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Hmm well I'm not sure there's anything particularly "Easter" about this character outside of the fact that he just can't seem to stay dead but… happy Easter anyways everyone!

Today from my hat I pull another stupid OC for your entertainment. Behold Professor Cyril von Zimman, a time traveling nutcase constantly on the run from the space police. He wasn't always like this. Born in Germany in 1905, the Professor was once a dignified and aspiring physicist who rubbed elbows with the greatest minds of the era. He was particularly interested in the nature of time and bending space to shorten the travel distance. Of course, the Professor operated in a time and place which was not exactly friendly to great minds. As the Third Reich rose to power, and stole his research to begin working on their nefarious Project Riese, von Zimman fled to the States to continue his research in "peace", whatever that means in the middle of a World War. Indeed, by 1943, the US government brought von Zimman onto Project Rainbow, the Allies' response to Project Riese. Testing a crude time travel attempt on the USS Eldritch, the experiment went horribly wrong, fusing men with the deck of the ship and contorting everyone and everything in all sorts of horrible ways. The project was shelved, as the Reich was unable to successfully pull of Project Riese either, and thus time travel was deemed dangerous and unwieldy.

However, it gained new life in 1948, when Project Rainbow was absorbed into Project Phoenix to study precisely why the experiment went so wrong. With von Zimman's help, it was discovered in 1953 that humans don't react well to time travel because their individual atoms are strung along a specific timeline, and trying to blast an organism into a different position therefore has similar carcinogenic effects to radiation. This led to the development of time stabilization technology in 1967, a crude and bulky room full of esoteric machinery which scared the government into shutting the project down two years later. Von Zimman's team, however, was not ready to give up their research yet, and so in 1971 the Montauk Project was established in secret. For the next decade, mysterious and sometimes unethical experiments were conducted in an underground air base. The technology was compactified, improved upon, and by 1979 they developed a sort of time engine GPS called the Whirligig. Von Zimman was among the first to go exploring into the past and future, but this unique window gave him the perspective to see what his team was doing behind his back. By 1983, he couldn't ignore the inhumane treatment of their secret test subjects anymore, and he joined a sabotage effort to destroy the project once and for all. Unfortunately, while successful, his efforts flung him into the untempered chaos of raw spacetime.

Already losing his mind slowly to the decay of old age, this situation undid all that remained of his sanity. Nonetheless, he still had his personal Whirligig engine which would allow him to visit any time period he wanted. Going into the far future to fit himself out with technology that made him functionally immortal and immune to the laws of physics, the Professor has since spent his days bouncing around the history of the Universe just being a general nuisance. Sometimes he's helpful, sometimes he commits crime, always for no other reason than he just kinda felt like it. He speaks in nonsense and is only ever helpful to the plot like once a month. He loves rock and roll, sticking it to the man, checking out famous historical mysteries, and black magic. The space police are constantly after him, and the thrill of the chase gets him up in the morning. At least, it would if he ever went to sleep. The man has the personality of someone who snorted ten shots of espresso. He's dangerous, quirky, and only follows the laws of physics that apply to Bugs Bunny. God help us all.

Design notes, obviously I leaned pretty hard into the classic Einstein-looking mad scientist caricature. I recall the dialogue from Professor Paradox in Ben 10 Alien Force where he explains that when he was flung into infinity, he went insane before ultimately becoming bored of that. Von Zimman is very much meant to embody the man I presume Paradox was before he got bored. This man is true chaotic neutral, and serves as my conduit for any time travel shenanigans in Drake Hero, a complement to Vlad who's more for space travel and crosstime. If I'm building on the far future portion of my OC universe and I need a more direct connection to the modern day plot, this is the guy to pull in.

For his suit, I actually drew heavy inspiration from that scrapped design for an astronaut suit that was meant to be used by the first cosmonauts in the British space program back in the day. It's clunky and old fashioned, but that kind of gives it character. It also makes von Zimman's silhouette a lot more rugged and gives off the impression that it's actually special equipment, not just a standard lab coat getup. His Whirligig I designed with the premise of just wanting this man to look like he's got a jet engine strapped to his chest. It's totally clunky, totally unsafe, and held together by quantum duct tape. Just like him. When he time travels, he literally flings himself forward with this thing, with his noodle arms flailing behind him until he crashes into something and takes that as his cue to start the next adventure.

Speaking of the Whirligig, that name, as well as the outline of von Zimman's story, is taken directly from The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time, a 1992 conspiracy book written by Preston Nichols. You may recognize the Montauk Project as the inspiration behind Stranger Things. Or you're like me, and read through the whole book just to see what the original details on arguably the most famous time travel conspiracy online are for the sake of worldbuilding, because the internet never goes into much more detail than "ship disappear". I can't say it's the worst thing I ever read. I certainly got plenty of laughs out of it. The actual conspiracy is of course easily debunked and the book is full of scientific notions that were long outdated even in 1992. Like, I recall the Aether being mentioned a few times, which was proven not to exist all the way back in 1887. But maybe that's just what the government wants us to think. Insert X-Files theme here.

Joking aside, for as silly as the premise and science in the book is, I have to give it credit: it's at least consistently wrong. Like sure, the science is bunk, but the author always does stick to his internal logic at least. It does actually read like a narrative about something completely unknown being dissected and put back together with actual scientific method. He also uses consistent techno babble words between chapters and even provides a few simple diagrams as to how the machines work within the internal framework of the novel's science. For a worldbuilder like me, it provides some really nice vocabulary and even some story ideas to play around with. Unlike him, though, I think I'll leave out the part where he cites "psychics and the homeless man" as his source of information. That's not a joke, I have it underlined in my copy. Best twenty bucks I ever spent. I just wish it didn't fill my Google ad algorithm with crystal healing junk, but I guess that's the sacrifice I make for you all.

Description
Hmm well I'm not sure there's anything particularly "Easter" about this character outside of the fact that he just can't seem to stay dead but… happy Easter anyways everyone!

Today from my hat I pull another stupid OC for your entertainment. Behold Professor Cyril von Zimman, a time traveling nutcase constantly on the run from the space police. He wasn't always like this. Born in Germany in 1905, the Professor was once a dignified and aspiring physicist who rubbed elbows with the greatest minds of the era. He was particularly interested in the nature of time and bending space to shorten the travel distance. Of course, the Professor operated in a time and place which was not exactly friendly to great minds. As the Third Reich rose to power, and stole his research to begin working on their nefarious Project Riese, von Zimman fled to the States to continue his research in "peace", whatever that means in the middle of a World War. Indeed, by 1943, the US government brought von Zimman onto Project Rainbow, the Allies' response to Project Riese. Testing a crude time travel attempt on the USS Eldritch, the experiment went horribly wrong, fusing men with the deck of the ship and contorting everyone and everything in all sorts of horrible ways. The project was shelved, as the Reich was unable to successfully pull of Project Riese either, and thus time travel was deemed dangerous and unwieldy.

However, it gained new life in 1948, when Project Rainbow was absorbed into Project Phoenix to study precisely why the experiment went so wrong. With von Zimman's help, it was discovered in 1953 that humans don't react well to time travel because their individual atoms are strung along a specific timeline, and trying to blast an organism into a different position therefore has similar carcinogenic effects to radiation. This led to the development of time stabilization technology in 1967, a crude and bulky room full of esoteric machinery which scared the government into shutting the project down two years later. Von Zimman's team, however, was not ready to give up their research yet, and so in 1971 the Montauk Project was established in secret. For the next decade, mysterious and sometimes unethical experiments were conducted in an underground air base. The technology was compactified, improved upon, and by 1979 they developed a sort of time engine GPS called the Whirligig. Von Zimman was among the first to go exploring into the past and future, but this unique window gave him the perspective to see what his team was doing behind his back. By 1983, he couldn't ignore the inhumane treatment of their secret test subjects anymore, and he joined a sabotage effort to destroy the project once and for all. Unfortunately, while successful, his efforts flung him into the untempered chaos of raw spacetime.

Already losing his mind slowly to the decay of old age, this situation undid all that remained of his sanity. Nonetheless, he still had his personal Whirligig engine which would allow him to visit any time period he wanted. Going into the far future to fit himself out with technology that made him functionally immortal and immune to the laws of physics, the Professor has since spent his days bouncing around the history of the Universe just being a general nuisance. Sometimes he's helpful, sometimes he commits crime, always for no other reason than he just kinda felt like it. He speaks in nonsense and is only ever helpful to the plot like once a month. He loves rock and roll, sticking it to the man, checking out famous historical mysteries, and black magic. The space police are constantly after him, and the thrill of the chase gets him up in the morning. At least, it would if he ever went to sleep. The man has the personality of someone who snorted ten shots of espresso. He's dangerous, quirky, and only follows the laws of physics that apply to Bugs Bunny. God help us all.

Design notes, obviously I leaned pretty hard into the classic Einstein-looking mad scientist caricature. I recall the dialogue from Professor Paradox in Ben 10 Alien Force where he explains that when he was flung into infinity, he went insane before ultimately becoming bored of that. Von Zimman is very much meant to embody the man I presume Paradox was before he got bored. This man is true chaotic neutral, and serves as my conduit for any time travel shenanigans in Drake Hero, a complement to Vlad who's more for space travel and crosstime. If I'm building on the far future portion of my OC universe and I need a more direct connection to the modern day plot, this is the guy to pull in.

For his suit, I actually drew heavy inspiration from that scrapped design for an astronaut suit that was meant to be used by the first cosmonauts in the British space program back in the day. It's clunky and old fashioned, but that kind of gives it character. It also makes von Zimman's silhouette a lot more rugged and gives off the impression that it's actually special equipment, not just a standard lab coat getup. His Whirligig I designed with the premise of just wanting this man to look like he's got a jet engine strapped to his chest. It's totally clunky, totally unsafe, and held together by quantum duct tape. Just like him. When he time travels, he literally flings himself forward with this thing, with his noodle arms flailing behind him until he crashes into something and takes that as his cue to start the next adventure.

Speaking of the Whirligig, that name, as well as the outline of von Zimman's story, is taken directly from The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time, a 1992 conspiracy book written by Preston Nichols. You may recognize the Montauk Project as the inspiration behind Stranger Things. Or you're like me, and read through the whole book just to see what the original details on arguably the most famous time travel conspiracy online are for the sake of worldbuilding, because the internet never goes into much more detail than "ship disappear". I can't say it's the worst thing I ever read. I certainly got plenty of laughs out of it. The actual conspiracy is of course easily debunked and the book is full of scientific notions that were long outdated even in 1992. Like, I recall the Aether being mentioned a few times, which was proven not to exist all the way back in 1887. But maybe that's just what the government wants us to think. Insert X-Files theme here.

Joking aside, for as silly as the premise and science in the book is, I have to give it credit: it's at least consistently wrong. Like sure, the science is bunk, but the author always does stick to his internal logic at least. It does actually read like a narrative about something completely unknown being dissected and put back together with actual scientific method. He also uses consistent techno babble words between chapters and even provides a few simple diagrams as to how the machines work within the internal framework of the novel's science. For a worldbuilder like me, it provides some really nice vocabulary and even some story ideas to play around with. Unlike him, though, I think I'll leave out the part where he cites "psychics and the homeless man" as his source of information. That's not a joke, I have it underlined in my copy. Best twenty bucks I ever spent. I just wish it didn't fill my Google ad algorithm with crystal healing junk, but I guess that's the sacrifice I make for you all.