Edens
Table of Contents
Edens
Other Appellations:
The FBI Witch World (Alpha), Universe 1995 (Universe 161)
Fox Harmonic:
Delta-Epsilon-Sigma-Delta
Astral Connection:
L3 D0
This world’s Astral connection manifests primarily through aether, an energy that suffuses all living things. Aether is thought-responsive and thought-controlled which binds it to the Astral. Aether is what witches use to cast spells, what prevents vampires from casting reflections, and what werewolves use to suddenly increase or decrease their mass.
Caution Rating:
2
The Shadow Division keeps a tight lid on the weirdness of their world. Mer, goblins, vampires, werewolves, and witches are forced to live in secret communities beneath the notice of the men. But involuntary isolation and differential treatment breeds resentment. We’ve seen it in our own reality with Earth State and their mandated superhuman implants. And superhumans filled with resentment may take themselves–and their issues—to other places. Hence why their world gets a 2 instead of a 1 even though Shadow Division has demonstrated great competence in dealing with supernatural threats. We’re worried that superhumans may migrate from their world to others and do so in secret since Shadow Division’s official stance on the multiverse is that no one outside the Division should know about it, knowledge always leaks.
Multiverse Activity:
Seldom
For most people on this Earth, the multiverse is a matter of science-fiction, and the Shadow Division wants to keep it that way.
Keywords:
Analog, Prima Materia,
The prima materia of this universe is aether. It’s a naturally-occurring energy common to all self-aware life, but a few special races have in it much greater quantities than common humanity.
Note that this universe is not a calendar analog. In their world, it is the 1990’s, which explains all the bright colors.
Description:
Man is not alone in the world. In their midst, hidden by mundane subterfuge and supernatural glamour, are beings they believe to be the stuff of imagination and folklore. But though they are unaware of them, their government is not.
In our world, the FBI was disbanded in 1936 after Alf Landon took the White House from FDR, cruising to victory with Gold Star’s public endorsement. The FBI was implicated in a number of abuses against America’s superhuman population. It was found that they had used spying, blackmail, and intimidation against America’s superhumans to help keep them under the control of the NRA. They had grossly abused the power invested in them and the American people were disenchanted with the idea of a centralized law enforcement agency. They instead turned to local superheroes, who even when masked had a face and personality the bureaucracy of the FBI couldn’t compete with.
But in this world, the FBI continues to this day. And they have a lot of secrets they aren’t telling the American public–chief among them being the Shadow Division.
While ostensibly a division of the FBI itself, it is widely rumored that the Shadow Division is in fact much older than the agency that houses it. The FBI was founded, as an unnamed investigative task force under the Department of Justice, in 1908 in both our world and theirs. But the Shadow Division is rumored to go back further–all the way back to the founding of the country. They say the Shadow Division has been keeping the United States safe from what lurks in the shadows since before the ink on the Declaration of Independence was dry and that several of the Founding Fathers were members. They say that it goes back even further, that the Native Americans used to gather in shadow dances and shadow lodges to commune with the people of the shadows.
But actually, no, Shadow Division was in fact founded the same year as the FBI in 1908, and the need for a centralized response to the large number of aetherics found living in the United States was part of the reason the FBI formed in the first place. It can even be argued that the FBI was created as a cover for the Shadow Division with the added perk of being able to efficiently bust racketeers and bootleggers.
But they don’t mind you believing Shadow Division is older than the FBI. Misdirection and misinformation is part of the game.
The first directive of the Shadow Division is to keep the existence of other races secret from mankind. The way they see it, mankind can barely handle dealing with itself, so in the interest of global peace, the other, smaller races must be hidden. And that includes us, because from their perspective we are ultraterrestrials. In fact, we’re one of their biggest secrets. The rank-and-file agents of the Shadow Division don’t know about us, they don’t know about the multiverse. They know about the shadow races of their Earth, the Mer and Werewolves and Vampires, but they don’t know about ARGO.
I think there’s something poetic there. What scares the FBI more than vampires is other humans from other places.
But lets turn our attention to the shadow people.
These shadow people are aetherics, aether-using races. Aether is an Astral-associated force that permeates this universe. Every living, self-aware thing has a degree of aether, but the aetherics have a significant amount of aether in their bodies–and know how to use it. These aethric races are managed by Shadow Division who plant them across America in secret communities right below the noses of the common man. From small roadside towns to major metropolitan cities, Shadow Division knows how to integrate what’s presentable about an aetheric and hide away what is not. The communities are close-knit, everyone knows each other, and everyone knows not to do something stupid like share secrets. And even if they do, Shadow Division is skilled in turning fact into fiction. Vampire sightings get reported in tabloid rags. Survivors talk about their experiences on Coast to Coast AM. There’s no need to kill people to hide the truth when the media does that just fine.
The largest community in America is Edens, a island community in Maine. Most of its inhabitants are aetherics, and normal humans are typically tourists.
Aethrics include:
Vampires.
In our world, vampires are ghosts who are shackled to their bodies by spiritual chains and forced to tend to their bodies by harvesting fresh blood and administering it to the still veins of their bodies lest they suffer discorporation. Ghosts don’t exist in this world, which is somewhat unusual for an L3 world but not too uncommon in the grand scheme of the multiverse.
The vampires of Edens are more so a collection of disease-afflicted humans than a true race. Vampires have a hunger for blood, and when they bite their victims with their fangs they transfer the vampiric disease to their victims. Shadow Division tries to cut down on vampiric incidents, but it’s always hard to stamp out a disease. The vampiric disease is not without its benefits, however. A vampire is physically superior to a human, though they aren’t the strongest aetherics.
Vampirism is a human-specific affliction and cannot be spread to other races. There are not, for instance, vampire werewolves, and there never will be.
Goblins.
Goblins don’t exist in our world, not unless one counts the ironically-named erlkings, servants to the two Courts of Fairy who are created out of twilight and magic. Erlkings are masterful spies and assassins and do the dirty business that the Courts consider beneath their dignity yet necessary. Like their masters, erlkings sometimes travel to our Earth, and in fact one of the new Martin’s teachers was recently revealed to be an erlking–he’s a good guy though, and had no idea he was an erlking at all. He wasn’t trying to assassinate anyone, thank God. Erlkings have been known by many names–ogres, trolls, bugbears, and of course, goblins.
The Goblins of Edens are very different from erlkings. They’re humanoids, but none of them would be able to pass as humans without severe plastic surgery and extreme cosmetics–or shapeshifting.
Goblins are natural shapeshifters and can alter their appearance in an instant. The potential this power has for abuse, so say, shapeshifting into another person to steal their identity, has led Shadow Division to pass laws under-the-table which prohibit the shapeshifter identity theft. These laws were passed by Congress as vaguely worded appendixes to an identity theft bill that no one read before rubber stamping that addresses “identity theft through biological alteration.”
They’re odd-looking in their natural forms. They’re skin comes in odd colors. Their ears turn at odd angles. They’re either too large or too small for humans. Goblins are the most common race of aetherics, and the poorest, owing to the same factor–they breed like rabbits and thus end up with huge families with many dependents. Goblins can be found in the poorer areas of Edens.
Werewolves.
In our world, werewolves are known as shapeshifters, and they are descendants from the first superhuman, the Prince of Dawn. They are typically found throughout Occitania but their bloodlines have reached around the world (being able to turn into birds has its advantages). During the middle ages, they became staunch Cathars, believing strongly in the gnostic belief that the physical world was fallen and corrupt. In shifting their shape, they believed they demonstrated the triumph of spirit and intellect over matter. They were targeted by the Catholic church during Albigensian Crusade, first because they were Cathars and then because their shapeshifting was taken as evidence that Cathars were in league with the devil. Because of this, they shied away from the world until the modern era, and firmly hold to their Cathar heritage. They’re also damned good swordsmen and even invented their own fencing style called l’art which involves phasing a sword in and out of existence like they do their mass.
In Edens, werewolves are a human bloodline in that they can breed with humans. The resulting offspring is typically a werewolf, not a human. Werewolves are more limited in their transformations than our shapeshifters and tend to be…well, just take a look…
Physically speaking, werewolves are the most powerful aetheric group by far. Fully transformed, they are essentially walking tanks. Werewolves take pride in their power, but also their self-control. They are the bluebloods of Edens as the self-control necessary to prevent them from becoming a danger to themselves and others comes in handy in the world of business and finance and because they can readily turn a profit on their awesome physical might. Shadow Division often employs werewolves to carry out ultra-fast engineering projects. A trained group of werewolves can reassemble a building in a night.
Mers.
We don’t have mers in our universe unless one counts the Thule. The Thule are the descendants of the subterranean Vril-Ya, cast out aeons ago over a disagreement and forced to evolve to survive in the extreme environment that is the Nepots Ocean. The Nepots Ocean lies far below Earth’s surface in the lower mantle. To survive, to move within an environment of solid ringwoodite, the Thule evolved personal telekinetic fields called “eyes” because they also function as visual sensory organs.
The Mers of Edens are fish people and exhibit the most physical diversity out of all the aetheric races. Our Thule are known for diversity. Some have blue skin, others purple. Some have webbed hands and feet. Some have milky, pupiless eyes while others have starkly contrasting yellow irises and black sclera. But the Mers of Edens have them beat in diversity. With Mers, you have no idea what you’re going to get.
Mers can breed with humans, like werewolves, but unlike werewolves the product of the union will be human, not Mers. Mers, unsurprisingly, live close to water. Many live at the beach and at Edens’ aquarium tending to the fish.
And then there are witches.
Witches are the most powerful and rarest of the aetherics. In our world, witches are just another name for thaumaturgists, for people who use the mental techniques of Abramelin and Crowley to reach up into the Astral and seize power from the hyperkeimenon. Witches in our world don’t have any innate power, it all comes from mental contact with the Astral. That’s not so in Edens. In Edens, witches have the greatest amount of aether and can mold this aether through spells.
Witches, unlike other aetherics, appear perfectly human on the outside. You test their blood, their blood will say they’re perfectly normal human women. That alone is a huge advantage they have other other aetherics, and that advantage grows when you factor in how powerful their spells are. With enough focus and aether, witches can do anything–absolutely anything.
But these advantages are balanced by how rare witches are. The power is carried through the blood, but even so it shows up rarely in descendants. Every witch in the world has a Shadow Division dossier attached to her. They form a tight-knit community. Every witch has at least heard of every other witch. The nexus of the community is the Sanctuary, an interdimensional world that promises safety and education for all witches. Sanctuary ensures that the next generation to use the craft is reared properly.
Recently, something so improbable as to be ridiculous has been plaguing the witch community.
Witches are being hunted, one by one.
It was hard for many of them to believe at first. Witches are powerful. Who would dare try and kill them? Who would dare anger their community and bring wrathful curses down upon them?
But it’s true. It’s happening. And it’s up to Shadow Division to investigate the slaying and bring the killer to justice.
Leading the investigation is Agent Fitz, a vampire, and young Robin Corbeu, a witch previously targeted by the killer partnered with Fitz to avenge herself and those slain.
Individuals of Notice
Agent Robin Corbeau
Cocky, irresponsible, playful, and effervescent, Robin more than makes up for her partner’s lack of life. At the tender age of 16, she’s one of the youngest agents ever employed by Shadow Division. When she’s not at work, she’s a student at the Sanctuary and gets along with her peers (more or less). She loves being a witch.
Raw Power 10
Durability 7
Speed 8
Sanity 8
Intelligence 4
Skill 10
Agent Fitz
A vampire and a gentleman. Though he’s Robin’s partner, he often has to be the only adult in the room–because well, he is.
Raw Power 3
Durability 10
Speed 9
Sanity 9
Intelligence 10
Skill 4
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