Game Play thread opened for dotting in.
April 17, 2099, Earth
The Temporal Defense Society's Minneapolis command center is a sprawling mix of early 20th century dark wood paneling and advanced technology with sleek, minimalist design. The rooms are bathed in a soft, ambient glow emanating a thousand different light-sources, including decorative wall-sconces, pulsating LED panels, and even holographic displays.
One of those LED panels currently displays a news report from Fox 9, Minneapolis:
Reporter: As floodwaters continue to rise in Miami, thousands of residents are being evacuated from their homes. The city, as many others along coastal areas, is grappling with the consequences of rising sea levels and extreme weather events due to climate change.
Authorities are urging residents to evacuate to higher ground as the situation worsens. The National Guard has been deployed to assist with rescue efforts.
We spoke to a resident who lost everything in the flood. She described the water rushing into her home with such force, she barely had time to grab her children and escape.
A close-up of a tearful woman hugging her children appears on the screen.
At the center of the room, a holographic globe hovers above a circular console. The globe displays a dynamic timeline, depicting historical events and potential future outcomes. Technicians in sleek, form-fitting suits move around the console, manipulating controls with swift, precise gestures.
In the next room, larger even than this, a team of engineers and scientists are huddled around a another terminal, fine-tuning its coordinates and calibration. The air is suddenly filled with a hum of energy from the sophisticated machinery - A TASC is returning from a time-journey.
You have each arrived individually at the command center, back for the first time since your recruitment into the Society.
Your training as Temporal Agents of the society, tasked with investigating space-time divergences and -where possible- countering their effects on the timeline, was completed two days ago. Since that time you've been sequestered in the Society's dormitories on the same rural campus as this command center.
This morning, you were told to come to the command center and contact Randolph Elwin, mission commander for the society. Today, you are to receive your first assignment into time.
Jeremiah groaned, rubbing his temple as he still adjusted to the thrum of information that flit through his mind unabated. The base of his skull still felt sore even when he knew the incisions had been fully patched and healed within minutes of the operations conclusion. Yet despite the unpleasantness, he could t deny the results were more than worth it. The breadth of human knowledge- at least for this time period, right at the tip of his fingertips. So to speak, at least.
It truly was incredible what humanity was capable of when they came together.
"Mmph... Perhaps an asprin would be nice however..." He mumbled, thankful for innovation that he'd already been familiar with in his own time. Taking a breath, he looked down to his watch "Right, yes. Schedule to keep. Wouldnt do for an agent to be late."
Gnarok strides into the command center, strides purposeful and sharp. Tall, head shaved bald, tattooed, with sharp features and a hunter's bearing, the man seems like he could have stumbled straight out of the stone age.
In a way, he did.
He mulls over the words he speaks, his accent odd yet strangely familiar, "Pff, these damned clocks. Bound to their ever marching hands. I have longed for freedom from them, to drift on the winds of time that our superiors have told us we can."
The young lady walked into the room quietly, as if wishing the attention of others would pass her by.
She took in the globe, her eyes roving across reality, but then stepped to the large window. She placed a hand upon the glass as of to assure herself she could go no closer to the scene on the other side.
So, this is it. It was almost a question.
Herr Spilane is the first to find the person you're all looking for. Talking to a group that had just gotten off of the recently arrive TASC vehicle is a balding everyman, a kind but worn face and a knob of a nose. Randolph Elwin could be a ringer for a policeman in one of those American movies of the 1930s. Even his blue uniform leant itself to the notion.
But of course his rank as Mission Commander here gave him much more clout. He was the man who ran this place, making sure to choose the proper crew for each mission, and cataloguing the success (or failure) afterward.
As Spilane approaches, he notes that one of the crew from the last mission has stayed behind; a brown-skinned woman, very slender and slight of build. To Spilane's eyes, she was beautiful even with her very non-European features.
He had to self-correct himself from referring to the woman's appearance as 'exotic', yet still he couldn't help but have his eyes drawn. The hot-blooded young man had to clear his throat and pull his attention away from the woman, trying instead to look to the much less appealing American man. It just wouldn't do to make such a poor impression of himself, particularly when his past already held a certain... reputation in this modern age.
"Sir," He stated stiffly, habitually bringing his fist to bump up against his opposite shoulder in salute with his heels firmly planted against one another. Notably, he was intentionally trying to speak English instead of his own native language. "I am Jerimiah Spillane, I was told to report here for assignment?"
"Ah, yes, Spilane. Our scientist," the man says, looking the man up and down as if trying to perceive everything about him in an instant.
"Welcome aboard. This is Agent D'Nisha Green. She's just gotten back from her first jump, and normally would be due some downtime, but I simply had to have her with your team on this one."
"Good to meet you Jeremiah," the young woman says casually, holding the German's eye a few seconds longer than was comfortable for him.
Gnarok sees a group hovering just outside the TASC bay that just became occupied. A man in a high-ranking uniform, with a slender man of blondish hair and an even thinner young woman with brown skin, currently dressed in a white leather bolero jacket and jeans. Gnarok suspects the man in uniform is Randolph Elwin.
Gnarok walks briskly, his stride purposeful as he approaches Randolph Elwin, "It is known you are in charge here. Speak quickly, tell what must be done. Life's currents rush onwards, as they ever do."
"Mr. Gnarok. A man who doesn't mince words, seeminly," Elwin nods.
"Here are two of your companions on this journey. We're still waiting on the final member of your team. Once she gets here, we'll be ready for your briefing. They're fueling a TASC for you in bay 4 now."
Bekkah notices a small gathering and tears herself away from the window... Best not be tardy. Fashionably late was not something she appreciated nor tried to be.
She strides up to the group.
Hello. I'm Khadaji. Sincerest apologies if I've kept you waiting.
"It is a pleasure to meet all of you." He spoke, turning curious attention to the honestly very large man of strange, vaguely familiar features. He just couldn't seem to place the ethnicity, and what he could make out of that language through the virus was very odd to his ears. When they were more settled, perhaps he'd inquire more.
"Well, now that I've got you all together, if you could follow me to the staging room, I'll give you your mission assignment and posts." With that, Mission Commander Elwin leads you to a small tram, which drives through the adjacent TASC bay and two others before coming to rest on the other side of a fourth.
Elwin takes you into a room with a 10' conference table and you choose seats.
"Each of you has one or more specializations that will be useful on your mission. Your post assignments will be based on your strongest scores in the aptitude tests."
"First, Agent Spilane. You are the team's official historian, as well as the temporal scientist. That gives you veto power if you think something the team is about to do will disrupt the time-stream. Hopefully that situation doesn't come up."
"Second, Agent Khadaji. You've scored exceptionally on piloting skills as well as other technical skills that make you an obvious choice for the TASC pilot's seat."
"Agent Gnarok. You are to provide security for the team, as well as warn of any psychic threats you detect."
"Finally, Agent Green is one of our 1st year finest medics, among her many skills, and will be your Medical specialist."
'Psychic?' Jerimiah's eyebrows raised at the word. His curiosity about the tall man only proceeded to grow even further.
"It will be my pleasure to work beside you all. I hope we do not run into much complication for our task. But, we'll, always expect the unexpected yes?" He said, a smile pulling at his lips.
Gnarok locks eyes with Jerimiah. He gives a slim smile to Jerimiah as his voice echoes in Jeremiah's head, "Not psychic, as our masters would claim. Chosen to hear the voices of the spirits of the land. We can speak more once we escape from their seeking ears."
Commander Elwin raises an eyebrow at Gnarok's rather interesting phraseology, but chooses not to inquire further.
"The four of you will be traveling here:" the man says, before turning on a holographic screen in the center of the table. No matter where you sit in the room, the image is facing you.
The image is rendered in "black and white," a photographic medium with which Spilane is quite acquainted. The image rendered seems to be in some sort of canyon, though the walls seem, to a good extent, to have been excavated. There, several shirtless men, Africans, push mining carts or perform various other menial tasks, while white, mustached men appear to be "supervising."
"A DeBeers Consolidated diamond mine, circa nineteen-hundred and nine (1909)."
Khadaji considers. Makes sense. Diamonds are a core component of the TASC vehicle's primary drive system, she reflects.
"The powers that be have determined that this is the easiest place in time for a large amount of diamonds to 'disappear' without damaging the timeline. As you may or may not be aware, Diamonds are a core component of the TASC vehicle's primary drive system, and every jump, a small quantity of them needs to be replaced."
"Your mission, therefore, is to travel to the Debeers Orange River mine, 1909, and return with 100 lbs of high-grade diamonds."
D'Nisha's eyes go wide with some emotion; shock? Rage? It's hard to read. She says, simply and quietly, "Blood Diamonds." Elwin rewards this statement only with a nod.
Khadaji considers Green's reaction and is worried.
I suppose "timeless" and "a girl's best friend" are poor follow-ups. I'm sympathetic to the pain of the exploited. But, what's done is done and we shouldn't even be thinking of tinkering with that aspect of things.
That their toil will mean some good can be done with the fruits of their labor will go unsung, but is important none the less.
Taking a breath, What's so special about there and then?
She looks to historian and then the commander.
Jerimiah adjust his glasses with a frown, "Yes, I beleive many of the materials my... orginization experimented with, came from mines such as these. While I still can not say I will feel 'good' about profiting off the backs of such... labors, we must not change what has already come to pass. To that end, I am wondering. I have heard that 20th century science had already begun to grow diamonds within a lab environment, surely 21st century science is at the point where it can compensate?"
To that end, I am wondering. I have heard that 20th century science had already begun to grow diamonds within a lab environment, surely 21st century science is at the point where it can compensate?"[/b]
"Excellent question. Certainly we CAN. But such technology is heavily monitored, and the results tagged. It seems someone got wise to some of our early...liberations of such equipment; we cannot risk discovery by the modern governments."
These particular diamonds, our temporal scientists have determined through weeks of observation, no one will miss. And 1909 is far enough from any known temporal disruptions for this incursion to cause damage to the timeline."
"Understandable, in that instance. We shall see this done then, yes?" He proposes, looking questioning at his compatriots on the journey.
When the meeting is over, a technician, a woman in her late 30s with thick black hair and a jovial face, directs the squad to TASC bay 4.
"This is a model 3, all the latest upgrades. It's got gravitic corrective scanning, which should help. Veers a little bit to the past, you might try to compensate, but don't overshoot. Coordinates for 1909 already calculated and laid in."
He turns to the others, speaking his native German in lieu of a commonly undsrstood language. Naturally, his words were translated all the same."Everyone has all their equipment, I hope?"
Do we have period... clothing and accessories? Bekkah was professionally curious.
And the vehicles of the era, less than ideal. She smiled.
Do we have period... clothing and accessories? Bekkah was professionally curious.
"Placed on board by our costuming specialists, per regulations."
Gnarok mutters, "Bastards, stealing the stone's shining blood for nothing but greed's sake. We are to simply let these injustices occur, and let these cruel masters continue their wickedness?"
"Yes." Jerimiah states simply, turning to look Gnarok in the eye with a hard expression. "I understand wanting to interfere, but we must try to keep damage to the timeline minimal. Stopping the operations both could and would leave a far greater impact than you might realize."
He turns away, looking down. "I should know that better than most. Yet... Ah, we should go. Time waits for no one."
D'Nisha squeezes Gnarok's arm in solidarity, but nods to Spilane's assessment.
"Trying to right large-scale moral wrongs in timestream can cause even worse atrocities later."
You board the TASC and acquaint yourselves with the peculiarities of this model. Seating in the model 3 is uncomfortably close together, leaving a battle for arm-room.
The pilot takes his seat. Training involved practice flights in Earth's orbit and in remote geographies such as the Australian Outback, but this is the first flight on a mission where arriving in the appropriate place and time mattered.
Arms moving to and fro, fingers nearly caressing the instrumentation... Bekkah preps for departure.
Keep your hands inside the ride and to yourselves, boys and girls. She gives a playful smile.
Allah huah akbar...
You all feel a sudden jerk as the TASC is pulled from spacetime. Performing this stage before launch, Bekkah reflects, keeps the TASC from being detected by modern air tracking systems during flight; multiple unscheduled flights from one location would give away the Temporal Defense Society's position and have several very curious governments breathing down their neck.
Once the TASC is safely in between space-time coordinates, she lifts the vessel and begins the journey. Since temporal disruptions can happen anywhere, anywhen, the TASC is designed to be able to travel through both time and space. Bekkah could easily, if the mission called for it, lift off into deep space and travel extreme interstellar distances in defense of the timeline.
For this mission, however, all that was required was a short intercontinental trip with a negative temporal adjustment of slightly less than 200 years. "Easy" Bekkah reflected sarcastically.
Within seconds, the vessel has re-entered real space-time, and is in the process of landing over the rugged plains of South Africa. You'll need to journey due east about 3-5 miles to reach the mine.
As Bekkah scopes her approach, Ladies and gentlemen, we are making our descent and if you check your seat monitors... you'll notice our destination approximately four miles due East.
We thank you for flying TASC Airlines and enjoy your stay in South Africa, 1909 AD.
The German raised a brow at the woman's words, and shared a look towards Gnarok who was doubtlessly just as confused. He in the end concludes it must be an idiom of the woman's time that he was unfamiliar with, and instead moves towards the lockers so he could pick up a change of wear. "Excellent navigation, miss. Khadaji. We seem to have reached when we're supposed to be at least, but we shall see with our own eyes soon enough."
Having gathered equipment and changed clothes as desired, the group cautiously opens the door. If any human life were present near the vessel, a buzzer would have sounded and the door remained closed.
Stepping out into the sun, the group climbs down a short ramp onto a dusty and rocky surface. The climate here, away from the Orange River proper, is arid; the type of place you'd expect to find a mine. The temperature, however, was mild, roughly 24 c (75 f).
As soon as the ramp door closes, the TASC becomes extremely well-camouflaged, its external panels reflecting images of what's on the other side.
Gnarok glances at the sun, surveys the surroundings, and points, immediately recognizing due east.
We stay on mission, keep our heads on straight and we get the hell out of here ASAP.
Did they give is information regarding the DeBeers operation, prominent individuals, etc..? If not, first thing is to watch.
She looks at the others... are we two couples?
Gnarok shoots a quizzical glance at Bekkah, ”Do I sense that you propose deception? The clever arts of the fox and the hare are respectable.”
As long as we don't end up the hares.
Jeremiah, when I grew up, in the late twentieth century, there was apartheid in South Africa, where there's was systemic segregation.
Blacks, Browns and Whites with, Whites enjoying control and highest privilege. No mixed relations or marriages, etc... She seems concerned.
As Jerimiah recalls, a British citizen named Francis Oats just became Chairman of the corporation in 1908. They are currently in a corporate struggle with the Premier Mine run by Bernard and Ernest Oppenheimer (your fellow countrymen). As to individuals who might be supervising mines, those names are a bit too obscure for Spilane to recall.
Jeremiah, when I grew up, in the late twentieth century, there was apartheid in South Africa, where there's was systemic segregation.
Blacks, Browns and Whites with, Whites enjoying control and highest privilege. No mixed relations or marriages, etc... She seems concerned.
Jerimiah's understanding of history certainly reinforces that mixed marriages would be very unpopular at the time. However, he does remember that the British, in particular, often gave some measure of trust and authority to people of color as guides and experts, always under British command, of course.
"Mm, I know a few overarching details but it is unlikely we'll see any of the faces I'm familiar with. Not every man or woman is historically documented, regardless of however important they were in their respective histories." He speaks with some level of solemnity, before elaborating on the details he knew.
Then he continues; "I will, of course, point out recognizable names as I see them if present. Now, as to identities for ourselves... It would not be in good taste to pose as a mixed couple, though I know that those seen as locals of regions such as these are often trusted as guides and experts to their lands by the British. So long as they were under their authority at least."
He gives an assessing eye to his compatriots on this journey, lingering breifly on D'Nisha before looking to the tall man. "I feel that as is Mr. Gnarok can pass for... Well, a variety of European ethniticities really. There is a strange sense of familiarity with your facial features that I'm still puzzling out."
Gnarok gives Jerimiah a crooked grin, ”My people are…well, those of my kinship called ourselves the Monekwos, the People of the Horse, but you would call us Proto-Indo-European. From what I have come to understand, it seems likely I am, somewhere far, far up the tree, your ancestor. Likely the ancestor of many in this tribe of time-wanderers.”
His grin widens, ”So respect your grandfather, whippersnapper.”
His brows raise at this revelation. "That explains much aleady! So wait, that language you're speaking, that would mean it would also be the root of... Well, all of them! Er, well, all that I find myself overly familiar with at least. I am still brushing up on my Mandarin. There's much that could be learned about how langauge formed and developed simply by having someone willing to speak who was there. This should be big news at the-"
Jerimiah cuts himself off, coughing into his fist as he realizes he was getting just a little bit too enthusiastic. "Forgive me, I am eh... Linguistics have always been a hobby of mine, even before my recruitment. Now is certainly not the time to indulge in such fancies."
So... Are we seeking employment?
As you discuss back and forth a more solid cover story, you see a horsedrawn cart making its way across the barren landscape in the same direction you are traveling toward, but further south. If it's passengers took any notice of you, they did nothing to indicate it.
It takes you about an hour to hike the rest of the distance to the mining company. A large wooden sign outfront identifies this as the
DeBeers Diamond Mining Company, Orange River Mine
There is a lot of activity in the vicinity of the entrance right now, and a few armed men in khaki British combat uniforms mill about the front.
Jerimiah brings a ha d above his eyes to block out the sun, as he peers down the ridge. "Curious,I wonder what's going on down there? Hmm... It is best to discover our means of approach. Coming as workers is... possible, but I think acting as potential buyers may be more our avenue if only so we may get close and observe the mine itself."
You're the Boss, I'm your valet. Seems to work.