NeoPrimitives

In the early days of the new age many humans turned their backs on what they saw as the wasteful ways of their fellow race and voluntarily went outworld, seeking to reconnect with nature. Sadly by this time there was very little nature left and now it is more common to find tribes of NeoPrimitives scavenging in derelict vehicles and ruined settlements than working the land or herding animals. Some hardy plants such as cacti have managed to survive the changing climate and a few NeoPrimitives succeed in coaxing rudimentary gardens to grow, though these are often raided by Trash Runner gangs who trade the crops inworld as novelty items. Rats, pigeons and cockroaches, survivors of the wildlife holocaust, are held to be sacred and are domesticated and farmed by a handful of tribes. Stone is still a common material for NeoPrimitives and the majority of their tools are fashioned partly from old machinery and partly from hewn rock.

Neo-Primitives are largely concerned with survival and they rarely come into contact with others except when the areas of land they have picked as their tribal territory is passed across by Runners or desired by the ReFrat or collectives. Their scavenging activities sometimes cause them to come into conflict with Runners or Artisans also looking for valuable waste, occasionally members of a tribe will be employed to lead searchers to caches of hidden scrap. Payment is usually in the form of manufactured goods which the Neo-Primitives openly shun, but are often secretly glad of.

Beliefs and superstitions vary from one NeoPrimitive tribe to another, with myriad local myths, spirits and rituals. Almost all look to the past with rose-tinted sunglasses and believe there will be a messiah who will rescue them and lead them back to a glorious future-past. The closest they have to an organised religion is Consomarism, which teaches there was once a time when goods were given freely to those who went to the great temples and signalled their need by presenting pieces of coloured paper or swiping plastic cards containing personal messages. They claim that the great god Consomar initiated and oversaw this interaction in order to ensure justice and wellbeing for all. But people took his generosity for granted and neglected their own responsibilities so prophets were sent to warn the world of its greed. The primitives speak of JC and the Green Two who tried to awaken mankind to its folly, provoking demonstrations and riots, but whose claims were largely ridiculed or ignored. The religion of Consomarism is prevalent among wastelander communities hoping for a return to better days and looking for the next great prophet to be revealed. How this will happen is uncertain but the priests speak of a ‘Magic Money Tree’, a plant with rectangular, patterned leaves, which will bloom and herald that the messiah walks upon the wastes.

Any wastelander may visit the outer courts of a temple of Consomar. By presenting the priests with a piece of scrap (anything will do, it is merely a token) they will receive access to the market halls and medical services provided within. The exchange of a symbolic item for the ’retail therapy’ and ’cosmetic surgery’ experience is known as curancy and is one of the ancient mysteries of Consomarism. It is largely only indulged in by traditionalist NeoPrimitives.

The lowest rank of the hierarchical priesthood of Consomar is the curate, one who participates in the daily rituals of curancy. Once their initiate training is complete they may advance to reverend doctor. A few priests of Consomar take to walking the wastes, evangelising to the lost.

A NeoPrimitive tribe will make its home in or from the wreckage of abandoned cities, collections of rusting vehicles or old quarries. Among the shattered concrete and oxidised steel shells they call home the NeoPrimitives favour one material above all others. The most admired houses are those built of reconstituted chipboard, to the great confusion of outsiders. Their settlements are ringed with barricades of rubble and junk, often piled into forms of people or long-extinct animals. Beyond the stockade the NeoPrimitives consider their sacred hunting grounds to stretch many miles in all directions. Often they will demand a toll for crossing their land or will outright deny passage. Wise Trash Runners befriend the tribes along their routes with choice items from their cargos. Although poorly equipped, malnourished and superstitious, NeoPrimitives have become at one with their harsh environment and are not to be underestimated when their tribe or lifestyle is threatened.

Each NeoPrimitive community will have a character known as the ‘Bice Doktor’. They live hermit-like existences in the sacred hunting grounds and are a place to seek wisdom and guidance. Bice Doktors are not condoned by the priests of Consomar, who see them as alarmingly eccentric and pseudo-scientific. Nevertheless all but the most devout believers of Consomarism will trust their personal troubles to a Bice Doktor before they would consider disclosing to one of the priesthood.

The tents and shacks of Bice Doktors are adorned with gears of all shapes and sizes, hanging from chains which clatter in the wind. It is said that before the fall of civilisation and the dawn of the new age Bice Doktors played an essential part in the fight to prevent the fuel crisis. Now they speak as oracles, consulting the gears and listening to the voices in the wheels to prophecy and give guidance. The wheels are great rings of metal, bisected by numerous thin spokes which they tension and tap with spanners to play a haunting, ringing music which echoes around the desolate canyons. Sometimes Doktors far away will hear the delicate strains carried on the wind and will add their own wheels to the symphony.

Bice Doktors are deeply suspicious of vehicles, whose loud engines drown out the delicate voices of the wheels. Most will simply cower when there is the sound of motors nearby and refuse to speak to anyone who brings an engine onto their grounds. Some, however, are fiercely militant about the sanctity of their land and will attack or set their local tribe upon those who profane the sacred grounds with track and tyre.

A prized relic for NeoPrimitive scavengers is the artefact they call ‘the Brick’. Bricks are rectangular devices of many different designs. Some have a pad of buttons, some have small, stubby projections or panels which flip open. Some are entirely composed of a single, shiny panel. All of them have a shiny panel of some size which can be made, by esoteric means, to glow and reveal pictures, sounds and messages from a time long past. Bricks are not an uncommon find, they seem to have been widely produced at one time, but it is rare to find one which has the shiny panel in tact and which can be made to reveal its hidden treasures. On the rare occasion one is activated it becomes a race to access and catalogue as much of the data as possible before the Brick goes dark again. A disjointed account of Brick revelations is kept in a special place in the meeting house of each neoPrimitive tribe.

The artefacts bear a similarity to terminals used within the GenCity and CycCentre complexes, and indeed hacker’s hides and all of inworld, places that would seem wondrous to any Primitive who set foot within. Other, more tech-savvy factions would probably have a good chance of being able to ‘awaken’ the Bricks. Unfortunately, Bricks are kept close as sacred links to the past by Primitives who find them and they are unlikely to be willing to relinquish them for study. As a result they may never know the full contents and meaning of the devices they carry with them. Most believe them to contain all the wisdom and knowledge of ancient cultures which will be unveiled at the advent of the new messiah.