[center][h1]Witch's Revival[/h1][/center][center][h2]The River that runs from the Mountain to the Glade[/h2][/center] 

[center][hider=The Mountain][img]http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/no-turning-back/images/4/4c/81a9e333aa3fe8969197027c43db4309.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20160928204807[/img][/hider][/center]

Deep in the heart of Cryogenics the only light to be found was cast by blue interfaces on slumbering machinery. The ever present frosted glass defused the harsh panel's light into a soft glow that provided a tranquil ambiance to anyone whom found themselves patrolling the deep freezer. In the passing moments the silence was broken by the automatic restart sequence as a lever slid down the stacks to retrieve a pod. 

Far outside grating slid to one side, and the heavy standard-issue boots of Vitate security trudging up from the ship's underbelly filled the halls. These rumbling low noises were burred beneath chanting of fervent women twelve in number. Before the procession was allowed to enter from the causeway, their Arc Security escorts ensured that the area was clear so that the ritual would not be interrupted. Once secured, and their right of rite of passage produced, two columns of six women were allowed to proceed up into the antechamber from the tunnels that housed the sewage and water lines.

The mouth of the River came only so far as the foot of the Mountain, and from its depths the faithful walked to the entrance to Cryogenics from the nearest access point. With the faithful came the song, and the chanting continued. With it the foremost and rearmost pair of crones burned thyme as they sang. The rest carried censers of ornate cast iron in which mistletoe leaves smoldered. 

The twelve formed into an octagon with eight on the circumference and a square of four in the middle. Frozen chrysanthemum petals flit and fluttered from their hooded cloaks as they danced barefoot across the chilled deck plating. The perfect precision with which the group sang and danced their spiral reflected the dedication they had to these proceedings, and their mastery which required a month's practice. Despite having come up from the ship's sewers there was no indicators of passing through it. They did not carry the tell-tale scent of damp piping, or insulation, and instead had about them the crisp scent of fresh grave dirt wrought into their very being. 

[center][hider=The Song][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04fEWQOwUD4[/youtube][/hider][/center]
As the spiral dance of the outer eight made its way outward the inner four kneeled facing inward in anticipation of the ship's acknowledgement of their presence. The timing was perfect in that the moment the song and dance came to its end, they had found themselves in a large chamber with the Viate's most annoyed technician whom oversaw the defrosting procedure. A large mechanical arm delivered one particular cryopod from the stacks, to the place of rest's end, and placed it in the center of the coven's gathering. Particularly on the reactivation node which they had enshrined in sacred geometry inked with the oil of milk thistle. To anyone outside of the traditions these practices would seem arbitrary, as would the choice of plants, but anyone within the traditions would know the meaning: that the plants were carefully chosen and prepared for this ritual. That they are what they represent and represent what they are.

There was no question of the revery with which those attending paid to the dreamer who dwelled with death in chamber of cold-heart. The question of legality of the proceedings had been settled years in advance. That, on this day, the High Priestess of the Old Religions would rise up from her bed of ice, on the Mountain where cold is kept, and return to lead her people. In the months prior they, the most devout, had walked the whole River in preparation for this moment: the moment awakening—of walking from the Mountain to the Glade. It was with some reluctance that their escorts walked with them but now the walking was nearly done.

Under the glass canopy of the cryopod a thick mist was being pumped out through attached hoses as to prevent leak in the closed system. Only the slightest trace of mist entered the sterile air of the medical facility as the canopy slid upward and back revealing the witch. With life returned the support umbilicals monitoring her vitals disconnected, and fell away, and the Keeper of Traditions opened her eyes. The chanting resumed as she braced her hands on the lip of the pod—one on either side—and hoisted herself up into a sitting position. A wave of relief and love washed out of her to her followers and then back from them to her. With great effort and imitate assistance she herself from the pod and into the circle. A circle that the mechanical arm reached into and retrieved the pod as she stepped out of it, and return it to whence it came. With the circle now complete it was time to return to the River and follow it back to the Glade.

[center][hider=The River][center][img]http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_XZT8hRUkuPc/TCmIe7EyHJI/AAAAAAAAD88/9coXXbMZRYo/s1600/rt0_01.jpg[/img]
[/center] [url=http://derrickhammond.blogspot.co.uk]Source[/url][/hider][/center]
Rather than launch into an address the awoken sleeper instead resumed the chanting, and with her the other twelve joined in. They reformed their columns and danced their way back into the Vitae's water access channels. They were followed by security escort whom closed the access hatch behind them. Through this, the Vitae's River, they marched down stream to where the water of life flowed. Ever toward the hub. While one might expect the procession to proceed to the Garden of Eden, such a person might also expect them to walk on the streets of man. No. Instead they were swept away in the River and lead deep underneath to the glades: the place which sprung up from the natural convergence for the Vitae's ley-lines.

When entering the Glades one needn't step up out of the River, as they did at the mouth of the Mountain, since it simply poured into the open. In a practical sense the Glades was a series of open catwalks, back-alley junctions, and forgotten access corridors and maintenance shafts. By modern societal standards it was a dingy and dismal place, but to these witches it was the Vitae in its most natural living state. Though it may be thought strange to describe the Vitae in the same manner one would a planet it was their world now, and it had in it all that which a planet does; if only in a modified form. The Glade was a perfect representation of that as even the druids could feel the power in this place. 

[center][hider=The Glade][img]http://www.ocpstudios.com/images/samprenders/Render-02.jpg[/img][/hider][/center]
As their voices swelled in its halls, and open spaces, the faithful whom tended to the Glade came to meet their priestess and join in song and dance. Dance to the place of ceremony where the song might end and the stories begin. Stories of the other realm. There they gathered and there she would tell them of her travels through the spirit world that their frozen families inhabited.

To speak at gathering was a great honor often reserved for the few of wisdom and experience, but in this time of unity all were invited to share and many did. They did so in the most natural place. The place where the stories of Earth and her will was made manifest on the Vitae: the Geological Research Institute. A towering spire that stood amongst the water treatment facilities, and hydroponics bays of the hub's undercity. It was the place where Earth's will lived on through its children who replicated her processes so that others may yet live in her splendor. 

[center][hider=The Cathedral][img]http://68.media.tumblr.com/fbd8067b0b5e2e4a5e3290dc903b00e7/tumblr_nj55d82nse1spjmjdo1_1280.jpg[/img][/hider][/center]

While not all whom worked in this sacred space believe in, or were attuned to, its mystical nature as these devout followers—they were certainly aware of its sacred stature in the community. They did little to belittle those faiths as many of the sector's brightness minds in the field practiced their craft along side their work, and both benefited from it. After all, the Geological Research Institute being the Cathedral was the undercity's worst kept secret.