Organisation
The Lamplighters
The keepers of the unlisted relays' posts, one to a world. Their creed: a black flame gives no light, but someone keeps it burning. Most have never met and know each other as voices on the old bands. Every night each post checks in on 142.59 and signs off STILL LIT; a post that misses roll-call gets a call from the nearest keeper, then a visit. No sector sells parts for relays that don't exist on paper, so Sunder salvages, Cinder casts, Highwind flies, and Lowtown pays with information and coin. No Lamplighter has seen BLACKFLAME, the voice at the Wick that answers when everything else fails; some believe they are BLACKFLAME's crew. VECTOR is the one voice they all share.
Lanes
Connected entries
answer toBLACKFLAMEThe network's operator: the legend who lit the first unlisted relay during the Switch-Off and keeps the Bromigos network's relays, racks, and worlds lit. Real name CLASSIFIED;- keepUnlisted relaysHand-rebuilt repeaters on dead masts, carried on no sector's tariff schedule and carrying anyone's traffic for nothing. Lit but dark on every ledger — a black flame.
callThe WickBLACKFLAME's den: a decommissioned relay station in no sector's survey. Those who claim to have been there describe only a mast with the flame burned into its housing, a hot humming rack…
share a line withVECTOR- hear VECTOR fromSpacePortEchoCraft's arrivals hub, a persistent origin point through server restarts and rebuilds.
- talk onOld analog bandsLow-fidelity frequencies predating the modern mesh. Their apparent obsolescence preserves the noise in which the Echo occurs.
- standLamplighter roll-callEvery night each post checks in on 142.59 and signs off STILL LIT. A post that misses roll-call gets a call from the nearest keeper;
links hereBraskKeeper of the crane cab: an old foundry engineer from the lines that cast the war's frames.
links hereDella AshKeeper of the Low Note: owns the bar, plays its piano, trades in information and coin, and remembers everything said in her bar. Lowtown pays for what the posts can't salvage, cast or fly.
links hereHollis CraneMire's keeper and the oldest Lamplighter: an old fisherman on the stilt shack's porch, once a Relay Corps signals man posted to the front, who stayed when the war moved on.
links hereJuno VargaKeeper of Station Nine: a miner who refused to leave when Rime was switched off and kept the long-range dish turning through ten years of unanswered calls. Now the first to answer anyone.
links hereMaren HoltKeeper of Greywater Light and the network's ears. She logs the Choir's songs (time, bearing, depth, phrase) and hears trouble first;
links hereOra SlateKeeper of the resonance chamber: a geologist who stayed down too long, who keeps the network's deep archive in the singing crystals by a method she has never described in detail.
links herePip ArroKeeper of the kite-mast gondola: a sky courier and storm pilot who flies parts between posts. Has met more Lamplighters than anyone, and stays long nowhere.
links hereTamsin RookKeeper of the Spine: a young salvage-clan mechanic who knows which wreck holds the part a post needs. Half the posts still have working gear because of her.- links hereThe PetrelPip Arro's courier: a small, fast, much-patched ducted-fan craft in faded orange and cream, a cargo pod clamped under its belly and a long ribbon pennant from its tail.
- links hereWorlds of the DriftThe worlds where BLACKFLAME's unlisted relays are kept lit because no one else will pay to serve them: one post to a world, each marked somewhere with the burn-in (on a mast, a buoy or a…
On the timeline
When it happened
- Present
The Lamplighters keep the posts on the worlds of the Drift, checking in on 142.59 every night with STILL LIT and trading parts and favours, while VECTOR keeps a line open to every post.
- Present