Archie at Kearney Street
April 18, 1974 | Thursday
Michael
I figure it makes sense for us to have a scene at Kearny late morning Thursday. Not sure if Jo plans to report in on the Cosmo-fetching errand she's running/has run for Patricia at her apartment, but that call could come in while the Club (minus Roger, who's on his day off today before reporting back for duty?) plus Viv and Merrick are hanging around if Leonard is up for it. Regardless, I know everyone has something to report (Archie the esmology he did with Jane, Mitch and Marshall the Roger news, Jo the stuff at Patty's apartment) so we might want to consider that our next scene. The last big committee scene worked really well in chat/not live, so I'm down.
Brant
Marshall arrives at the office at his usual time (10:40 AM) and collects the classified overnight status briefing from whoever is responsible for preparing that. He heads to an office but, spotting Archie, detours and grabs a seat across from him, report tucked under his arm. "Just like the old days at Livermore," he quips. "Mitch and I found Roger. You won't believe this – well, maybe you will – but he was living in Charley's lab. It seems one of his alternate personae subroutines seized control for an ... extended period." Marshall recounts the whole situation. "I'm heading over there later to check on him. Not sure when he'll be fit for field duty again, assuming I can even get the Peak to release him back into our program. Anyway. Did I miss anything around here?"
Leonard
[Jocasta is not calling in this morning. She’s heading straight to the Haight to watch the drop; she’s too close to risk anything else now. She trusts Archie to understand what she said to him and to send a car at the appropriate time. She’ll only check in again if the SLA doesn’t come for her or something else unusual happens.]
Rob
"Living in Charley's lab?!?" Archie's appropriately confounded, but his main concern there is just to confirm Roger is ok.
"I talked to Jocasta. She's made contact with the SLA, including Hearst. She told them she can get them to Los Angeles. Wants us to provide safe transport. She was under cover, so we couldn't really discuss it, but I wonder if we wouldn't be better just scooping up the lot of them."
"Also, I roughed out some esmology around the Bohemians' history shift." Archie summarizes what he learned in the scene with Jane, without mentioning her involvement. "Beirce might be able tell us more, now that we know what to ask him. Or this woman you met in Oakland: if her mother is still alive, she might remember too. Or maybe the Clampers? They just reached out to me, which seems like one of those coincidences that isn't."
"Regardless, the math suggests that a faction of the Bohemians — not the artists and radicals, but the bankers and politicians, or some artists and radicals who became bankers and politicians — used the Quake to seize control. Maybe the Kings took advantage of them, maybe it was the other way around. Either way it's fair to assume the Bohemian Club was, and probably still is, 'clued in.' To, you know, the way things work. Histories. Reality."
Brant
“Do we know what to ask him now? I’m seeing a picture emerge but I’m still not seeing the connections. It is still somewhat early days but our best lead yet remains Hearst — I feel like we’re still playing catch-up. Oh, and then there’s this.” Marshall reaches into his jacket and slides one of the iPhones across the table. “We found a satchel of them in Roger’s apartment — Mitch and I — about 200 of them. I dropped them off at Livermore, left them with Sophie. That’s how we found Roger — Mitch insisted on trying to find some sort of way to plug this thing into a light socket. I dunno.”
Marshall accepts a coffee on a saucer from a Special One and mouths “thank you.” Then: “You know I swear I saw one of these in a dream. I keep a dream journal, naturally, and I found the entry last night when I got home. In the dream, a sort of … futuristic Sophie and this British fellow, Sophie was tapping at one these with her fingers. The Brit said something.” Marshall closes his eyes. “‘Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! For in one hour is they judgment come.’”
Rob
To the first part, Archie says, "Well, I'd ask Beirce about the other Bohemians, Hearst and company, and just how things went wrong in their little utopia. But I agree: getting the Hearst girl back is still job one. Do you think we should cart them down to L.A. like Jocasta promised? Isn't that the perfect opportuntiy to grab them with a minimum of bloodshed?"
To the second part: Archie continues the verse: "And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn for her, for no man buys their merchandise any longer." But he shrinks from touching the iPhone at first. "Did Mitch check this out? It's not History B tainted? Some kind of Anunnakku technology?" If reassured it's not, he turns it over, puzzled, reads anything written on it. (Does the back in fact say "Designed by Apple in California"?) "Okay, but what is it? Some kind of battery pack for a futuristic phone? Boy, I wish Charley was here for this."
Michael
(Finally got a good front back and side image of the iPhone 1, with alamy watermarks all over it, but yeah, it's "Designed by Apple in California." Was kind of hoping I was right on that.)
(Also, Archie thinking it's a battery: "Carlson's no fool, man. He's gonna put it on his feet!")
Rob
I think it looks more like a battery pack than anything else anyone in 1974 would recognize. (I'm assuming of course the screen has been black the whole time - no lights or images.)
Michael
Yep, these things are inoperative as far as any of you poor benighted inhabitants of the past can tell. So clocking them as batteries, totally, that makes perfect sense, yes.
Rob
Michael
Charming that you find the smartphone a non-lethal item
So I was thinking... this might be a good time for one of the Kearny Street field agents to have picked up Jocasta's report about what she found at Patricia's apartment. Keep in mind, this is something Jo put together before the acid flashback and incident at the park.
Brant
To the first part, Archie says, "Well, I'd ask Beirce about the other Bohemians, Hearst and company, and just how things went wrong in their little utopia. But I agree: getting the Hearst girl back is still job one. Do you think we should cart them down to L.A. like Jocasta promised? Isn't that the perfect opportuntiy to grab them with a minimum of bloodshed?"
As that person arrives, Marshall responds: “Priority one is getting these events out of the press and out of the public’s attention. The first step to do that is what everyone is doing right now — trying to find them. At that point one of two things can happen. They can be brought in. Some arrested, some killed. The system works. She was brainwashed. Assuming she survives, spends the rest of her life in a psychiatric facility — McLean, probably — under strict care.” He waves a hand in the air. “Old thinking.”
“So what is the other thing? I don’t know. Maybe there’s more than one ‘other thing’ — but we are thinking differently now so we cannot blindly rely on the methods of our predecessors.” Marshall is in full guru mode.
“Anyway. we know option one — the old way of doing things — works. It would solve this problem. But what then? So we look to the second option. I don’t know what it is. I know it can’t be the old way now. So we have to do it differently. That means going with what Jocasta is recommending. We need to get to them first, though, no matter what. If that means they’re in LA, that might make things easier. We can hide them in LA. We know how to do that.” Marshall says “we” in a way that feels (intentionally?) intimate to Archie, conspiratorial, even.
Rob
If Marshall's manner feels at all like NLP or enthrallment, any esoteric persuasion, Archie will stiffen. "You — you don't need to do that with me." "New thinking, I know. But you just agreed that getting the Hearst girl back was paramount. If we have them, in a van, when will we ever have a better chance to get Hearst — and Jocasta — out safely? How can we just take them to L.A. and set them loose again? In a huge city where they likely have confederates, where they may be planning God knows what? We're thinking differently, sure. But we're still thinking straight, I hope. Old thinking would be going in with guns blazing."
Brant
(Oh no no, to be clear, Marshall wasn't using any of that shit on Archie. It was just an air to his tone.)
Rob
(I figured! But it felt like an interesting beat.)
Brant
(If anything Archie has, since his "promotion," picked up a more deferential and conciliatory tone from Marshall - like Marshall definitely considers Archie "his boss" now.)
Michael
For continuity's sake, there are two communiques from Agent Menos that will come in to Kearny over the afternoon of Thursday, April 18.
A written communique retrieved from Jo's dead drop at around 12:30 pm, detailing Jo's discoveries at Patricia Hearst's apartment unknown—most notably, her art school research into "the Crowd" and her interest in Coppa's (now the site of the Transamerica Pyramid), Patricia's possession of a Cosmopolitan from 1907 with George Sterling's "A Wine of Wizardry" in it, and a xerox of the Chronicle art section front page reaction to/promotion of the poem. I assume Jo will note that she suspects memetics in the Sterling poem. (Finding a copy of both of these texts for Archie and Marshall to review is child's play if they call Sophie for a telefax of microfilm facsimiles of both, may take 15-20 minutes for Sophie to dig them up and send them over.) I assume that Jo won't mention the article on Randolph Hearst that Jo took as a Psychometric connection to Patricia, but if she does that's cool too.
At 2:30 pm or so Thursday, the secure line will ring—we can say Merrick takes the notes on this—with the following one-way message from Jo:
Three vans, staged in 20-minute intervals starting at 11PM Friday, Bayview Motel, Hunter's Point in the City. Older vehicles, separate routes to LA. Reliable operatives from the commando units to drive -- competent but quiet, select for counterculture appearance if possible. Provide with plausible cover. Not to interfere with SLA personnel unless attacked, and if attacked, maximum force response, no survivors. Concealed surveillance, audio and video if possible, in the vans, and make sure the drivers note drop locations, especially Tania - likely Watts or Compton squats. I will accompany and be dropped at the Reseda location [Jo's still-empty occult bookstore front]. Immediate debrief with M & A. SLA plans major action in Watts. Bring in Martin if available, very important. No further communication until then.)
Rob
(If anything Archie has, since his "promotion," picked up a more deferential and conciliatory tone from Marshall - like Marshall definitely considers Archie "his boss" now.)
(I've noticed that, and it's interesting, since I think in Archie's mind he is less directly in charge of Marshall now, as Marshall is in charge of URIEL and has a certain autonomy in how he runs it. In fact, let's say this:)
After maybe a bit more back and forth, Archie nods. "It's your call, Marshall. This is a URIEL op, after all. However you want to play it, I'll back you. I just hope it doesn't get away from us."
(OOC, I am fine with going along with Jo & the SLA, I just think somebody needs to have registered the obvious objections.)
Brant
(I've noticed that, and it's interesting, since I think in Archie's mind he is less directly in charge of Marshall now, as Marshall is in charge of URIEL and has a certain autonomy in how he runs it. In fact, let's say this:)
(One never quite knows how much to make explicit a PC's internal motivations but it's especially hard in cases like this where the PCs are both experts in Psychology, etc. Regardless, Archie can likely suss out Marshall's motivations since they've known each other a while: Marshall has ambitions to completely dismantle or subsume Project SANDMAN, cast it into the bin of history as 'old thinking', and he thinks Archie is his best bet to make that happen.)
After maybe a bit more back and forth, Archie nods. "It's your call, Marshall. This is a URIEL op, after all. However you want to play it, I'll back you. I just hope it doesn't get away from us."
"Of course, of course," Marshall says, putting his hands up. "It's a fraught situation; I have no desire to let them loose anywhere. I guess I just consider it old thinking to plan too far ahead – to arrive at a conclusion or a solution without fully understanding the problem. It's like with Merrick from yesterday: planning for a future that may or may not come to pass. I'm willing - barely willing, but willing – to give Jocasta some leash on this. But when I check in with Roger later, I may gauge his willingness to act as one of the bag men for this little escape plan Jocasta is cooking up. Notwithstanding his recent, uh ... well, notwithstanding that, he is still the most reliable agent I know."
(Unless Rob/Archie has more, I think at this point Marshall would go about his day's activities until he gets the missive at 2:30 PM from Jocasta; then he'd have someone bring a car around so that he could go to Roger's place.)
Michael
(And I know from the 12:30 missive, there will be stuff for Archie to look into memetically but we've also got Swede's/the Clampers on the hook at the moment. And I know Jeff has been busy but I want to make sure he gets the chance to hop into one or the other of these scenes or a third if he's got something in mind.)
Brant
(Yeah, assuming it's around 12:30 when Marshall and Archie wrap up that still gives Jeff/Mitch about two hours before Marshall takes off. Plenty of time.)