Stirring the pot a little... --Mal
November 28, 1940
Richmond, Virginia
Clarence Potter examined the object on his desk with a dubious eye. It was small enough to fit in a man's hand, matte-black on all sides and very light. It was also scorched and partially melted along one edge, as if someone had taken a blowtorch to it. On the back a plate read
Please Return To Mr. Jacob Featherston, The Gray House, Richmond in neat lettering.
“And you say that this was found near the James, right?”
The lieutenant who'd brought the object in nodded. “The Freedom Party man who gave it to me said he'd been walking his dog along the riverbank when he found it. Said it fell out of a clear sky. No aeroplanes around, either.
“Out of a clear blue sky,” Potter repeated. “Lots of things falling out of the sky these days, Lieutenant.”
The lieutenant shivered. “Yes, sir.” The memory of the gigantic whatsit the Martians or Mysterons or whoever the hell they were had arrived in cast a long shadow. Half the city was traumatized by the experience. “In any case, sir,” he continued, “since this is marked for the President, the Party fella gave it to me, to make sure it wasn't a trap.”
Potter nodded. “Good thinking. Is it?”
“Bomb squad doesn't think so, sir. Or at least it's not explosive. We opened it and, well, see for yourself sir.” The lieutenant picked up the object, pried it open like a clam's shell and showed the insides to Potter. The interior of the device consisted of two grilles on either end of the two halves, and a bright green button marked
GO.
“Looks like a telephone handset, Lieutenant.” Potter said.
“Yessir. We haven't pushed the button yet, sir.”
“Well then, there's no time like the present. Hand it here, Lieutenant.” Potter held out his hand. The lieutenant looked dubious, but reluctantly handed the phone over. Potter pressed the button and put the phone to his ear.
To his surprise, he could hear the phone ringing on the other end. On the second ring, it picked up. “Hello?” asked a voice, pleasant and genial.
“Hello?”
“Am I speaking with President Featherston?”
“You are not. This is Brigadier General Clarance Potter. Who is this?”
“Potter, Potter... oh yes!” The voice on the other end sounded oddly pleased. “The man who destroyed Philadelphia! Splendid! You have Mr. Featherston's ear, yes? Please deliver the telephone to the President, and all will be explained.”
Potter blinked.
The man who destroyed Philadelphia? Clarence Potter was no more immune to flights of fancy than any other man, and Lord knew that every man in the Confederate States had fantasized about wrecking Philadelphia at one point or another, but the man on the other end of the phone made it sound as if it was a done deal.
“I'm not taking this thing anywhere near the president,” he rallied, “unless I have some assurances that this isn't a trick. Who are you?”
“My, my, General Potter,” the voice replied. “I understand your suspicion, but there's no need to be rude. My name is Ingolfsson, and I represent a group of...
interested parties who have been watching the situation. We happen to be great admirers of the Confederate States, and we think you have...
potential. Great potential, yes, great potential
indeed. We'd like to discuss that potential with Mr. Featherston.”
“That's all well and good, Mr. Ingolfsson,” Potter said, “but it'll take time before I can bring this to the president's attention.”
“Of course, take all the time you need, General. Just remember one thing,” Ingolfsson's voice changed from genial to ice-cold. “The Fen are aligning themselves with your enemies as we speak. You
will need our help when all is said and done.”
The connection closed, and Clarence Potter was left staring at a phone that fell out of the sky, the other end connected to God alone knew what.
November 28, 2016
Drake's Rock
Sol-Neptune L5
Wilfred Ingolfsson hung up the phone and looked thoughtfully at the mural covering the habitat wall. Like most of the murals in Drake's Rock, it showed a pleasant pastoral scene of
servus happily toiling away in the fields whilst
drakensis went about their daily routines. A scene to soothe the soul and serve as a motivator; there was still a long way to go, but the Final Society would be theirs.
The door chimed. “Come in,” said Ingolfsson. In walked Thomas von Schrakenberg, Ingolfsson's relief for the contact project. Like Ingolfsson, von Schrakenberg had biomodded to get as close to the
drakensis genetype as possible; tall, blond and athletic, possessed of greater-than-normal strength and – they hoped – greater-than-normal intelligence as well.
“How'd it go?” asked von Schrakenberg.
“We finally got a hit,” Ingolfsson said, “but it wasn't Featherston. It was his lackey, the one from the books that kept trying to kill him but was too useful to dispose of. Still, as lackeys go this one's pretty important. I figure we'll be in contact with Featherston in a week, two tops. The show the Fen put on should convince him that he needs allies like us.”
“Mm,” von Shrakenberg grunted. “Wilf,” he continued, “are we sure we know what we're doing here? I mean, Featherston's not entirely there to begin with, and when the Fen find out...”
“The Archon agreed to the plan, Thomas.” Ingolfsson said sharply. “That's all a good Draka needs. This will work; inside of a year we'll be running the Confederate States. Running it
properly, not this half-measure murder machine Featherston's got right now. We'll overrun the United States, the Convention and anybody who gets in our way. We
will build the Final Society. It's destiny, Thomas. Everything is going according to plan.”
OOC: Some quick notes on our neo-Draka here. They're obviously not *the* Draka; if they were that'd be cause to go "forget about the Confederates, kill it with fire!" These are Draka fanboys, schmucks who like the idea of the whole Final Society from the Draka books and want to go about conquering everything. They're also the last (organized) gasp of the Turnerites; they escaped getting stomped by Great Justice by virtue of hiding in the Neptunian trojans and not getting involved with Boskone.
They're not as big a threat as they *think* they are - the drakensis biomod gave them superhuman arrogance, not superhuman intelligence - but they've been building up a war machine undisturbed for a long time. The neo-Draka can (and probably will) make things into a bigger mess than it would've been otherwise once they burst onto the scene.
Mr. Fnord
interdimensional man of mystery
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