New Reality Seeds

[Astromancer]

Try this one...

Scythe

One of the things most feared in months immediately after the end of WWII in both Europe and Asia was plague. Actually, between insecticides and new drugs, deaths in Europe and Japan far below expectations. But not in this Q6 Low Mana world.

A brutal from of the flu is sweeping Eurasia in the Autumn of 1945. Millions are dying. Stalin, Churchill, Mao, Gandhi, Kenyatta, De Gaulle, Ho Chi Minh, Ayn Rand, William Buckley, Joseph McCarthy, and Castro, are all confirmed dead. Yet FDR is still alive and in improved health.

Homeline assumes that biowarfare is being used by either Centrum or the Cabal. It really isn't their style, either of them. Still, this parallel is called "Scythe" since it's assumed that someone is actively slaughtering millions were a normal plague isn't anyone's fault.

Basically, espionage in a period of heightened suspicion with a plague on top. Finding out who, if anyone is manipulating this parallel is a major project in itself. Doing anything about it would be a whole other thing.

[Willy]

Even at this TL people are able to reproduce a flu vaccine. So a bait ( and immediate help for the humans there ) would be to introduce a vaccine via a small company and wait for the reaction.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Willy

Even at this TL people are able to reproduce a flu vaccine. So a bait ( and immediate help for the humans there ) would be to introduce a vaccine via a small company and wait for the reaction.

I'll incorporate your idea.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Try this one...

Scythe

One of the things most feared in months immediately after the end of WWII in both Europe and Asia was plague. Actually, between insecticides and new drugs, deaths in Europe and Japan far below expectations. But not in this Q6 Low Mana world.

Although people in this parallel wouldn't be able to see it there seems to be a clear political agenda to who or what is controlling the Plague.

Except for those either later shown corrupt or incompetent, no major figures on the British Left have contracted the plague. Meanwhile in the Tory ranks and among their allies major figures from Beaverbrook to Anthony Eden are dead. Minor figures of later prominence like Margret Thatcher are also dead. At the same time many figures that attacked Colonialism, especially nationalist leaders are gone. Meanwhile Maynard Keynes (who had been dying of heart disease) is in vibrant health.

In America, with the exception of Eisenhower, every individual who would have become a Republican President from 1950 to 2032 has either died in the plague or their ancestors have. There is a pattern among racists, those like Theodore (the Man) Bilbo, who were unrepentant champions of racism and "Jim Crow" are dead, those who reformed like Byrd or LBJ are in fine health. Many key conservatives are dead as are some radicals whose politics were divisive and paralyzing to the American Left. Both Edward Said and Franz Fanon are dead.

Although Franco is dead, whoever is directing the plague seems to be much less focused and careful away from the anglophone world. Either that or losses in the more disrupted areas of Europe and Asia are seen as acceptable.

In the Islamic world every key figure in the development of Islamism is dead. As are many key reactionaries from the Shah of Iran to the King of Egypt, to much of the Saudi Royal House.

Russia is taking a brutal beating from the Plague. The already disrupted agriculture and food distribution system of the USSR is in free fall. Between famine and plague Russia seems to lose more people than they did in the war. Gaining clear data on any distinctive patterns in who lives and dies in the USSR will require major espionage efforts.

The plague is gutting China but especially the Communists. Mao and Zhou Enlai are dead as are most of those top leaders of the party favored by the USSR.

Japan is in deep mourning because the Emperor and most of his close family are dead. The Japanese have declared a republic.

Both Homeline and Centrum have brought vaccines to the Market though small companies they control. These vaccines seem to be effective, but there also seem to be multiple virus variants but progress is being made. Neither Centrum nor Homeline is inclined to allow such an advanced biowarfare system remain covert and a threat to themselves. They are determined to find those responsible.

[Flyndaran]

That could also mean that the plague itself could be natural to the parallel, but out timers are assisting those they want to live through it.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

I'll incorporate your idea.

To spin it further, to make a person immune to such a flu or plague is a quite easy task for a TL 9 society, or even a end TL 8 aka Centrum, Homeline, the Cabal or even Swagman. The problem is while between the vaccination and the plague can be a wide timespan - for certain flu strains up to 70 years, and there is nothing more necessary as either a "moskito bite" or a contact with a person who is ill from a very close strain, or even a some fluid smeared on a surface, a proove for this ist not.

You will need a blood sample and unless the person doesn´t got hurt seriously, from par example a accident, you need the good old siringe to take one. For this you need the cooperation of the donor.
Also the timespan is a bit more crunched, getting near leaders during a pandemic event is a adventure by itself. If I would be the bad boys I would watch any person important and vaccinated by me closely to find out if some folks show up who ask certain questions.

A point in favour for the bad guys is at this time no public person is 24/7 accompanied by a camera, and there are next to zero cameras that superwise public areas. So checking just every photo and other media that shows the healthy leaders, has to do by scanning them first, on the other hand while there is less material, it´s not digital so just wiping some harddrives isn´t enough to hide traces.

So yes, I think baiting them with a vaccine production is the easiest way to get there attention.



Added from here:

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

That could also mean that the plague itself could be natural to the parallel, but out timers are assisting those they want to live through it.

Yes but even if you want to help and it´s a natural plague, the helpers have certain problem, without a quarantine and a sterilisation of everything they cary, they risk spreading it in there own timeline. Also while we have now some antiviral drugs, or last ditch antibiotics unknown at the time, they aren´t easy to reproduce or would rouse gouverment suspicion, if you need a lot more than a normal doctor prescipes regularly, unless the helpers are the gouvernment lackeys of course. And developping a vaccine, or medication within a TL7-8 timeline would take years, even if you have TL9 knowledge. If Covid had shown up even 5 years earlier, we would be even more in trouble than we are now, certain key technologies are cutting bleeding edge. The best way to get a vaccine is to get a sample into a high security biolab in the helpers timeline!
If only some persons would survive I would say even a little group with access to world travel, and the money of a filthy rich person could be it, but it are way too much survvivors in key positions and from a certian political spectrum, that screams foreign gouverment activity.

[Flyndaran]

They could also be from a close "future" parallel that had suffered their own duplicate plague. That at least may relax the requirements for what kind and level of tech they must have. This could also give them more hard to predict motives for who and why they're saving only some.
They may be attempting to prevent or cause some event that occurred in their disease ravaged reality. Since it's all predicated on an event that didn't happen on Centrum or Homeline, such an event would be near impossible to determine.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

They could also be from a close "future" parallel that had suffered their own duplicate plague.
They may be attempting to prevent or cause some event that occurred in their disease ravaged reality. Since it's all predicated on an event that didn't happen on Centrum or Homeline, such an event would be near impossible to determine.

Even worse if they travel from a diseased parallel reality, maybe even fleeing it, into a unaffected timeline, there is a good chance that they were the carriers that spread the disease in that world. Knowing what happened and which countermeasures in there own timelime were taken, gives them of course an edge on fighting the disease.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Try this one...

Scythe

One of the things most feared in months immediately after the end of WWII in both Europe and Asia was plague. Actually, between insecticides and new drugs, deaths in Europe and Japan far below expectations. But not in this Q6 Low Mana world.

In Europe, the Plague is hitting hardest in those areas most disrupted by the war. Thus Sweden and Ireland are experiencing relatively little misery. By the same token Poland and the war torn areas of the Western USSR are going through hell. The Gulags and prisons of the USSR are being emptied by death, which is hard on the economy of the USSR. Given the lack of attention to the basic comfort and care of their troops the Red Army has been more than merely decimated. The US military has seriously stepped up hygiene reequipments and have teamed with the other Western allies to increase hygiene for all troops and refugees. One American Colonel slugged a Red Army Captain and had his men take the Russian soldiers to get decent baths and a healthy meal (and also to keep them from abusing the locals). The Russian Captain wanted revenge, his higher ups told him to shut up and let the Americans protect his troops. If he didn't like it he could argue with the NKVD about it.

In the Near East, were you have poverty and/or refugees the plague is hell.

In most of Asia, the brutality of the Plague is equal to how disrupted society was by the recent war or one of the many ongoing wars.

Australia and New Zealand have the lightest outbreaks. But it is noted by out timers that most of the dead are either ring-wing politicians or their ancestors or radical political figures like John Pilger.

Latin America has had a serious infestation. The Poor have suffered disproportionately but once again reactionaries and radicals have been wiped out. Homeline assumes the deaths of Peron and Pinochet is a good thing for democracy in Latin America.

Africa is suffering but less than would be expected. The Boers of South Africa seem to be being hit the hardest. All the key figures that set up apartheid are dead and their parties are in chaos.

Anglo-America and the Caribbean are experiencing a milder epidemic than anywhere else except the antipodes. Along with the standard elimination of Right-Wingers and hard radicals, White southerners especially in Mississippi and Alabama are taking a brutal hit.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

That could also mean that the plague itself could be natural to the parallel, but out timers are assisting those they want to live through it.

If the Plague is natural to Scythe, then someone is using it as a murder weapon.