Shifting Sands

SCOPE:  This Manipulation & Abstraction Exercise is a training technique for Night Office field operatives who have demonstrated sensitivity to the magico-temporal vibrations of the space-time continuum. This exercise allows an Adept of the Way to practice attunement to and anticipation of the random perturbations and excitations of the Way without exposing their psyche to extraneous compression, eradication, time-shifting, or dimensional tessellation. 

PREPARATION: Shifting Sands may be explored with a standard deck of fifty-two cards. The deck should be simple in its presentation and iconography. Cards that are intended for oracular, divinatory, or other psychically-reactive environments should not be used, due to their additional sensitivity to influence from the Way. 

Prepare the deck by removing the jokers and shuffling the cards thoroughly. 

Check your current sensitivity to the Way by picturing a card from this deck. Cut the deck twice, making three smaller decks. Verify the card you have imagined is not on the bottom of any of these three decks. 

If the card is present, reassemble the deck with this card on the top. Place the deck within a container that has been lined with a Barrier of Active Discordance. If, after twenty minutes, the deck still exhibits elevated levels of psychic sensitivity, please burn the deck and try a different one. 

You are now ready to walk the Shifting Sands.

PLAY: The layout for Shifting Sands is two rows of six cards each. Each turn is the consideration and resolution of the cards within these rows. When no other resolution is available, both rows of the Sands are refreshed to six cards again. Cards are dealt into the empty spaces, filling uneven rows until they are of equal length and then top to bottom and left to right.