Ersta 29, 230 AC

This is Nastasia Sutakon reporting, from Surakosai. I am a nouetic-to-media liaison, which means that I integrate perceptions, witness feeds, and remote viewing into a readable text sequence. I have been given connections with the nouergists and nouetics of Surakosai and their allies and what you are reading is dictated or styled in as it comes to me.

This is the unedited record of what I received from the nouetic responders during the initial events of the Great Earthquake at Eridu on 28 Ersta 230.…begin stream…

Nouergic Institute at Surakosai, late afternoon: Pre-empt received on all screens: major earthquake in progress at Eridu. Initiate responder program all nouergists and nouetists THIS IS NOT A SIMULATION. REPEAT THIS IS NOT A SIMULATION. They've been working on this for more than a year, now is the time to put it into action. Communications already missing from Eridu. Aurians? Invasion? Remote viewers tasked, verify earthquake conditions in Eridu.

In the gardens at the Institute, pink spring petals are floating in the wind. Tanheu the director looks out through the wide window, and turns to get his gear, which he has had accessible at all times.…dressed in his all-black soldier kit with helmet and heavy pack he heads downstairs and out into the courtyard where others are already gathered. Greets Ariadne who is now acting Director and leader of the disaster response effort. Information diffuses fast: the students and faculty and administration and helpers are in the yard within minutes. Sound of approaching aircraft, big carrier rotocraft landing on the plaza, pouring out Surakosan military men and equipment. In through the main building and out into the increasingly crowded courtyard.

"ALL UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL OUT OF THE GATEWAY AREA," amplified voice. Two newly trained Gateholders from the nouergic staff take their places at the sides of the Gateway stone pylons. Narseh the Aurian and Palamidis from Ion, their first important Gateway assignment. The target area is near the Great Library, no knowledge of what condition it's in. The information is triangulated before being sent to Narseh and Palamidis. Initiate Gateway.

In the studio at Taris, a hanging lantern oscillates in windless air. Mereth the nouergist architect looks up from his desk screen. Echoes anticipated before they happen, the shudder here of a cataclysm elsewhere. Hand on the screen, traced by green light. Mereth, this is your last chance to refuse. You don't have to go. Mereth gets up and goes to get the equipment that the Surakosans listed for him.

Mereth the architect steps through a low-emission Gateway into the Institute grounds and arrives at the staging area, dressed like a chic explorer with high boots and an expensive excursion backpack. Everyone turns to look at him.… a typical theatrical Mereth appearance. Meanwhile the two-man Gate is ramping up. They're doing well for novices. The strategy is to have the novices run the Gate from Surakosai and let the masters go through to use their energy on rescue operations.

The Gate is set but not opened yet. The first one through will be Tanheu who will check for radiation from Gateway breakers. These systems are in every city, usually paired with cell phone networks, to stop unauthorized entry by gateway. The earthquake will have damaged these systems. Tanheu is equipped with radiation detectors and protective gear. The Gate opens and dust and smoke billow through it into the clear Surakosan air. Tanheu steps through and disappears in the smoke for a moment.

No radiation, he says through the voice transmission network. But we are off target by about a half kilometer. Any way to move the Gateway? Too difficult with the newbies running it. Tanheu looks at his military GPS mounted on his arm plate. Thank you, Surakosan army! The ground continues to shake, an hour into the event. Ariadne, your decision. GO, she says, and the team pours into the gate, an opening the size of a garage. Speed is essential, but barely possible. Activate GPS systems and find location. The dust is stifling and there are local residents milling about newly terrified by the appearance of a paramilitary force. We're all wearing Surakosan ID clearly marked, but they don't recognize it. How do you communicate that you're here to help? What language do they speak?

Fortunately no one in Eridu has firearms; they have been banned for decades. We're in what's left of a small square, blocked by rubble on two sides. GPS tells us that we're close to the Library plaza, which is already crowded. Remote viewers are in operation, linking in now. The Aurians have secured the Library, that was their first objective. Are there Aurians in the plaza? Someone comes through the Gate and it snaps shut. The last of our Master team just made it in, our Aurian Master Noshir the mining engineer. We'll need him to talk to the Aurians and do some cultural-appropriate nouergic convincing. Noshir rushes to the front and joins Ariadne and Tanheu.

Desperate Eridanians are screaming at us. Telekinetics fire up their energies, Ariadne flips a fallen wall off some poor creature trapped underneath. We need to move toward the plaza or some other open space or we won't have space to work. The streets are unrecognizable, signs are down. The GPS isn't helping when the landmarks are gone. I'm looking at the map. Tarsi subsquare. Ministry of Appropriate Technology, there's the sign for it but the building has collapsed. Solar Energy Ministry, this must be Technology Square adjacent to the southern corner of the Plaza.

Horrible noise, screams and crashes and exploding rumbles, and above us, the roar and clatter of Aurian lifters and rotocraft. They have a lot of them and they are using the Plaza as a base, just the way we want to. Tanheu and Noshir are in the front, Ariadne and crew on the flank doing telekinetics and whatever medical aid can be done in this environment. We have the makings of a field hospital if we can get to a stable place to set it up.

The GPS says we are on "Natural Philosophy Avenue." This is just one block from the Plaza. It has taken us more than an hour to move three blocks from our starting point. I see the monument to Ensi Eryan IV, which amazingly has not toppled. That's at the edge of the plaza. We'll have open space and not have to crawl over rubble and ruins if we can get to the plaza. More telekinetics, and we have the last few meters open. Up the steps and onto the plaza, which is filled with clumps of huddling wailing refugees. And in front of us is a line of Aurian soldiers with their machine guns pointed right at us.

TO BE CONTINUED

Posted at 1:33 am | link

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