Talk20060115

Joint Monday/Saturday in the future

• Monday wants to find the real Crown, and Saturday has it
• Monday has Cain, to be merged with the machine, which needs to be programmed by Korlax
• Merlin Huntington plans to interfere with the Deus rite

Joint Wednesday/Saturday

• Trenton is linked to the techno-fearful
• The UNF deploys 41 ships (including the Perseverance) to Wolf 359 to fight them when they show up
• Saturday has been to their world, and Max is responsible for their creation

Many things happen during and following the several months of downtime

• Mars’s new consciousness, Aries, manifests itself not as a young child like Luna did, but completely as an avatar. It appears to be a mature adult humanoid, though it has very recently come into existence. The avatar restlessly walks the surface of Mars, and is being influenced greatly by the whispers of the half-fiend Nyx. The ramifications of this are still unknown…
• As a result, Mars does not cast away undead souls when they are destroyed, but instead spins them back out.
• Mars is rebuilt.
• The war between Lupus and Canis intensifies, with Lupan troops being deployed on Canis. The Canites fight back as more of a loosely organized militia. However, so far, no further breaches of the Dresden Accord have occured, at least not in the public eye. The respective forces are called the wolves and the dogs.
• The techno-fearful make their way to the Terran systems, and eventually Wolf 359, hitting Lupus first. Khan claims they are some terrible weapon sent by the dogs, as a last ditch effort. The UNF sends 41 ships, and the battle inflicts terrible losses.
• Vadril Korlax researches the ultimate AI for Cain’s great machine.
• Huntington is concentrating some of his effort on manipulating the war, but a large part of his efforts go toward plotting for the day of Deus rite.
• Eventually, Monday gets involved in the war as well, because they learn more about the "planet juice" once they meet with Pipwhistle and learn about his research.
• That research will have recently borne fruit such that the creation of DEO is possible. It is discovered that the techno-fearful feed on mystic energy from mystically infused worlds. Thus, DEO can be deployed against the techno-fearful to sap them of their food source; it works but they take time (months) to die. a world preemptively to prevent the techno-fearful from Mars, or against Lupus or Canis as part of the war.

What happened to Harry Bryant

• Bryants warns the Caretaker, as promised.
• Then he tells Mini-Vee that he has personal business to attend to; in particular, he says that he is going to attempt to recover the true Crown of Nebuchadnezzar.
• He offers to send Mini-Vee and Brice’s dog back to DEE, or failing that (if DEE is not in a mystically-infused area), in the care of Gaia’s Ancient Order on Earth. Leaving them behind is non-negotiable.
• The dog’s name, by the way, is Sir Hamilton Bacon, unless Andy vetoes it, in which case its name is Poophead. No, Nanaki.
• Bryant then is contacted by the Saturday group again, and he recruits them to obtain the Crown from Canis. The fact that Cassenti also wants the Crown is fine with Bryant, because it increases the chances of the Saturday group making an attempt.

What’s next for Monday

• They need deliver Cain somewhere, but where? Rossner offers to give the Monday group clearance to the UNF facility on Ceres, the largest asteroid in the belt, where Cain can be held more securely.
• They need to acquire the real Crown to give to Xela, since that was the agreement. At minimum, they need to redo their deal with Xela.
• If they travel to Midgard, Xela asks about the outcome with Cain. She may ask them to make contact with a royal named Vadril Korlax, on behalf of the Caretaker, and give them a certain message (encrypted on a data crystal) to give to him.
• Alternately, if Monday speaks to the Caretaker itself again, it will definitely ask them to find Korlax, and tell them to try locating Korlax and Bryant on Canis.
• If the want to travel directly to Canis, the party finds that the war has escalated, with more bombs having been detonated and ground troops (AIs and mechas) having been sent in to decimate the colony. But the inhabitants are starting to loosely organize themselves and fight back, holing up in the more high-security buildings.

• If things are starting to founder, the New Lunar Order could discover their location now and make a play of some kind for Cain.

• During the downtime, Nikolai’s parents may be recruited to work on the compromised LORE chip issue.
• After the downtime, the Monday group hears about the New Lunar Order making some sort of move against Ceres to recapture Cain.
• During or after the months of downtime, Deblin Gaddelsmocks contacts them, asking for help to prove her innocence in the StratCo/Magitech debacle. Perhaps her son Nald is incommunicado and she fears for his safety, given the facts she has recently uncovered.

What’s next for Wednesday

• Peters will propose taking Moss to Magitech HQ, to see if they can contain him.
• Others will probably have alternative proposals.

What’s next for Saturday

• Both Bryant and Cassenti appear to lay claim to the Crown. Both offer great rewards to the party to turn it over. They fight verbally, almost like children with one another, until finally Huntington moves to protect them once things have escalated to physical threats.
• Max proposes a merger with Bryant, who is willing to do so, if Max is diplomatic enough. (Bryant will certainly request one of the terms being the delivery of the Crown into his hands.) If the merger goes forward, Bryant attempts to kill Max when they "merge," since he doesn’t want Max’s soul influencing him (nor is he convinced two souls could even coexist in the way Max proposes). During the battle, Max will get glimpses into McLean’s secrets, including the truth about Mercury (it was intentional), and possibly flashes of memory about Vittorio Garibaldi (McLean’s takeover of the Silent Syndicate).
• Once Huntington reports to Khan that antimatter bombs were indeed found, and the party corroborates this evidence, war beguns on Canis (Khan’s ground troops only for now). Khan does not know the details of Huntington planting those bombs, but he orders the mystic to detonate, and Lin follows orders (he had ported the bomb from the mansion to near another one of the bunkers).
• Ivan tells Matt what he knows about Huntington, and is angry that the Saturday group is working with their sworn enemy. Ivan does not know that their old man mystic item specialist associate is the actually Huntington in disguise. However, he is angry that Huntington has "stolen" Baba Yaga’s book.