Welcome to Gaia! ::

Directly across the street from the old feien shop is a door. On its black monolithic surface are emblazoned the following words in silver:

Battle Fleet
Gaia Regional HQ

There is a buzzer to the right of the door under a small sign, "Ring for entry." Ringing the door results in its unlocking momentarily no matter time of day or night it is, but entry is monitored and only those individuals not on the Fleet's blacklist may enter freely.*

Beyond the door is a cramped, narrow stairwell with another door at the top. This door is wooden with a frosted glass window set into it and yet another sign:



This door is not locked. It opens into a reception area with all the usual trimmings: chairs for waiting and a secretary's desk, mysteriously unoccupied. Directly ahead is a short hallway with several more windowed doors and a glimpse of a large room at the end. The carpeting is a tough dark blue speckled material and extends through the waiting area into the hall and to the lounge. The waiting chairs are smooth, curved silvery metal frames with plush dark blue cushioned seats. At first they look no better than any doctor's waiting room but they are surprisingly comfortable. In the far corner is a water cooler with little disposable paper cups and a small trash receptacle attached to the water cooler for their disposal. A sign on the receptacle reads "CUPS ONLY".

A black metal file sorter sits on the corner of the secretary's desk nearest the door. Its compartments are clearly marked: GAIA OUTGOING, GAIA INCOMING, ATTN: HAMADA, ATTN: ANTIPOV, FLEET OUTGOING, FLEET INCOMING. The bays are empty, but the one marked "GAIA INCOMING" has a piece of masking tape affixed to it with a star and the words "All inquiries here!" in red marker. There is blank paper next to the file sorter and a ceramic mug full of pens and pencils.

Behind the desk are two signs, one of them a placard and the other made of paper. The paper sign gives directions; the placard has an inscription on it of the Fleet's Governing Mantra: "To Serve Loyally, Protect The Empress, Avenge Our Fallen Comrades, and Defend the Three." The placard is well-polished and clearly very carefully cared for; the paper with the directions has fared slightly less well. The corners are bent and there is a small wood polish stain along the right side.

A large window looks out onto the street below and offers a good view of where the feien shop used to be. The window has a curious sub-window in it which quickly reveals itself to be a miniature door cut into the glass through which a small flying creature could enter. It is obviously intended for the benefit of the feien. While it does not appear to be locked there is surely some sort of mechanism which would allow it to be locked in the event of a storm or attempted break-in by any unauthorized personnel. The mechanism simply isn't clear.

Strangely, the window cannot be seen through from the street, not even at night. It possesses some sort of coating which makes it a true one-way mirror, but from the inside the view is crystalline clear. The glass is also very thick, in all likelihood bulletproof and perhaps even more. The other windows in the building are exactly the same.

The first doorway in the hall area is near the stairs and bears the words "Admiral Pavel Antipov, Director of Intelligence" stenciled in white across the frosted window set into the door. Even with the window it is impossible to see inside the darkened office and the door is always locked unless Antipov is actually present in the office. When he is there, the interior of the office can be observed to be medium in size with a window looking out into the alley. A large mahogany desk occupies the wall furthest from the door and behind it a giant Union of Soviet Socialist Republics flag is displayed. There are three chairs at the desk, a large intimidating one behind it and two simple wooden chairs opposite for guests to use, the type of wooden chairs found in underfunded public schools. There are two bookshelves in the office full of titles in French, German, and Russian, including many books on Marx. A dark red rug, square in shape, sits between the window and the door. The floors are a dark stained wood, not carpeted like the waiting area and lounge. Aside from the flag, the books, and the rug there are no personal touches.

Directly beyond Antipov's office is the kitchen. The doorway is open to the hallway and the kitchen is visible from the waiting area. It is almost the same size as Antipov's office but seems smaller since it is more thoroughly furnished. There is a window in the kitchen with a lovely view of the alleyway very similar to the view from Antipov's office and a round table with five blue plastic chairs around it. The floors are white linoleum with faux tile print. Counters line the back wall with a sink, microwave, four-burner stove and oven, and (most importantly of all) a well-used coffee maker (which also makes excellent tea). There are cabinets above the counters containing mostly coffee and plates and various cups, but also regular foods such as soups and pastas. Directly to the right and below the sink is a very small dishwasher/sanitation unit which can fit several plates and utensils and cleans them totally in under thirty seconds. Unlike most fast-action Earth sanitizer units, the Fleet's sanitizer can also cool the dishes in this amount of time so there is no danger while removing them and no steam to fog up one's glasses.

Adjacent to the counters is the refrigerator, stocked constantly with all the essentials and several nonessentials. There are eggs and milk and fruit juices, sandwich trappings, even caviar and cream cheese. The person responsible for the signs peppered around the offices has put another one here: "Help yourself! Don't forget to bus your own dishes! This includes you, Director!!" Clearly the foods to be found in here are courtesy the Fleet. There is a plastic wipe board on the side of the fridge with several food items written there; it seems as if you can write what you want to have stocked there (within reason).

Across from the kitchen is another door with a frosted glass window and white stenciled text. The title denotes that this is the office of "Captain Maruo Hamada, Deputy Director of Communications." Like Antipov's office it is locked when not in use and the floors are wooden. The office behind the door is smaller than Antipov's but contains far more stuff. The bookshelves in here have a combination of programming manuals and Japanese comics. Computer parts are crammed into every available space but carefully contained so the floor is clear and the office seems clean. A round teal-colored floor rug gives the office a welcoming feel. The desk is smaller but covered in displays and assorted input devices. There is one flat-panel monitor; the other displays are stasis field monitors which use holographic imaging technology. The three chairs around the desk are all the same, secondhand wooden chairs with red upholstery, comfortable but unassuming. There are some posters on the wall, most notably a movie poster for Fritz Lang's Metropolis and one for the animated movie version based on Osamu Tezuka's works.

There is a small door in the office leading to a closet with several shelves all full of complicated computer equipment, including several items in need of repair. The rack of tools hanging on the door would seem to indicate that the owner of the office is capable of making the repairs himself.

Next to Hamada's office is the door for the janitorial closet with two crucial features. First, it has a broom and a mop for manual cleaning on the right wall. Second, the left wall is covered in strange machines. Presumably these are some sort of cleaning devices; they are never observed in use and only activate when the office suite is empty.

Across the hallway and next to the kitchen is the door leading to the bathroom. The room inside has clearly been converted into a bathroom, as it is several feet too large. Given how large the space is, the bathroom has a toilet, sink, large cabinet of supplies and towels, and a frosted glass shower stall. The stall is clean thanks to the janitorial machines and shows no signs of ever having been used. The bathroom also has a window, but not only is the glass one-way, it's also frosted. If it were clear it would only reveal more of the alleyway.

Across from the bathroom is Dr. M's plain office door which does not have a window or any text and is always, always locked even when in use. Sometimes strange noises come from inside. In the extremely unlikely event the office door is breached, the space beyond is a dark pit of papers and overturned furniture. Books lie open to random pages and the desk has been shoved against the back corner to create a small fort behind which is hidden a computer system. There are no decorations of any kind besides the scattered papers.

Dr. M's office must have been the employee lounge originally for it has a small door leading to a private bathroom. This bathroom is precisely the right size for its toilet and sink. It is also covered in mysterious blood stains. Medicine bottles lie scattered about and there are pills hidden in the corners behind the toilet.

For some reason, the cleaning bots don't enter this office or its bathroom. Neither does anyone else.

Past the main bathroom and Dr. M's office the hallway opens up into the lounge. Once a conference room, the lounge now has a coffee table, two couches, two armchairs, a jukebox containing every song ever known to man (and several songs known previously only to various alien subcultures) and a big-screen television which in addition to being able to tune in every channel on Earth and Gaia also has a built-in database of movies and television shows both new and old, all of which can be navigated by the remote or by talking to the television set. (The television does not talk back, though it can understand complex commands like "give me a list of every movie starring Jackie Chan filmed before 1995 and set in outer space.") The television also features a convenient subtitle feature which covers all written Earth languages and several alien languages.

Only one area of the office suite is unaccounted for. Behind the bathroom and next to the lounge is a mysterious blank space. It is apparently shielded from teleportation of all types, including feien teleportation, and cannot be entered through any means, even trying to drill a hole through or planting explosives (the walls are shielded). Presumably this is either the office's supercomputer, its security center, or both.

All of the lights in the building area proximity-activated. As soon as someone enters, they illuminate. The level of lighting can be adjusted by spoken command: "lights up" or "lights down" until the desired lighting level is reached. The default setting for the main areas is normal bright. Antipov's lights are slightly dimmer than is comfortable for most people; Dr. M's office is always totally dark except for the bathroom. Hamada keeps his lights at the normal level for the most part.

* If you can post, you are allowed to enter. Attempting to circumvent the security measures will be dealt with very harshly.