The Five Evils

The development of steam energy that launched the Volcanic Era was not well received by everyone. More than two hundred years earlier, a bitter decades-long argument had divided the Cluster Islands over whether or not to use tongs when eating. The philosophy of Tactilism grew from the argument, and 250 years later had already divided into multiple interpretations.   Clenti was among the strictest of these, believing that any work that could not be done with the hands was unnecessary and degraded the humanity of the worker. She lived at a time when volcano energy was still in its early days, and strongly opposed the proliferation of steam-powered machines. Although they had not yet spread from Zaiyev's natural hot spings and vents, some local craft houses had begun sending raw materials there to be processed, which she saw as a betrayal of Tactilist ideals.   Out of her many arguments with craftmasters, Clenti identified what she termed the "Five Evils" of machinery: spoil, waste, impatience, carelessness, and indifference. She refined these ideas into a speech that she delivered countless times in many public areas around the Three Companions. Her fervor gained her a following, and she called herself and her supporters the "True Tactilists."   The final goad was when the islands began using a new year-numbering system based on the first use of a steam tool. Clenti vowed to take her fight directly to Zaiyev, to confront the evil at its source. To emphasize her point, she spent three years laboriously carving her "Five Evils" speech into several wood plaques. Her plan was for the True Tactilists to break into steam plants, dismantle whatever they could get their hands on until the energy generation stopped, and leave a carved plaque prominently displayed.   This was not so easily accomplished. On her very first attempt, the sabotage team was caught and thrown out. Clenti hurled the carved speech as she was carried away. Many other Tactilists, when they learned of the spectacle, objected to Clenti's self-styled "True Tactilist" title. In response she rejected the Tactilist movement as too weakened, and thereafter made herself and her followers known as "The Sacred Hands".   Clenti continued the sabotage attempts, but only once succeded in disrupting a steam pipeline. Plants began posting guards, and thereafter the Sacred Hands were either captured and evicted, or captured and detained. The momentum she hoped to build never materialized. In the end she had to admit defeat. Clenti delivered her speech one last time, after which she and her most loyal followers retreated to a village of their own where they cut themselves off from the world they saw as corrupted.