Welcome to Gaia! ::

Dear Father,
I have decided to keep a record of all that has and will befall me in this manner to be able to digest all these fantastic things that I have seen, and hopefully will see, and also to help heal the pain I find myself struggling with after being told that, unlike me, you did not survive our plan.

The last thing I remember before my awakening was your face as you pulled the roof of the stasis chamber over my head, with the information channels blaring in panic in the background about the nuclear holocaust. You were telling me that we would meet again soon enough. Oh, how wrong you were. But then you would not have known. You would not have known that the chambers would both malfunction. Mine would have never have woken me up, and yours simply broke down after a meagre hundred or so years. Apparently you were suffocated without ever retuning to consciousness; a painless death, or so I’m told. I certainly hope so. To think that you suffered any would pain me more than I admit. I have seen your poor mummified remains and have laid them to rest with the help of these kind people here. But there, I am getting ahead of myself.

The years passed by me in the chamber. By my reckoning about three hundred years have passed since the ‘end of the world’. I remember the sleep as a sort of dreamless limbo, not unlike real sleep, but unlike it either. If I must compare it with anything, it was like trying to sleep without actually being able to go completely unconscious. I rather think it was more annoying than peaceful, as some of my new friends have ventured with a smile.

Would you believe, Father, that I was found and woken due to a rat? Perhaps not. I certainly did not until I met the creature in question. A very handsome white lab rat he is, too. I am given to understand that he had led a girl named Blair to me during one of his usual outbreaks of curiosity. I am thankful to them both. I have since then met the girl, Blair, that is, and the rat. He is called Milord. I think that name would have amused you a great deal Father. Both are very interesting characters, I think, though Blair seems not to be a person very much inclined towards socialising. Nonetheless I hope to get better acquainted with them both, as I find them good company. They had graced me with a number of visits during my long recovery from the long sleep in stasis. You should see what they have instead of doctors now! Healers, they are called, and very competent and kindly, too. It was amazing how they got me back on my feet so soon. I personally thought I would never walk again. Though I have been told to avoid doing anything pfysically strenuous for quite some time and must report to the Healers every so often.

Now I think I should tell you something of where I am. It really is absurd in some way, but supremely wonderful in another. The settlement I am currently residing in is called Obernewtyn and believe it or not, it is a settlement of people like us! And people not like us, as well. As you know I managed to inherited your telepath and a little of your empathic abilities and Mother’s telekinesis ability. The ‘new’ people call these ‘farseeking’ and ‘teknoguilding’ and also have a wide variety of other abilities amongst them! I am simply amazed and thrilled at this. There are people who can talk to animals, whom they call Beasts, there are those who can control the minds of others, there are called coercers. There are empaths, these healers, futuretelling (very hard and finicky, or so I’m told), and something called ‘enthralling’ that is apparently very rare. For instance, the girl who found me, Blair, is a coercer and teknoguilder (these being her dominant abilities, or ‘Talents’) and also has some little beastspeaking ablitiy.

All new comers to Obernewtyn are asked to be tested if any Talents. One may refuse, if one wished, but I was curious if they could see mine. I did my best to deceive them, trying to see if they really could do what they claimed. My ‘examiners’ were not less people than the heads of the Guilds. That is, all people of a given ability are members of guilds bearing the names of that ability. For example, Blair could have been a member of either the Teknoguild, or the Coercers, as both these talents are equally strong for her. Her inclination is more towards the Teknoguild, but she also attends Coercer meetings and classes.

It was soon clear to me that these Guildmasters and Guildmistresses are very strong and experienced in the use of their Talents. I could hide nothing, almost. Quickly they decided that I was both a farseeker and a teknoguilder, with some very rudimentary empath abilities. I told the Teknoguild head, one massive individual called Garth, that I was good with machines, deliberately trying to lead him astray, but he merely gave me a knowing look (I really think he saw through my ‘testing’; I rather like the man) and told me that that had nothing to do with it. The head of the Farseekers, who is also the Lady of Obernewtyn, is a slight, dark woman whose eyes always seem to be in shadows. She is a person who is very hard to fathom and rather intimidating, regardless of her small stature. It was rather disconcerting to have her sweep over my mind like a wind, not knowing what she had taken, or left behind, in point of fact, as I hear that she is also a coercer.

After the interview, most guild heads, including the wolf representative of the Beast guild, had filed out with dignified farewells, leaving only Garth, Lady Elspeth and the foreboding figure of the Master of Obernewtyn, one Rushton Seraphim. They were very kind. Kinder than I would have thought they would be, knowing who and what I am: a member of the race of men who had brought wholesale destruction upon the world, after all. They told me succinctly that I was a free man. I could remain in Oberbewtyn if I wanted to, or go wherever I wished to. I remarked upon this as unusual as I by then knew that I was a danger to their society, having knowledge that could prove dangerous. This made Garth grin and the Lady Farseeker smiled thinly, saying that they knew this perfectly well (I was sure in that moment that she knew you, Father, and I were scientists and what our research actually was) and that it really did not matter. I suppose they would put some sort of watch over me whatever I would choose. Not that I blame them. I would do the same in their place.

I have chosen to remain at Obernewtyn. I really would not know where else to go, and at any rate this place is fascinating. I have been accepted amongst both the Farseekers and the Teknoguilders and start training as any other person who comes to Obernewtyn with a Talent. They ask nothing in return but to make myself useful at what chores there are that I am suited for. As a result I have been put to teaching the teknoguiders about computers and such. The guild leaders and the Master of Obernewtyn have strongly warned me against making it widely known what I am. And, frankly, I have to agree with them. Between us we have concocted a story to explain my ‘peculiarities’ as Master Seraphim has put it. To those who do not know, I was found by Blair and the other teknoguilders in her company at the mountain called the Tor, unconscious and in bad repair. My memory of my former life is gone and despite the best efforts of the farseekers, no trace of my past could be found. Still rather mysterious and unsatisfying, I think, and told them so. The Master Seraphim simply gave me a smirk of sorts and said that he doubted I would have any problems warding off any inquisitors. I don’t think the man has taken a liking to me. The feeling is mutual, but I see his point.

It has now been three weeks since I was found and a new life awaits me, without you, Father, to my greatest sorrow. You would have loved it here. He has circulated that I’m something of a ‘wonder’ and as such has taken me on as a sort of apprentice. I think this is a sly at keeping me where he can see me, not that I mind. It is tiresome and hard to keep up the fiction I’m supposed to. Between him and the quiet and withdrawn Blair, I can relax a bit. You would have like them both, I’m sure.

Well that is all I can think of right now, Father. I start my new life as a student at Obernewtyn officially tomorrow. I shall write as often as I can.