Arcanocron

Appearance:

The Arcanocron is ... well ... not many people know what it actually is. The people who do know what it is have becoming crippled by insanity, have undergone voluntary nerve stapling or committed suicide. They share common traits of being made of highly complicated materials, such as transphasic aluminum dioxide impregnated with rare materials including and not limited to uranium, bismuth, and metallic hydrogen. They have a thermal barrier, and resist having their temperature changed, and as such, cannot be burned or scored, even with high energy lasers or particle generators. They produce light, and frequently generate nameless colors.

Arcanocron 001 is a pentachoron, or a four dimensional pyramid made of an indescribable translucent material.

Arcanocron 002 is a tesseract, or a four dimensional cube, made of a translucent material set in a gold/steel alloy.

Arcanocron 003 is a glome, or four dimensional sphere floating in a gold/steel alloy cage.

Side Effects:

Being in regular proximity to an arcanocron has a number of common side effects. Considering the nameless colors, people in regular proximity to an arcanocron suffer lucid dreaming, synesthesia, waking nightmares, nausea, tooth loss, glossolalia, border personality disorder, changes in eye color, changes in DNA sequencing, changes in fingerprints, and other changes.

Being in proximity to an arcanocron reduces the difficulty of working on arcanotechnology, either actual hands on work, or theoretical work. The scientists and engineers who've had an arcanocron in their possession have managed some impressive breakthroughs.

Machine intelligences act very strange around arcanocrons, acting in abnormal manner. They will adopt aggressive stances, and will attempt to put their hands on the device, demonstrating almost atavistic behaviors and lust like behaviors for the object. The most common outcome is that the machine intelligence becomes unstable, entering a catatonic state or 'passing out'. The least common is a savage killer drive to attempt to force the arcanocron into their power core.

Uses of an Arcanocron

There is no real use for an arcanocron. The devices produce power, assuming a technician can find a way to connect to it. It also produces a number of different forms of radiation, none of which register as mutagenic or carcinogenic. Arcanotech devices that integrate an arcanocron see their performance specs go through the roof, but sync tests are murderously hard, and failure tends to destroy whatever is trying to sync with the arcanocron.

Known Facts:

The arcanocron is a perpetual motion device.

It has infinite capacity for data storage.

It generates the same amount of power as the reactor that powers a 75 ton MAD-3R Marauder mech, but can fit inside a pocket.

If a single person manages to sync with an arcanocron (a process that can take days or weeks) they develop parapsychic abilities, unstable at first, and then growing in force.

If an arcanocron is destroyed (seriously difficult) it automatically triggers a serious dimensional fatigue event. Not a bug hunt, but things like recursive time loops, reverse time zones, altered probability, people turn into a different species, and no one notices, the entire area is knocked out of phase.

Unknown Facts

An arcanocron represents about a billion dollars worth of time, effort, and resources condensed into an object the size of a Magic 8 Ball or Rubik's Cube.

They do not have a purpose.