1st of June, 2022
[Chiron's Doom]
Three Fools Explore Chiron's Doom

Chiron's Doom by Nick Bate: An expedition sets out to scale the enigmatic monument known as Chiron's Doom, with disastrous consequences.

The approach #

We see Chiron's Doom beyond the horizon. It is… incomplete. Arid. Baroque. A spiralling tower of exquisite complexity, surrounded by a black desert littered with shattered shipwrecks. Torn scaffolding canvas flaps like a pale flag from the top of this terrible mast.

We are: THREE, the eternal wanderer, Thoroughfell, who will never give up their memories; TEN, An artificial person, La Bambola Indelibele, who killed their maker to be here; and NINE, A trader in relics and obscurities, Artemis, who distrusts La Bambola, because who can trust what lasts forever?

Chapter 1: Ascent Unending #

First passage #

NINE_DIAMONDS: You find a clue to the monument's makers. Who are (or were) they?

As we cross the waste we look up at Chiron's Doom and see the stars through its baroque details—not just any stars, but a constellation, the Shears. It doesn't quite align, but Thoroughfell assures us that, long ago, the stars would've been right. What's more, as we draw closer more and more constellations light up the monument's crevices and pinholes. Each one is wrong, but each one was once right—or perhaps will be at some predestined future time.

Second passage #

ACE_DIAMONDS: The monument grants you a great and unexpected gift. What is it?

We arrive and pass into an atrium with a distressing view all the way to the top. To look up is to feel vertigo—for Artemis and Thoroughfell, that is. When La Bambola looks up, it gains flesh of starlight.

Artemis immediately tries to destroy it with her blade, but Thoroughfell steps in. This could be interesting, he says. Well, Artemis insists, from now on I'll travel in the rear and it can travel in front.

Third passage #

THREE_DIAMONDS: The monument extends further than you thought. Where does this take you?

We climb for hours. Days. Sometimes we find ourselves descending where we were ascending—ordinary trickery—but others we stop and look out over impossible heights while our breath crystallises.

Fourth passage #

TWO_SPADES: The outside world intrudes.

We spy them from a balcony—an armed column of capirote-topped expeditionary guards. The Mapmakers' Guild! They must not trust us to return faithfully, or at all. Now the reward will be split with these cartographers and their mercenaries.

Fifth passage #

SIX_SPADES: Part of the monument is damaged. Who did it? How did it happen?

We redouble our efforts to climb. A few days later, an explosion blasts hot air up the central atrium. La Bambola was standing in the atrial starlight and their new flesh tore off like ink disturbed in water. For a horrible moment, Chiron's Doom shudders and groans under its own weight, and then seems to right itself, but now there are hairline fractures spreading all the way up from the base. Time, however distorted, is of the essence. We stop resting.

Chapter 2: Flame and Fracture #

First passage #

TWO_DIAMONDS: The monument changes, and the mystery deepens.

We don't know when it happened. All we know is, the surface of the world is no longer visible to us. All there is is the darkness and the tower. The stars are drawing near and the wind is growing colder.

Artemis wants to turn back, but Thoroughfell is too fascinated. At last, something beyond the mediocre world! Literally! La Bambina does not speak any more. Their star-flesh has returned, leathery and pale.

Second passage #

JACK_DIAMONDS: The monument speaks to you. What does it say? How?

La Bambina claims to hear words. Numbers, mostly. Songs. La Bambina claims the songs are comforting. It repeats the words. Artemis threatens to kill it, bitterly. Thoroughfell knows the threat is empty now. We continue.

Third passage #

TWO_CLUBS: The monument begins to resist your attempts to understand it.

Where once things fell down, they now fall in strange directions, or not at all. Where once we walked on the floor, we now walk on the walls or ceilings. Every balcony is a danger, every walkway a deathtrap.

Fourth passage #

KING_DIAMONDS: One of you dies in an accident. What secret does the death reveal?

The doorway. Two heavy iron doors. Thoroughfell float-steps through and his flesh almost roasts off in the heat. Artemis loses a hand pulling him back. La Bambina doesn't risk themself.

When Artemis is finished tending to their injuries and looks back through the door, she sees… capirote-wearing expeditionary guards walking through the rubble of the entryway to Chiron's Doom. She sees the desert behind them, slams the doors shut, and races up the stairwell, spurred on by the pain.

It seems that this place controls both space and time…

La Bambina Indelebile follows, despite Artemis' screams to leave them be.

Chapter 3: Breakdown #

First passage #

KING_CLUBS: The monument takes one of the explorers. What happened?

Artemis is alone now. La Bambina Indelebile followed an orphan beam of starlight into the void and vanished. It's quiet and cold. Sometimes she stumbles on expeditionary guards, or, increasingly, their corpses, and scavenges for supplies.

Going by the number of them, she estimates she could survive for some time. They'll run out eventually, though. Presumably. Unless Chiron's Doom can turn one person into two, which it may well be able to do.

That aside, just how are they getting ahead of her?

Second passage #

TEN_SPADES: An obligation you have been neglecting becomes urgent. What is it? What do you do?

Ah! No! Artemis needed to deliver a letter to maintain a line of credit for their relic-hunting expeditions. The creditor will surely be fuming.

She writes an apology on the back of a fresh, incomprehensible map scavenged from one of the guards, folds it into a paper bird, and throws it from a balcony. It can't hurt.

She continues upwards… or, as she increasingly understands, downwards, or perhaps inwards.

Third passage #

NINE_SPADES: An official letter arrives with bad news. What does it say? And what does it mean to you?

Artemis has come to expect many things from her months in this horrible worthless monument, but receiving a response to her earlier letter was not among them. A paper bird soars in.

Her line of credit has been withdrawn, her workshop and apartment have been seized by housebreakers, and her remaining un-auctioned baubles from previous expeditions have been claimed and sold off for a pittance. Well. Oh.

Fourth passage #

SIX_CLUBS: The monument induces an unpleasant physical or emotional sensation. What is it? What does it cost you to resist it?

Vertigo. All the time. Just like looking up in the atrium, but it never stops. Artemis has to close her eyes and tread blindly up and down the stairs.

Chapter 4: Breakthrough #

First passage #

FIVE_DIAMONDS: You uncover a hidden inscription on the monument. What does it say?

Ad Aspera Per Astra, according to her limited knowledge of various old tongues.

The stars are getting closer.

Artemis has enough food to last for a while. The last few expeditionary guards she met actually put up a fight, though.

Can't be long to the top… bottom… core now.

And then! What a view!

Can't be long.

Far, far above, a pinprick of light—a distant planet—twinkles into view. Not long now. Down, down, down, goes Chiron's Doom, a spiralling tower of exquisite complexity, surrounded by a black ocean dotted with beautiful ships.