Lodewick, Idaho
At least, that’s what the records in the town all say. The site was discovered by hikers in Idaho’s Salmon-Challis National Forest about three weeks ago, and the panic button was hit almost right away. The Lodewick ruins had literally (and this is not an abuse of the term ‘literally’) appeared overnight; the two hikers in question had walked the same trail the day before, and saw nothing but Idaho. And, as it happened, one of the hikers had the kind of job that would allow him to drop a governmental Cone of Silence over the entire site.
It’s not just an abandoned city; Lodewick is a deeply disturbing and creepy abandoned city. Judging from the skeletons, Lodewick had a population of at least ten thousand (roughly eight thousand of which were slaves); researchers think that the town had a ‘natural’ population of about fifteen thousand, but there’s nobody to ask. The architecture, layout, and artifacts on the site all suggest a technological level somewhere around the Edwardian level, with significant differences. And often highly unpleasant differences; for example, the streetlamps have integral wire nooses built into them and most buildings have shackles installed on the outer walls. The civic murals are even worse.
What few books survive are written in a somewhat idiosyncratic but readily understandable English. Unfortunately, none of them can definitely establish that Lodewick is from an alternate timeline, and there are enough references to dark magic to support the theory that the town had ‘merely’ been under a fairly powerful glamour for all these years. There are references to dates; the last one is in January of 1911, and it’s from a ledger cataloging how many people were sacrificed to something called That Which Stretches Sorrow over the previous twelve months. Turns out that there were a lot.
Which is probably why the place looks like a… there’s no real simile for this one. Lodewick was apparently subject to a slave revolt that burned down large sections of the town and slaughtered the entire population. At least, that’s how the forensics people are describing it, and the place has enough tableaux of pure horror to support the description. And, again; nobody knows exactly what Lodewick, or how it got there.
And the reports from the on-site research team have started to get… odd.
Area Knowledge: IQ+1
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That location would necessarily be an alternate reality intrusion.
There isn’t arable land in the area to support a fraction of that population. Adequate water would be difficult. It’s not a great site for mining, and poor for logging.
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I’d suggest moving it up to the St. Joe National Forest in the panhandle. The forest is *thick*. Lots of hardrock mining for heavy metals. Rare gemstones (star garnet) that might have esoteric uses. Plenty of agriculture potential (and plenty of actual agriculture a short truck ride away. Water is plentiful.
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But there is one useful reason to have a camp at the Challis location. It’s very close to the Idaho National Engineering Lsomethingorother. (Experimental nuclear reactors, and production of reactors for the Navy.)
Helpful info: Google Maps can only take one so far. 🙂
Unless it’s a deliberate plot point, might want to move the time line a tad closer to Lincoln’s proclamation 95 ..
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It does work as a deliberate plot point, of course .. just need to highlight one or two other artifacts .. a mention of grey uniforms would be subtle enough, or some Tarpley carbines if you want to boop the gun-nuts.
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Mew