Douglas Sharper, who was from Modesto, California, was not a member of the DRC or a Restoration Engineer. Instead, he was the only third-party contractor the DRC ever hired.

First Restoration

Sometime around 2002, Sharper arrived in the cavern. While familiarizing himself with the place, he discovered a set of linking books to Teledahn, and as a reward was given overall responsibility for restoring it. Later, he was also given the Watcher's Pub to restore, and assisted with Ahnonay.

However, Sharper, who was arrogant and impatient, quickly grew angry at the pace the DRC set for him. He complained bitterly in his personal journal about all the safety checks and delays imposed on the release of Teledahn, feeling that he had done the job properly from the outset and angry at what he felt was a lack of trust in his professionalism by the organization. Partly as revenge, he kept a number of secrets from them. This included knowledge of a linking book to the Baron's Office, a location in the Guild Hall complex on Ae'gura Island, and he didn't tell them about documentation he'd found about a slave-trading ring that had operated out of Teledahn in the years leading up to the Fall of D'ni. He went as far as setting up a spying post in a collapsed section of corridor in the upper floors of Tokotah II, opposite a conference room in Tokotah I where the DRC were discussing the restoration of Teledahn. After Teledahn was finally approved, he was reassigned to work on the Great Tree Pub.

Becoming increasingly disgruntled, Sharper sided with Restoration Engineer Phil Henderson after the latter returned from a year-long disappearance. He allowed Phil to guide him through the Path of the Hand, and thereafter wore the shirt Yeesha gifted to those who'd completed it because he knew it bothered the DRC members. Sharper also helped to found an explorer society called The Great Tree after the pub, a group which opposed DRC policies. In late 2003, Sharper led a large number of explorers to the blocked-off entrance to the Kahlo Pub, and together they destroyed the barricades that had previously kept the pub closed.

Because of that action, he was taken off the Great Tree Pub restoration, and this prompted him to argue that the DRC's policies were too restrictive. He brought up the names of explorer Brian Fioca and other members of The Great Tree as allies in his movement, and used Yeesha's messages and Phil's mysticism as fuel in his criticism of the DRC.

When Phil Henderson was locked up by the DRC in 2003, Sharper took Phil's Relto book, possibly because its bookshelf held many more Ages then those of other explorers. Thus, when Phil apparently died in a collapse in the upper stories of the Guild Hall complex, Sharper felt responsible, believing that Phil could have survived by linking to Relto. This took a lot of the wind out of his sails, and he toned down his activities.

Shortly afterwards the DRC lost funding and could no longer attempt to restore the cavern. Douglas Sharper was the last DRC employee to leave.

Second Restoration

In May of 2007, Sharper returned to the cavern to rejoin the DRC, which was then being directed by Cate Alexander. Alexander publicly stated that she was happy that Sharper was a part of the Restoration effort again.

Because he was an experienced hunter, Douglas was assigned to investigate the mysterious disappearance of animals around the observation pod of Negilahn. He conducted his first exploration of the area with Nick White and an explorer named Rils. They didn't have to go far before they found the body of an urwin that had been brutally slaughtered. Several trees around the corpse had deep parallel furrows carved into them, which Douglas was able to say were from some sort of claws, but there were no tracks around the urwin that could be used trace or identify the predator.

In that same month, he and Nick went back to Negilahn, and set up a hunting blind to watch for activity. They’d just settled in when they got the news that a cave-in had trapped Willow “Wheely” Engberg and Rosette Taylor. It was decided that Nick would go back to the cavern to help with the rescue effort, leaving Douglas behind. Soon afterward, he sent a message to Nick saying that something had taken the urwin he was watching and he was going to pursue it.

Douglas followed the tracks he was able to find, and ended up in a field where several Bahro were waiting for him. Sharper realized too late that he had been lured into a trap. Just as he was attacked by the Bahro, more linked in and began to fight with the original group. Douglas fled, leaving behind what he called a war.

After discovering that rogue Bahro were responsible for the deaths in the Negilahn and of Wheely Engberg, he spent a month on Noloben, an Age the Bahro who killed Wheely had kept mentioning in the only known incident of a Bahro speaking a recognizable human word to anyone other than perhaps Yeesha. He spent a month there, observing them. He had stated publicly that he intended to kill the Bahro responsible in retribution for the murder of Wheely.

At the end of the month, Douglas returned to the cavern, shaken and saying that he had killed a Bahro. According to him, he attempted to shoot one of the Bahro nekisahl, but another Bahro had jumped in the way. Later, while he was speaking to explorers in the Watcher's Sanctuary, two Bahro linked in next to him with the body of the one he’d shot. They seemed to mourn the Bahro in front of Douglas for a time, before they linked out, leaving the dead one behind lying on the viewer.

In the following months, Douglas became more morose, repeatedly telling explorers that the war was coming to the cavern and he felt there wasn't much we could do about it. He decided to go back to Noloben to help the friendly Bahro fight.

When he finally returned to the Cavern in January of 2008, it was to discover that the DRC had left again, supposedly to raise funding. He decided to return to the surface as well, stating that he wanted to see a few football games, since the Patriots were having a good season. He never returned.

Did Sharper Believe in Yeesha's Restoration?

In a word, no. He wore her shirt as a way of thumbing his nose at the DRC, and argued in favor of Yeesha's ideas out of sheer contrariness, not because he actually cared about them. Practically everything he knew about her was from what Phil Henderson said. When questioned directly on several occasions about how he felt, he denied believing in her, and said that she had to be dead because she would have been too old to still be alive. To Sharper, Yeesha was just a way to express his own anger and discontent with the DRC. It was Phil Henderson and Jeff Zandi who were the true believers.

Myst, the Myst logo, and all games and books in the Myst series are registered trademarks and copyrights of Cyan Worlds, Inc. Myst Online: Uru Live is the sole property of Cyan Worlds Inc. The concepts, settings, characters, art, and situations of the Myst series of games and books are copyright Cyan Worlds, Inc. with all rights reserved.

I make no claims to any such rights or to the intellectual properties of Cyan Worlds; nor do I intend to profit financially from their work. This web site is a fan work, and is meant solely for the amusement of myself and other fans of the Myst series of games and books.