Shadows of Truth

Shadows of Truth was a program whose host was after the Jihad by Werner von Schattenberg.

Overview

The program was a platform to review several conspirator theories that run after the Jihad. Among these theories we have:

• Kacey Edwards, president of the Nesbit Foundation, explained that the Foundation had been working on a passage of Frank Nesbit's prophecies speaking of a man of peace though formidable visage that would redeem the blue marble and usher in a new golden age. That person, followed by many companions, some fell, some fair, would vanquish a great devouring monster, sitting astride the hearthstone of the universe. The Foundation identifies this man as Devlin Stone and the monster as the Word of Blake, and makes two bold claims:

• That Devlin Stone is blood related to House Cameron.
• A new Star League would be reborn in one year.

• An interview with Professor Reginald Themso of the Paranormal Institute who defended that Grigori Rasputin did resurrect after his death and could be seen in historical events like the final photo of Richard Cameron. He also states that Comte de Saint-Germain was recorded at the court of the Star League, demonstrating his Elixir of Life for Jocasta Cameron, and that he was listed in the records of the Order of the New Dawn as the founding Grandmaster of the New Earth lodge in 2185. He went also to say that the Word of Blake claimed Saint-Germain visited Jerome Blake and warned the ComStar founder of an Amaris plot, while providing him mystical spells with which to see the future.
• Comparative Mythology professor Frederick Rotbart links Devlin Stone to King Arthur's mythology.
• Veteran paranormal investigators Harold Murray and Dan Hudson along the show's host travel to Epsilon Eridani and visit the site of the Harvard Company, Inc.'s aerospace components factory were AEAF butchered civilians that had tried to found shelter after the bombing of Madison city. Local legends were full of ghost stories originating from the ruins, so they spent 24 hours in the ancient ruins pursuing signs of ghost activity. They showed results allegedly showing the paranormal activity of the site.
• The program covers the subject on the several times there have been accounts of "ghost 'Mechs" or "phantom MechWarriors" with the fruits of uncovered lostech caches. The program explain of two of the last cases, one being the "Ghost Warrior of Tukayyid" (a Clan pilot said to have destroyed a dozen ComStar 'Mechs with a small laser, though actually it was the heavy dust buildup what interfered with sensors, and that the Mad Cat in question was brought down by conventional weapons) and the other being the "Locust wraith" reported during the liberation of Epsilon Eridani (which in this case was an advanced BattleMech deployed as a stealth scout and raider and equipped with technologies that melded emissions controls developed by the Star League with the Light Polarization technology, and asks the audience if this could not have been the case for some of those past cases like the fight between Morgan Kell and Yorinaga Kurita.
• A theory that says that in 2111, a set of photos taken on Tau Ceti show neatly arrayed irrigation channels and what appear to be fields of Terran wheat and that also show megalithic pyramids. The theory continues saying that those things actually existed and were destroyed by Terran Alliance authorities.
• After interviewing Stacy McCloud, an IE hand, about the Green Ghosts, the show goes to expose a complex theory that tries to explain the Ghosts' attacks to many religious sites. The theory is that the Ghost are following the trail of the Padraic Brotherhood, who launched the last DropShip sailing outside Terra just minutes prior to the Amaris Coup was carried, with a passenger identified as A.C., given special passage through security checks as control gave the Brotherhood DropShip priority to depart, and asks if that passenger could be Amanda Cameron and if hence the Ghost are pursuing the Padraic Brotherhood to find out what happened to the heir of the Camerons.
• A program dedicated to House McQuiston and their link to Banshees. The program says that Ian McQuiston's great-great-grandfather Perry married the last daughter of one of the sub-branches of the Clan MacDonald of Skye, hence granting him a funeral dirge by the Banshees. As McQuiston had no siblings on Terra so the clan authority traveled with him to his manor outside the Bannockburn Bogs on Skye. With him the Banshees came, and there were several observation on them during the years starting with the death of McQuiston's first wife, and including an appearance before Archon Robert Marsden's coup, the Kurita invasion of 2407, and after the doomed marriage of Regina McQuiston. But even with the disappearance of House McQuiston, the Banshees have been sighted again when Skye comes under threat, most recently at the beginning of the Jihad.
• An interview with investigative reporter George Kerry that links Katherine Steiner-Davion to the Hellfire and Brimstone Society on the campus of the NAIS, and to its alleged celebrations of a Black Mass and the worship of an idol called Baphomet. The program went to say that the idol was brought to New Avalon by the first Terran colonists and that every scion of the First Families of New Avalon was a member of the society. Satanism expert Johann Morgenstern said that for Katherine to join the society a buy-in would have been required, a sacrifice, and if it was from a dearer person and in a profane way, the better, linking this to the murder of his mother Melissa Steiner-Davion.
• Occult expert Christian Weishaupt explains that only the Rosicrucian Order existed and survived at least until the fall of the Star League. The program goes to say that Francis Bacon demonstrated an immortality Elixir at the height of the Star League, and influenced Jerome Blake, and ask the viewers who could tell how much power his Order wields behind the scenes after the Jihad.
• Based on comments from ethnologist Gavrilo Benes, the program worked on a theory pointing to Marshik Marik, a pretender to the Duchy of Marik in Bohemia with ties to Transylvania, as being a vampire.

Saying that House Marik had won their titles through a combination of warfare and marriage, and one dynastic link they forged led back to the infamous Vlad Tepes, the program also said that there was an uncanny resemblance between extant portraits of Vlad Tepes and Charles Marik.

With rumors on newspaper accounts of a triple murder in Dormuth in 2207 following typical vampire actions. Globally, the program said similar complaints and similar unsolved murders had cropped up over the entire Marik Commonwealth for centuries, displaying the spread and reach of the Nosferatu.

• A complex theory supported by BlakeWatch veteran Elissa Chen of the Spear of Destiny being recovered by Jerome Blake from the Greenhaven Gestapo, then handled to Conrad Toyama and then ending in the hands of the Master. Finally he tries to tight it to the mysterious disappearance of Devlin Stone with two ComStar armies in May and June of 3079 prior to the decisive Invasion of Terra and asks if he tried to recover the Spear.
• An interview with Taoist Priest Qiu Erzhi explaining that the Xin Sheng movement clean the past sins of the state and opened a new age of success after the disaster of the Fourth Succession War, and that selection of all new names and designs built were working in a positive way for the state. Qiu ends his interview though by warning the Chancellor Sun-Tzu Liao of his hostility towards Devlin Stone and the risk of the sin of hubris unbalance the country again.
• Based on captured Blakist soldiers speak of their surprise at the outcome of the Whitting Conference, and that they were expecting a Third Transfer and a heavy focus on the Clans. After this, Werner goes to link these events with rare celestial conjunctions present in the skies of Apollo (system) seen only three times since the system settlement and linking them to the Third Transfer and a resurgence of House Amaris. The dates on the rare events are:

• In 2463, the year House Amaris ascended to rule the Rim Worlds Republic.
• In 2765, on the eve of the Amaris Coup.
• And in April 3067, nearly prior to the Whitting Conference.

• One theory said that Kalvin Liao was an occult follower who owned a copy of an alleged book called "The Bloody-Handed Duke", with insights on the book given by somebody called Nyla Rustah.
• The killing of a Jihad veteran from Tharkad, Franz Wei, by what a person described as a bulky, very hairy gentleman which they claim to be a werewolf.
• A theory that said that some among the Belters had been living for hundreds of years supported by an unknown source.
• News on "phantom" black navy ships like the Augustus, the Century Hawk‎ and the Celestine Maria‎.
• Alleged killings of Word of Blake Manei Domini by WoB ROM.
• Werner was approached by a recent visitor to Columbia with alleged news to other Belter communities with links to Columbia. He said to have met somebody from Churchill, the real British colony, implying New London had been a faint. He also claimed to know of a colony called Veracruz.

As a final touch, he said that Columbia had launched its own slowboat missions and that they had dozens of hidden settlements in uninhabited systems.

These rumors though were never confirmed.

• A theory that involved David Lear to the Rosicrucians and alleged rituals involved to make Devlin Stone succeed.

Bibliography

• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 11/02/3080: "The Nesbit Prophecies Confirmed?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 12/04/3080: "The Once and Future King, Devlin Stone?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 19/04/3080: "Epsilon Eridani's Star League Ghosts!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 26/04/3080: "Phantom 'Mech or Phony 'Mech?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 03/05/3080: "Photos Out of Time?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 04/05/3080: "Immortals Who Guide the Inner Sphere"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 10/05/3080: "Green Ghosts of the Camerons?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 17/05/3080: "Banshees on Skye?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 24/05/3080: "The Cursed Blood of Hohiro Kurita!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 31/05/3080: "The Infernal First Princess!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 07/06/3080: "Alchemist Masters of the Inner Sphere!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 14/06/3080: "Vampires of Marik?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 21/06/3080: "Tortured Trail of the Spear of Destiny!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 26/07/3080: "Xin Sheng or Feng Shui?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 02/08/3080: "Revenge of the Rim Worlds?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 09/08/3080: "The Bloody-Handed Duke!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 16/08/3080: "Werewolves of Tharkad!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 23/08/3080: "Immortals Among the Belters?"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 30/08/3080: "Ghost Ships of the Periphery!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 13/09/3080: "The Mysterious Nephilim!"'
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 27/09/3080: "Hidden Legacies of Magellan!"
• BattleCorps ScandalVids, 04/10/3080: "Hidden Puppeteer of the Coalition?"