the principal patabotanist

Manifestation: investigator of non-human sentiences, atmosphere diffuser and wrangler of pataphors. Cat-herds the motley crew of patabotanists across parallel realities and reestablishes human-plant communication on a societal level, introducing patabotany in the circles of interspecies movers and shakers; presides at seasonal feasts and esoteric mysteries. Auspice: atemporality, reconnecting with the vegetal mind, empirical divination, pataphoric thinking, ritual design. Portent: introverted, persevering, intuitive, otherworldly.

the cook

Manifestation: mistress in the arcane art of transforming vegetation into nutrition. Holder of the Certificate of Plant Sacrifice, and Minister of Comestible Sacrament. Preserves plant essences, managing the staff of the interspecies kitchen; plants, prunes and harvests the garden; encourages plants to cross-fertilise with pataphors. Auspice: ethereal cuisine, meat trees, edible stories. Portent: extreme femininity and motherliness, secretive, caring, earthly.

the archivist

Manifestation: librarian and literature researcher, collector of networked knowledge and keeper of records. He is the archivist responsible for keeping track of manifold tangents generated by the patabotanists and their research assistants. Gardener of the Garginz archive, keeper of the Dilzio logbook, and a resident sceptic. Auspice: multi-dimensional mixed reality classification systems, maintaining order. Portent: authoritarian, scholarly, pompous, obsessively orderly, convoluted and incomprehensible communicator.

the mystic

Manifestation: mystic in transience at the Institute of Patabotany. He invokes and communes with Viriditas, the incomprehensible greenness behind all life, but is reluctant to use his powers in daily life. Opens channels between humans and plants by awakening the vegetal mind; mostly dwells in greenhouses in quiet meditation, and favours direct experience over dialogue. Auspice: introspection, alternative mind-states, collective consciousness, cognitive science, mystical experiences, obscure literature. Portent: asocial, meditative, wise, dissociated, scatterbrained.

the alchemist

Manifestation: a multi-talented artist and scientist engaged in the creation of new patabotanical species. In her crucibles stories and plant matter are transmogrified into living beings. She collects ethnobotanical data and plants, and encourages patabotanical mutation and incubation, babysitting and pacifying confused lifeforms. Auspice: transformation of matter, metempsychosis, trend-watching and trendsetting, movement (dance), culinary artistry. Portent: quiet, meticulous, peaceful, inspired, resilient, the embodiment of the union of opposites.

the assistant patabotanist

Manifestation: student of patabotany, assistant to Alchemilla Lily Umiliata, responsible for fieldwork coordination and recruitment, feast instigator. Works to draw attention to human-plant interaction; a cross-reality mission proselytiser. Engages new research assistants of patabotany, conducts and documents fieldwork, and ensures that everyone remains engaged, curious, without head injuries. Auspice: journeys, extreme sports, biomimicry. Portent: adventurous, risk taking, irreverent, joyful, deliberately silly, naive.

the translator

Manifestation: cross-species thalience linguist, ranger of the Park for Artificial and Botanical Intelligences; his office is in communicating with sentient non-humans. Translates (simultaneously and otherwise) between almost all human and botanical languages; channels inner plants, research into vegetal cognition and signalling. Sometimes can be persuaded to teach, stilling his conscience to corrupt young minds with his irreverent ideas. Auspice: linguistics, science fiction, plant neurobiology, the Other. Portent: enlightened, irreverent, wise, loyal; indulgence in copious amounts of alcoholic beverages.

the apprentice

Manifestation: engineering apprentice, assistant to Trismegisto Herbert Taraxi, a youth showing much potential but lacking discipline. He lives and works in the crafts workshop, acting as guard and receptionist; often gets lost on fieldwork expeditions. A clumsy experimenter, throwing the workshop into chaos. Eager to help but relentlessly questions the patabotanists' work, turning their hypotheses upside-down and inside-out. Auspice: sacrificial rituals, con-artistry, pain management, optical illusions, vegetal poisons. Portent: clumsy, helpful, thoughtless, greedy, regretful, broad-minded, shabby.

the trans-species lawyer

Manifestation: law theoretician and practitioner, plant rights activist; versed in jurisprudence of multiple species and several parallel realities. Experienced negotiator in disputes concerning plant offerings and celebrant in patabotanical marriage of stories and plants. Infiltrates the legal system to give plants identities and legal rights, allowing them to have a voice in human elections and policy making. Auspice: the law of cause and effect in parallel universes, knot theory, interspecies rights, institutional governance. Portent: righteous, balanced, fair, bland, virtuous, stable, stoic, moderate.

the organo-linguistic engineer

Manifestation: transdisciplinary craftsman, master of hybrid techniques of esoteric magic and ritual science. Builds machinery for cross-species (mis)communication, scavenging and connecting obsolete and emerging technologies, debugging human-plant interaction protocols and repairing fieldworkers’ shoes. Auspice: systems and interface design, illusionism, biotechnology and shoemaking. Portent: willpower, virtuoso manual skills, trickster.

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