2020-07-13: Etheretics by Dr A Hanada

Etheretics by Dr. A. Hanada
Arumi begins recruiting Astra into the Society of Ether
IC Date	July 13, 2020
IC Time	11 AM
Players	Arumi, Astra
Location	Arumi's Lab deep in the desert
Prp/Tp	N/A
Spheres	Traditions
Theme Song	Five Millennia Later https://youtu.be/1jxUqJykEY4

Arumi would arrange to pick up Astra, in her red Tesla Model 3, and drive out out into the desert. About as far out as the Nexus is, but a bit to the north, and just off of the main highway, she pulls up to this teeny tiny house, and parks under an awning to protect the car from the sun. "Here we are!

Astra has a huge grin on her face when she sees your car, giving an approving thumbs up as she slips inside. She does her best not to play with too many buttons during the ride. She looks surprised at the tiny little house they pull up to and tries to hide her disappointment. "It's ahh.. smaller than I was expecting?" She says as she gets out of the car, "It's cool that it's entirely off the grid, but you can't play online games through that thing can you?" She motions to the antenna. Priorities are important.

Arumi is a fast driver, so hopfully excited Astra doesn't get carsick. She giggles at that comment. "It's like a Tardis. Come inside." She will then lead Astra into the tiny house. "Grab some water from the fridge if you want..." before opening the secret hatch to lead her down and in...

Astra smirks as she joins you downstairs, "It's cheating when the big box is *underneath* the small box." She chuckles, making her way to the fridge for a bottle of water, "But this is much more like it!" The workshop tools illicit a look of jealousy, especially the 3d printers. "You still haven't told me what your working on yet?" She asks as she makes her way toward the computer, she expects it to be locked but she's going to peek anyway.

Arumi laughs and sighs. "Yeah. I'm out here becuase it's safer. Astra." She pulls out one stool and offers it to her, then setting her bag down on the workbench adjacent, she plants herself on another, feet dangling.

"Can you keep a secret?"

Astra takes a breath as sits down on the stool, "I need to get one off my chest first, assuming Bobbi hasn't already said something." She sighs, "The designs I'm working on are based on Alien Technology." She winces a bit an peers at you worriedly.

Arumi settles in, folding her hands in her lap, hands resting on her thighs. Leaning forward a little. Preparing to speak, Astra blurts that out, and that makes her giggles, and sigh. "Okay. That's kind of why I brought you here. Astra, The things you said in the basement of the coffee shop sounded like you were working on fortean research outside of the scientific consensus imposed on humanity. What I do down here, seeks to bust that open and advance humanity to our rightful destiny in the stars."

Astra smiles and blushes a little, "Fortean has a much nicer ring to it, but you can just call me crazy. It's okay, everyone does!" She swallows, "But.. you sound like you're okay with that? And maybe we even have similar goals?" She asks hopefully.

Arumi raises a finger, and hops off of her stool. Sandals landing with a quiet clunk, she walks to one particular drawer, squats down, and opens it up to pull out something. It looks vaguely like the Zorg ZF-1, as she fits it onto her arm. "It's not crazy. It's science, before a secret organization called the Technocratic Union decided to put humanity on a secret plan of slow, controlled advancement."

Raising the cannon, aiming at a charred dummy hanging on the back wall, she smiles to AStra. "I however am a member of an organization that landed on the moon in the 1800s, and put a space station in to Lunar orbit soon after."

She then pulls the trigger. The twang of a sound comes as a glowing bolt of red plasma ejects from the weapon, flies across the room, and smacks into the the dummy, casuing it to explode in flames.

Astra slips off her stool to watch, giggling like mad when the bizarre gun fires, "Oh my god that rocks!" She cheers, "You based that thing on The Fifth Element didn't you?" She furrows her brow, looking slightly upset at your words, "The 1800's?" She shakes her head, "That can't be, it's too early, the Secret Space Program didn't get off it's feet until the 50's!" She seems sure of this, "The public moon landings were real, but mostly for show. and of course they had to keep the 10,000 year old Human Moon Bases a secret..."

Everyone know s this stuff right!?

Arumi giggles as she takes the cannon off. "I did. It's a useful design though. Hard to drop, especially in 0G. I don't have the famous net gun though, or anything but the plasma rifle, in case I run into hostile aliens when I go into space in a few months."

"This is an experimental model though. Once I get the ship built I'll make some prdouction models to take with me, for my crew to use. A crew I'm inviting you to join, as a research assistant of mine. Please, sit down."

She puts the plasma rifle back away, and sits again. "Captain Horatio Savage of the Royal Ethernautical Society, chartered by Queen Victoria in London, landed on the moon in 1893, and built Victoria Station with the help of aliens he met there."

"This lab? It's underground, and in the desert, because if the government, or the Technocratic Union, found out about it, they would send helicopters to shut it down. Especially after I expand the back wall way out, and down, to create a fullsized space hangar, which I will dub the Shatterdome."

Astra grins, "Homing rounds wouldn't be terribly hard to pull off you know, you could make some clunky but serviceable gyrojet rounds with off the shelf tech, just sayin'!" She gets a bit more serious as she listens, "Maybe your crazier than I am, but I'm willing to take that risk." She says with a shaky breath. "Technocratic Union...? Never heard them called that before, but it fits..." She chews on her lip. "Even if you toss out the Aliens, 'They Live' is still 98 percent accurate, metaphorically at least."

Arumi giggles. "Or just impart the right amount of spin on the ether in the barrel, so when it comes out the vibrations of the light are already moving in the right direction, precalculated according to a predetermined target."

Takes a deep breath. "They Live, yeah. It's... kind of true. But instead of aliens, it's the TEchnocratic Union, founded by a bunch of men in a room in, like, Paris or something. It has five main conventions. The ones that would be like They Live are called the Syndicate and the New World Order. Enough said.

"But I'm with the Society of Ether. What if I told you science stopped advancing when Michelson and Morley did their so-called disprof of the Ether, and the Union rigged that to try to stop us from bringing all of humanity into space?"

Astra quirks an eyebrow at your idea and looks like she wants to hug you, "That sounds similar to what I'm doing, a big part of it's exciting exotic matter into higher energy states, using vibrational energy along with a few metallurgical tricks!" She nods slowly as you continue, "I've heard something like that, Einstein was either bullied or mind controlled into giving up the idea of the Ether, depending on who you talk to?" She sighs, "And I absolutely agree that humanity is being held back, I just don't have the fancy names for the problem that you do."

Arumi smiles. "Einstein, for all his positive traits, was a member of the Union, Astra. So yeah, he eventually gave in on Spooky Action At A Distance." She sighs. "But yes. That's why I Want to bring you on board. Next month when I Start construction of my ship, which will use a hyperdrive to jump directly from the Shatterdome, into transdimensional Etherspace, which extends to the entire bloc of space inside the asteriod belt, I'd like your help with the metallurgy of the structure and the hull."

Astra nods eagerly, "I can absolutely help with that, but I want to do more for you too, I can already excite electrons into gravitons, or flip then over into positrons which excite into *antigravitons*!" She says proudly, "The only problem is positrons are sort of... antimatter. And they keep melting my carefully crafted gravity plates into slag." She sighs, "That's kind of where I'm stuck at the moment. But what I really want to do, someday, is excite Photons into Tachyons, though I'm wondering if that's what this hyperdrive of yours is going to do to?" She asks worriedly, as if she's gotten here too late.

Arumi bites her lip. "Cool. That sounds very interesting. I'd be interested to see you develop a theoretical foundation for that. I can help." She leans over to open a drawer, as she adds "My basic theory is that I'm going to impart controlled compression waves into the Ether, which will interact with atoms at the lattice and nuclear level, in order to change physical and atomic properties. Make sense?"

She then hands over a small hardback book, bound in black leather, with gold embossed title. "Kitab al-Alacir, or, The Book of Ether"

Astra nods to you, "I think so. Again it doesn't sound too different than what I'm doing, shifting matter into a higher, or at least alternative energy state?" She take s the book and strokes the cover carefully, "This looks old, and expensive..." She says worriedly, "I'll take good care of it, but are you sure you want me to have it?

Arumi nods. "Please take it. But be careful with it. This is the Book of Ether. It is a book orignally written in ancient Greek. I have a copy in that language if you prefer. It's... it's a book about a conversation between the philospher Aretus, and King Priam of Troy. Aretus basically described to Priam the philosphy of Etheric science: humanity depends on our need to go out beyond into the unknown, the fortean beyond of the universe. IT's all metaphor, but you may find it enlightening,w hen you have time to sit down and study it."

Astra blushes softly, "I'm suddenly feeling awfully uneducated.. but then UC Prospect doesn't exactly offer courses on Secret History." She says with a weak smile, then flips the book open to examine the first couple pages.

Arumi giggles and sighs, getting back rebalanced on the stool after closing the drawer. "When my advisor at Caltech gave me a book just like this, I blew a whole three day weekend reading it very deeply and carefully, several times, with lots and lots of coffee and a little adderall. I can't recommend you do that, so like.. no rush. But don't let anyone see that book. For the same reason I keep this lab secret, you must make sure that book does not get out. It would make you a target by the Men In Black. Not the alien fighting comic book heroes, but the New World Order goons."

"I think this book is telling me I'm not ready for it yet.. but soon." Astra says as she closes it again, then nods to you, "I won't let it out of my sight, and I won't let anyone see it, Bobbi already gave me this lecture after I offered to make her copies of my Astral Sensor to let people fully appreciate her art." She says with a soft flush to her cheeks, "And I get it, the 'Are you being a good citizen?' guys, Not Will and Tommy Lee." She smirks.

Arumi nods. "Keep it. You have the potential. You're theorizing. You're stumbling on things. And you're willing to question the consensus. I think you can do a lot. So yeah, next weekish I'm going to start expanding my lab, I Think. And after that I should start construction of the ship skeleton. You've met Bobbi right? What did she tell you about... who she is with?"

"Thank you.. I hope I live up to your expectations." Astra says hopefully, "I'll help dig the hangar bay our with a shovel if I have to!" She grins, then looks thoughtful when you ask about Bobbi, "Not a lot that I understood honestly, She mentioned The Order and Hermetics a couple times? That's her path, tradition, whichever?"

Arumi nods. "The Order of Hermes is an even older organization. It's about... 1500 years old or something? It... studies weird things they call magic, in a weird way. Think Harry Potter. The Order of Hermes and Society of Ether two of nine allied organizations against the Technocratic Union. Keep everything she tells you a secret as everything I tell you please. Lives depend on it."

Astra smirks at you, "Oh right, I'm supposed to call you Dr. Hanada until you use the M-word of your own free will." She says mischievously, "I've been using using the term Hogwart's Shit myself, but I feel that I should mention that I can talk to ghosts, and animals if I try hard enough, without any extra gadgets mind you, though I would have told you Magick was mostly psychic powers up until I saw the half-fire elemental guy. That's what really blew my mind." She says with a nod, then smiles at you again, "We're going to have loads of fun debating this over the next few months I'm sure." She pulls her phone out and frowns at it, "It's later than I thought, I've got an evening class to get to. Could I trouble you for a ride back to town?"

Arumi snorts. "My goggles are capable of seeing through dimensional barriers into the unknown, and can detect when aliens and things come across into our dimension. Sure Let's go back. Pizza's on me. I'm the one who builds spy satellites for the Space Force, in the heart of Techocratic Union turf."