GM Narration:
You have recently established a presence around your respective anomaly and been provided lodgings. Where are you? Please describe the state of your lodgings, the general size of your dispatch team (is it one or two researchers or an entire facility?) and name at least one of the higher up researchers and give a brief description of their demeanor and skills. Furthermore, if you would like, describe the journey there. The anomaly can be roughly described as a pinhole-sized floating void in space that ebbs and flows in expanding and contracting by a few inches throughout the day. When it is touched when inactive, physical objects pass through it as though it isn't there. However, when it is active, it can be extremely dangerous to get near it, but what happens when it becomes active varies by location. This will often be up to you, but sometimes I will tell you what the anomaly does at certain times. The anomaly at each location will be active at 14:14 UTC on October 27th for exactly one hour and eight minutes during this turn. It will draw attention to itself with a very bright light that passes through solid objects and stretches towards the sky and emit a high pitched noise. How does your team respond? Does your team learn anything about the anomaly while this is happening?
Questions to consider:
- Where exactly in your region is your anomaly located, and how was it first discovered? Is it near a lot of human beings, or is it out in the wilderness?
- Your team was sent with at least one specialist in a specific field of researcher. Who are they and what are they specialized in?
- What is the relative wealth of your researchers compared to the people in the community?
- How do the locals feel about outsiders?
- Additionally, each player was sent a different special challenge question to incorproate in their response.
Attatched Material:
- CABLEGRAM.PDF
- GILLIAN: Email body, as PDF, Gold Rush.jpg
- BELLAMY: Email body, as PDF
- LILLITH: Email body, as PDF, YGGDRASIL.png
CASTLEFORD
15 Norwegian peasants washed up today on the beach of Warden, England, naked as babes and lost."
"Pardon?"
"15 Norwegian peasants, I said. I 'eard they were Norwegian, on account of I knew someone said he had heard the language before and it was that for sure."
Thomas shrugged, and frowned. He laid his cards down and pushed his money towards the center of the table. "I fold."
Virgil snaked his wooden arm out, and scooped the coins towards him, piling them into a small bag on his lap. "It's just what I hear on the grapevine is all. Can you believe it?"
"No, Virg, I truly cannot. Where are you hearing such nonsense?" University boy Walter, with his thick-rimmed, wine-bottle glasses, always the skeptic. He started dealing out the next round. His soft scholar's hands had no trouble making rough, quick work distributing the dog-eared and torn set of cards. All the men trusted him to be a fair dealer.
Virgil picked up this round's hand. With a slightly embarrased grimace, he replied:
"Just something I heard from my cousin up in Kent is all. He says they couldn't answer any questions, even from one o' the folks there that spoke Norwegian. Acted like they didn't remember a damn thing about themselves, not even their names. Had him frightened as a ghost. I swear it be what he told me."Thomas roared out in frustration. "God's piss, these focken cards!" He threw his hand immediately down on the table, folding right away. Virgil and Walter glanced at each other, and then back down the table to silent old O'Malley, who tapped the back of his cards with his index finger, dropped another 10 pence into the pot, and put one card face down.
"Sounds fishy. Lutefisk-y, even." Walter joked. It was completely lost on the other three.
"Strange times, eh?"
"Strange times."
ANCHORAGE
Maurice was about to get out of trouble. Governor Sheakley was on his ass about getting railroads built "all the way out to the hicks and savages in Seward."
"We must hasten to bring some civilization to the territory, if we're going to have a shot in this frozen hell of being relevant in the 20th century."
Maurice couldn't do it. For nearly two years he had tried to pass off dozens of enticements out east, south, and north. Letters to Westinghouse, Vanderbilt, Harriman, carrying spectacular guarantees of black gold beneath the snow, hundred-year tax breaks, various guarantees of expensive estates and cheap labor.
The railroad titans didn't often send back. When he did receive letters or wires from them, they were terse and blunt: We're not negotiating building tracks through Canadian territory just to send railcars out to a rural backwater. Come back to us in 10, 20 years time when there's been something built out there.
Well, that was about to change. He'd received a tip about something new, a few miles out of Nome. Something remarkable. More importantly, something he might be able to monetize. The stories he'd heard from his eyes on the ground were astonishing and unbelievable. Some sort of 'nexus of light,' a natural occurrence that flashes brightly and created things in the frozen tundra. If the moneyed yanks needed something special to bring them out to the Norton Sound, Maurice was certain this would be it.
He planned for an expedition of his own, and some men of his own to build around this mysterious opportunity.
Maurice was something of a gambling man, but like any gambling man, he wouldn't call this a gamble; he was sure on this bet. And he'd keep his cards to himself for the time being. Maurice put in an application for a high-leverage loan, and he passed the word around. An anonymous benefactor was looking for scientists and builders. The best of the best of both. He'd pay handsomely for any men with the bold spirit to come out to Nome and build something. This was a good decade for building something.
INNVIK
Arve's arms were throbbing from chopping wood. His father had left for Yggdrasil, and he was doing the work of two men for the household now. Yggdrasil had warned them that the season would be frigid, and Arve had no intention of letting his sisters or his mother freeze, so it was chopping wood for him today. Hours and hours of it.
When Arve had finished his day's labor, it seemed as though the day had hardly passed. A bright, unlifting mist had developed into a warm, effervescent fog. It drowned everything distant in the woods, but for beams of radiant yellow light piercing through the canopies of trees. He made his way back through the woods with his pale tan cart, leaving a winding path in broken red leaves. Twice he returned to the clearing he had worked in, loading and unloading the cart down the hill a ways, stacking it in a careful lattice underneath the small lumber shelter near their home’s well.
On the third time he returned to the clearing, Arve met Fallow.
"Do you have food?," asked the wolf, in a choppy, quiet voice. She sat on top of a cleared stump, weak, sunken eyes. Skin and bones. She wasn’t quite the same as any wolf Innvik had seen before. She was smaller, with a narrower face more like that of a fox, not the fearsome, large predators he was accustomed to. And there was the simple fact that she was speaking.
Arve hesitated. "I do, yes," his eyes darting around the clearing, looking for an explanation. "Not with me. Up the ways a bit."
"May I ask for some?" The wolf was not demanding; she seemed polite. Desperate, but somehow resigned.
"I don't see why not. I've plenty to spare." This was the plain truth, though he surprised himself that he was so willing to part with it to this strange creature. He did have food to spare; half of Innvik had disappeared overnight. The village had more than enough to go around now.
"Thank you. Can you show me to it?" The wolf shakily began to stand, and gingerly she stepped off of the tree stump.
"Sure. One moment, then follow me. It isn't far." Arve approached the wolf, who looked up at him and followed his eyes, then walked past her and collected the last of his lumber. He began stacking it in his cart. "My name is Arve."
There was a long, heavy pause before the gray wolf replied: "Fallow."
"Sad name, that."
She said nothing, and that suited Arve just fine. He set his wagon on its end, spun it around, and set off back to his home, Fallow following close behind.
GM narration:
Your researchers received no contact from Epsilon Thorium for the remainder of October and all the way until mid-November, despite your messages. They have gone apparently silent; there are no letters, nor telegrams back. Any private telegram lines that were arranged with them have gone dead, and they are unable to get through to any contacts they have within the organization. They all seem to have taken leave from their public-facing positions abruptly.
This has not happened before. When your lead researchers consult their orders in the case of total silence from Epsilon Thorium, they learn they are expected to continue all research priorities and acquire the resources they require to continue their operations independently, without making waves or drawing attention to themselves.
Questions to consider:
-What's the scientific equipment the team uses like?
-What does the team use to communicate with each other?
-How are the members of the team paid for their work?
