Born of Earth, Beneath Minds like Glass

It was your Pilgrimage that brought you back here, back to the mounds. This place has haunted the chaotic shifting fires of your dreamscape for as long as you can remember. You might call it your birthplace, if you were inclined to attach such perverse sentimentality to it. As things are, they remain a place of fear and uncertainty. You only remember parts of it. Terrible, nebulous details of what happened to you broken up by hideous nothing. Perhaps it was the desire to become master of memory's palace that kindled your fascination with the mind and its fragility.

The mounds teem around Bishopsgate Psychiatric Hospital's East Wing, like blunt teeth. One mound makes up the foundation of the building. While they aren't exactly towering, they remain vast conicles of rocks, earth and vegetation, piled by whatever forgotten native tribe called this land their own however many centuries ago. The knowledge that that these mounds go so much deeper than the eye can see is unsettling.

Dusk has fallen over the Hospital Grounds. It's fairly out of the way here. The windows of the East Wing are for the most part, shuttered, as you stand perhaps 200 metres from the mound you clambered out from under. You freeze and cast your mind back to your first moments.

Birth

You feel molten agony from inside your torso as you are crushed by a cold, overpowering mass from all directions. Jagged points burrow into your skin as you try to free yourself. You try to cry out, spitting grave earth from your mouth, but you find you cannot speak more than meaningless vowells. You open your eyes to see a dim light winking through tiny gaps between the monolithic stone slabs imprisoning you. You see writing made from smears of a deep red substance daubed onto the slab before you, flecked in yellow fluids.

Terrible Journeys Await You My Child

You feel a kind of mental fortitude gestate within you. It flows from your psyche into your flesh as you calmly, and quite involuntarily, wrench your arm free from a pocket of earth, elbowing rocks from behind you. The light is brightest behind the stone slab in front of you, with the writing on it. You bring your fist against it to the sound of a sharp crack and rocks tumbling on the other side. The slab seems to have moved a couple of inches. It seems that gravity is on your side.

OOC: I thought that we could deal with a repressed memory of a traumatic birth, since mental frailty seems to be a real theme with your character concept. So my idea is to dole out the birth flashback sequences episodically as you progress through Bishopsgate Hospital attempting to understand madness and its part in the human condition or doing whatever it is that you want to do. This is your chronicle after all. However, I would advise avoiding confronting your birthplace in the present timeline until you're finally granted Memory's Shocking Revelation (tm) as part of a repression/avoidance complex. If you want to do something different just say. This is your game and I have no problem tweaking it or changing it up if this isn't what you were looking for.

The Hospital grounds are enormous, lying on 24 acres of overgrown farmland. You're surrounded by wide spaces and looming buildings, which lay claim to a diverse array of architectural styles. Stone facades of the 19th century clash against the bland architecture and poured concrete of the late 1960s. It's obvious that the buildings are well maintained, but they somehow remain menacing as they loom over you. The setting sun causes the East Wing to cast a vast, blurry shadow over a memorial fountain. Bishopsgate's exterior is clearly intended to be serene, though the spindling razor wire lining the North, West and East walls detracts from this somewhat. The few visitors and security personell you pass don't even look twice at you. All they see is a man with a briefcase, who could be here for dozens of legitimate reasons. You see no patients.

Modern signage directs you to the reception area in the main medical facility. You also notice directions to the gardens, a gymnasium, a VA ward, and the East and West wings. From the exterior, the main medical facility is an institutional looking, three-storey sprawl. Stepping through, you find yourself in a sterile lobby. It doesn't really smell of anything. It's well-lit and surprisingly quiet. You hear only distant footsteps and telephones, wailing only for two or three rings before being answered. The woman at the reception desk speaks on the phone, relaxed. She looks up at you apologetically as she forwards a call elsewhere. She's fairly young and a little on the heavy side, with a plain sort of face and mousey hair. She hangs up, addressing you with a professional sort of false cheer.

Spoiler:

2009-10-31 01:47:41 Alcibiades rolls 2 dice to Disquiet 1,8 (1 success)
2009-10-31 01:47:23 Receptionist rolls 5 dice to Resist Disquiet 1,2,10,3,8, 1 (2 successes)
2009-10-31 01:48:28 Alcibiades rolls 4 dice to Empathy 6,2,10,1,5 (1 success)

"Can I help you?" she asks, smiling politely. The smile may be a little forced, but you read in it none of the irrational revulsion you're all too familiar with

OOC: I'm kind of new to STing Promethean, so we're in similar boats. A dialogue is handy, so if there's anything about the medium that's baffling, just ask..

"Well... I think the board of directors are in charge of hiring specialists, I could tell you who to contact..." the receptionist begins, "...unless it's the custodial position you're applying for."

She looks a little doubtful. It's possible that you look a little overqualified for a janitor's position. She continues regardless, opening a desk drawer near her feet. She tentatively bends to retrieve something. She seems to over-reach, straining something. She laughs awkwardly under laboured breath.

"Well good luck to you." She exhales, finding her balance before rummaging through the drawer. Eventually she emerges, placing two sheets of green paper bearing Bishopsgate's bland, modernized emblem. The information it asks for is fairly scant. Oddly, you see no mention of criminal background checks. You could barely fit 'Highschool Diploma' into the box provided to list formal qualifications. The receptionist looks down and nods, providing a ballpoint pen.

"You can fill that out right here, if you want. I'll get it to the head groundskeeper. If you've got a copy of your resume, that'd help with your application."

The receptionist pauses, as if unsure of how to broach a difficult topic. She laughs awkwardly once. She seems tired.

"You're not, like, writing a novel or anything like that, are you? I mean, this isn't research, is it?"

She stops herself, embarassed, as though realising she'd overstepped a social boundary.

"I'm real sorry to hear that." the receptionist offers, underwhelmingly, looking somewhat unsettled by your answer. She smiles the same painted-on smile as she puts your application to one side.

"If I can get this to Gene tonight... Gene's the head groundskeeper... could you interview tomorrow? I know he's been meaning to get an extra guy for the gardens for a while now."

OOC: Hey, sorry for the delay in both Promethean and Vampire. If you want, then we can fast forward to the interview tomorrow. PbP can move at a glacial pace, so it's a good idea to be conscious of what can be skipped/condensed etc. If you want, you can just provide a brief summary for how Al spends the night, possibly making, say, a research roll into Bishopsgates history if he visits a county archive or something. Up to you.