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On a neolithic tundra, a woman in skins stalks an aurochs. She trails behind it, leisurely, determined. The huge ungulate's knees buckle with each laboured step. She'll strike when the animal can't run anymore.

Cordoning off the whole neighborhood, all-night shifts, non-stop abuse from everyone who can't get to their corner shop, or bar, or home...

A man sprinkles dried kibbles into a bowl. His companion pads around him, brushing against his ankles, tail fluttering. Streetlights smear against the window, but the fragile machinery of routine holds the world at bay.

16:42:17: START OF TRANSCRIPT - What is that? - Oh fuck, did we -- why's it turning? - Full power. [increase in ambient noise] - I gave it full power -- the speed -- [unintelligible] - Oh my god. Oh my god.

It's her, but from a dream.

You're in the presence of a power utterly beyond your comprehension.

Final epoch of the Pleistocene age. The measured, even breath of the huntress is the only thing that could betray her presence as she stalks the dire tiger in tightening circles.

The padlock on the door breaks easily. Dust motes in the air, a sneeze, a flashlight shining around the darkened room -- threadbare velvet, faded posters, a broken glass box office window.

Afternoon matinee -- plush red carpet, the frosted glass windows of the box office reflecting warm orange light.

Grey hairs at twenty-five, a memory of the barber who came in to trim daddy's moustache twice a week... two hours does seem a long time for such a small job...

Farther south, past the fraying edges of Party Alley, a man in a crisp tracksuit climbs into a heavily-loaded tuk-tuk. He adjusts the rearview mirror and checks himself. Verdict: 'dope'.

An evil alignment of celestial bodies, the spearhead of that dread constellation hanging directly over the heads of you and your old comrades.

All across the world, subjects of the Illuminated Empire are looking at trees like this, and thinking of home.

Ask the paleolithic part of your mind: Would the ancient huntress stalk the megalosloth with this band?

In a small recording studio deep in the Housing Campaign, a man slips his arms into an old military-style coat. He pops a tablet of pure L-theanine. On the desk nearby, a brown paper bag, reinforced with ultra-thin foil, waits for the head that will unleash its power.

Across time and space you feel another intelligence reaching out to you: insane, methodical, murderous.

A heavy voice through light static: 'CASCADE only, person to person! CASCADE or nothing!'

Flicking ashes out the window.

In a faraway hotel, a man presses the button for the lift. On the nineteenth floor, something waits for him that will change his life, if only he can figure out what it means.

A feline ancestor stalks the dark, snowy forests of Skaalslaand. While the cold forces other animals to shelter, the skaalskat paces through, leaving only deep prints from thick-furred paws and the blood of its prey behind.

A woman leans out the open window, shivering in the cool evening air. She tries not to blink. They've had to pack so quickly, this is the first chance she's had to try to memorise the view she's mostly ignored for the last six years.

High upon high, the Manus Fati swivels in its stars and raises a middle finger in PSEUDOPOD's general direction.

In a grey-curtained apartment on the fringes of Novessa, a mother has not heard from her son in days. She pulls her cardigan tighter around her shoulders and tells herself the odd dream she had last night meant nothing at all.

Whips of dust blown by helicopter blades. Thud of boots on ground, billow of trench coats, steel cackle of assault rifles. The Empire Without Territory descends.

Within the hull, Ultra Violeta clasps her keyboard to her chest and stares unblinking at her damp shoes.

You can hear the prayers of the tribespeople echoing up from the pass:

A twelve year old child in the gun-crafting colonies of Dream of Rustam makes the exact same movement.

Clang. A can clattering down, cutting through the Bazaar's noise. Patrons walking around, sipping cold coffee.

WHAT WILL YOU SAY TO THAT CRUEL ANGEL --

A five-year-old girl in oversized sunglasses taps a tiny hand on her knee in perfect time with the backbeat -- emanating like a homily from the car speaker.

The last thing the peasant class of Saskia saw before the bombs in close-up -- Ultra Violeta's face winking at them from behind her trademark 'V' salute.

In a dim recording studio in the Luzian capital of Cicatriz Frontera, a young girl and an old man discuss an unfolding of light. A cultural hypernova. A map across the stars.

A middle-aged vendor begins carefully laying sheets of tarpaulin over his wares. As he smooths out the creases, he hums an intimate melody meant for no one but himself.

A middle-aged vendor carefully arranges his wares in accordance with a strict personal algorithm. As he does, he hums an intimate melody meant for no one but himself.

Songs can haunt you longer than people. All the way to the end of a life, on perpetual loop in the background of your mind.

A six-year-old girl slowly lifts the corner of a heavy white sheet with frayed edges. Behind the sheet is a mirror. There is no one else in the living room. The girl catches a glimpse of herself and drops the sheet in shock.

Four young women bound in holding cells. The interrogations have not yet been violent, but they have been ruthless.

You can't quite shake the feeling that this girl is seeing visions of your death as you talk and keeping them all to herself.

In an apartment block in a suburb of Novessa, twenty minutes by commuter rail, a middle aged woman watches a few seconds of a heavily censored erotic thriller before changing the channel. An open can of treacly liqueur has gone warm next to her.

Solo-karaoke, no one around to hear her shout-singing along to the griefsludge disc she keeps in her bag for days like this.

Somewhere in a designer hotel, a bleach-clean prison where she waits for her one-way trip to the moon, a twenty-one year-old pop sensation feels a chill, followed by a sudden, uncontrollable bout of nausea.

The paleolithic huntress exhales as she fondles the precious river stone, the primal superstition inside her calmed -- for the moment.

You are milking your lucky cow dry, take it easy on him. Once a day is more than enough.

The paleolithic huntress exhales as she fondles the precious river stone, the primal superstition inside her calmed -- for the moment.

You're milking your lucky cow dry, take it easy on him. Once a day is more than enough.

Every once in a while he accidentally wanders close to the edges of his limited experience in the world, and when he does a deep and primal fear enters his eyes.

The paleolithic huntress exhales as she fondles the precious river stone, the primal superstition inside her calmed -- for the moment.

The paleolithic huntress exhales as she fondles the precious river stone, the primal superstition inside her calmed -- for the moment.

It's never going to work like that. You have to believe.

344 skill checks - ZERO PARADES field manual - Page 5 of 7