Episode 619: Maskirovka, Special Features
Contents
GALLERY OF GUEST STARS[edit]
Rina's former employer immediately after the war, Omar runs a garage and repairs shop on Eavesdown Docks. Famous the docks over as a tightwad, very few know he's also a member of a clandestine Independent network.
Anna is the officially appointed Alliance Regional Governor of the Russian Cultural Preservation Enclave, based in St. Petersburg Kremlin. She has quite a cult of personality campaign going but she also runs the city with the proverbial iron fist in the velvet glove, doling out political rewards and creature comforts as a means to maintain control over the populace. She is not, however, averse to using harsher methods when deemed necessary.
The Tigranovs
Rina's mother and Prima Donna of Traditional Russian Opera. Now a political hostage—euphemistically termed 'guest'—of Anna inside the Kremlin walls.
'Sasha', Rina's second oldest brother, once a lacquer artist, now a fish cannery worker in the Russian Cultural Preservation Enclave.
'Mitya', Rina's third oldest brother, once a painter and a steampunk sculptor but now a factory worker in the Enclave. He is married with a wife, Svetlana, and three children.
- Also mentioned but not seen...
Rina's father and Master Luthier. He and Rina's mother have spent their lives in the Enclave, training for and achieving Artist Guild status, with successful careers in their respective fields. He is also a political prisoner of Anna.
'Grisha' Rina's first oldest brother and accomplished painter and portraitist. He was taken in as a 'guest' of Anna along with his mother and father when Nikolai was imprisoned.
'Kolya', Rina's fourth oldest brother. once a popular folk singer, he was arrested for sedition and thrown in the Kremlin's notorious Black Tower. It has been three years and more since his incarceration and there has been no news of him since.
POSTCARDS FROM THE VERSE[edit]
Founded early in the initial years upon arriving in the Verse from Earth That Was, the Cultural Preservation Enclaves on Sihnon are accessible only by a single spaceport located in the Israeli CPE. Access to the other ethnic CPEs is by foot, by ground transportation such as car or train, or in some cases by shuttlecraft if there are proper facilities for them to land.
HOW TO SPEAK RUSSIAN[edit]
pizda = пизда = peez- dah = cunt Sound clip
Chto vy khotite? = Что вы хотите? = Shto vu khoh-teet-yeh = What do you want? Sound clip
Zdravstvuĭte = Здравствуйте = zdrahvst-vooy-tyeh = Hello (formal/polite form) Sound clip
Pakhan = пахан = Pahk-kahn = godfather, boss Sound clip
Chernaya bashnya = черная башня = chor-neh-yah bahsh-n'yah = black tower Sound clip
Vot by mne = Вот бы мне = Voht bee m'-nyeh = That would be me. Sound clip
HOW TO SPEAK CHINESE[edit]
Pigu = 屁股 = pee – goo = ass, buttocks Sound clip
See also: further definition
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS[edit]
- What is causing the malaise on Persephone?
- Is it a Pax derivative such as Bianca Meyers hinted at on the voyage over from Red Sun?
- If it is, how is it delivered?
- Is it in the air or the water or the food supply?
- Omar said the poor and the unemployed are hardest hit by this drug. If so, how are the rich escaping the effects of the drug? How are they by and large immune?
- Does this mean a pre-existing behavioral component is needed to trigger the drug?
- Or does this mean a specific segment of the population is being targeted along economic lines?
- If that's the case, again the question becomes one of delivery vehicle—how is the drug getting to its target?
- What is the event that Omar hinted is coming soon, the one that will galvanize the splintered Independent groups to a consensus?
- What is behind the recruitment program for The Elect?
- Is there any significance behind the audience targeted for the program?
- What are The Elect supposed to do?
- Who is Anna?
- Why is she running the Russian Enclave like her own private fiefdom?
- Is she coming up with her methods of ruling St. Petersburg or is she a puppet for someone else?
- Why is the Black Tower empty?
- Are the prisoners killed outright but in secret?
- Are the prisoners shipped off elsewhere in secret?
- If so, where?
- Omar says that Georgia is stable as can be, given that it's seen battle and there's a war on. No worlds have fallen to one side or the other but he told us to keep our eyes open for certain waves.
- What kind of waves? About what?
- Omar also said that something's going to happen and soon.
- What does he mean by that? What's happening? How soon?
- He said it was going to be a big target. ##He also warned us that we're to take extraordinary steps if necessary, that if we're there when it happens, we wouldn't want to be there.
- So what is the target? Political? Corporate? Terrestrial? Celestial? What?
- When Rina invites Omar to her wedding, he makes a cryptic remark about possibly needing to leave Persephone. Why?
OUTTAKES AND AD LIBS[edit]
The following was culled from the homecoming at Dmitri's. It was an amusing bit of in-character enthusiasm and I hated cutting it, but it didn't really advance the narrative as economically as I felt was needed. So, here it is.--Maer.
Nika: Let's backburner that thought for just a moment. If only because while Badger is not in the best graces of the people that I would prefer to keep taking cargo from if I have the option, he's not necessarily a person I'm particularly concerned about staying in good graces with. However, that said, I don't want to hand over a bunch of sex drugs over to a lady who's essentially imprisoned people.
Joshua: But that's the beauty of the plan, right? That somehow through crazy antics—
Nika: No. No abseiling!
Joshua: Through crazy antics we managed to get her family out AND get the cargo back? And even if we don't get the cargo back, if we screw Badger, then I'm not going to lo—
Rina: And that's where the fake box of cargo comes in. If she delivers it, she'll be exposed as a fraud. And we, having the real cargo, come through.
Joshua: It's like one of those Cortex films. Like … four, five fake boxes where nobody knows which one is the real one and there's crazy music playing in the background like yakkety-sacks …
Okay, okay, Whoa. Cool your jets, Joshua.
Kiera: Did you actually, like, breathe at any point or did your brain lock up due to lack of oxygen?
Joshua: Lack of oxygen. (gleefully) I am having the most fun. We should come to the Russian Enclave more often.
Nika: You know, as ridiculously stupid as it may sound, it might actually work.
Joshua: Fake box?
Nika: Yeah.
Arden: Really?
Nika: I am so on board with this.
Joshua: If there's one thing I've learned, it doesn't matter what the plan is. All that matters is that we pick one and get on board with it. It's all going to fall apart. So we might as well pick one, roll with it, and then go. Hopefully … there will be abseiling.
Nika: Okay, okay. Stop! We got the fake box part. What about the family part? We've got to get your brother from the tower, and we've got to get your parents and also another brother out of the main part of the Kremlin.
True. The mood around the table goes serious again. What does Nikolai do, Joshua asks? He's a singer. And right now he's in the Tower for … what, exactly? Nameless crime? Sedition? Rina says he might have snarked off during one of his concerts—he's known for the smartass comment in public, poking at convention. Or maybe he was actually raising sedition, who knows? Regardless of the crime that put him there, he's in the Tower and we have to find a way to get him out.
Nika asks the brothers if there is a way for family members to visit people there. No, none. Damn. That had been Rina's plan, to somehow visit and pull off the jailbreak from the inside. Well, how about her parents? They're already inside the Kremlin. Could they get access? No, else they'd have done it already. Nobody sees the prisoners once they're incarcerated but sometimes waves are allowed. If the prisoner is not under any restrictions, then they are free to wave back.
Could someone on the outside request to visit guests of the Kremlin on the inside. Could Rina just ask to see her parents and get in that way? No. Anna is not in the practice of taking in riff-raff who show up at the door.
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