The Capitol grounds had always been a place of power, but in this new Austin, it had taken on a different role. The Archivists had set up here, in the shadow of the once towering monument, to record and preserve the cultural history of the city and its indigenous people.
The Archivists were an integral part of the Great Project. Their purpose was to break free from the myopic view of Western colonialism and delve into the depth of local knowledge, the cultural wisdom and practices of the indigenous communities that had long been overlooked. UNESCO had provided a framework, but it was Chi Luu’s writings that had galvanized their mission.
The Archivists worked tirelessly to gather data, even in the most conflict-ridden zones of the city. They made use of an old system called Safecast, repurposed to serve their needs. They recorded every story, every anecdote, every piece of knowledge they could find, restoring the fading voices of the indigenous communities.
In the heart of the Capitol grounds, they had erected a makeshift school where they taught Tlingit, a language on the verge of extinction. It was a defiant act of cultural preservation, a testament to their commitment to ensuring that the wisdom of the past did not get lost in the ashes of progress.
As the dusk set in, the grounds buzzed with an indescribable energy. Archivists huddled in groups, whispering in Tlingit, their voices melding with the soft rustling of the leaves. But amidst this peaceful scene, there was a brewing storm. An old conflict was resurfacing, threatening to shatter the harmony they had worked so hard to create.
The Archivists had unearthed a cultural artifact of great significance - an ancient Tlingit amulet, which was believed to be a talisman of immense power. Now, different factions within the community were vying for its control. The Capitol grounds, once a symbol of unity and cultural resurgence, was on the brink of becoming a battlefield, unless a resolution could be found, and quickly.
đźš® W.A.S.T.E.: Words Assisting Sustainable Transformation & Ecology
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| (Underground) (0.00) | Amidst the tranquility of a botanical garden lies a hidden passage to an underground archive, its entrance marked by a cryptic stone carving. This secluded realm, a haven of esoteric literature, beckons the advanced student and researcher to delve into mysteries veiled in ancient manuscripts, awaiting the touch of the curious to unveil their arcane knowledge. |
| Bottle Oracle (0.00) | The patient vessel that whispers future flavors, revealing secrets only with time. |
| Calibration Arc (0.00) | Practice of local repair, reuse, mutual care, and shared access. People use scrap, skills, and trust to keep each other safe and resourced when official systems fail. |
| Cane of Blossoms (0.00) | An elder’s staff that grows as both root and record, carrying wisdom in living wood. |
| Cartograph Skin (0.00) | A living map whose ink flexes like veins, charting not where you are but where you are becoming. |
| Climate Change (0.00) | Climate change: it's one of the most pressing issues of our time, an urgent and pervasive challenge that calls for innovative solutions and transformative action. In this section, we will explore the intersection of climate change and urban development in Austin, Texas, through the lens of ReLeaf, a local company that's pioneering green solutions with their vertical gardens. The company's work provides not just environmental benefits but also a framework for social and economic resilience in the face of climate change. Through insightful articles and imaginative SolarPunk fiction, we'll delve into ReLeaf's unique approach to mitigating the effects of climate phenomena like El Niño. Additionally, we will examine how the company's initiatives are creating a model of resiliency that can inspire and be replicated in cities worldwide. So, join us on this journey as we explore how ReLeaf is reimagining the future, empowering communities, and combating climate change, one vertical garden at a time. Let's learn together, draw inspiration, and envision a future where climate resiliency is woven into the fabric of our cities. |
| Cultural Shift (0.00) | This section tracks how values, habits, and public space change when a city commits to circular practice. In Austin, neighbors trade skills, repair before buying, and design for reuse. Rings of contribution replace price tags. Libraries, depots, and gardens become the new main street. The mycelial network carries stories, trust, and logistics. Culture moves from me to we without losing room for individual expression. What you will find here: • Signals: new words, rituals, and cues that mark progress. • Practices: repeatable actions you can start this week. • Places: sites where the change is already visible. • Stories: Organic Fiction that lets readers rehearse the future. • Metrics: simple counts that show whether care is growing. Use this to learn, copy what works, and leave your own trace. The shift is live. Help steer it. |
| Echo Lanterns (0.00) | Paper moons that carry voices from past and future, glowing with unspoken memory. |
| Eva Marquette (0.00) | A brilliant strategist and field operative driven by conviction more than faith. Once a scientist within ReLeaf, Eva turned rebel after uncovering The Gardener’s manipulation of bioengineered ecosystems. Focused, sharp, and quietly defiant, she balances intellect with intuition, often serving as Langley’s moral compass and tactical equal in the fight to reclaim Future Austin’s freedom. |
| Floor 1 (0.00) | Welcome, intrepid explorer! You find yourself standing on the First Floor of the sprawling ReLeaf Organic Media Collections & Botanical Gardens. A sense of wonder washes over you as you realize you're surrounded by a wealth of knowledge and natural beauty. Directly ahead, you see two grand, ornate doors. Each door leads to one of the most visited rooms within this treasure trove of a library. One door is adorned with intricate designs of rivers and creeks, signaling the entrance to the Watersheds Collection. The other door is decorated with an array of book spines, bookmarks, and paper leaves, inviting you into the Big Free Library. In the Watersheds Collection, you can immerse yourself in writings and other media that celebrate beloved watersheds like Shoal Creek, Waller Creek, and even Marigold Town's very own Settler's Creek. It's a room where each creek, river, and tributary tells its own story, awaiting your discovery. Alternatively, step into the Big Free Library—a haven for book lovers. This ever-growing collection is dedicated to promoting the circulation of books and other forms of organic media. Here, every shelf offers a new adventure, a new perspective, and an opportunity to engage with the world in a different way. Now, adventurer, the choice is yours: Which room will you explore first? |
| Forgotten Ledger (0.00) | The invisible account of lives and selves recorded in fleeting traces like receipts, mirrors, and margins, always half-remembered yet never erased. |
| Future Austin (0.00) | Future Austin invites you to explore a luminous vision of the city’s tomorrow—where imagination and reality intertwine to create a thriving, sustainable urban landscape. Here, grassroots ingenuity and cutting-edge technology power communities, transforming Austin into a place of boundless possibility. Through insightful articles and evocative Organic Fiction, you’ll glimpse futures shaped by innovators like ReLeaf, whose bold strategies—such as Vertical Garden Fairs in schools—seed green revolutions in unexpected places. From unconventional movements like Trash Magic reimagining music distribution, to fictional worlds alive with unseen energy and harmony, this collection offers both practical inspiration and immersive storytelling. Whether you’re drawn to actionable sustainability or simply wish to lose yourself in tales of a resilient, radiant future, Future Austin points toward the city we could create—and the one we must. |
| Immigration (0.00) | Immigration is a topic that often triggers passionate debates and stands at the intersection of economic, social, and cultural issues. However, within these complex debates, stories of innovation and integration often emerge, highlighting how communities and companies can play pivotal roles in shaping the immigration narrative. In this section, we turn our attention to Austin, Texas, and the remarkable efforts of a local enterprise, ReLeaf. Through their vertical gardens initiative, ReLeaf has addressed the challenges and embraced the opportunities of immigration in a unique and inspiring way. We delve into how ReLeaf is providing sustainable employment and community engagement opportunities for immigrants. We explore the company's role in assisting individuals in their journeys from homelessness to empowerment, and how it leverages this process to create positive change on a wider scale. Join us as we uncover the transformative power of community-driven action in addressing immigration. As we venture into this narrative, we invite you to consider the potential of similar initiatives to inspire positive change and foster integration in communities around the globe. |
| Neon Spores (0.00) | Fictional festival or real infection, a cultural bloom that disperses memory like pollen, seeding futures that never officially happened. |
| Organic Media and Fiction (0.00) | The rapid pace of urbanization and its environmental impact has inspired various speculative genres in literature and media. Organic Media and Fiction, a recent addition, offers a refreshing counter-narrative to dystopian futures, focusing on optimistic, sustainable societies powered by renewable energies. ReLeaf, an Organic Media and Fiction-inspired platform, epitomizes this genre by blending reality with narratives that envision a world where humans coexist harmoniously with nature and technology. ReLeaf's ethos is rooted in the belief that a hopeful future of sustainable living is not just an ideal but a reality. It combines engaging storytelling, visual arts, and direct action to showcase the possibilities of an Organic Media and Fiction future. By merging immersive narratives with tangible solutions, ReLeaf serves as both a creative outlet and a catalyst for change. The narratives in ReLeaf are set in cities that integrate renewable energy and green technology into their architecture, infrastructure, and daily life. From urban gardens atop skyscrapers to solar-powered public transport, these stories offer a glimpse of future urban landscapes grounded in existing technologies and practices. They provide an encouraging perspective on how our cities could evolve by amplifying sustainable practices we are already exploring. ReLeaf's stories feature diverse, inclusive, and community-oriented societies, emphasizing social justice, community empowerment, and equitable resource distribution. These narratives reflect societal structures that could foster a balanced coexistence, highlighting the importance of these values in creating a sustainable future. Beyond storytelling, ReLeaf engages in direct action, promoting real-world initiatives that echo Organic Media and Fiction principles. By supporting community-led renewable energy projects and sustainable urban farming, ReLeaf bridges the gap between the Organic Media and Fiction vision and our present reality, making the dream of a sustainable future feel achievable. ReLeaf broadens the understanding of the Organic Media and Fiction genre by presenting a balanced blend of reality and narrative. It underscores that Organic Media and Fiction is not just a literary genre or aesthetic movement, but a lens through which we can view and shape our future. The Organic Media and Fiction vision put forth by ReLeaf invites us to imagine, innovate, and create a future where sustainability is the norm. By intertwining fiction with reality, it presents Organic Media and Fiction as a plausible future, offering a hopeful counterpoint to narratives of environmental doom. ReLeaf helps us believe in—and strive for—a future where humans live in harmony with nature and technology. |
| Seeded Silence (0.00) | The fragile peace that grows in the pauses between people, fragile yet nourishing like bread with tiny seeds of memory. |
| Tradescantia pallida (0.00) | Tradescantia pallida is a species of spiderwort native to the Gulf Coast region of eastern Mexico. The cultivar T. pallida 'Purpurea' is commonly called purple secretia, purple-heart, or purple queen. Edward Palmer collected the type specimen near Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas in 1907. Tradescantia pallida is an evergreen perennial plant of scrambling stature. It is distinguished by elongated, pointed leaves - themselves glaucous green, sometimes fringed with red or purple - and bearing small, three-petaled flowers of white, pink or purple. Plants are top-killed by moderate frosts, but will often sprout back from roots. The cultivar T. pallida 'Purpurea' has purple leaves and pink flowers. Widely used as an ornamental plant in gardens and borders, as a ground cover, hanging plant, or - particularly in colder climates where it cannot survive the winter season - houseplant, it is propagated easily by cuttings (the stems are visibly segmented and roots will frequently grow from the joints). Numerous cultivars are available, of which 'Purpurea' with purple foliage has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.
Support this species by reading about it, sharing with others, and donating monthly or yearly to the ReLeaf Cooperative in honor of Tradescantia pallida. We deliver any quantity of these, for free, to any ReLeaf site (Free Little Library or other suggested location in the Shoal Creek, Waller Creek, and Fort Branch watersheds). We are currently seeking cooperative members in Austin and beyond to cultivate and provide Tradescantia pallida and other species for free to ReLeaf sites in their local watersheds. Inquire by email: bryceb@releaf.site. Thanks! |