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[Atadiusti]

Originally, I was going to prologue the entire story with this legend, but when I orated the legend to my friends, I discovered it wasn't interesting enough alone to be a hook, and that I, telling it as a legend, like Atlantis or Camelot was missing something. I realized that I couldn't have Mort tell the legend uninterrupted. Like The Genetic Opera, it is a story that needs interruptive thoughts. And Prof. Thibodeaux is the kind of gentleman who can't contain his thoughts, and thus, was the perfect tool to create a better telling of the legend.

 

 

 

 

 

 

MORTIMER: Long ago, when the world was young, there was a society called Legueré that was made up of three islands: Atlantis, Lemuria, and Cook. The Legueren people had technology far beyond the rest of the world. When Babylon had yet to build the hanging gardens, the Leguerens had electricity, advanced medicine, plumbing, and the power of flight. But the king of Legueré, against the wishes of most of his people, wanted to build an empire that spanned the entire Earth. He had a weapon built, a weapon of unimaginable power, in order to achieve this goal.

However, by accident or by design, the weapon was sabotaged. When the weapon was unleashed, its power backfired, and caused a massive destructive cataclysm. The Earth shook, the seas boiled, and the islands began to sink into the ocean.

For Atlantis and Lemuria, there was no hope, but Cook was saved, at the last moment. I've heard that The island of Cook only survived through attaching itself to the back of a gargantuan turtle The remaining island continued its existence floating about the sea on the back of the sea turtle. Soon, however, the survivors realized that they had to regain their former technological glory, as much of their advancements were lost in the cataclysm, and still more had to be relearned in time, so they engulfed themselves and the turtle in a cloud to hide themselves from the outside world and give them time to rebuild.

 

WAHLTER: The people of Cook became travelers and traders by necessity, but eventually, it became a cultural way of life.

 

MORTIMER: That's not true at all. Cook has always had a fascination with the other cultures in the world. It's practically an ethnic trait. In fact, it's about the only one there is, aside from wanderlust. Cook is made out of a collage of different peoples from all over the world.

 

WAHLTER: My apologies, lad, I can't help interjecting sometimes. I have not heard that version of events before.

 

MORTIMER: Understandable, sir. Now back to the story: It's been said that you can't find Cook unless you've the true spirit of a Cooki, although some mariners and explorers throughout history claim to have been shipwrecked and washed upon their shores.

 

WAHLTER: Yes. I have compiled a list of accounts by those who claim to have Cook. The last documented account made by a man who washed up on Cook's shores was in 1702.

 

MORTIMER: The legend goes that soon after, the Island of Cook took to flight. Maybe the turtle had died, no longer able to ferry the island, and the Cookis built a flying contraption to keep the island from sinking into the seas. From then on it was crewmen of airships - not boats - that crash-landed upon Cook. Even these pilots are widely thought of as insane or delirious, but I know that Cook is still out there, floating through the sky, hidden in a cloud.

Edited April 19, 2010 by Atadiusti