Sons of Liberty
Construct
From the bases of Symposium #L101, the Technocrats work to eliminate all RD influence over Sleeper affairs. They strive to curtail the most blatant activities of RDs. And they play on the dominant political mindset – which leans moderate to liberal – to propagate scientific advances, especially through universities like NYU and Columbia and think tanks on Wall Street and around the UN Headquarters.
Clearly, the Union is focused on Manhattan. That borough remains the hub, the commercial and even cultural heart of New York City, and the most vital elements are influenced from there. The Union realizes the other boroughs suffer more without its constant guidance, but even the lions of Symposium #L101 have their hands full with just Manhattan.
Headquarters
Symposium #L101 maintains a number of bases throughout the Big Apple. For example, the Syndicate call the skyscraper, Crystal Clear Investments, towering over Wall Street, their home base in the Big Apple. The Progenitors are found on 1st Avenue meanwhile (east side of Manhattan), based out of New York Medical University. Iteration X keeps their own secret laboratories under the New York Institute of Technology, which is found on the other side of Manhattan from NYU medical on the Upper West Side, right off Broadway. And the Void Engineers launch their BCD, NSC, and EFD operations from beneath La Guardia Airport. This is the only major Technocracy base not found in Manhattan. La Guardia is found on the northeastern coast of Queens.
But the Symposium’s most important headquarters is definitely Liberty Island. The entire island, including the Statue of Liberty itself, is under the protection and secret inhabitation of the Technocracy. The New World Order runs the base primarily, but it is a communal headquarters for agents of all Conventions to meet, plan, recharge, and make ready for the execution of major plans. The Symposium meets here and the main arsenals and surveillance centers are found here.
Where? Certainly the base isn’t located above, at the foot of Lady Liberty or in the tourism and museum structures on the island. Naturally, the Technocrats’ base is dug deep into the earth beneath. The compounds are accessible only by secret entrances from the base of the Statue. This huge base delves deep into the island, containing five levels of offices, common rooms, barracks, laboratories, arsenals, and vehicular garages connected to the island’s ferry terminal. The base is big enough to comfortably house hundreds of agents and protect them from severe elements and even “bunker bombs”, not that such firepower has ever been put to the test.
Of course, the underground compounds are decorated with only the most spartan of colors. Paintings and prints hang on basic brick walls (reinforced by steel). Plain desks compliment pinewood wall paneling. Linoleum floors are merciless to the feet and the ceilings rarely extend higher than ten feet. Few realize this, but even the Statue of Liberty is considered part of the base. No unauthorized personnel are permitted there, and the Technocracy’s additions are well hidden from tourists and maintenance men’s sight. However, the crown and torch of Lady Liberty actually serve as major beacons of Technocratic surveillance. Satellite up-links and state-of-the-art, automated communications equipment let the Union monitor the entire world, never mind just the city. This is the nerve center of the American arm of the Technocracy, after all.
Nodes
The Statue of Liberty is more than just a global surveillance center for the Technocratic Union. It is actually a powerful Node and has been for over a century. As it became a symbol of freedom, hope, and opportunity for all those who viewed it, it began to generate a tangible if elusive source of Primal Energy. Its resonance was obvious: while hope and freedom were what the Statue stood for, the duty to uphold and protect those liberties was what she really defined. Subtle vibrations in the Statue itself, too subtle for the science of Sleepers to detect, are what build up that Quintessence. Hidden wiring channel that energy down from the statue and into a Primal Processing and Storage Facility, locked down at all times deep within the base, and accessible only by prior authorization. This Node powers much of the Symposium’s hyper-generators and cannot be frivolously spared.
Defenses
Of course, the entire base is well secured against detection and intrusion. Magnetic doors, electronic keypads with triple firewalls and circuit protectors, Gauntlet lock-downs, and hologram projectors guard and veil all of the base’s portals and vital labs, bays, plants, and private offices. Computer systems are dedicated and what external links exist are given the utmost precautions as far as electronic wards and trace/infection programs go. On top of all of these static systems, armed patrols rove the halls and even the island with irregular patterns. Hidden under the floors and even the surface’s grassy turf lurk hydraulic lifts that can put killer cyborgs and robots on the warpath in emergency situations. They are all heavily armed; the surface ‘bots even pack anti-aircraft (and they did long before 9/11). There are even small Technocratic submarines and armed divers just off-shore, watching the waters of the New York Bay.
Backgrounds & Characters
All members gain the Construct Background at *****. All other Backgrounds must be purchased and acquired normally. The construct commands a communal Level 5 Node of static Duty.
Citizens
Twenty thousand employees work for the Union, and only a handful of them are in the Liberty Island base. Most are stock agents on Wall Street, union workers on the docks, diplomats on the East Side, cultural attaches based on midtown, university professors, politicians, mob bosses and their soldiers, secretaries, janitors, and much more throughout the city. And most do not have a single clue who they ultimately work for, and are subjected only to the most basic levels of Conditioning. They are Conditioned just enough that the Union can more readily recognize tampering from RDs in the city. Only about five hundred employees, most of them armed guards or basic technicians working on the Liberty Island base, are “in the know”. And typical of the NWO, they don’t know much.
