Inside the Cathedral

The nice thing about the doors of the Ark and Dove Cathedral was that, despite their comparatively smaller size, they swung shut almost as slowly as the massive metal door of Vault 101. Ellen crept into the cathedral several paces behind Woodrose. If the building had ever had interior walls or benches they'd long since been demolished in favor of crude pipe-and-cloth or stick-and-hide partitions. Some of them gave the appearance of sleeping areas, some of storage spaces. Some housed what looked to Ellen's eye like hydroponic rigs devoted to unusually large punga plants. None of them gave a very strong impression of hygiene; Ellen was silently glad for the Chinese stealth suit's sealed helmet.

There were more tribals inside the cathedral than out, some of them tending to the plants, others tending to their fellow tribals, and a few simply staring at the walls or giggling at things only they seemed able to see. Woodrose navigated around the less conveniently situated ones, making for the back of the cathedral at a brisk pace. Ellen had a hard time keeping close; she had to move slowly, and people tended to wander across her path. At the sight of a dark-haired, dark-bearded man with red paint around his eyes Woodrose raised one hand. "Jackson!" she called out. "Hey, Jackson!"

Ellen froze as Jackson turned their way, but the man gave no impression of seeing her. "I need to get to my praying grounds, Woodrose," he said. "The Enlightened One will be calling to me soon."

"Sure, no problem, won't take long," said Woodrose. And some other things, too, but Ellen didn't hear them. Someone was tapping her on the shoulder.

"I seeeeeeeeeeee you, spirit," said a man's voice much too close to her ear for her liking. "Maybe they can't, but I can."

Slowly, oh so slowly, Ellen turned her head to one side. The man looking at her was... well, he wasn't exactly looking at her, or even through the space where her stealth field indicated she'd be. His eyes had an unfocused look to them that suggested rather strongly he wasn't really seeing anything in this world, and that she just happened to be in his path. If there weren't other tribals near enough to hear him she would've shaken him off and continued on her way, but...

She risked a glance towards the far end of the cathedral. Jackson and Woodrose had vanished somewhere.

Maybe she could turn this to her advantage.

"So I see," she said, in what she hoped was a suitably mystical voice. "Well done, uh..."

"Toad," supplied the man helpfully. His scar, she couldn't help but notice, was particularly prominent and crooked. "Everybody calls me Toad."

"Toad," Ellen repeated. Well, she'd heard stranger. "Very well, Toad. I am-" She scrambled frantically for an answer that wouldn't require her to lie outright; one of Three Dog's radio broadcasts came suddenly to mind. "-the Lone Wanderer, and I've traveled far and wide across these lands, looking for one such as yourself to tell me of his people and their ways."

Toad's breath caught in his throat, and when he said "Really?", it reminded Ellen of nothing so much as a Vault child who'd just been given a completely intact comic book for her birthday. Brain-damaged he might be, and probably chemmed to kingdom come, but there was such a sincerity about that one chem-addled word...

"Really," Ellen said. "Come, let's walk away from the others, so that you and I can converse without disturbance."

Toad beamed again and set a meandering course for one of the cathedral's side doors. "I know just the place," he promised. "Come on. Nobody comes here."

'Here' was a vestibule of sorts, a minuscule room that had probably once held coats or instruments or something- Ellen was still only vaguely cognizant of what had actually gone on in churches before the Great War, other than the actual services. The important thing, it seemed, was that it was a small, dim space that had been mostly filled with junk over the intervening years. Toad moved a few pieces of what had once been some kind of furniture out of the way and settled down cross-legged on the floor. Ellen followed suit, and was relieved to note that the shadows mostly concealed the stealth field's blurring even from herself. "Is this your place, here, Toad?" she said gently. "I can see many things were here once."

Toad shook his head. "Nah," he said. "I don't have a place. We all have the same place. There's no such thing as 'mine', see. That's just crazy talk."

Ellen opted not to answer that.

"Are you still there, Wanderer?"

"Oh, yes," Ellen said quickly. "I was just considering your words. You have an interesting understanding. I haven't met very many humans who think like that."

Toad nodded soberly. "That's the way of this tribe," he said. "To think different. Jimson says, "The material world is destroyed and imperfect. We seek to release our mind from their tainted cages, so as to find a better world.""

"Is that-" She couldn't make herself say it. Instead, she rocked forward onto her knees and lightly ghosted the tips of her fingers over Toad's scar. "-why your people do this?"

"Oh, yes," said Toad. "We all have that in common. That's the part of us they take away because it holds us back. Makes us think too much about the everyday world."

How she was able to hold her tone steady Ellen never knew. Somehow she managed enough control to say, very quietly, "Who takes it away, Toad?"

The tribal shrugged. "I dunno," he said, and there was real regret in his tone. "It's a mystery. We go to the Bog to get the seeds from Mother Punga, and we see Her visions. And when the visions fade, we don't have that part of us any more, so we come back here to learn to free the rest of our minds."

"I see," said Ellen. "Does that happen a lot?"

"I dunno," said Toad after some thought. "I kind of lost track of numbers. One, two, many, lots."

"Part of your … enlightenment?"

"Yep," said Toad with a smile. "They were holding me back, so I forgot them. Had to use Jackson's mushrooms at first but I don't even think about them now."

"Jackson, your leader," Ellen hazarded; Toad nodded, so she continued without pause. "He knows the Enlightened One. Do you?"

"Mmmnope," said Toad, and hung his head sadly. "I wanted to, though. I thought if I could just speak with the Enlightened One once, he'd help me transcend even further. But Jackson caught me trying to follow him to his praying place, and told me to go away. Said I wasn't ready."

"Well, that wasn't very nice of him," said Ellen. "If all your people are pursuing enlightenment, you should all be allowed to try."

"You really think so?" said Toad. His look of soulful longing would probably have worked a little better if it weren't directed at a spot about a foot and a half to Ellen's left.

"The only way to know if you're truly ready is to test yourself," said Ellen, "not just to take somebody's word for it. Would you like me to visit Jackson, and say this to him?"

"That would be wonderful, Wanderer," said Toad. "That- that would be so wonderful."

"You've been very helpful, Toad, and I've learned much about your people today," Ellen said. "I think I owe you for this. Take me to the path that leads to his praying place, and I will find Jackson myself. I need to talk to him."