Teleporters do not provoke the kind of persistent worry that telepaths induce in most normals, but their particular gifts cause a more physical concern. An experienced teleporter can reach or see into any location they’ve ever been; security officials don’t just need to make sure that no teleporter is in a restricted area, but that they’ve never been there before at any time. Access into the most important areas is carefully filtered to ensure that no outside teleporter ever gets a chance to see a location they might suddenly appear in several months or years later.
Most governments with access to trained psychics will have at least a few expert teleporters on hand to provide untraceable communications links and superlative infiltrators. Despite their many advantages in intrusion and evasion, however, a teleporter needs the skills to actually get into a restricted area before they can take advantage of a quick escape. It’s not unknown for teleporters to be paired with more conventional burglars who supply the security-defeating skills and information-gathering talents that a professional psy-chic doesn’t always have the time to cultivate.
The criminal applications of teleportation are obvious, as is its utility in surveillance. Some bold teleporters make excellent money as thieves or spies for whatever employer can afford their exorbitant fees. The price for their services is invariably high, not only due to the rarity of experienced teleporters, but due to the consequences of arrest.
As tempting as the criminal path can be for many teleporters, most are dissuaded by the penalties. Very few worlds have prison facilities that are in any way designed to cope with teleporting inmates. On advanced worlds, this means that criminal teleporters are often implanted with surgical bombs keyed to explode if they leave a restricted area or stop receiving a specific signal from a government transmitter. On primitive worlds, this means that criminal teleporters face summary execution for any crime more serious than a misdemeanor.
Some devices can be used to defeat teleporters, creating a curdled patch of metadimensional space that is impossible to enter or leave via teleportation. These ancient pretech artifacts are invariably ridiculously expensive in the unlikely case that a planetary government allows them to remain in private hands at all, and only the most important figures of an advanced world will have any access to teleporter-sealed “safe zones”. Many worlds have no access to such devices at all, with even princes and potentates left to keep a wary eye on teleporting psychics. A metapsion brainguard is the usual low-tech answer to psychic threats, if such an expensive mercenary can be hired on the world.
Personal Apportation
Core Technique
The teleporter can translocate to another location they have either occupied before or can see with their unaided vision. Locations are fixed in reference to the nearest major gravity well. For example, it is not possible to teleport to the cockpit of a distant moving vehicle they once occupied, but they can teleport to another point on a planet’s surface even though the planet has since moved far through the stellar void.
The core technique allows the teleporter to move himself and any mass he is able to carry with his own natural strength. Resisting targets cannot be carried along, and unresisting ones must be touched. A teleporter can leave any clothing, shackles, adhesions, or other matter behind when he teleports, but he cannot leave behind matter that has been inserted into his body, such as cybernetics or shrapnel. Matter cannot be partially left behind.
A teleporter will instinctively abort any apportation that would leave him embedded in a solid object or in an environment of imminent physical harm. Any Committed Effort on such aborted jumps is wasted, as is any action spent triggering the power.
The maximum range of Personal Apportation depends on the teleporter’s skill level. Teleporting with Personal Apportation counts as a Main Action and requires that the psychic Commit Effort for the scene.
Level-0: The psychic can teleport up to 10 meters.
Level-1: The psychic can teleport up to 100 meters.
Level-2: The psychic can teleport up to 10 kilometers.
Level-3: The psychic can teleport up to 1,000 kilometers.
Level-4: The psychic can teleport anywhere on a planet’s surface or near orbit.
Proficient Apportation
Level-1
Personal Apportation now counts as a Move action, though it still can be performed only once per round. Apportations of 10 meters or less no longer require Effort to be Committed, though any augments to the technique must still be paid for normally.
Spatial Awareness
Level-1
The psychic may Commit Effort as an On Turn action to gain an intuitive 360-degree awareness of their physical surroundings. The sense is roughly equivalent to sight out to 100 meters, though it cannot read text or distinguish colors. It is blocked by solid objects but is unimpeded by darkness, mist, blinding light, holograms, or optical illusions. The sense lasts as long as the Effort remains Committed to the technique.
Burdened Apportation
Level-2
The psychic can carry willing companions with them when using Personal Apportation. Up to three human-sized companions and their man-portable gear may be carried per skill level in Teleportation. Allies must be within 3 meters of the teleporter to be carried along. Ordinary inert matter cannot be carried along unless the psychic is touching it or it’s being carried by an ally affected by this power. If carrying inert mass, up to two hundred kilos of objects can be carried per skill level. Using this technique increases the Effort cost of Personal Apportation, requiring that an extra point of Effort be Committed for the day.
Perceptive Dislocation
Level-2
Commit Effort for the day to sense any location the psychic could teleport to. The psychic perceives the location as if there, lasting for fifteen minutes at most.
Spatial Synchrony Mandala
Level-2
The psychic imprints a particular object or person on their psionic awareness. Provided the object is relative-ly intact and in range of their Personal Apportation, the psychic always knows its exact location and can teleport to within three meters of it with Personal Apportation even if it has moved from its original location. Im-printing an object requires an hour’s meditation with it, and only one object can be imprinted at a time. If imprinting on a person, the target must be willing and cooperative to make the imprint. Objects must be at least one kilogram in mass to be effectively tracked.
Effortless Apportation
Level-3
The psychic does not need to Commit Effort to use Personal Apportation. If the technique is augmented by other techniques that come with their own extra or increased cost, however, this extra cost must still be paid.
Stutterjump
Level-3
The psychic can instinctively micro-teleport away from incoming danger. As an On Turn action they may Commit Effort to begin shifting their spatial position away from attacks, gaining a base Armor Class of 20 so long as the Effort remains Committed. This Armor Class is not modified by armor, shields, or Dexterity modifiers, and the micro-jumps do not significantly move the psychic from their current location. While Stutterjump is active, as an Instant action the adept may Commit Effort for the day to negate a successful hit by a weapon attack, even after damage has been rolled.
This reflexive defensive jump may be used only once per day and leaves the psychic just outside the radius of explosions or other area-effect attacks.
Rift Reduplication
Level-3
Expert teleporters can be infuriatingly difficult to pin down. By Committing an additional Effort for the day as an Instant action, the adept can use Personal Apportation as an On Turn action, even if they’ve already used it once this round. Apporting itself costs whatever Effort it normally would, in addition to any techniques that augment it. Rift Reduplication can only be triggered once per round.
If the adept uses their powers to teleport into a location, perform an action, and then use Rift Reduplication to teleport back out, onlookers in the area will not have time to react to their action or attack the adept unless the onlookers have held their action explicitly to counter the psychic. Enemies who hold their action this way waste it entirely if the psychic does not give them a chance to attack or otherwise interfere. Such a lightning strike may be surprising to onlookers, but it doesn’t allow enough preparation time to count as an Execution Attack as described on page 52.
Deep Intrusion
Level-4
The adept can use Personal Apportation to blind-teleport into a building, structure, vehicle, or spaceship visible to them, including spaceships close enough to engage in conventional ship-to-ship combat. They intuitively seek out a space large enough to hold them and without immediate environmental hazards, but cannot control their precise destination. Using this technique in con-junction with Personal Apportation is very draining to the psychic, and requires that they Commit an additional Effort point for the day.
Offensive Apportation
Level-4
The psychic can use Personal Apportation as a Main Action to teleport an unwilling target, provided the user can make physical contact with them. Contact with an unsuspecting or incapacitated target is automatic, while touching a resisting enemy requires a Punch hit roll with a bonus equal to the psychic’s Teleportation skill.
If the psychic does not use the Burdened Apportation technique then only the target is teleported; otherwise the user may go along with them. The psychic cannot teleport a target to any location they could not teleport to, including locations of imminent environmental danger, such as high in the air, into a windowless tomb, or into the middle of a sea. A conscious, resisting target can make a Mental saving throw to forcibly abort the teleportation, rolling at a penalty equal to the psychic’s Teleportation skill. Use of this technique adds to the cost of Personal Apportation, requiring the psychic Commit an additional point of Effort for the day whether the touch hits or not.