The Grey Places
by OldDog

>OldDog is a bit of a drifter, an old-timer magician who likes a different earth under his feet each night and a different sky above each morning. We got to talking over a jug of applejack the other day, and he got off onto a ramble about places he’d been. The Grey Places, he said, just on this edge between this world and the next, that were just magic…
>Johnny the Stump

The Stone
Where: Outside of Dartmouth, Massachusetts, UCAS
Now, you go talk to a druid if you want to hear about ley lines and stone circles and what-have-you. But if you go to Massachusetts, take a few long walks in the countryside. Outside the sprawl, where the old farms are dead and gone to wild, and there are stands of trees uncut from the primeval woodland. Queer things you can find in those New England woods, the mysterious monoliths and farmers' follies of yesteryear. Others might tell you to seek out Druid Hill, but listen to me when I tell you to look for what isn’t there.
	In the woods outside of sleepy Dartmouth, if your Sight is keen, you might find a line of power. Follow the sluggish undertow of the mana deeper into the woods, and you'll come across upon a crossroads, where it intersects another line, all but identical to the first. Planted at this nexus, amid a faint eddy of mana, lies the Stone.
	The Stone is old, a massive boulder of dark grey slate, dappled here and there by hardy lichen. Time and something else have weathered and shaped the Stone, so that is seems to be a rough obelisk in shape, taller than a troll. When I came onto the Stone, it was dusk, and I lay down in front of it to sleep. The moon was full that night, and in my dream I saw a gate...an old passage into the wet earth, with a lintel made from three stones, as large and dark as the Stone itself. I passed through the gate and travelled on to the plane of earth, where I found a spell I sought.
	If you should find the Stone and enter the gate, best not to tarry long, but be about your business there. The gate closes at dawn the next day, and they say you’ll die if it closes before you come through it again. The Stone does not lie exactly in this world, I think. Its position cannot be marked to be found later, but the little stream of power must be found and followed again. Nor does it matter where the line of power is found, walk a mile down it's length you’ll find yourself again at the crossroads. 

>Sounds like some sort of alchera that opens up to an astral rift. If so, I'd be careful to get back to your body before dawn...especially if you're unitiated or mundane.
>Libros

The Forgotten Mound
Where: Murray County, Georgia, CAS
	The Indians of the South were mound-builders, kin to those of the Great Plains. In Georgia, you may still visit the biggest mounds. It is a nice way to spend a day, though if you're looking for power, I can't say you'll find any. I haven't. Some you can’t find, though. Back when Howling Coyote was doing his Dance, the people of the South were scared, and small places fell prey to vandals. In Murray County they say a group of boys killed a mound, a small one, about five feet across and five feet high. Broke it up with shovel and pickax, leaving a hole five feet wide and five feet deep. 
	Now, I say killed, because when the Mound died it left a ghost. A spectral place, an echo you can barely see on the darkest nights. Just sits there, chained to the hole where it was in life, emanating a deep and heartfelt sadness. The NAN still makes noises to the CAS about the management of the mound sites, but they're all worried about the bigger ones like Ocmulgee. No ones seems to know about this one. Maybe that's why it's so sad.
	I came across the Mound one moonless night, running from a posse. It glowed like faery-fire, and as I crept closer, it seemed to brighten, though the pit beneath it seemed darker than the mouth of Hell. Most likely I'll never know what possessed me to try and climb that ghostly pile. Blame it on my Indian blood. But I sat on that sorrowful mound, half-in and half-out of the Astral until morning, and they passed me by...like I was as much a ghost as that Mound was.

>How odd. This Mound sounds like an astral hollow crossed with a polarized ward. I wonder if OldDog's talk of AmerInd ancestry isn't the key.
>Libros

>It goes without saying, but if OldDog is right about the Forgotten Mound being an astral construct, you don't want to stand in the hole and try to astrally perceive or project! Be like manifesting inside a brick wall.
>Captain Obvious

Carhenge
Where: Alliance, Nebraska, UCAS
	Some damn fool back before the Awakening thought it would be peachy-keen to build a mock-up of Stonehenge on the Great Plains made from old automobiles. Then some other damn fool decided to rebuild it when part of it collapsed in 2035. John Rumbolt, a descendant of the Reinders family that built the site, owns it and maintains Carhenge as a “retreat” for urban shamans who need to lie low. The only spirits that can be called within the henge are city spirits. That’s why the city shamans like it there. No one knows how it works. A couple of druids came by once, as the story goes, and left flabbergasted. Hell, a couple of aspiring Pythagoreans-the magical equivalent of math majors in college-tried to plot out a sequence of manalines to major cities. It didn't work, of course. Nerds. Guess that’s one more little mystery.
	Me personally, I just think it’s damn ugly.

>OldDog's got the jist of it. No one knows why, but as far as your mojo's concerned, anywhere inside the circle is considered an urban domain. Anyone's welcome, reasonable rates. BYOML.
>Reinder Shaman

>BYOML?
>Hermie

>Bring Your Own Medicine Lodge.
>Oscar

Berkeley Boulders
Where: Berkeley, California Free State
	Now, when the glaciers receded, they dropped a lot of big rocks, and some of them landed in the hilly, pleasant territory that became the college town of Berkeley. Being forward-thinking liberal hippies, and the rocks too damn big to move, they made the things into parks.
	There’s little finer in life than a sunny day and a rock to climb, I say. In fact, the sheer number of rock climbers, mostly amateurs, in the place is astounding. Most of the rumors about “rock magic” at the parks is patently untrue…they don’t make better telesma or materials for foci, for one thing, and adepts don’t automatically gain insight into climbing-related powers. Of course, there is one thing that’s true: a few of them have developed hollows.
Shortly after the Year of the Comet, some University kids figured out that at the very middle of the largest or deepest buried boulders are hollows…some about the size of a man, some quite a bit larger. Not long after that, people started hearing knocking sounds from within…and some student mage took a little Astral look-see, drifted down through the living rock into the biggest hollow, and had himself a peek. Poor kid was down there too long though, his body died bereft of his astral self. The City's asked other magicians not to try the same thing.

>If this was in Europe, I'd say Berkeley was dealing with a family of Knockers, those little faerie in mines and caves.
>EuroLass

	Naturally, I dropped by. There's a good lore store in Berkeley, and you can't beat the bouldering, so no matter what I doubted it would be a wasted trip. I did a bit of dowsing first...wanted to find a better spot than that kid. Laid myself down on the rock and pushed through to...well, a little kingdom. I don't know if they're faeries, exactly-some of them almost look like Indians-but I can fairly say that they're there to stay.

>The Berkeley Boulders might be an astral gateway of some sort...or maybe these faerie-type beings really do live in the hollows in the rocks.
>Libros

The Shrine of Idoru
Where: Denver, Front- Range Free Zone
Saint Isadore of Seville, who wrote the world's first encyclopedia, has been considered a patron saint of communication in the Roman Catholic Religion since the turn of the century. Deckers have long appreciated the dual comforts of coffee shops and bars. Denver, home to the Nexus, and thus a great many deckers indeed, is home to the Shrine of St. Isadore Bar and Coffee Shop. Catering to an eclectic but steady clientele, the St. Isadore is best known for its Irish Coffee, nicotine gum, and the extensive line of pharmaceuticals it sells to “computer professionals,” most of whom also tend to be Nexus regulars.
	Around the back, though, is the Shrine of Idoru. Set up and maintained by a disparate collection of deckers, some connected to the Nexus, some not. The shrine consists of a small open-faced cave made from old-fashioned brick, mortared messily together by cement and shot-through with multicolored fiber optics. Inside is a small statue of a woman, vaguely resembling a Virgin Mary, and all manner of offerings...little dolls made from wire, My First Cyberterminal™ kits, kiddy stuff. It also holds an archaic Matrix plug-in. Many a decker or otaku lights a candle at the Shrine before a major run.
	Now, most people would tell you different, but there is some magic in that shrine…it’s a living place, not a dead part of the city at all. Sometimes, just sometimes, when a decker or otaku goes into the shrine, either to pay their respects or light a candle for a friend or leave a gift, they find a little charm…some appropriate piece of jewelry, like a ring, amulet or hair tassle, roughly made from part of an old deck. Old deckers consider this a sign of luck. I don’t know about that, but I pay my respects when I stop by, to whomever lives in the little house of the Shrine of Idoru.

>There's an archaic Matrix connection hidden at the back. It goes to a single host, which looks like an endless empty grey space. You can't do anything there or go anywhere, so it's useless. Weird.
>OtakuGhost

>Shows what you know, rugrat. The Spirit of the Shrine let's those of us who are Awakened and punch deck to journey from there. You have to jack in, with anyone who wants to come along hitched with you, and you take off like you're going to the metaplanes...but you end up in a different sort of place, where your Quest takes the form of a Matrixrun, challenging your skill at manipulating both magic and the Matrix. When you're done, the Spirit takes her price from you, which is pretty draining. But I figure it's worth it.
>DeckerAdept

>Naturally, the runs are color-coded. The easiest astral journeys take you through blue or green hosts, while the most dangerous and difficult journeys are red.
>Macky