4345.236 · August 24, 2025 AD
Borrowed Faces, Broken Trails
Beatrix Cramer survives on invention—faces borrowed, trails broken, truths bent just enough to pass. Between two worlds, she hides behind names that aren’t hers and choices that cut too close. Livestock heists, police stations, and broken families blur into a journey both absurd and perilous. But in Clivilius, disguise is never protection for long. Every mask has its weight, every trail its consequence—and Beatrix must decide whether she is escaping danger, or simply carrying it with her.
Beatrix Cramer has learnt to live in the spaces between worlds. One moment she's navigating the familiar streets of rural Tasmania, the next she's traversing the dusty outback highways of South Australia, and somewhere in between lies Clivilius—a place that shouldn't exist but does.
Identity is currency when you're running, and Beatrix has become an expert at trading in false names and fabricated stories. Sophie. The woman at the petrol station. The stranger collecting livestock from a property she's never owned. Each borrowed face is a lifeline, each broken trail a chance to disappear before the questions become too insistent. But in a world where portals shimmer in abandoned buildings and memories bleed between dimensions, even the best disguises have their limits.
From the claustrophobic confines of police stations to the absurd comedy of livestock heists gone sideways, Beatrix's journey careens between the mundane and the impossible. There's Vincent the goat, a pet shop under siege, and a Toyota Prado that may or may not be stolen, depending on which story you believe. There are chickens that need rescuing, towels that need buying, and a father who deserves answers—though Beatrix isn't sure she has any to give.
But as the threads of her lies begin to unravel, Beatrix must confront an uncomfortable truth: she's not just running from the authorities or the complications of two worlds colliding. She's running from the weight of her own choices, from the family she left behind, and from the realisation that disguise only works when you remember who you really are underneath.
Set against the stark beauty of outback Australia and the strange, liminal spaces of Clivilius, Borrowed Faces, Broken Trails is a story about survival on the margins. It's about the people who help you when they shouldn't, the animals that complicate everything, and the moment when you must decide whether you're escaping danger or simply carrying it with you wherever you go.
Every mask has its weight. Every trail has its consequence. And sometimes, the hardest person to hide from is yourself.
