Electric Bastionland: Worked Examples (2)

(Part One)

Deep Water: The Twining Sea

Currents
The Wick - swifter than expected; not as choppy as the other currents round the islands
Whale Lane - colder, deeper and clearer than other stretches of water.
Ungungstruk - draws silt from the coastal islets and deltas. A thick, dark current.

Features
A - Windshook: a rocky island dotted with high columns, seemingly natural (in fact partial ruins built of an abnormally smooth stone).
B - Vansittart Cluster: a number of little islands, with a few scattered houses. (A few sheep farms remain here, but the bulk of the population is currently a film crew).
C - Puffin Perch: a squarish black rock, covered in puffins (if the puffins leave, you may find the body of a nihilist, a straight razor and a cryptic letter)
D - Tescel: privately owned island, known for an artist's colony (many of the artists in question are past their prime; a lack of strong drink and narcotics has set some on edge).
E - Bruning's Knot: a tangle of weed and wreckage caught between the currents (a small family of wrecked sailors reside here and know the way through).
F - Three-Schilling: a watch station on an island (the station head does a good Black Market trade in Coast Guard supplies).
G - Angel's Plait: twining sandbanks, decorated with birds (pools of water between the banks can reveal stranded wildlife until the tides return).

Complications
Whale Lane, circling B: rough waves threaten to drive your vessel onto the rocks of Brensen, uppermost island of the Cluster.
Whale Lane, passing A: a giant squid, bearing the seal of a foreign power on its power harness. An eye swivels towards your vessel.
Whale Lane, far past D: in the distance, the shape of a vast albatross. It stoops and soars down to perch on your deck. About its neck - the corpse of a sailor. It begins to speak....

The Wick, past B: the missionary barge, the Heart of Skegness starts proselytising in morse code.
The Wick, approaching G: the sandbanks are covered by water - can you recall where they lay?
The Wick, in sight of C: a piratical submarine lurks in these waters and will surface and attack you purely for the opportunity of some fresh air and new faces.

Ungungstruk, skirting E: a strong wind draws you closer to the Knot.
Ungungstruk, circling D: a weather balloon appears to be following your ship.
Ungungstruk, in sight of F: the Coast Guard stage a surprise inspection. There has been a change the nautical licensing code.

The Underground: Deep Beneath the Hotel Messala

Rooms and Passages 
A - Corroded Substation - an electricity substation; corroded, flaking fuses and rheostats between blank concrete walls. Arcs of electricity play off the depths of the substation, which sits in a sunken chamber at the junction.
B - Auto-Triage: a medical station with rows of examination coffers (someone placed in a coffer is categorised according to the severity of their wounds. Little or no medical assistance is offered by the automated systems).
C - Emergency District Information Hub - a small, well-equipped print shop and a formal room with a stage, pulpit and magic lantern projector (a hidden safe at the back of the printshop has partial details of civil defence regulations and the degrees of emergency law that may be imposed in time of war. You have not heard of any of the regulations involved, nor of some of the things they apparently ward against.).
D - Heliotrope Helix: a series of spiral tunnels, the ceilings of which gleam like the sun. (Intended so that people in the shelters could change environment and experience something like sunlight - but in a short space of time. Stay too long inside and you will get badly sunburnt).
E - Gaudy Street Seal: an internal gate in the emergency conduit, with a defensive bubble-turret. Named for the street above in chalked letters on the lintel. (Once closed, the gate will seal shut until the system detects that the gas attack has passed. The system is not in good working order.)
F - The Hive of Chains - a shaft, rising up into the regular basements of the Hotel. Chains, ready to lift or lower platforms hang down at every hand. (Some of the chains clatter ceaselessly; something below is shaking them.)
G - Automated Exchange: banks of enamelled stations, where telephone calls can be put through. But the wires are moving all by themselves. (The only calls being made are test calls between emergency stations, introduced by a unique piece of electronic music and a string of numbers).
H - The Discretionary Reception - a plush-carpeted room and four elevators. (An entrance to the hotel for guests desiring secrecy. Far larger than one would expect....)
I - Steel Cookhouse: two long metal counters, two stoves, two sinks. (Approach, and a number of unlabelled tins drop out of a chute. A voice will urge you to cook the best meal possible with these random ingredients.)
J - The Waste Disposal Offices - a dull door with a conspicuous nameplate. Inside, an office with several battered cupboards and a hatch. (This is where hotel employees gather to dispose of discarded luxuries, overlooked delicacies and other valuable items. There is a dumbwaiter directly from the kitchens.)
K - Guest Vault: A series of heavy metal doors, each with a code lock. Each door has a large sealed compartment through which objects may be passed. (You may find the guests inside, in one state or another).
L - The Cellar of Last Resort: the place where the rarest beverages for the hotel above are stored. They are hermetically sealed in individual caskets. (Discovering which casket is which requires knowledge of the symbols and abbreviations used by the caste of sommeliers).

Complications
A-B - A leaking pipe has spread water across the passage; this has been electrified.
B-C - As you pass down this corridor, the sensation of touch is completely absent from you. Even if you are clutching something tightly, you cannot feel it.
B-K - Several automated cleaning trolleys block passage. They are scouring the walls into harsh, acidic cleanliness.
C-D -  Phosphoric primroses bloom from the iron of the floor grids. Do not tread on these.
C-K - Numerous jukeboxes begin playing music as you approach. Armed figures watch you approach; they do not react to this sound.
D-E - A fierce, disorientating buzzing intensifies as you approach E.
D-L - Birds sit in the passage; magpies, with wings of platinum and black iron. They eyes you in a hostile fashion.
E-H - Custodian Concierge: a respectful but very firm Concierge would like you to go no further away from H. Either go up, or go out.
F-I - Ahead of you, the floor begins to heat up. One more step, and you may fry.
I-C - The concrete slabs and iron grids of the floor fluctuate like the ripples of a pool.
I-J - A revolutionary cell is meeting here, and they do not wish to be disturbed or observed.
J-D - A turnstile bars your path. Several red lights blink into existence as you approach. Something is watching.
K-L - Clockwork scribes tick through here, trailing lists and inventories in their wake. Prepare to be stamped, inspected, briefed, debriefed and numbered.
L-H - Before you in the passage, a pepperpot-shaped automaton pushes a large barrel. It does not appear inclined to stop.

Stretches
B-F
1. Familiar as this passage is, the air around you becomes close. There is a constant shaking and the choking smell of engine exhaust. The winding of great tracks begins, only to stop at the sound of regular shrill plinking. A cannon roars.
2. Former foundations: vaults designed to support a structure that stood where the hotel now is stretch ahead of you. They are not always safe. Some are partially flooded.
3. Ahead of you the corridor is quite lightless. Nothing cuts through the darkness, though pale smoke can somehow still be seen in the air. From somewhere comes a great wind, and the walls no longer appear to be present.
4. Rubble ahead, the bitter scent of ash, and shrapnel fragments. But no bomb could pierce these cellars, surely? And no aerial raids have yet been spotted.
5. The piercing scent of bile is on the air. The tunnel narrows at the top, becoming the shape of an equilateral triangle in cross-section, walls covered in white and orange tiles. A hook-footed crab-like being clicks behind you along the corridor, oil oozing from its joints.
6. A white-painted corridor; coloured lines on the floor, with multiple dog-legs and a gentle slope. Deer of boiled leather and brass wire prance along it. If they come near you, they will entangle you in twining, tentacle like brass antlers.

Lessons and Conclusions

You are meant to have all the notes on the page with the map - but A) that's not as such a blog-friendly format and B) I started drawing maps on A5 paper and so had to continue. So, draw your maps in an A5 space on an A4 sheet, I suppose.

(Like so)

It was a little difficult to establish a proper frame of reference on the currents on the Deep Water map for the complications - quite what a 'stretch of current' is isn't clear from the things on the map. Perhaps my 'Skirting Point X' or 'In Sight of Y' works.

I'm not China Miéville; it has been a little difficult to really put my mind to a living, breathing, self-contradicting metropolis. Bits of what I've done feel a little too much like a stage set, or an orrery  Perhaps that makes this a useful thing to do again. Turning my Silent Quarter post into a borough of Bastion might be worthwhile..