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Message: <blockquote data-quote="malladin" data-source="post: 743949" data-attributes="member: 8230">The greatest discovery since the war has been the communications revolution enabled by the Etherscope. The Ether-tech equivalent of your computer was developed in our world shortly after the Pan-European War. The device never achieved the same widespread use as in your world, as it was retained as a privilege for the wealthy for many years. Our equivalent of microchip technology exists by the manipulation of Etherspace, thus all 'computers', or scope-points as we call them, are all interconnected within Etherspace and hacking has been an issue from day one.  In the 1950s the Americans developed the technology to transfer the human consciousness into Etherspace. Once inside Etherspace they were able to form pathways and landscapes that have a fare greater potential for recreation, information and interactivity than your Internet can ever hope to develop. Ether, it was discovered, is the material of thought itself, and passing into the Etherscope has become a common pastime around the world. Americans distributed their ‘Scope-Jacks around the world for next to nothing. The Etherscope soon became the leading recreational activity. However, the British government saw the potential for subversion and education of their lowest classes, and outlawed personal ‘Scope-Jacks, providing licences to establishments that were allowed to vendor time in the ‘scope to those who could be considered responsible. However the counter-culture will always find a way, and soon ‘Scope-Tabs were available; drugs that temporarily transfer your consciousness into the ‘Scope. These are, as you can well imagine, highly illegal, very popular and tinged with the usual dangers of recreational drugs. In the world today, America is a prosperous and clean land, seen by many Europeans as the ideal industrial environment. Their workers wield a political influence through the ballot box that has ensured their welfare and health far beyond what Britain and Germany can offer. The vast brick and tarmac sprawls of Europe have been replaced in America with purpose-built arcologies of glass and steel. The crusty gothic towers of Metropolis are dwarfed by the gleaming spires of New York, Detroit and Chicago. America is a land built on trade. It lacks the vast industrialisation of Europe, but builds many fine technologies and provides food for most of the rest of the world. The recent discoveries of plastic technologies have boosted their power further. The American Oil fields can produce enough oil to supply plastics to the rest of the world for the next three thousand years, if you believe their projections.  Plastic has come late to our world. As without the reliance on oil that the internal combustion engine brought about in your world (Ether technologies have allowed us to gain much greater power and reliability from steam engines, making the gasoline engine largely redundant), the utility of oil has been much reduced. However, it is an industry that has brought new life to the failing Ottoman Empire. Their control of the Persian Gulf states has provided them with a great deal of oil, enough to rival the American monopoly on plastics. They supply the British and German factories and refineries and sit back on the profits. Their rulers are even more decadent than the great and the good of London and without our traditional restraint. Closer to home, the price of British expansion has been great. For the past fifty years, Metropolis has a death rate similar to that of Russia after the Pan-European War. Most deaths are from violent crime or industrial accidents. Disease is rampant, with many children dying in their early years. Our plight falls on the deaf ears of the powerful in London. They sit back in the decadence of the wealth of empire and let us struggle on, money being far more valuable than our lives. It is no surprise, then that there are rumblings of unrest. And it is not only the downtrodden who feel disenfranchised by the government. The wealthy industrialists are bled dry by excessive taxes and lack the clout in Westminster to argue their case. An unusual alliance of Industrialists and workers has forged a Republican movement. We fight for independence under the banner of Northumbria. All the cities of the North are united as one to throw off the yoke of London rule. The government propaganda tells us that we are the pawns of American subversion, trying to disrupt the might of the empire, but we don’t listen. One day we will be free and we can build ourselves the welfare state and health system of America. However, recently new dangers have come to the fore. As you see me before you, speaking in plain English, tinged by my Mancunian accent, you think me human. You see the pale tone of my skin and think it is because of my poor health from living in the Downs of the Great Metropolis. You see the strange colour of my eyes and think it caused by pollution and smog. However, I should tell you that I am not human as you know it. I am of an older species than yours. Ours is the civilisation of Lemuria, destroyed long ago by our own hubris, but now you have discovered the same force that brought about our downfall. The realm that is known as Etherspace is Hell itself. It holds many horrors that have lied dormant for years. You use their rage to fuel your Zeppelins and Dreadnaughts, you forge your landscapes from their flesh and torture them with your strange devices technologies. They will not lie sleeping for long, and as they awake they will tear down the world once more. We the Fey, the lost children of Lemuria, know that our ancestors sealed the realm you know as Etherspace and sank their civilisation to the bottom of the ocean so that the secrets might never be discovered again.</blockquote>

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