past, especially since he'd found no traces of his mother here.

He just shrugged at the question before answering it.  "Well, I can't use magic out here, so it seemed prudent to bring a few things.  I'm not the best scavenger yet, but I'm learning.  Some of the mages of Wyllmochvar are looking for people to bring back anything from places like this," he said, looking across the landscape.  Liam had been warned about the dangers out here, but he had come anyway.  He might as well try and do something useful until he figured out just what he was going to do with himself on this world.  "Who's this person you're looking for?  Maybe I can help," Liam added.  It was something to do for awhile anyway.

Mendean glanced over his shoulder at the young man. If there was some glimmer of recognition, it did not surface. He looked down at his dusty boots. “I do not know you. If you knew me, then perhaps it was another me. I am not him. I am sorry. He is gone.”

There was a moment of reflection. The mood became sombre, as though a moment of silence had been invoked in memory of that which had been lost. A wind pulled small zephyrs of pale brown dust into the air, that twisted their way across the arid ground, between the two men and the wreck. A desert bird squawked somewhere in the distance. The spell was broken. The god looked up at the half-buried dragon face.

“The mages of Wylmochvar can take a running jump over a short cliff. They want to gather precious specimens, they can get off their fat arses and come here themselves.” He indicated the crashed vessel with a wave, defiance in his eyes. “See this? This is mine now. I found it. I'm claiming first dibs. Scavenger's rights. You want to take something? You ask me first, or kill me for it. Scavenger's rules. You getting the picture? The man is mine too. If I see him, he is mine. Understood?”

Without waiting for a reaction, Mendean approached the artificial mound that had once graced unfamiliar skies, keen eyes picking out details. An ambusher would most-likely be waiting there, or over there, or…

Something moved in an arc across the sky, the sun made it impossible to look up without being dazzled. Mendean heard something hard clatter against a rock. Pieces of it exploded across his legs. Splinters. Nothing damaging; just the remains of an arrow. He stopped, immediately picking out the pale curve of a horn bow. A warning.

Speaking in the tongue of the Elvembek, Mendean raised his hands and called out. “You seek to shoot an unarmed man? What kind of cowards are you? Come out and speak to me as men, instead of ambushing me like a craven letgus!”

One, two, three…four walnut-coloured faces emerged from behind debris. Two with bows, the other two armed with spear throwers and a handful of lightweight bamboo javelins. Of course, thought Mendean. They probably think the airship is cursed. No way they'd actually go aboard the thing. Arms still raised, he muttered in the hope that Liam would be close enough to hear him. “There'll be another one. Someone has to watch the zemjahts or devaka, or whatever they came here on.”

His eyes dropped to the ground, and Liam felt doubt for a few long moments.  There was a memory in the back of his head, of someone similar to this, chopping vegetables in a kitchen.  Perhaps he was mistaken?  But perhaps not.  It was hard to tell sometimes.  The young man only shrugged and nodded, accepting the answer that he was offered.  A smile did cross his face when Mendean told his opinion of the mages.  It was pretty close to what he thought. 

At Mendean's claiming of the ruined ship, he nodded.  That was fair enough, Liam had been here second.  "Honestly, I've no problems with that.  Not sure what they want with it anyway, other than to pick it over and hoard whatever knowledge they figure out.  But… a guy's got to eat, and jobs are not the easiest thing to find," he said.  Wondering for an idle moment what his mother would have done, Liam decided that she would have done whatever she needed to in order to survive.

It wasn't until the arrow shattered against the ground that Liam realized they weren't alone.  The young man cursed himself for being so inattentive, that was something that he had yet to learn.  He squinted against the sands, trying to see just how many there are.  He knew only a few rudimentary words of the Elvembek tongue, but he did until the tone of the insult.  All the men were armed with ranged weapons, and Liam only had his blade.  He couldn't even use his magic here, so Liam felt more than a bit useless.  His hands raised along with Mendean's.

"Any ideas as to what they want?  You can at least speak with them…  I'm truly the outsider here," he said, muttering the last mostly to himself.  If nothing else, this was yet another reminder he was so very far away from home.

Mendean cast an irritated glance. He had hoped this Liam might run off or something, but that was clearly not going to happen. That meant Mendean was now responsible for him as well. He hated having to be responsible for others. Being responsible for his family was enough trouble, and he barely even interacted with any of them.

Still, it meant he was not alone, which was oddly comforting. Returning his attention to the Elvembek males who were emerging from behind wreckage, he could see the mixture of anger and the tiniest hint of shame in their eyes. Not all of them, but enough to destabilise the situation, even if it were only a little.

“You invaders. How many?” One of the men spoke in broken Wyllmochvaran. Well, at least he could use his native tongue and be understood by at least one of them, the god mused. He stared at the one who had spoken and moved closer, hands still raised. There was a clattering of weapons being raised.

The god halted and answered mildly in the Elvembek tongue. “Call me an invader again and I will tell your mother that you stole your brother's dinner on the day he fell from the cliff and died.” Mendean had seen it in the man's dreams, a recurring guilt that plagued him, even now after more than a decade had passed-by. The man's face blanched and for a brief moment, Mendean revealed himself to him. Not enough for the man to remember who the god was, but enough to know that the foreigner was not someone to be trifled with.

They locked eyes and Mendean saw understanding in those metallic coloured eyes. The Elvembek was remembering more than he was supposed to. Probably an effect of being in a dead zone. It reduced the god's influence more than merely being in Parvpora did. But in this case, it was an advantage. The man conferred with his comrades for a moment, and then one-by-one they backed away in the traditional ritual of respect to an honoured guest, until they were out of sight once more.

Mendean lowered his arms and shook his hands, flexing the fingers with a wince. “They will let us go aboard now. Come on.” And without waiting for a response from Liam, he began searching for a way into the wreck.

He took a step back from the glance cast in his direction, but Liam figured it was better to stay in place.  If nothing else, at least in his mind, they would be easier to take out if he tried to run.  And Liam didn't really have any intention of dying out here in the wastelands.  Shaking his head as the native spoke, he could understand the few words.  But when Mendean spoke, he understood not a word.  His mother had a talent for languages, and Liam was still learning.  But the one man's facial expression told him all that was needed, and the natives quickly backed down.

Keeping his eyes on the natives until they were out of sight, he scrambled after Mendean.  It seemed a better idea to take a chance with the man he could at least communicate with.  Not to mention, there was a mystery to be solved, and that was something he couldn't resist.  Especially since there was a missing person involved.  "This ship… it looks different.  Like it was twisted somehow.  I noticed it when I was at a distance.  It's not twisted the right way for it to have happened when it crashed though," he said to Mendean once he got close again.  It was like something massive had grabbed part of the ship, twisted it, and thrown it to the ground.  He wondered if Mendean had noticed the contorted metal. 

About twenty feet forward, he noticed an overhang only a few feet off the ground.  And behind that overhang, which looked a bit like a balcony now that he thought about it, was a smashed glass-like door.  "I think that's our way in… though it's smashed like someone wanted in.  Rather than trying to escape.  Weird," he muttered the last few words.  This whole fallen ship was weird, and Liam found himself wanting to know more about it.

As his eyes passed over the broken structure of the foreign vessel, it was clear to Mendean that Liam was correct. Terrible forces had bent and squeezed the superstructure. If being in a dead zone had not killed this machine, then it was whatever had twisted it out of shape that had. But there were many possible causes. An enormous pair of hands, the stresses of passing from one world to the next. There were many terrible things and terrible forces that existed between the worlds and between the times. Mendean had had first-hand experiences of such things. Things most mortals would probably be better off knowing as little as possible about.


Offering no comment other than a grim nod, the god approached the door. All that glass. Whomever this vessel had belonged to, must have been extremely wealthy, in their world, as well as this one. Panes of glass larger than a few inches across were hard to come by. He shrugged to himself before approaching the point of entry. Hopefully he would find those who had sailed in this peculiar ship. If not alive, at least their corpses would render clues and information to him.


“I think you are right.” Mendean nodded and reached up, testing the overhang. Fingers finding purchase, he tugged once. There was movement above. Dust and fragments of glass and metal rattled, falling around the god in a glittering cloud. He stepped back blinking, then brushed the worst of it out of his hair, from his shoulders and sleeves. Dust was expected. It came with the territory. One did not pass through the Siva Zemlyst without emerging, caked in dust. It brought back fond childhood memories.


Reaching up, he tested again. Less fragments fell this time. It felt stable. It would certainly carry their weight, for a little while, as long as they did not linger. Grasping hold, Mendean pulled himself up with both arms, legs flailing for several seconds before finding purchase on the lip of the rim. Grimly, he pulled himself up the rest of the way, thanking his years of training in the monastery for his prowess in such things.


A moment later, Mendean was squatting on the overhang, it sloped downward, but he locked one elbow around a sturdy railing, leaning forward. As he extended his free hand for Liam to take, he noticed a shallow cut along the side of his forefinger. It did not hurt much, but the sight of his own blood concerned him. The blood of a god was a precious commodity. He looked at Liam warily for a second before chiding himself. Liam had no idea what he was. He was safe.


“Come on, I'll give you hand-up.”

Letting the young man lead the way, Liam kept an eye out for anything else that might try and attack the pair.  There had to be a way up to that hole in the ship, and he was curious enough to stay and see what was inside of it.  He took a quick gulp of water, grimacing slightly at the warm taste.  But there were worse things, and Mendean seemed to have found his way up to the balcony.  He quickly tucked the canteen away, and carefully followed his companion up, taking the hand-up when he needed it.  Before entering the darkness of the interior, Liam took one more glance around the exterior.  It seemed that the natives had scattered, it would be very annoying if they were attacked again.

Taking a moment to light a torch, Liam chuckled to himself.  "Almost didn't get the tinderbox… but then I remembered where I was planning on heading.  It's weird for me to not be able to even cast a spark of fire," he said, shaking his head.  It wasn't until he lifted the torch into the interior of the darkened ship did he realize just how extensive the damage was.  And it made him wonder just where all the people had gone.  A ship like this couldn't fly itself, could it?  And there were no bodies, or blood, around anywhere.  At least not here.  "I don't smell anything in here except dust…  I wonder how long the ship has been here.  Either the people flying the ship are long gone… or it's been here for a long time, and the desert dried them out.  Sure your friend is in here somewhere?" he asked.  Maybe Mendean would find something that he was missing.