Diary of Pip Rippon

I was going to write a diary entry a while back, but never got around to it, about being followed in Beeley woods, part of the Wisewood close to the border with the netherlands, but I didn't ever get around to it. Anyway, I'm sure I've been back to Beeley woods since, and I did again today. There is a part of those woods known as the Dead wood, because the trees are twisted as if in their final death throes -- and in there, appropriately enough I found a makeshift camp with a spit, the kind of which is used to rotate meat over a fire. The place was deserted, but as I approached, a vision came to me of a human being being roasted over lapping flames. The person on that spit was me. I at once felt horribly disgusted to the core, yet also found it faintly erotic. I have no idea where the vision came from, since the apparatus that I observed has clearly yet to be used, and up until now no fire had scorched the earth below it, not that I could ascertain anyway. I'm not sure either whether I was alive on the spit, or already dead, which is a troubling thought in itself. I don't think I was followed on this visit, but the previous memory made me think that there were eyes that were watching -- could have been the organic network, of course, but you can usually tell the difference between the watching of trees and plants, and the watching of actual eyes.

This got me to thinking about who would commit such a heinous crime, and the answer can only be those who exist in the netherlands -- the location of the spit being close enough to the border that you can see it -- although technically in that area between the Dun and the Great Northern Causeway, which is still part of Hellsborough. Of course, if the perpetrators were one of the netherlander clans, that would make it human sacrifice and cannibalism. The dead wood is only a little way from the Dun itself, a place known in antiquity as somewhere where human sacrifice has taken place, as recorded in the famous lines:

The shelving, slimy river Dun,
Each year a daughter or a son.

Got out into the badlands for a change, which reminded me that the last time I had ventured that side of "The Great Northern" -- the Causeway, was during the storms of hail-ripperthroat over a year ago. The difference in the ferocity of the river Dun was marked -- a year ago it was bursting its banks, sweeping away diseased trees, filth and all manner of debris, to be dumped miles away. Today, it was a mere trickle in comparison. The badlands though, or crosslands, or the netherlands, however you refer to them are like a canker on the butt of Hellsborough, a creeping corruption and decay, littered with rust and detritus. Of course, the nethermen refer to Hellsborough in the same way, and it is quite refreshing to roam free -- as it were -- without psycmask and without being constantly surveilled by the eyes of the organic network. A veritable junkyard, the crumbling and grumbling of ancient architecture, I saw no-one other than a solitary moldenke -- with of course the requisite electric scooter. The place reminded me of some research I did when I was in Oxford that I dramatised: Junkyard Speedball -- I've dug it out and put it in the Urban Myths & Hymns area of the site. It is also available to download as an EPub if you have a free subscription from your My Hellsborough page.

There was a big event in the off-world, which isn't my scene at all, so I decided to go on an extended hike in The Dark Peak. I followed the Dun down to Outibridge and the took the Cockshutts lane up and up and over -- eventually to Onesmoor. There was a strange type of stinger up there that plagued me for some time, awful little critters, must have been something to do with the humidity. That weather though, once I was up on the top started to turn as I descended becoming the squall of squall-longleg. Soaked me through it did, and Shad, he was wet to the bone too. I was looking for the fastest way down, but my routes were blocked first by demonspawn and next by snoughweed, since I will not walk through fields containing either of those foul things. Thus I was compelled to take longer routes back to the bar on the Middlewood road, where I arrived saturated to much hilarity.

I fell down in the wood of weird creatures today, just a slip in the mud and came down onto my backside good. I must do a map with creature images of that place, it's not huge, but there are so many strange sights to be had in the place -- where the trees are warped and spindly, overlooking the fast flowing Loxley river. I checked into the bunker, while I was out that way; it's still in the ascendance, and pictorially it was the same, with no new designs to be examined. Maybe that means it's at a turning point?

Van was in the bar when I arrived, looking pleased with himself and had lined me up a pint on the bar. This is good Pip, I like it, but we need to go faster -- you have my notes now, let's get them out there.

Van, I'm doing the best I can and getting them out there the fastest I can, look: The final versions of the first five chapters are done. I've put them in the subscribers area -- they're out there now Van!

I think that the humidity plant is on the blink again, from over hot to silly cold, it is neither one thing nor the other at the moment; hopefully it will stabilise soon, because as a result of its unpredictability, I didn't venture far this week. Although I didn't feel it when out and about in The Dark Peak, as soon as I got back into Hellsborough, I had the feeling of being watched. Shad was with me, of course, so I didn't fear for my safety, but this incessant feeling that I am being eye-balled all the time - whether I am on the street, whether I am in one of the bars, or whether I am in the park, I know that someone is looking at me, following my progress -- stalking me, maybe. I'm finding it quite unnerving.