Infinity Schema

By Casca (bertishg@db.erau.edu)

Description

The short version is that a group of Sons of Ether, Virtual Adepts, and disgruntled Void Engineers decide to pool their collective geniuses in an effort to crack the Time barrier.

The actual mechanics of it are incomprehensible to folks without an Arete of at least 4, but it goes something like this:

A group of Void Engineers have determined that temporal shifts are more easily accomplished through dimensional disassociation, as time (a concept that humans created to Prevent Everything From Happening All At Once) becomes more subjective when experienced while traveling at Relativistic Speeds (hence Einstein's Twin Paradox and other fun problems regarding transluminous speeds). The warp-fold procedure of VE exporatory vessels generates such speeds (and temporal dilations) when dimension-shifting.

These rogue VEs, annoyed with the lack of vision shown by more conservative elements within the Technocracy, decide to defect in order to prove their theories. They enlist the aid of Virtual Adepts to assist them in their calculations, since Temporal Coordinates are 4-dimensional: X, Y, and Z coordinates for spatial location, and the T-coordinate for when they want. The VAs leap at this offer, but realize (after months of number crunching) that it's damn difficult to get the coordinates precise enough to crack the Wall, due to the Uncertainty Theory. They come to the conclusion that in order for the Project to work, they need folks who can take the restrictive rules of Quantum Mechanics and do godawful things with them. With all due trepidation, the Project heads contact the Sons of Ether.

The Etherites jump at the chance, happily babbling about the 'cross-temporal characteristics of molecular structures when exposed to Etheric medium'; in other words, they theorize that certain subatomic particles appear differently because only a part of their structures exist in this time. In other words, Quarks that are labeled Up, Down, Charmed, Strange and so forth are actually identical particles, simply viewed from a different temporal perspective -- the parts we can't see exist elsewhen. The SoEs then go about building a drive system for the Time Pod which operates along the lines of synchronizing the Quarks within the area of a 'Time Field' (generated by the Pod, of course). Within the area of this field, the Quarks which make up the Pod will exist in all configurations simultaneously. This will shift the Pod into a 'place' where time happens all at once. By selectively attuning the vibrational qualities of the Quarks, the Pod can be 'steered' into whatever time period the Chrononauts wish.

There's only one catch, however: contact with chronolocals will cause the Quark field to rapidly destabilize from catastrophic cascade failure within the field due to its attempt to attune the Quarkic properties of the chronolocal with that of the field. The chronolocal, more strongly rooted in time because it has not undergone the high-speed electromagnetic bombardment preparatory phase of the journey then the Chrononauts have, acts as a 'ground state' upon the field. When the field destabilizes, the Chrononaut rapidly shunts back to his own time period as his Quarkic frequencies shift back to their normal rest state.

This is a mild failure of the system, but still is a resounding overall success for the Infinity Schema, as it allows for actual travel into the Past. While interaction with chronolocals is still restriced, Schema members philosophically state that full interaction with the past is 'only a matter of time.'

Chronolocation

Time 5, Spirit 4, Correspondence 5

This massive Rote allows for bodily transference into the past, though no interference with history will be allowed. Interaction with people, or with things that cause interaction with people, invoke Paradox upon the rote as if it were Vulgar with Witnesses. This is usually enough to cancel the effects of the rote and send its participants back their own time, severely disoriented and with great damage to their equipment (immediate roll for Paradox backlash.) Sometimes the malfunction is so great that the Pod chronolocates to an unknown destination and is never seen again....(exile to a Paradox realm, or maybe the Backlash is enough to kill them all. Who knows?)

System

The Void Engineers shift the Pod into the Umbra, where Paradox isn't so restrictive (Spirit 4). The Pod creates a field of Time Immunity (Time 5), then, depending on your perspective, either Co-Locates its surroundings around it (Correspondence 5, Co-location) or goes everywhere at once (Corr 5, Polyappearance). It now exists everywhere at one exact 'place' in time. This is Schroedinger at his finest: the Pod's location can, and simultaneously cannot, be determined; neither can its T-coordinate. Using this loophole, the Chrononaut can select a destination (Correspondence 3, Filter All-Space and Time 2, Postcognition are used if the X, Y, Z, and T-coordinates are known; Mind 1 is useful if they are not and the Chrononaut must search for them himself) and proceed there through a reversal of the Correspondence 5, Time 5 effect, exiting the Umbra when the proper coordinates are reached. This Rote is considered Coincidental if no interaction with people from that time period occurs; the moment it does, the effect becomes Vulgar with Witnesses.