"Taking the Stone" A life disc embedded in Chiana's abdomen suddenly ceased functioning. This indicated to her that the life force linked to the disc, her brother's, had ceased to be. Distraught over the death of her sibling, Chiana sought solace from Crichton, but the Human was busy tinkering with Moya's systems. While I admire Crichton's efforts to learn more about Leviathan technology, his exuberance temporarily shorted-out several key biomechanoid elements and effectively blinded both Moya and myself to what was occurring onboard. By the time system integrity was restored, Chiana, confused and distressed, had already commandeered Aeryn's Prowler and slipped away to a nearby Royal Cemetery Planet. Officer Sun, Crichton, and Rygel (our resident royalty, as he ceaselessly reminds us) followed her in a Transport Pod. On arrival, the three discovered that Chiana had taken up with a local people who call themselves the Clansmen and live in underground tunnels below the gravesites. Chiana, still coping with the shock of her brother's passing, was attracted to the young Clansmen's hedonistic lifestyle of drugs and danger. These people, led by one called Molnon, embraced life-threatening situations, constantly testing each other with deadly rites of passage. These rites culminated in a ceremony called "The Gathering," in which Clansmen would plunge into a subterranean pit, relying on a voice-activated sonic net to catch them at the bottom. While surviving the jump was considered the highest honor among the Clansmen, the act itself was extremely difficult to perform and often resulted in their deaths ("taking the stone," as the locals put it). The task of calming Chiana's grief and bringing her back to Moya was left to Crichton and Officer Sun, as Rygel had chosen to devote his energy to the oh-so-noble task of grave-robbing. But Chiana, in her current state, was deaf to reason. Despite having seen one Clansman, a man named Das, already fall to his death, she decided it was time for her to leap and risk "taking the stone," though whether she sought to face death or embrace it was unclear ... even to Chiana herself. Anthony Hayes  . . . . . .  Molnon Peter Scarf  . . . . . .  Das Michela Noonan  . . . . . .  Vyna Natasha Beaumont  . . . . . .  Janixx Writer  . . . . . .  Justin Monjo Director  . . . . . .  Rowan Woods << Previous Log Next Log >>