TEXT: Bast
  by Kenneth Hite
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  2
  Ken Writes About Stuff
  Bast
  Publisher:   
  Cathriona Tobin
  Author:   
  Kenneth Hite
  Artwork:   
  Melissa Gay
  Layout:  
   
  Cathriona Tobin
   
   
   
   
   
   
  © 2016 Pelgrane Press Ltd. All rights reserved. Trail of Cthulhu is published by arrangement with 
  Chaosium, Inc. Trail of Cthulhu is a trademark of Pelgrane Press Ltd. Pelgrane Press is co-owned by 
  Simon Rogers and Cathriona Tobin.
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  Contents
  The Great Goddess Bast 
  4
  The Cult of Bast 
  5
  The Many Moods of Bast 
  6
  Trail of Cthulhu 
  6
  Brood of Bubastis 
  6
  Ashen Stars 
  7
  The Contract 
  8
  Twist 
  8
  Backstory 
  8
  Complications 
  8
  The Choice 
  8
  TimeWatch 
  8
  Remek-Bast 
  9
  13th Age 
  10
  Quote 
  11
  Usual Location 
  11
  Common Knowledge 
  11
  Adventurers & the Icon 
  11
  Allies 
  11
  Enemies 
  11
  History 
  11
  The True Danger 
  11
  Malkin/Cat-Folk 
  11
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  3
  Contents
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  4
  In his essay “Something About 
  Cats,” H.P. Lovecraft asks, “What fully 
  civilised soul but would eagerly serve as 
  high priest of Bast?” And indeed, what 
  soul would not, in any civilization, 
  from Ulthar to England to the Dragon 
  Empire to outer space? Read further 
  that you may join the souls Bast plays 
  with, the many souls pricked by She 
  Who Scratches. Good kitty!
  The Great Goddess 
  Bast
  "My heart is Bast,
  I shall ascend and rise up to the sky.”
   
  -- Pyramid Texts (ca. 2300 B.C.E.)
  Bast begins as the patron deity of the 
  city Per-Bast (“House of Bast”), or Per-
  Bast (Pibeseth in the Bible, and Bubastis 
  to the Greeks) began as her temple city. 
  Both the goddess and her city first appear 
  in records of the 2nd Dynasty (c. 2890 
  BCE). If her name doesn’t come from 
  her city, it may come from bas, meaning 
  “perfume jar,” or from bas-t, roughly 
  “she who devours.” Some scribes wrote 
  her name as bas-tt, as though to make 
  sure readers recognized her femininity, 
  leading some modern authorities to call 
  her “Bastet” although it’s unlikely her 
  name was ever pronounced that way.
  Bast likely began as one of several 
  local goddesses, all of whom played the 
  same role in Egyptian myth. The Distant 
  Goddess slaughters mankind until she 
  is given beer (later, wine) disguised as 
  blood to drink, then tamed or adopted 
  by Ra. As the Daughter of Ra, the 
  goddess becomes his Eye, and kills the 
  serpent Apep at the end of the Twelve 
  Hours of the Night. She completes the 
  cycle by having a son by Ra, either the 
  lion-god Maahes (or Mihos) or Horus-
  Nefertum, who incarnated the smell of 
  the blue lotus or lily and may be related 
  to Bast’s role as Lady of the Perfume 
  Jar. In the Pyramid Texts, she becomes the 
  mother of Anubis as well.
  The Apep-killing cat begins in myth 
  as Ra transformed, then becomes his 
  daughter – identified as any of several 
  goddesses: Bast, Mut, Pakhet (“She Who 
  Scratches”), Sekhmet, Mafdet (“the 
  Runner,” possibly a cheetah goddess), 
  Tefnut, Neith, Wosret (“the Powerful”), 
  and even Hathor. Inscriptions identify 
  Bast with all of these goddesses; with 
  its theology of multiple souls, and its 
  need to unify a vast and diverse urban 
  empire, Egyptian religion was less 
  picky about separate identities for its 
  deities. A statue found in Bubastis (c. 
  1850 BCE) is dedicated to “Sekhmet 
  in all her names,” a statue of Hathor is 
  labeled “She Who Dwells in Bubastis,” 
  and an inscription at Philae (150 BCE) 
  describes Hathor-Tefnut: “She rages as 
  Sekhmet and plays as Bast.”
  By any name, Bast was an important 
  goddess: Khefren’s temple at Giza (c. 
  2570 BCE) has only two names on it, 
  Bast and Hathor; Shepseskaf (c. 2510 
  BCE) was the “beloved of Hathor-Bast.” 
  Bast may thus have represented all of 
  Lower Egypt even in the Old Kingdom. 
  Amenhotep II (c. 1425 BCE) “slew foes 
  in battle like Bast kills along the Road 
  of Amen,” and Amenhotep III (c. 1370 
  BCE) made a major pilgrimage to Per-
  Bast to worship “She Who Protects the 
  Lands.” An inscription on the Temple of 
  Mut at Karnak (c. 1400 BCE) refers to 
  Bast as the “Ruler of the Divine Field.” 
  Ramesses II built her great Red Temple 
  in Per-Bast around 1275 BCE and 
  allowed her priestess to be buried in 
  the Valley of Kings. The female pharaoh 
  Tawosret (1191-1189 BCE) made Bast 
  her patron goddess; around the same 
  time, the vizier Iuty was buried in the 
  Cemetery of the Nobles at Per-Bast, 
  and his son Ay became high priest of 
  Bast.
  In the New Kingdom, Bast became 
  more and more associated with the 
  cat as well as the lioness. Egyptian 
  hunters 
  and 
  housewives 
  steadily 
  domesticated the Egyptian desert cat 
  (felis silvestris lybica) over the third and 
  second millennia BCE. By 1000 BCE, 
  most depictions of Bast show her as a 
  cat-headed woman dressed in clinging 
  robes, holding an aegis (a shield with a 
  lioness’ head on it, probably invoking 
  her earlier iconography) and a musical 
  instrument called a sistrum. Her city 
  intermittently became the capital of 
  Egypt under the 22nd Dynasty (943-
  720 BCE), founded by invading desert 
  Libyans who may have wanted to 
  promote their own totem animal into 
  Egyptian godhood. Two pharaohs of the 
  23rd Dynasty (c. 830-730 BCE) took 
  the name Pedubast, “given by Bast.”
  Even after the Libyans left, worship of 
  Bast exploded among the common folk: 
  Bast became a domestic protectress just 
  as the cat became a domestic pet. She 
  not only ruled cats (and thus fertility 
  and music) and perfume (by punning 
  extension from her name), but guarded 
  pregnant women and protected houses 
  from disease, demons, and poison. By 
  the Late Period (664-330 BCE), the 
  cult of Bast was one of the most popular 
  in Egypt; visiting Greeks identified 
  Bast with their goddess Artemis, who 
  turned into a cat to escape the monster 
  Typhon. 
  Under 
  Greek 
  influence, 
  especially after Alexander’s conquest of 
  Egypt, Bast shifted personae from Ra’s 
  sun to Artemis’ moon.
  Under the Ptolemies and the Romans, 
  Isis began to absorb Bast. On the temple 
  Bast
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  5
  Bast
  of Horus at Edfu, we read that “the soul 
  of Isis (ba-Aset) is present in Bast,” and 
  Isis claims “the city of Bubastis was 
  built for me.” Bast's name also shifts to 
  "Bubastis," and as Isis-Bubastis her cult 
  spread to Ostia and Pompeii in Italy, 
  Pannonia Superior (modern Hungary 
  and Croatia), and to southern Gaul 
  (we have a Roman inscription to Catia 
  Bubate near Vienne). When the city of 
  Bubastis became a Christian bishopric 
  in 325 CE, her worship was prohibited. 
  Even then, she may have survived in the 
  Languedoc cult of St. Agatha, or Sant 
  Gata (“Holy Cat”), who appears as a cat 
  to those who work on February 5, her 
  holy day.
  The Cult of Bast
  “I am Bast, who gives my Will to all 
  my servants.”
   
  -- undated inscription on a 
  lapis lazuli carving of Bast
  “Whoever kills a cat [in Egypt], whether 
  intentionally or unintentionally, he is 
  certainly put to death, for the common 
  people gather in crowds and deal with 
  the perpetrator most cruelly, sometimes 
  doing this without waiting for a trial.”
  -- Diodorus Siculus, Library of History, 
  I:83
  The cult of Bast began at Per-
  Bast, but had spread to Dendera near 
  Thebes and Sakkara near Memphis 
  by the 3rd Dynasty (c. 2600 BCE). 
  By the 6th Dynasty, she has an entire 
  temple compound in Memphis near 
  the pyramid of Teti (c. 2340 BCE). 
  Other cult centers included On 
  (Heliopolis), the “Hill of Bast” near 
  Henen-nesut (Heracleopolis), Taremu 
  (Leontopolis), Ta-senet (Letopolis), 
  Per-Wadjet (Buto), Zau (Saïs), and a 
  so-far unknown site in the Delta called 
  Ba-ir-Ra-st.
  Her temple singers had a major role at 
  the court of Merneptah (c. 1210 BCE), 
  which 
  approximately 
  corresponds 
  to the period when Bast begins to be 
  depicted holding a sistrum. This early 
  tambourine may have originated earlier 
  than that, as a sacred instrument in Per-
  Bast. Egyptian worship involved sung 
  or chanted hymns; if Bast was indeed 
  the “Lady of the Sistrum” this implies 
  a crucial role for her cult in Egyptian 
  ritual. The priesthood of Bast was not 
  necessarily hereditary, although the 
  position of cat caretaker likely was in 
  the New Kingdom and after. Monetary 
  offerings to Bast paid their salary and 
  the cats’ upkeep: the petitioner shaved 
  half his child’s hair, weighed it, and 
  donated that weight of silver to the 
  cats.
  As early as the 8th century BCE, 
  Phoenician traders made and sold Bast-
  festival commemorative plates and 
  jars as far away as Spain and Cyprus; 
  pilgrims may well have come to Per-
  Bast from all over the Mediterranean. 
  Certainly by the time of Herodotus’ 
  visit to Egypt (c. 454 BCE), the festival 
  of Bast was one of the biggest in the 
  country. He described it first-hand, as 
  follows:
  Now, when they are coming to the city 
  of Bubastis they do as follows: They 
  sail men and women together, and a 
  great multitude of each sex in every 
  boat; and some of the women have 
  sistrums and rattle with them, while 
  some of the men play the flute during 
  the whole time of the voyage, and the 
  rest, both women and men, sing and 
  clap their hands; and when as they 
  sail they come opposite to any city on 
  the way they bring the boat to land, 
  and some of the women continue to do 
  as I have said, others cry aloud and 
  jeer at the women in that city, some 
  dance, and some stand up and pull up 
  their garments. This they do by every 
  city along the river; and when they 
  come to Bubastis they hold festival 
  celebrating great sacrifices, and more 
  wine of grapes is consumed upon that 
  festival than during the whole of the 
  rest of the year. To this place (so say 
  the natives) they come together year 
  by year even to the number of seventy 
  thousand men and women, besides 
  children. [Histories II:60]
  Herodotus also describes the law of 
  Egypt at that time: “If any one kill [a cat], 
  the penalty, if he do it with his own will, is 
  death, and if against his will, such penalty 
  as the priests may appoint.” This law did 
  not apply to the priests of Bast, who 
  ceremonially killed cats by the thousand 
  during the festivals when pilgrims paid 
  to place a mummified cat on the temple 
  grounds. When the temple filled up with 
  cats, the priests buried the mummies in 
  enormous feline necropoleis outside 
  Bubastis and Memphis. During the late 
  18th Dynasty (c. 1330 BCE) priests of 
  Bast actually emptied an older cemetery 
  in the cliffs of Sakkara to use for cat 
  burials; the Ptolemies called this network 
  of (ahem) catacombs the Bubasteion. 
  Herodotus’ big festival probably 
  occurred during the middle of April; 
  a month later was the joint festival 
  of Hathor and Bast. She appears in 
  procession at the end of August (now 
  the Egyptian New Year), and celebrates 
  another festival in mid-November and 
  another procession in early December. 
  (The modern Coptic calendar moves all 
  these dates a month and a half forward.) 
  Sacred days of Bast also depend on the 
  stars: according to one reading of the 
  Egyptian system of decans (subdivisions 
  of the zodiac), Bast has power over July 
  14-28, September 23-27, and October 
  3-17. On the Dendera Zodiac (c. 50 
  BCE), Bast is pictured below the first half 
  of Aries near the cusp with Pisces (circa 
  March 18-28); thus, the decan Remen-
  hery (Rigel) has been associated with her 
  by some scholars (May 11-20).
  By the Ptolemaic period (330-30 
  BCE), the cult of Bast was a genuine 
  mass religion. The divine name most 
  commonly used in people’s names in 
  that period was Osiris; Bast was the 
  second-most popular. Bast was especially 
  popular with women, who left 90% 
  of the surviving dedications to her. By 
  Roman times, her priests and priestesses 
  wore silk robes of purple and green and 
  linen garments of white and purple, 
  both implying royal patronage. Bast’s 
  temple in Ostia also held a golden belt 
  and a key of unknown purpose.
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  6
  Ken Writes About Stuff
  nurturing her cults both human 
  and feline.
  • Bast is an Elder Goddess who first 
  rose to power in Atlantis, ruled 
  in Egypt, and now dwells in the 
  Dreamlands. Her sacred city is 
  Ulthar, where by ancient law no 
  man may kill a cat. She cares only 
  for humans who have proven their 
  The Many Moods of 
  Bast
  If even the Egyptians never seemed 
  to settle on a given version of Bast, 
  why should you? She can appear in any 
  game: a lover-rival of Quandos Vorn in 
  the Gaean Reach RPG, or as a feline-
  themed lady super-burglar with a heart 
  of kibble in Mutant City Blues. She 
  could be a possessed murderer in Fear 
  Itself riffing off Cat People, or appear 
  as the “Outer Dark with a human 
  face” seducing humans into soft-porn 
  archaeology and feckless superstition 
  in The Esoterrorists.
  Herewith, some meatier treats for 
  other Bast-themed Pelgrane games.
  Trail of Cthulhu
  “… there hovered over them some trace 
  of that profound and inviolate sanctity 
  which made their goddess great in the 
  temples of Bubastis.”
   
  -- H.P. Lovecraft, The Dream-
  Quest of Unknown Kadath
  Lovecraft never explicitly mentions 
  Bast by name in his fiction, although 
  her cats take center stage in The Dream-
  Quest of Unknown Kadath and most likely 
  “The Cats of Ulthar.” Robert Bloch 
  brings her on stage in more horrific 
  mien in “The Brood of Bubastis,” and 
  alludes to her cult in his Egyptian cycle, 
  especially “Fane of the Black Pharaoh.” 
  Sax Rohmer crosses the streams 
  between occultism and pseudoscience, 
  but avoids cosmicism almost entirely in 
  his mystery The Green Eyes of Bast.
  As with the discussion of the other 
  gods and titans in the Trail of Cthulhu 
  corebook, the following variations 
  on Bast intentionally contradict each 
  other.
  • Bast is one of the weak gods of 
  Earth, created by the mutual 
  ambivalence of human and cat. An 
  emergent property of two species’ 
  self-will, she has taken more direct 
  action in the affairs of humanity 
  than the other gods of Earth, 
  Brood of Bubastis
  “Just how near the old priests had approached their idea of godhead I 
  dared not surmise. Many of the bones before me hinted of ghastly spawnings 
  between beast and man.”
   
  -- Robert Bloch, “The Brood of Bubastis”
  The necromancer-priests of Bubastis, obsessed with creating an ideal vessel 
  for their goddess on Earth, began magically interbreeding selected humans and 
  felines. After hundreds of generations, the Brood of Bubastis resembles a catlike 
  ghoul: long fangs, tearing claws, matted brown fur, and lambent yellow eyes.
  Abilities: Athletics 11, Health 6, Scuffling 7
  Magic: 3-5 for regular Brood; 10+ for priestess-caste Brood. Contact Bast, 
  Contact Brood of Bubastis (same as Contact Ghoul with slightly different names 
  and sigils), and Sign of Eibon are common Brood spells. Priestesses may have 
  Create Hyperspace Gate, Dread Name of Azathoth, and Elder Sign as well.
  Hit Threshold: 5 (horribly quick)
  Alertness Modifier: +1 (+2 for hearing and motion sense)
  Stealth Modifier: +2
  Weapon: +1 (claw), +0 (bite)
  Brood can make one claw and one bite attack against the same target in one 
  round. If both claw and bite hit, the brood grapples with its jaws (automatic 
  bite damage each round) and rakes with its hind talons: rake attacks allow two 
  claw attacks per round against the grappled target, whose Hit Threshold is at -1.
  Armor: -2 vs. any
  Stability Loss: +0
  The Chewer of Corpses
  She is an enormous specimen – or apotheosis – of the Brood. She may 
  contain the soul-spirit of Bast, or merely be one of the goddess’ avatars. As of 
  1937, the Chewer is confined to an abandoned tin mine in Cornwall, but her 
  acolyte may have dug her an escape tunnel before she devoured him.
  Abilities: Athletics 16, Health 11, Scuffling 25
  Magic: 12; all Brood spells plus Contact Nyarlathotep and Contact 
  Mordiggian.
  Hit Threshold: 4 (very large)
  Alertness Modifier: +2 (+3 for hearing and motion sense)
  Stealth Modifier: +2
  Weapon: +2 (claw), +1 (bite); special attacks as Brood.
  Armor: -3 vs. any
  Stability Loss: +1
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  7
  Bast
  devotion to her cats at the expense 
  of their own life or sanity – many 
  such became witches in medieval 
  times.
  • Bast is an avatar of Nyarlathotep 
  embodied in a specific pheromonal 
  code, 
  hence 
  her 
  symbolic 
  connection to the perfume-jar. She 
  clings to cats, lions, wendigo, and a 
  very few human sorcerers.
  • Bast is a monstrous humanoid 
  beast who shambled on the Earth 
  in primal days, a titan offspring of 
  Shub-Niggurath. After a reign of 
  terror in Lemuria, she established a 
  dark and carnivorous priesthood in 
  ancient Egypt, devoted to creating 
  a fleshly vessel for her spirit. With 
  her brothers Anubis and Sebek, she 
  joined to exalt Nephren-Ka in the 
  waning days of the 3rd Dynasty.
  • Bast is a Great Old One, the 
  Distant Goddess who awakens to 
  devour mankind until, drunk on 
  our blood, she sleeps again. Cats, 
  or perhaps toxoplasmosis gondii, 
  are her servitor species.
  • Bast is the destroying daughter 
  of Cthugha, sent to spread his 
  terrible fire-magic to humanity. 
  Her “cat form” represents panicked 
  domestication of her power in 
  ancient Egypt. She hates Cthulhu, 
  the principle of Water.
  • When Nephren-Ka fell, the cult 
  of Bast fled to Egypt’s colonies in 
  Gaul and Britain.
  • Iuwy-Kheruef, a priest of Bubastis 
  in the 13th Dynasty reincarnated 
  from Atlantis, rediscovered the 
  cult’s doctrines and recorded them 
  in the suppressed Black Rites.
  • At some time in the Ptolemaic or 
  Roman era, Mormo destroyed Bast 
  and absorbed her, a crime reflected 
  in Bast losing her solar identification 
  and taking on Mormo’s lunar 
  identity. All worship of Bast since 
  then actually serves Mormo.
  • Bast was indeed destroyed at some 
  time on Earth, but her dream self 
  survives in Ulthar.
  • The spirit of Bast indwells in those 
  born on her sacred day; certain 
  magics can awaken her spirit and 
  fuse it with the human host.
  • The spirit of Bast can only indwell 
  in an ideal form – human or feline 
  -- created by necromancy and 
  eugenics.
  • Bast can see through the eyes of all 
  cats anywhere.
  • The Cats of Saturn worship both 
  Bast and Tsathoggua, her father-
  brother-husband.
  Ashen Stars
  “KIRK: Why a cat? 
  SPOCK: Racial memories. The cat is 
  the most ruthless, most terrifying of 
  animals, as far back as the saber-
  toothed tiger.”
   
  -- Star Trek, “Catspaw,” 
  written by Robert Bloch   
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  8
  Ken Writes About Stuff
  connection making the relationship 
  unwise and impossible.
  • Bast is actually a Vas Kra, an un-
  devolved Vas Mal protected by 
  Ia’s 
  hypergeometrical 
  temple 
  fields from the Mohilar weapon. 
  Vas Mal players have their own 
  ethical conundrum – she may 
  indeed deserve their worship, 
  and she certainly demands it. That 
  demand, of course, the modern 
  Vas Mal remember as against their 
  traditions, but Bast knows their 
  memories can’t be trusted.
  The Choice
  Escape Tanis safely or intervene 
  to free the planet from its predatory 
  goddess? Keep in mind the people 
  of Tanis seem happy enough in their 
  cat-filled cities – although that could 
  be the toxoplasmosis gondii talking. 
  Studying a godlike alien also has its own 
  intellectual rewards – and getting on 
  its good side has many other kinds of 
  reward.
  TimeWatch
  “The cats came. Their ships glittered in 
  the naked sky above Arachosia. Their 
  little combat craft attacked. The cats 
  who had not existed a moment before, but 
  who had then had two million years in 
  which to follow a destiny printed right 
  into their brains, printed down their 
  spinal cords, etched into the chemistry 
  of their bodies and personalities. The 
  cats had turned into people of a kind, 
  with speech, intelligence, hope, and a 
  mission.”
   
  -- Cordwainer Smith, “The 
  Crime and Glory of Commander Suzdal”
  Nobody knows where, or when, Bast 
  was born. She of course claims to be an 
  Egyptian cat goddess, but TimeWatch 
  is pretty sure she’s a 34th century 
  scientific (and criminal) genius. She 
  certainly spent a decade or so in the 34th 
  century creating her loyal servitors the 
  Remek-Bast, genetically engineered 
  shapeshifting cat people. She has 
  also spent at least a decade operating 
  This episode premise for Ashen 
  Stars casts Bast as a godlike alien, who 
  plays with humanity as a cat plays with 
  … you know the drill.
  The Contract
  The crew arrive on the isolated 
  human-balla world Tanis:
  • Escorting a bonded cargo from 
  Old Earth on its final leg, kept in 
  complete stasis and labeled with 
  the utmost in bureaucratic opacity. 
  Without breaching the seal and 
  their contract, the crew can’t figure 
  out what’s inside: the cargo turns 
  out to be mice, or pre-Mohilar 
  War tubes of Fancy Feast, or Nepeta 
  cataria a.k.a. catnip.
  • Looking for Arabella Quinzo, 
  daughter of a highly placed official of 
  the Palatine Cluster longshoremen’s 
  union. She: followed a boyfriend, or 
  converted to the Tanite nufaith, or 
  has been kidnapped by mobsters 
  who hid out on the isolated world 
  until the heat was off.
  • Seeking a cure for a rampaging 
  plague ripping through the tavak 
  world 
  Botig. 
  Plague-specific 
  antibodies have been found in the 
  blood records of the few Tanite 
  citizens 
  encountered 
  offworld, 
  implying that their world knows the 
  plague exists.
  Twist
  Tanis is full of cats -- and ruled by a 
  godlike entity calling herself Bast.
  Bast toys with the crew, appearing as 
  a black cat, beautiful human seductress, 
  dangerous predator, or forty-foot feline 
  specter depending on her whim. Aim 
  her cruel play at their Drives, personal 
  arcs, and psychological weaknesses.
  Some non-human crew members 
  see her as their own equivalent animal 
  to a cat:
  Balla: See a vrua, a felinoid species 
  very similar to your Earth cat, and one 
  of the only three species balla poetic 
  convention equates with sexually 
  available balla in beauty and grace.
  Durugh: See a grukku, a carnivorous 
  species used by high lords of the durugh 
  to torture underlings and guard heirs.
  Kch-Thk: See a rr’rkhk, a legendary 
  “eater of larva” feared and admired in 
  kch-thk myth.
  Tavak: See a divit, an arboreal pest-
  eater resembling a large, round-headed 
  Earth flying squirrel, much loved by 
  tavak for its somnolence and placid 
  expression.
  Backstory
  Tanis began as a nufaith world 
  dedicated to its founders’ probably 
  inaccurate understanding of “Kemetic 
  religion.” A generation or so before 
  the Mohilar War, Tanis was the subject 
  of Thirty Pieces of Osiris, a trivid soap 
  opera (not filmed on Tanis) that became 
  insanely popular among the balla thanks 
  to its innovative use of greenery. This 
  attracted a number of balla converts 
  to Kemeticism, among them the 
  brilliant hyperphysicist and architect Ia 
  (Starglory).
  Ia redesigned the Great Temple 
  and attracted – or summoned, or 
  imprisoned – a godlike energy being 
  with its geometries. After the War, 
  the colony’s economy collapsed and 
  Ia’s energy-expensive temple failed. 
  Calling itself Bast, the being emerged 
  to rule Tanis as a goddess.
  Complications
  • One of the crew (ideally a PC, but a 
  GMC if need be) kills a cat (possibly 
  while testing the plague antidote), 
  and is sentenced to death.
  • An emotionally vulnerable PC 
  adopts a cat from Tanis, or a high 
  Tanite official gives the captain a 
  cat as a welcome gift – although 
  intermittent psionic visions or 
  other tests indicate the cat may be 
  linked with Bast.
  • An emotionally selfish Bast bonds 
  with a PC, ideally one who either 
  hates cats or has a strong offworld 
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  9
  Bast
  without attracting the attention of 
  TimeWatch, changing history by inches 
  toward her great plan, whatever it is. 
  Her agenda seems to be, by and large, 
  devoted to two main causes: weakening 
  powerful or oppressive states (she may 
  also be behind the Roman image of the 
  goddess Libertas: a beautiful woman 
  with a cat at her feet) and increasing her 
  own influence.
  The worst part? She may have 
  already succeeded in enough shifts that 
  removing her from history irreparably 
  changes what TimeWatch thinks of 
  as the “true” time stream. There are 
  certainly enough weird discontinuities 
  in the myths of Bast to make time 
  meddling a plausible explanation, at 
  least.
  Bast’s sleeper agents may have 
  completely infiltrated the timestream. 
  Historically vital figures with trusted 
  and beloved cats include: Confucius, 
  Plato, 
  St. 
  Gregory 
  the 
  Great, 
  Muhammad (“Muezza”) and his Yemeni 
  companion Abu “Father of the Kitten” 
  Huwaira, Nostradamus (“Grimalkin”), 
  Isaac Newton (“Spithead”), Louis XV, 
  Samuel Johnson (“Hodge”), Lord Byron 
  (“Beppo”), Pope Leo XII (“Micette”), 
  Edgar Allan Poe (“Catarina”), Harriet 
  Beecher Stowe (“Calvin”), Abraham 
  Lincoln (“Tabby”), Queeen Victoria 
  (“White Heather”), Theodore Roosevelt 
  (“Slippers” and “Tom Quartz”), H.G. 
  Wells (“Mr. Peter”), Charles Lindbergh 
  (“Patsy”), Winston Churchill (“Smoky,” 
  “Nelson,” 
  and 
  “Tango”), 
  Einstein 
  (“Tiger”), Ronald Reagan (“Cleo” and 
  “Sara,” who lived at the ranch), Pope 
  John Paul II, Bill Clinton (“Socks”), and 
  Pope Benedict XVI (“Chico”).
  Other suspected Bast operations, 
  targets, or opportunities include:
  525 BCE: Conquest of Bubastis 
  by the Persian king Cambyses II; he 
  reportedly defeated the Egyptians at 
  Pelusium by advancing behind a screen 
  of cats the Egyptian archers wouldn’t 
  shoot at. Cambyses may have killed 
  the sacred cat of Bubastis; the pharaoh 
  Pedubast III ambushes Cambyses’ army 
  in the desert outside Siweh in 522.
  c. 625 CE: Senchán Torpeist, chief 
  bard of Ireland, saved from Irusan, 
  the King of the Cats, by St. Ciarán of 
  Clonmacnoise.
  961: Baldwin III of Flanders 
  suppresses a witch-cult of Bast in Ypres 
  by hurling their cats from the top of 
  the Cloth Hall belfry; he dies in 962. 
  The cat-hurling festival continues until 
  1817.
  July 1 1277: Mameluke sultan 
  Baibars dies of drinking poisoned 
  milk; he has previously endowed a 
  permanent garden home for Cairo’s 
  feral cat population.
  c. 1370: Dick Whittington earns a 
  fortune thanks to his cat, becomes Lord 
  Mayor of London in 1397.
  1478-1481: Leonardo da Vinci 
  intensely 
  sketches 
  his 
  borderline 
  heretical Madonna del Gato (Madonna 
  of the Cat); he studies cats again from 
  1514-1515.
  1483: A cat saves the life of 
  Tudor conspirator Sir Henry Wyatt, 
  imprisoned in Scotland; he later 
  becomes guardian of Henry VIII.
  1569: Thomas Preston writes the 
  play Cambyses, containing the first use 
  of “hey diddle diddle” in print. “The cat 
  and the fiddle” refers to Bast and her 
  sistrum.
  September 1630: Once confirmed 
  as first minister of France, Cardinal 
  Richelieu builds a cattery at Versailles 
  for his fourteen cats.
  Remek-Bast
  The “People of Bast” are Bast’s genegineered agents. They can take either 
  human or cat form, although their eyes reflect light in both shapes.
  TimeWatch agents inevitably call them “Bast-ards.”
  Remek-Bast Stats
  Defense: Hit Threshold 4, Armor 1 (genegineered ballistic fur), Health 12
  Offense: Scuffling +3 (first hit, +2 thereafter), Shooting +1; Damage 
  Modifier +0 (extruded claws, may contain sleep or retro-pheromone serum), 
  +2 (neural needler Stun 5, likewise)
  Abilities: Athletics 12, Tempus 16; Charm 3
  Special Abilities: Blink (includes minor teleportation, cost 2), Catfall (always 
  land on their feet after a throw or fall; never take more than +0 damage from any 
  fall less than 100 meters, cost 1), Clock Out (only inside a fane of Bast), Perfect 
  Balance, Resistant to mind control or (non-Bast) pheromonal domination +4, 
  Resist Stun, Shape-shift (into a cat, cost 2), Strength (cost 0), Technology (cost 
  2), Super Leap (Jump 6m or 3m vertical, cost 3 Athletics), Venom (cost 2; sleep 
  serum or retro-pheromones in claws, needler)
  Misc: Alertness Modifier +2 (darkvision, sensitive hearing and smell), Stealth 
  Modifier +3
  Description: Genetically engineered in the 34th century from a mix of 
  human, feline, and ezeru DNA, the Remek-Bast worship Bast as a goddess and 
  serve her unquestioningly throughout time. TimeWatch claims this is because 
  she literally programmed their loyalty into their pheromone receptors; they, of 
  course, know the truth of her divinity.
  Bast Herself
  Use Remek-Bast stats with Mastermind, Mind Control (pheromonal, 
  cost 2), Summoning (cost 3 -- cats), Seize Initiative (cost 2), Timecraft 3, and 
  Tempus 40. Add any other ability or power as you see fit.
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  10
  Ken Writes About Stuff
  1738: The “Great Cat Massacre”: 
  printers’ apprentices in Paris hang as 
  many cats as they can get their hands 
  on.
  1780-1784: 
  Magician 
  and 
  magnetizer 
  “Colonel” 
  Gustavus 
  Katterfelto 
  exhibits 
  his 
  arts, 
  including an enormous black cat, in 
  London; claims to have discovered 
  the microbes causing the influenza 
  outbreak of 1782. He gives a kitten 
  to Marie Antoinette in 1783.
  1793: Captain Stephen Clough 
  carries Marie Antoinette’s cats (but 
  not the Queen) to Wicasset, Maine 
  on the ship Sally; they become the 
  ancestors of the Maine Coon breed.
  1842-1846: Robert E. Lee serves 
  as post engineer at Fort Hamilton in 
  Brooklyn; his dog Spec prevents him 
  from befriending several curious cats.
  1859: A three-year-old Nikola 
  Tesla begins a lifelong obsession with 
  electricity after drawing sparks while 
  petting his cat Macak.
  March 
  1865: 
  Lincoln 
  visits 
  Grant’s headquarters at City Point, 
  Virginia and rescues three stray 
  kittens.
  1866: The Cheshire Cat appears 
  to mathematician Charles Lutwidge 
  Dodgson.
  1886-1889: Swiss archaeologist 
  Edouard Naville excavates Bubastis.
  September 22, October 17 
  1906: Railway workers discover of 
  the Treasure of Bubastis at Tell Basta 
  in Egypt.
  August 
  1920: An 
  unknown 
  person places a cat on the bed of 
  sickly dictator Vladimir Lenin. He 
  adopts the cat, and lives until January 
  21 1924.
  March 20 1924: President Calvin 
  Coolidge’s cat Tiger (one of six) 
  wanders away. On March 24, Secret 
  Service agent James Hanley makes 
  a radio appeal to the citizens of 
  Washington to find Tiger; he turns up 
  under a desk in the Navy Building.
  1941: A cat named Oscar survives 
  the sinking of the Bismarck; renamed 
  Sam, he survives the sinking of the 
  HMS Cossack and HMS Ark Royal.
  1942-1943: A cat named Mourka 
  carries messages for the 124th Rifle 
  Brigade at Stalingrad.
  April 19 1962: U.S. Ambassador 
  John Kenneth Galbraith triggers 
  riots in Pakistan by calling his cat 
  Ahmedabad “Ahmed” in public.
  October 18 1963: Félicette 
  becomes the first (and so far only) cat 
  in space, aboard the French CERMA 
  rocket Veronique AGI No. 47. She 
  transmits her brainwaves to Earth via 
  a radio-linked EEG.
  1990: Cat owner Pope John Paul II 
  affirms that cats have souls.
  1989-1997: 
  A 
  cat 
  named 
  Humphrey resides at 10 Downing 
  Street.
  13th Age
  “The cat’s archetypal image is present in 
  us all. It is clearer to women, for the 
  cat – even the tomcat – is much more 
  feminine in behavior than, for instance, 
  the dog. Men have the cat also, but here 
  it is more connected with the anima. 
  Thus they do not escape the disastrous 
  tendency of their anima cat to spin 
  plots. This degeneration is certainly 
  very reminiscent of the days we live 
  in, where plots are so readily spun in 
  the unconscious and subconscious lives 
  
  TRAIL OF CTHULHU
  11
  Bast
  of women and men alike, not only in 
  ourselves but even on a worldwide 
  scale.”
   
  -- Barbara Hannah, The 
  Archetypal Symbolism of Animals
  Bast walks between the worlds of 
  animals and mankind, domesticated 
  and wild at once. The cat is her 
  symbol, her ambassador, and perhaps 
  her actual favorite of the world’s 
  creatures. She breathes conspiracy, 
  exudes desire both warm and cool, 
  and walks by herself.
  She might substitute for another 
  Icon (the Priestess or the Prince of 
  Shadows seem closest), be one of 
  many Icons in an Egyptian- or Mythos-
  flavored 13th Age campaign, or 
  perhaps she is one of the first Icons of 
  the coming Fourteenth Age, walking 
  silently into the world to sniff out the 
  coming change and prepare for it.
  Quote
  “I am the Cat who walks by Herself, 
  and all places are alike to Me.”
  Usual Location
  Bast’s city is Ulthar, on the banks 
  of the Grandfather in a rolling plain 
  beyond the Wild Wood. She herself 
  walks the world, preferring warm 
  and whispering cities like Axis, 
  Glitterhaegen, and New Port.
  In a campaign where she has 
  replaced the Priestess, Santa Cora 
  becomes Bubastis. In a campaign 
  where she plans to do so, it is only 
  Bubastis to its cat-folk, its perfumiers, 
  and to sailors on certain dark galleys 
  that put into its harbor.
  Common Knowledge
  Bast is the Queen of the Cats, 
  who protects the common folk from 
  poison, disease, and vermin. She 
  comforts them in pain and guards their 
  dreams. She cares for animals and for 
  people who love animals. Even dogs.
  Adventurers & the Icon
  Malkin adventurers, of course, 
  serve Bast gladly if she asks; most 
  rangers know to serve her warily but 
  well. As a musical goddess, she shares 
  her songs with deserving bards. But 
  any thief on the outs with the Prince 
  of Shadows, any cleric the Priestess 
  has quarreled with, and any sorcerer 
  who remembers his dreams can always 
  seek direction and comfort from She 
  Who Scratches.
  Allies
  Bast walks by herself, but often 
  walks by herself beside the Elf Queen 
  or the High Druid, who share her 
  fondness for animals and her glowing 
  eyes, although she enjoys humans 
  and cities too much for their taste. 
  Whether she conspires with or against 
  the Prince of Shadows, they both 
  delight in the game too much to fight.
  Enemies
  The Orc Lord eats cats, as do all his 
  people. The Lich King resents Bast’s 
  habit of walking into the land of the 
  dead without knocking. The Crusader 
  suspects her of nameless sins, and the 
  Archmage patronizes her.
  If Bast seeks to replace the Priestess, 
  their relationship can turn frosty 
  despite both Icons’ warm natures.
  History
  Bast has walked the world in prior 
  Ages, save for those without cats.
  The True Danger
  Everything will be all right until the 
  thirteen thousandth cat is killed in the 
  Empire. Then Bast will claw at its soft 
  throat and secret underbelly. What’s 
  that? You’re pretty sure that more than 
  thirteen thousand cats have been killed 
  in the Empire? Oh dear . . . 
  Malkin/Cat-Folk
  +2 Cha OR +2 Dex
  Darkvision (Racial Power)
  You can see in the dark.
  Shadow Walk (Racial Power)
  Once per battle, you can 
  shadow walk as the Rogue Class 
  Talent (13th Age, p. 128).
  Malkin look as you might 
  expect: slender, furred humanoids 
  with catlike heads, prehensile 
  paws, and tails. (Their fur may 
  be any color from natural cat-
  camouflage to ginger to teal.) 
  Wilderness malkin, who keep to 
  the old ways of the hunt and the 
  torture-kill, live in the marshes 
  of the Fangs. City cat-folk, who 
  embrace the new ways of getting 
  someone else to hunt so you have 
  more time to nap in the sun, prefer 
  to dwell in the warmer towns 
  along the south coast: Santa Cora, 
  New Port, and Horizon. A malkin 
  in Glitterhaegen or Drakenhall 
  is usually more ambitious than 
  lazy, which means very ambitious 
  indeed.
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Ken Writes About Stuff/Ken Writes About Stuff Vol. 3/Bast.pdf