Sketchy Thing: The Rot (completed)
Lillhans
🖼️ 7 images Surveyor
Area overview + maybe portrait, and write-up combo W.I.P.
Edit: final result below
Lillhans
🖼️ 7 images Surveyor
Area overview + maybe portrait, and write-up combo W.I.P.
Edit: final result below
Comments
I have absolutely no idea what I'm looking at, but it looks nice. (I like planning things in detail too.?)
@DaltonSpence I couldn't keep proportions right with angle if my life depended on it! Rotating after the fact ensures I will never improve either...
I meant what I said quite literally. Is this supposed to be a house? A temple? A spaceship? A city? What is it supposed to be a sketch of?
Looks like the floorplan of a church or temple to me. :)
Likewise! :) As @Ralf suggests it is a church. I am using the floorplan (wallplan, more like!) for tracing later - making the sketch proper.
What is the scale (distance between grid points)? I've worked on church floorplans before so I'm familiar with how they are laid out. EDIT: I noticed while measuring the bitmap that the horizontal centerline was one grid high when checked against the north and south walls and the center of the apse. This means the steeple and the porch are slightly off center.
So the idea here was to wrap up (kind of) a short story I had previously posted elsewhere ("The Rot") by way of tracing a sketch. Adding the first part for full context. Brace for wall of text!
THE ROT
Part 1
The rot, for lack of a better word, had started as a subtle shift in the air when they were first coming up on the cabin. Like the lingering suggestion of a perfume, the kind of which you could take out an elevator’s worth of people with.
Now, it was invading their senses. Both the corporal, Charles McIntyre, and the French veteran, Victor Arsenault, had insisted that it was in fact not the smell of death. All four were nonetheless expecting to stumble upon the remains of someone or something around every corner as they slowly made their way through the cottage interior.
It was quiet, same as it had been since earlier at night. Seeing the column of light momentarily shoot up from the cottage into the skies above had left them all speechless for minutes – even McIntyre. Even the forest itself had had its breath taken from the event, it seemed, only it had never quite recovered – no animals, not even the wind playing in the trees. It was all quiet. Unnaturally so.
Jan Henriksson, one of professor Karlsson’s local talents, had sworn he could hear someone moaning from across the small lake just as they were getting ready to move out from the makeshift observation post. It had made them halt, uneased. Then, professor Karlsson had taken it upon herself to remind them that it would not be the first time that Jan was called upon by spirits, and then gently prodded them to carry on. The professor was usually not one to crack a joke – and she generally was terrible at it - which was probably why even Jan had let out a chuckle.
I could use that, the Swede thought to himself as his eyes came upon the bottle on the small mantle-piece. “Bit of Dutch courage before going over, eh?” Charles whispered, obviously appraising the same option. The quartet had entered a small library, or study, the other door of which would lead them to the last room of the cabin. Unlike its windows, the door to the corner room was not barred in any way – save only for the rot that seemed to emanate from behind it.
“Bon”, whispered the Parisian gentleman. “I think this door probably not locked or trapped either, same as front door. But we check first, yes. Anna?”. Victor gestured for the burglar to move up on the door, and moments later she was giving the thumbs-up.
“Right”, Anna nodded and drew her revolver. “We go”.
Morning light was finding its way through the cracks of the barricaded windows, dancing over the floor and walls of an empty room. The stench had vanished the very instant Ms Atwood had opened the door, which only furthered the sensation of disbelief of what lay beyond it. Professor Ljung could not possibly have left the cabin unnoticed as there were three other observation posts positioned around the area. Nor would anyone had been able to approach or enter it after him.
“And here I was beginning to hope we would actually run into the old man”, Charles quipped. “Tenner says he’s gone for his secret cave”. Corporal McIntyre pointed at the perfectly circular hole in the floor at the centre of the room. Half-expecting the errant Egyptologist to pop his head up at any moment, they all trained their weapons on the hole - each waiting for the other to make a move towards its edge. As was her habit, it was ultimately Ms Atwood who stepped up to the task. “For Christ’s sake, you’re all a bunch of cowards and will owe me dearly. Give us the torch”. Victor kindly presented the torchlight to the burglar who promptly proceeded to the hole.
“No cave, I’m afraid”, she relayed. “In fact, no nothing”. Indeed, she would have expected to see at least some soil and perhaps a bit of bedrock further down. But the hole extended beyond the reach of the torchlight. If you could call it a hole: it was more reminiscent of a shaft of sorts, and its smooth sides were covered in some sort of greyish paint. The same paint, they soon established, was covering the floor and walls of the room. There where places where you could see the wallpaper behind it and others where the pale hue was less thin.
Having observed a particular section of the wall for a few moments, Ms Atwood made a startling discovery. “Bloody hell, the paint is shifting!”. The others gathered round and shortly could confirm that the pain was indeed moving - seemingly pulsating patterns creating ebb and flow in the hue.
“How are we with time?”, monsieur Arsenault asked. “We should get back and report”. A few moments passed without an answer and making no effort to hide his frustration, he asked again. “Well, that’s just it, Vic. I don’t know”, Anna finally responded. “My watch is dead.” Much to his surprise, and not helping his frustration in the slightest, Victor found that his own watch was similarly no longer functioning – in fact, none of the time pieces were. “Charlie”, he growled. “You say you always count seconds. Helps you calm, yes. How long have you counted since we got in this shit cabin?”
The corporal grinned and was about to offer his estimation but instead grew a shade of pale. He didn’t know. In fact, for the life of him, he couldn’t find it in him to count even then. “One..”, he stumbled aloud, unable to keep going.
“I think we are being observed”, Jan said, not having spoken since they left the observation post. “I think we should get out”, Anna snapped back. There was a sudden draft coming from the shaft and then, after a few moments of silence, they heard a voice that did not belong to either of them.
“I think you are out of time”
--------------------------
"Where's Charlie?", the colonel watched carefully for any signs that Ms Atwood might finally be coming around. "I don't know what tell you John. Vic has told you; Jan has told you; I have told you. Who the hell is Charlie?", the burglar replied calmly, exchanging telling looks with the other two members of the team.
She might as well have been asked for Mrs Chamberlain's personal taste in garters, the colonel thought. It was certainly not his first debriefing, but he usually was not the one having to compose himself. There was nothing insincere to Ms Atwood's response, or the others for that matter. But something was clearly, the colonel had now established, fundamentally askew.
"Charlie", the colonel offered. "Big lad, hard to miss. A bit of a braggart, but never backs down from a challenge. You trained with him before shipping over, miss Atwood and as for you, monsieur Arsenault", the colonel turned to Victor, "the two of you damned near came to blows in the hotel bar. I should know, because I was there myself and had to stop you".
The Frenchman leaned over the table, speaking softly. "Colonel…John" he corrected himself. "We have each known the other since the Somme. You are like my brother. On battlefield, off battlefield. No difference! We have done things, and seen things. And because you came to me, I am here now. I am here. But this test, John”, he sighed. “I do not know how I can win. Who is this Charlie?".
The colonel removed his glasses, rubbing his temples. It was pointless of course but still making for a good habit to at least try, he thought. There was inevitably to be a headache, and it would not release its grip until he could get his medicine. And that was that.
"Very well. But let's just go backwards instead. From the time you reached professor Karlsson, shall we?" he suggested, thinking it might help matters to throw things around a bit. "So, you were observed entering the cabin at 05:39. Some ten seconds after that, according to professor Karlsson, you returned to the observation post. Now, mister Henriksson, you told Karlsson that...". The colonel stopped dead in his track. He could feel his pulse pounding at his chest, aching almost, as he looked at the third chair on the opposite side of the table. Empty.
"Henriksson? Are...are you alright, John?". The concern in Anna's voice was genuine, as was Victor's worried frown when the two looked at each other. John had seen men disappear entirely before his very eyes in the past. Mortar shells could do terrible things to a man's existence, particularly in confined spaces. But they could not as readily erase the memory of the man, and he now found himself in a room with others who questioned that Jan Henriksson had ever existed in the first place. There had not been the violence of a mortar shell, but it was violent to his mind all the same.
He excused himself and hastily retreated to the outside corridor. There, professor Karlsson soon found him mumbling to himself. "Did you see that?", he begged. "Gone! What the devil...". The colonel was interrupted by Karlsson extending a cigarette. "Yes, John. I think you should probably see doctor Holmgren anyway, but I saw it same as you. Jan was there, and then he wasn't". Like the colonel, she leaned against the wall, reinforcing their common ground in understanding the recent development. "Charlie?", she intercepted with a smile, "Bonnie Mac was among the best you have ever brought over, John. I suspect that our friends in there might be at odds with the world as we know it. It's them alright, but I think they also didn't entirely leave that cabin".
Reassured he wasn't going insane just yet, the colonel turned to the professor. "We can safely assume, then, that professor Ljung found the missing pages", he started. "This complicates things, granted. But from what we have learned so far it is in nobody's interest to enter that cabin, the Others included". He was preparing to get back with the remaining duo – not expecting either of them to actually still be there – but professor Karlsson stopped him.
“If you think of it, John, we can at least stop worrying about not finding the pages before Ljung”. She smiled. The colonel did not. “I hope you don’t put that assessment in the report. Good God, Lisa…”.
Yes, but which one of them is, she wondered as John went back inside.
Part 2
The gangling frame of a human made its way across the churchyard from Queen Street. There was nothing imperfect about his exterior and in the brief moments when he would halt and orient himself, the aging gentleman looked like any other citizen. It was, of course, an illusion doomed to fail him as soon as the benefit of distance was no longer on his side. A steam press without a proper wash will only get you so far.
As he rambled past the bench the odour of neglect followed in his trail, lingering well after his other features had faded and making it – along with the obvious liquor stench – the lasting memory of the man. Refuse acting the part, the professor thought to herself; not out of spite, but rather in making an observation of whatever unknown factors that had irrefutably brought him to this state.
Besides, were they that different? He once must have had a purpose same as she – or at least having been under the illusion that there was merit to his person and efforts. Same as she. Everything must and invariably will pass – wars too. Hers was not even one fought on the frontlines. Hers was a war known to few and fought over stakes known by fewer still. There were no parades held for the losses that lay at the feet of their victory, no dancing with strangers in confetti-laden streets. It was never for the medals, they had all agreed; medals were for that other mess – as they had called it throughout. But damnit, if she didn’t feel robbed.
The pinnacle of her academic career belonged to her male pseudonym but she was at full liberty to freely communicate with academia around the globe as well as research and publish as she pleased. Not once had she entertained the idea that her professorship in Sumerian studies would ever extend beyond that of the arrangements of the Committee. And while all the Swedish branch could offer afterwards was the token position as a secretary at the University of Gothenburg, she had been to Bletchley: those women had made an impact in a war that people knew of all but too well, and what did they get to show for it? No, it wasn’t so much about being pushed back into civilian obscurity – others had it worse, financially not the least. It was the complete oblivion.
There had of course never been a Swedish branch, or Committee for that matter. How could it, possibly? It was imperative that the greatest threat along the border to Norway was always ever going to have been the nazis. The plights of their comrades-in-arms elsewhere on the continent and in the world would forever be unknown to her, but for as long as their war was on she at least knew that she was not alone. But now?
At one point she had tried to contact the colonel, managing to dig out what must have been his first commission. But there had of course never been a lieutenant John Taylor III. How could there, possibly, when even her own section deputy from little Saxnäs had been removed from the church records? Removed, not redacted: the only reason she knew that the records had been tampered with was how the clerk had commented on the odd smell when he pulled them out of the archives for her. She had, herself, never been too sentimental about leaving Lisa Karlsson behind but the sensation of being buried alive with her memories was only growing stronger with each year.
“Ma’am?” The query startled the professor, not so much because her thoughts were adrift but because of whom the voice belonged to: the note had only said to meet at the cathedral, and when. “Atwood?! Christ, you look like hell.”
There was an urgency to how the burglar sat down on the bench that wasn’t lost on the professor, but she was still struggling to process that a ghost from thirteen years back had materialized in front of her like it was nothing. “My apologies, but you do look like the morning after”, she offered along with a cigarette. “Look, it’s not that I’m not happy to see you again, only it is rather unexpected. John said you didn’t make it after shipping back to England. Besides, we won our war. We don’t…we’re not supposed to exist anymore. They didn’t tell you?”
Accepting the cigarette, Anna – if that was still her moniker – spoke. “Yes. Yes, but, I don’t know. I am. I had to leave. And go here. I looked you up. Found you. Had to see you. Had to go back”. It was no secret to the professor that physical trauma could alter one’s mind, but she very much doubted that the scars on the burglar’s face had anything to do with her current ability to make sense. The burglar seemed at odds with reality all right, only less coherent than when the professor had last seen her. “Yes, got away. Had to.” Atwood continued. “Charlie came to see me the other day. We spoke. He said to warn. He says hello”.
There were now two things which the professor could not accept in their entirety. The fact that she had herself failed to locate her former comrades-in-arms, she could agree, was no guarantee that others would be similarly hindered by the Committee’s precautions. That John may not have been entirely honest with her certainly was not stretching the boundaries of reality in the least. She could not, however, see that Ms Atwood was in any shape for both having made a daring escape from whatever asylum they must have kept her at, and locating a former section commander – of the Swedish branch no less – within days. And within days of what? Seeing Charlie?
It had been a generally accepted truth that Charles McIntyre had ceased sometime between 05:39:00 and 05:39:10 on the morning of July 15th, 1937. Not because two members of his team somehow had gotten their brains mixed up, but because the cabin had – without failure – been under surveillance until it was finally sealed in 1946 when the Great Threat was ended. The professor was frustrated, and was about to share her frustration with the burglar when she noticed the two men by the cathedral entrance.
“It’s wonderful that you finally remember Charlie, Anna.” In the corner of her eye, she could see the men had now started towards them. “Quickly now, what did he say?” The burglar looked at her and tilted her head, asking “When is the eclipse?”. Having made a habit of distancing herself from current events, the professor wasn’t helplessly out the loop. “Tomorrow. Why?”. There was sudden clarity to the burglar’s face as she grabbed the professor by the wrist. The two men were running now, with more approaching from the street exits. Atwood then threw her head back, seemingly miming to a voice that couldn’t possibly be her own.
“I think you are out of time”
Sketch results above @DaltonSpence :) I, too, noticed the .5 m discrepancy and adjusted accordingly.
I love a map with a story.
This (map and story) is fantastic.
Was the map done entirely in CC, or did yo finish it in something else? How did you go about achieving the hand-drawn effect, if you don't mind sharing?
Thank you, @OverCriticalHit. You can check my community challenge entry this month for a file which showcases the "how". In written, the process is best described as drawing polygons.
Drawn on a straight line between two nodes (going from A to B and then rebounding to A) a closed fractal polygon will deviate from the line on account of the fractals. With a solid fill, then, you get the varying width along the line.
I tend to dial fractals down to 0 (arrow buttons) going one way, and up maybe one or two pips when going back. This way the width variation will always be relative to a straight line, getting a more "disciplined" appearance. "Drawing" circles becomes a matter of using the trace command etc.
Pros: draw anything
Cons: fractals will bog down process speed. Big fractal polygons will bog down process speed bigly. Details-light or not, it's not going to be the quickest route to a map.
Wow. wouldn't have reverse engineered that in a million years! Thanks for the walkthrough. I'll d/l the file and study the process.
Many thanks!