Catalog of the Weird Parallels

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If they suffered amnesia, then they'd never know how to leave. The parallel would likely be marked lethal.
Unless the first group just happened to include an A.I. or otherwise immune character.

I can imagine loads of handicapped or elderly people paying anything to go there just to have a healthy albeit juvenile body.

That's actually why I picked the 30s. I wanted a time that would still be relatively familiar but had rather low standards of child welfare.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

That's actually why I picked the 30s. I wanted a time that would still be relatively familiar but had rather low standards of child welfare.

Nothing that a supply of gold and a sufficient "Mysterious Benefactor" vibe can't fix. And because this is so recent, you can research specific individuals and find someone who won't rip you off.



"Kids" working in multiple locations drop various letters off to the other locations, all in the name of fictitious adults, and soon enough, those fictitious adults have enough personality to keep the hired "employees" in line.



Eventually, you probably do want to bring a few of the locals in on the secret.


Why are you doing this? Life extension. Immortality is one of the most sought after prizes in history, and this will give you another 50 years. The real challenge is not contaminating the time line. After folks have been there for a while, they won't be able to leave without killing themselves (or wondering if they will), so they'll become attached to this world-line.



World War II should look very interesting if these kids grow up fast enough.


Yes, my vision is different that the original.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Nothing that a supply of gold and a sufficient "Mysterious Benefactor" vibe can't fix. And because this is so recent, you can research specific individuals and find someone who won't rip you off.

Probably doesn't even take that much research. You basically need one honest lawyer to set up the necessary trust funds, front for your orphanage or whatever. Stereotypes aside, relatively honest lawyers are not in short supply, especially when the clients can afford to pay a quite nice retainer anyway. I should give up the million dollars a year they're paying me on the chance I can rob a bunch of innocent children of more money without getting caught?

[Flyndaran]

Kids being watched over 24/7 is a very recent cultural requirement.
In the 80s, no one paid attention to preteens wandering all over the place sans adult supervision.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Kids being watched over 24/7 is a very recent cultural requirement.
In the 80s, no one paid attention to preteens wandering all over the place sans adult supervision.

Even if you need adult supervision it can't be *that* hard to hire it.

Especially not in the 1930s. In an era when long distance travel wasn't an overnight flight yet, I imagine that quite a lot of kids were packed off to boarding schools with whom the arrangements had been made entirely by mail or telegraph, with no personal contact between their parents and anybody connected to the school. Likewise there must be plenty of reputable firms that are perfectly comfortable with taking orders to buy and staff a house for clients they have never met who will be arriving by luxury liner next month and want a place ready when they get here. And if the kids end up arriving "first" because their "parents" have last minute business elsewhere, what, you're going to refuse to let them in the door?

[Dr. Beckenstein]

And what about the native adults?

Does it happens also to them?

If yes, how often does it happen? If yes, how? Maybe it is kept secret, maybe there is even some kind of secret "immortal children" society that runs the world behind the curtains - or better, right in front of everyone, hiding in plain sight on every playground ...

[Flyndaran]

Perhaps it does happen to natives in a similar way to outtimers. But it's from "micro-banestorms" where they flicker between worlds so fast they don't notice exactly what's happening.

It's just a strange rare local danger.

This could add major interest to any group researching unique facets of cross time physics.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

That's actually why I picked the 30s. I wanted a time that would still be relatively familiar but had rather low standards of child welfare.

Actually thinking about it a bit more, if the travelers retain their memories I don't see that the local child welfare system makes any difference. They act like adults, and their ID says they are adults (faking documents is presumably a major Homeline industry), they have plenty of obvious personal assets. So what if they look like children? They're apparently rich adult midgets.

[Flyndaran]

Lots of modern dwarfs that look not at all like children other than in height get mistaken as kids all the time.
So while I believe something like this could work for authorities, I doubt it would work that often among the public.

[Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2]

Just got done reading through the whole thread. It's been a while since i posted here, so i thought "Why Not?"

Here's one I've been thinking of for a while ...

Bond is a world of high melodrama. The general society is similar to Homeline in the 1980's. But matters of love and hate are much more serious and difficult to ignore.

In Bond, everyone has special supernatural bonds with other people. A majority of people will never encounter all their bond-mates, but they know they're out there someplace. Those people who actually find all the people whom they have a bond with have been known to alter history.

Once a person has met soneone they have a bond with, they know exactly what sort of Bond it is and from that time on can sense their presence, direction, general wellbeing, and extreme emotions. ...

There are three sorts of bonds, linking everyone into Triads.

Love Bonds bring two people together in a union of Perfect True Love. Known as "Soulmates", they not only can read each other's feelings, they can heal each other's illnesses and injuries by touch (actually a lower form of Regeneration).

Hate Bonds cause two people to despise each other. The hatred is irrational and total. They are known as "Arch-Enemies". To make things worse, their hate can actually injure their bond-mate (a form of low-level Innate Attack that only affects the Arch-Enemy).

Life-Bonds make two people dependent on each other to exist. If one dies, so does the other (a Constant Dependency). These are known as "Anchors".

Everyone has a Soulmate, an Arch-Enemy, and an Anchor, sharing only one of these bonds with another specific person (no one is both Soulmate and Anchor to the same person, for example). These bonds do not activate until they make eye contact for the first time and last until death. Many people live their entire lives without activating even one, Some become Questors, searching the world for someone they have a bond with, while others simply ignore the whole thing.

The Bonds do not respect social caste, language, race, gender, or most other criteria. The only hard-and-fast rules is that two Bonded cannot be related closer than two generations and must be at least adolescent (whch is good, as the potential for destroying families is rather high.) The vast majority of Bonded are within five years of age.

The classic "Tragic Triad" is when someone's Soulmate is the Anchor for their Arch-Enemy. The classic "Romantic Triad" is when each person in the Triad is Soulmate to one of their partners and Anchor to the other, providing a trinity of love that will live and die as one.

Of course, it's rarely this smooth. Most people who find their bondmates find only one, with a smaller group finding two. Many tragedies are recorded of people finding their Soulmates on opposite sides of a war, or discovering their Soul-Mate is married to or a relation of their Arch-Enemy.

And rather than fitting into neat three-person packages, it's much more likely that the bonded people will not connect with each other, instead making a sprawled-out web of love, hate, and life-dependency like any other social network.

As one can imagine, society in this reality has a very "soap opera" feel. Laws have to accomodate the needs and compulsions of the Bonded and the complex networks of True Love, Undying Hate, and Absolute Necessity that governs a significant percentage of the population. Dueling is legal, marriage laws are much more flexible, and the definition of "justifiable homicide" can be very flexible indeed.

This world is in the 1980's with the Internet revolution right around the corner. How the coming of Social Media will affect a society shaped by Bonds is anyone's guess.

Visitors to this world were first mystified by the concept. Then it was discovered that parachronic travelers are not immune to the Bonds when two Infinity Agents made eye contact and promptly tried to kill each other. At least one agent is trapped on Bond with his native Anchor. Parachronic travelers journey to Bond at their own risk.

There, that's pretty strange.