The Disruptors discovered
Previous theory had
concluded that the variation across Human- inhabited
parallels would be enormous. Instead, W.O.T.A.N.
demonstrated that socio-historical variation fell within
30% on the Marx-Oppenheimer index of ZeroZero's history
across a set of one thousand "neighbouring" parallels.
This was, of course, improbable in the extreme. For
example, the odds against the simultaneous adoption of the
Gregorian calendar, across these sample parallels, was
calculated at approximately 735 000 to 1 against. Yet only
five parallels were not using the Gregorian calendar by
whatever name it was known. There had to be an outside
force acting on the parallels. W.O.T.A.N. chose to fall the
effects of this force "Disruption", and before long had
proved to its satisfaction (95.5% probability) the
existence of the "Disruptors".
Initially it seemed that every parallel exhibited some
shade of Disruptor activity; even ZeroZero. The
considerable panic this engendered was used to justify the
the expansion and rebudgeting of the Valhalla Nova complex.
Fortunately the continued research demonstrated that this
"shadow" of Disruptor activity was exactly that, for it
emerged that there were parallels occupying "probability
foci" (also termed "psi-matrix nodes") and that any
disturbance on these focal points was echoed by similar
disturbances on the "shadowed" parallels.
Two things were swiftly demonstrated by this new
information. First, Disruptor activity had been and was
being co-ordinated across these focal parallels. Second,
ZeroZero occupied a strangely stable position in the
Multiverse.
The first period of research into other parallels (1905 to
1928) ended when the psi-section was brought fully onto
stream with the rest of Valhalla Nova. The next few years
saw the difficult work of setting up "field operations" on
those parallels that could be reached via the empathic
link. By 1930 Valhalla Nova had four hundred and sixty-two
psychics with the empathic link, each in contact with
between three to twenty alternative selves. The taxing work
of achieving full communication, then persuading what was
very often a most frightened individual to work for
ZeroZero could take years. The first "field agent" was
Margaret Bondfield of 28-00-35, a citizen of the French
Imperial Estates-General, recruited in 1924. Other Margaret
Bondfields followed on other parallels until, by 1930,
there were fourteen active Bondfields; two of whom
succeeded to government in a ministerial or consular
capacity on their respective (British Empire and Roman
Republic) parallels.
By this time a considerable body of information on
Disruptor activity had been assimilated. ZeroZero now had
the insights into the respective histories, modes, and
means of Disruptor campaigns across a huge number of
parallels. Unfortunately, a goodly amount of this
information was highly speculative; furthermore the
patterns of Disruptor activity often seemed contradictory.
Analysis of the few thousand parallels available to
ZeroZero through the empathic link showed numerous patterns
of common historical perception. Whereas psychometric scans
of certain parallels revealed that their history, usually
up to the sixth through to the eighth centuries, had been
manifestly different, it soon appeared that the Disruptors
had rewritten, or grafted on, the history of the parallels
at least twice in recent centuries. The first and greatest
remoulding of the "perception of the past" had taken place
between 550 and 700AD. The second was during the years 1500
to 1800AD, centuries that saw a rapid turn around from the
period of the "witch-hunting craze" (common to most
parallels) to a period of scientific discovery and
enlightenment on some parallels but of philosophical and
scientific repression on others. Whatever they were doing,
for whatever reason, it was certain that the Disruptors had
engineered wars, coups d'etat, plagues, peace treaties,
scientific discoveries, industrial and philosophical
revolutions, assassinations, autocracies, alliances,
reformation, decline and renaissance for over a thousand
years. Some theorists argued that their influence could
stretch back all the way to the beginning of human society.
The majority, however, settled on the fourth and fifth
centuries as those in which the Disruptors became
established.
ZeroZero came to recognise most of the Disruptors' work
carried out by indigenous agents. Of these, the key agents
usually occupied positions of power on their native
parallel, typically as heads of state or religion, or as
"powers behind the throne". They received their
instructions through either empathic link, or, increasingly
since the end of the nineteenth century, through
sophisticated communications terminals.
Rather to ZeroZero's surprise, it emerged that most of
these agents were dupes. The Disruptors would deliberately
manipulate their agents' perceptions, so that only a few
knew of the existence of other Earths. Moreover, the they
represented themselves in several different lights, so that
their exact nature was still a matter for conjecture. The
Disruptors' influence on these native agents (called
"Bishops" by ZeroZero) could often be traced back over
several centuries.
A technique of Disruptor "first contact" emerged. The
Disruptors would begin by representing themselves as a
powerful, though secret, organisation sympathetic to their
chosen agent's cause, convictions or ambition. Where the
agent's social or personal background made it possible this
would be couched in quasi- religious or mystical terms,
where scope exists for extensive psychic manipulation.
The newly recruited Bishop would then be aided in the
establishment of a much-expanded power-base. Where
possible, existing social groups were used as fronts, be
they political, religious, corporate or criminal. ZeroZero
agents often had the frustrating task of trying to locate
which secret society, out of several "native" ones, a
Disruptor Lodge was hidden in.
The Bishop would first recruit further agents to work for
the Disruptors. These would be formed into an Inner
Council, the only Lodge members aware of the Disruptors'
existence. Immediately below that, an Elite was organised,
who believed the Bishop and the Inner Council to be the
masters of the Lodge. Finally, there was usually a rank and
file, controlled by the elite or members of the Council.
These "ordinary" members made up the largest proportion of
most lodges; their exact organisation and knowledge about
the Lodge layout varied form parallel to parallel.
Once a Bishop's power-base, together with its dependence on
and loyalty to the Disruptors, had been firmly established
(usually within the passage of a generation) the Disruptors
would begin to use their puppet for their own inscrutable
aims. By this time the Bishop, or their heir, normally
accepted these "world-shaking" plans as perfectly
justifiable or sensible.
The inducements offered by the Disruptors were
considerable. Their strongest card was knowledge. Many
parallels fell to Disruptor- controlled minorities using
sophisticated weapons and tactics beyond the norm of that
Earth. Brutal and direct support in armed conflict was
provided by the Rooks. These were cybernetically advanced
humans, far stronger than a normal person, with an arsenal
of highly advanced weapons at their disposal. At first,
they were thought to have been entirely robotic in nature,
but a ZeroZero agent who managed to disable and briefly
examine one during the Battle of Brussels in 1930, on Para
34-00-08, reported it as being about 30% machine and 70%
human/organic. Unsurprisingly, it was also heavily shielded
against psionics.
Far more subtle and dangerous than the Rooks are the
Disruptor Knights, whose existence was only positively
proved by ZeroZero several years after that of the Rooks.
These human agents were invariably psychic and able to
travel between parallels (as did the Rooks) by use of
"Trans-Parallel Vehicles" (TPVs). The Knights functioned as
in-situ advisors to the Bishops; on rare occasions they
took command of a Lodge to deal with a critical problem,
but thereafter moved on to another parallel, another job.
In all the years of the Trans-Parallel War, not one
Disruptor Knight was captured alive.
It was not until 1958, when a ZeroZero team captured a
Disruptor Lodge in Venice, para 00-71-87, that a
significant piece of Disruptor technology was acquired and
exploited by Valhalla Nova. The team prevented the Bishop
from destroying the Lodge's Trans- Parallel Communicator
(TPC). Working via empathic link and psychometry the
ZeroZero scientists examined the TPC and later that year
the first ZeroZero TPC went into operation. The Trans-
Parallel War saw a sudden escalation as a result, and for
the first time the section leaders of Valhalla Nova began
to feel that they might defeat the Disruptors.
By 1960, ZeroZero had firmly established how the Disruptors
manipulated the parallels. Who they used on any given
parallel could now be predicted, with reasonable accuracy,
by W.O.T.A.N. Rooks and Knights had been observed in
operation several times. A vast library of information on
Disruptor activity, both past and present, had been
accumulated. Yet the section leaders of Valhalla Nova still
had no idea of what exactly the Disruptors were, nor of
their eventual aim. How, they asked themselves and
W.O.T.A.N., could the organisation striving so frantically
for world peace on para 12-45-06 be the same callous
manipulators of numerous Thousand Year Reichs? Why would
one Earth be encouraged to achieve multilateral nuclear
disarmament, whilst another was being kept teetering on the
brink of annihilation? For what reason was racial hatred
encouraged here, quashed there? Why had women on most
parallels been oppressed since the 1600s and yet on a
select few parallels elevated into matriarchal governments?
The answer lay in the aeons before Humankind arose, and
there was war in heaven.