Aether

**Aether** is the alias of a magically adept youth named Jeremy who was captured by Kemetic Solutions in Phase Three.

## Personality

Aether is a kind, but struggling young man who was born with an adeptness in manipulating technology. He is trusting towards The Mountaineers, who he believes can save him from his captors. Aether has a strong connection with Constance and, though he is in danger, seems more concerned about her safety than his own fate.

## Biography

Aether learned about his magiq powers at a young age, after being prescribed medication for his depression. The medication awoke his latent ability to manipulate machines and made Aether realize the lie of the world. Together with his best friend Constance, he found The Low and came into contact with other magiqally experienced individuals. Some time after Aether came in contact with the Low, he began receiving phone calls from someone claiming to know of Aether's powers and that he could help him.

In November, Aether was kidnapped by an employee of Kemetic Solutions named Teddy who intended to use him to study his abilities and open a door into the magiqal world. Aether was taken to Kemetic Solutions' underground facility, along with two other individuals - a girl and a Mountaineer - who he could hear through the walls of his cell. Aether and the other subjects were put through multiple tests, including monthly sleep studies, to study their magiq powers. Kemetic Solutions utilized drugs in order to enhance their magiqal potential. They were also tortured and lied to in order to ensure their compliance.

Aether was first encountered in Fragment Ten when Martin Rank visited the Kemetic Solutions headquarters. Using his ability to manipulate technology, Aether embedded hidden messages into Martin's pictures, which he posted on the Basecamp 33 Forum. Recruits followed Aether's clues to find Kemetic Solution's website.

In one of Martin's photos was a file - patience.rtf, which was password protected with the word "aether". It contained the words "63 minutes," which lead recruits to wait that amount of time on the Kemetic Solutions website. After waiting for 63 minutes, Recruits were greeted by an internal promotional video for Kemetic Solutions. Later, Recruits found some of their posts edited by a new user - xxxxaetherxxxx. After analyzing the dates and times of the posts, they were able to pinpoint a specific day and time. After visiting the Kemetic Solutions website at that time, they found that the internal promo video had been altered, interspersed with clips of Aether's kidnapping.

    Analyzing Aether's video, they found words hidden in them that pointed to a Tumblr blog known as There Are No Constance. The blog belonged to Aether's best friend Constance who was able to inform recruits of Aether's sudden disappearance. Constance allowed recruits access to Aether's Tumblr blog by giving them the password TheCommonDrumCalls. The Tumblr account had a Youtube video posted from the Basecamp's official account - a livestream hangout set for five days in the future. When the day of the livestream arrived, recruits were able to speak to Aether, who informed them of his dire situation. He had been kidnapped by Kemetic Solutions so that they could open the door to the magical world and control it. Aether ended the video by saying that he planned to escape Kemetic Solutions by invading their systems with his powers, and he warned Mountaineers that a storm was coming .

    A week after Aether's livestream, he was brought in by Teddy to perform another test of his ability. Teddy wanted Aether to envision a door and describe it to him, but Aether used the magiq-enhancing drugs in order to invade their systems. Being able to access their information, Aether created several pages on Kemetic Solutions' website where he posted some of Teddy's experiment logs.

### Teddy's Logs

What would this power have been in the time before?
Telemancy? Telography?
Could he be the first case we’ve seen of an adept evolution? A power adapting to its environment? Fascinating.
If we could harness it, the technological potential would be staggering. Surveillance, communication… possibly the foundation for an organic-born AI.
[DATE]
He is a kind boy. Reminds me of [ ] It hurts to see, hurts to say. I hope I can do better by him than I did by her.
[DATE][DATE][DATE]

While Aether was escaping to cyberspace, Martin had been investigating Aether's background and was able to track down and speak with his mother. She told Martin that Aether, known as Jeremy, was "away at a new school, a special school, and doing really well". Martin was also able to contact Aether's high school guidance counselor, who fed him the same response. Kemetic Solutions had brainwashed Aether's family, friends, and school to believe that he was away. Mountaineers later discovered that this included Aether's best friend, Constance, who was brainwashed after helping the Mounties protect their site.

In Fragment Eleven, Aether helped the Mounties by hijacking various websites an obtaining useful data. Within Aether's escape video, he embedded the number 117-2, which led to a series of pages on the Kemetic Solutions site with information. One of the pages was a message from Aether, stating "Thought I would see everything, but world is fragmented. Obfuscated. Broken. Something feeding. Watching. Something warping everything, even here there is a veil that obscures. But I found the 18 Gates. Must find Sanvig first." Within the hidden links, Aether directed Mounties to Go-Getters, where Augernon was residing. In order to gain critical information from Augie, Aether hacked into the Lost Athenaeum account of R.K. Adler which Benefactor used to request the Consolatory Teatime for Misplaced Memory spell. Accessing the Basecamp's backend, he used the emails of Mountaineers to send pieces of the RKAdler username and password to recruits, as well as the Lost Athenaeum website name.

While Mounties performed the Consolatory Teatime spell, Aether worked to direct The Last Oracular Eye to the Basecamp, with Kemetic Solutions in pursuit and his power quickly beginning to dwindle. "Locked out Kemetic now, know I’m free. Searching, trying to kill like virus, danger. Have found the oracular. Driven the eye of the sun to you. Am getting lost more and more, hard to surface. Find the closed eye. It’s close to home. At the moment the sun sets over the 18 Gates. Its power comes from the veil. Sullivan knew the center. Wait for it to open with last rays of light. Choose well. Another piece inside. More soon." To assist Aether, Benefactor requested another article on the Athenaeum on the Oracular Eye, allowing Mounties to learn more of their future. Afterwards, Aether uploaded The Low Report to the Basecamp Youtube channel, with a note to Martin telling him he would understand. In the process, Aether convinced Martin to be honest about his history and the struggles he faced after the Lachmann incident.

At the start of Fragment Twelve, Aether emailed Mountaineers telling them that he wanted to help, but that he needed to get back to his body. He was getting weaker from using his powers for so long, but Kemetic Solutions was preventing him from returning. While Whistler and Marty considered how they could help, Aether encouraged the Mountaineers to make their own magic to aid in the escape. He also had Marty upgrade his phone so that it would be bluetooth compatible. Aether ordered a bluetooth earpiece and set up an account in preparation for a livestream of the escape, in case anything would happen. He also told the Mountaineers that the Council of the 18 Gates knew what they were doing and were trying to support them. The Council had been speaking to him while he was out of his body, offering him advice on how best to help the Mountaineers.

On May 31, Aether and Marty successful entered Kemetic Solutions, meeting Whistler at the door. Marty instantly recognized Whistler as Sacha, but handed the phone to her anyways. Whistler left with the phone to go downstairs, taking it to a firewall-protected cell before she left to restart Kemetic Solution's security system. Teddy came on an intercom to mock Marty, stating that Whistler had never really woken up and that it had all been a plot to get Aether back, as well as trap Marty. In response, Marty revealed that Aether had always been safe in a bluetooth headset and had been both livestreaming the event to Mountaineers and transferred gigabytes of top secret Kemetic Solutions data to a safe location. However, the confrontation with Teddy was cut short by an attack by the Churning Storm on the building. Marty told Aether to go get back to his body, and the pair met up in person for the first time. The pair also met with Alison and Portencia, who had been held hostage by Kemetic Solutions. However, their meeting was cut short as Aether went off to buy time for Marty, Portencia, and Alison to prepare an escape. Marty went back for Aether, but the livestream was cut short, leaving the success of their escape a mystery.

After the Storm overtook Kemetic Solutions, Aether's fate was unknown, until Martin came out of hiding to speak to the Mountaineers. He revealed that Aether, Portencia, and Climber were safe together, hidden from the Storm. Portencia had brought them into the future that she saw. They were using a magmystic token that was gifted to Marty to hide from anything magimystical. Aether remained in hiding for the remainder of Phase Four.

On The Day of Change, Alison popped in to tell Mountaineers that Aether was in the grid redirecting traffic away from Cole and Marty, and he was ready to access fire and rescue to register high gas levels so he could limit casualties. Port and Alison worked on a blinding charm to give low level protection to recruits and Cole and Marty.

### After The Monarch Papers

In Marty's "A Quick Check In", he told Mountaineers that Aether was staying with Portencia and Alison, the trio seeming to live together happily. He was scouring the remnants of the Low looking for a way to reverse the memory-erasing effects the Storm had on his mother, Constance, and everyone else affected. According to Martin, Aether and the others struggled to use their powers after the Day of Change, stating that "whether it’s trauma, decompression, or the fact that whatever we did last year used up most of what’s left of magiq here, I don’t know. If adepts really do eat magiq to use their power, makes sense."

## References

1. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/880
2. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/881
3. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/1080
4. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/46
5. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/123
6. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/931
7. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/1080
8. ↑ http://kemetic.solutions/aether
9. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-ten-gladitor-the-office-of-kemetic-solutions/594/1111
10. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/29
11. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/44
12. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/70
13. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/76
14. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/117
15. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/152
16. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/168
17. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/249
18. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/859
19. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/solved-fragment-eleven-durkonos/735/1326
20. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/found-fragment-twelve-into-hell-aorthora/993/149
21. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/found-fragment-twelve-into-hell-aorthora/993/156
22. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/found-fragment-twelve-into-hell-aorthora/993/236
23. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/pre-fragment-15-unlock-the-chronocompass/1422/257
24. ↑ http://forum.basecamp33.com/t/the-day-of-change/1509/34