Minor Fictional Characters in Crosstime Traffic

This article lists the various minor fictional characters who appear in the Crosstime Traffic. These characters play, at best, a peripheral role in the series. While they were usually given a name, some weren't. Most were simply mentioned or had a very brief, unimportant speaking role that did not impact the plot, and never appeared again.

=Gunpowder Empire= Volume 1

=Curious Notions= Volume 2

Dave
Dave was Mouradian's helper. He unloaded an order of garlic for Paul Gomes.

Fatty Horvath
"Fatty" Horvath was a police captain well-known to the entire city San Francisco. Paul Gomes contacted Horvath when he inquired into the fate of Charlie Woo on behalf of Woo's daughter, Lucy.

Later, when Lucy was in the custody of the Feldgendarmerie, she invoked Horvath's name to prove she and her family had no connection to the Gomes. The Germans were not impressed.

Old Man Lin
Old Man Lin was a neighbor of the Woo family. He informed Mrs. Woo that he'd seen her husband arrested by German authorities.

Louie
Louie ran a hamburger restaurant in San Francisco. When the German Feldgendarmerie shut down Curious Notions and arrested Lawrence Gomes, his son Paul ate at Louie's. While Louie was worried about what might happen to him if Paul was caught in his restaurant, he was more concerned about Paul's well-being, and so fed him.

Before Paul and Lawrence left the alternate, they visited Louie one last time for some baklava with the Woos, leaving a generous tip.

Peggy Ma
Peggy Ma was a friend of Lucy Woo's. They spent Sundays together in Golden Gate Park, because it was free. Like Lucy, Peggy was frustrated with the poor status of the United States.

Mildred
Mildred worked with Lucy Woo, running a sewing machine at a shoe factory. She'd been at it for most of her adult life. Like everyone else on the floor, she hated the superviser, Hank Simmons.

Mouradian
Mouradian was a garlic farmer in Gilroy. He unknowlingly sold a good chunk of his crop to Crosstime Traffic via Curious Notions.

Andy O'Connell
Andy O'Connell was a San Francisco beat cop in an alternate where the Kaiserreich ruled the United States. He was of Irish descent, and had a massive belly. He was friendly with Paul Gomes. When Paul was on the lam after his father was arrested by the Feldgendarmerie, he had a chance encounter with O'Connell on the streets. O'Connell warned Paul to stay out of sight. He also offered to find out why Lawrence Gomes had been arrested.

Mrs. Pastrano
Mrs. Pastrano was a wealthy customer of Curious Notions. She bought a record player and a stereo. Her purchase paid for a load of garlic for the home timeline.

Both Paul and Lawrence Gomes were privately disgusted by Mrs. Pastrano's mink coat.

Hank Simmons
Hank Simmons was the foreman at the shoe manfacturer where Lucy Woo worked. Simmons was a strict and mean supervisor. However, when the Triads took an interest in Lucy and what she knew about Curious Notions, they put pressure on Simmons to be nicer to her. He responded by having her sent to the warehouse's front office.

Chris Triandos
Chris Triandos sold almonds to the home timeline via Curious Notions for years. When the Triads took an interest in the store, they threatened Triandos and other farmers, warning them not to sell. Lawrence Gomes learned of this from Triandos.

=In High Places= Volume 3

=The Disunited States of America= Volume 4

Adrian
Adrian (d. 2097) was a soldier in the Virginia Army. While stationed in Elizabeth, he and another soldier, Millard, caught the tailored measles virus Ohio had unleased on Virginia early in their 2097 war. Adrian eventually died. Justin Monroe "borrowed" Adrian's uniform, joined a platoon, and fought his way into Charleston.

Violet Brown
Violet Brown (b. c. 2027) was a childhood friend of Myrtle Berkley in Elizabeth, Virginia. When Myrtle returned to Elizabeth in 2097, she ran into Violet's sister, Daisy Springer.

Cal
Cal was a soldier in the Virginia Army. He participated in quelling the Negro uprising in Charleston that came at the same time as the Ohio-Virginia War of 2097.

Cloyd
Cloyd was one of two Virginia border guards who inspected Beckie Royer, Myrtle Berkley, and Uncle Luke's passports. Both Cloyd and his colleague could not understand why two Californians wanted to visit Virginia.

Irma Davis
Irma Davis (d. 2097) was the waitress in the only diner in Elizabeth in the country of Virginia. She'd managed to get into Parkersburg for a dental visit after Ohio released a tailored measles virus into Virginia, where she contracted the virus. She died some days after that visit, but not before she'd served Randy Brooks and Justin Monroe several meals.

When word spread that Irma had died, Myrtle Berkley tried to convince Ted Snodgrass not to let Brooks and Monroe back into the house. Snodgrass did not heed the advice on the grounds that everyone in the Snodgrass household had been exposed by now.

Major Duncan
Major Duncan, Virginia Army, was part of the offensive to regain Elizabeth from Ohio in 2097. When several troops were infected with the tailored measles virus Ohio had unleashed early in the war, he ordered his men to pull back out of Elizabeth.

Duncan had a heated argument with an army doctor, who refused to leave, asserting that taking care of the sick men was his job.

Eddie
Eddie was a soldier in the Virginia Army. He bonded with Justin Monroe when Monroe disguised himself as a soldier to get back to Charleston. Not long after entering Charleston, Eddie was wounded by a Negro insurgent. Justin was able to pull him out of danger.

Everett
Everett was a Virginia soldier stationed in Charleston, Virginia at the tail-end of the Ohio-Virginia War of 2097. He checked Beckie Royer's papers when she went looking for the Charleston Coin and Stamp Company. Everett was surprised to see someone from California in the middle of a Virginia war-zone. Everett's partner assured him that the Charleston Coin and Stamp Company was legitimate, and Everett allowed Beckie on her way.

Special Agent Jefferson
Special Agent Jefferson of the Virginia Bureau of Investigation led an investigation into the death of Charlie Clark, a Negro janitor in Elizabeth, Virginia. To that end, he and his subordinates, Agent Madison and Agent Tyler interrogated both Beckie Royer and Justin Monroe. While Jefferson was suspicious of the Californian Royer, he determined that neither were involved in any Negro revolt designed to take advantage with the war with Ohio.

Mr. Kerfeld
Mr. Kerfeld was a grocer in Elizabeth, Virginia. Justin Monroe and Randy Brooks shopped in his store after the diner was closed down.

Justin had the chance to observe Virginia's racial politics while in the store. Kerfeld treated his fellow whites, Justin and Randy, as equals. His interaction with town janitor Charlie Clark, a Negro, was cordial, but subtly showed the disparity between the two men's positions.

Lonnie
Lonnie was a driver for Crosstime Traffic. He volunteered to take Randy Brooks and Cyndi & Justin Monroe to a quarantine alternate. The alternate had never evolved humans, which gave Lonnie the chance to catch up on his birdwatching.

Louise
Louise was Myrtle Berkley's sister and Beckie Royer's great-aunt. Myrtle and Beckie stayed with Louise and her husband Luke in Belpre, Ohio on their way to Myrtle's hometown of Elizabeth, Virginia. Louis insisted that Luke give Myrtle and Beckie a ride to Elizabeth, much to Luke's chagrin. He was running guns to Virginia Negroes, and didn't want the company. However, Louise, unaware of her husband's activities, insisted.

Luke
Uncle Luke was married to Myrtle Berkley's sister, Louise. Beckie Royer only ever knew him as "Uncle Luke". When Myrtle and Beckie visited Louise in Belpre, Ohio, Luke grudingly agreed to take them to Elizabeth, Virginia. Luke had been going that direction anyway, to run guns to the local Negro populations in anticipation of war breaking out between Ohio and Virginia.

Luke cleverly used Beckie and Myrtle's status as Californians to distract the border guards, allowing him to safely take his load of guns into Elizabeth. Once they arrived, Luke ordered the two women out of the car, and went about his business.

Agent Madison
Agent Madison was one of three Virginia Bureau of Investigation agents who questioned Beckie Royer and Justin Monroe.

Bessie Mathewson
Bessie Mathewson was the wife of Fred Mathewson. The fact that she was panicked about her husband's illness was proof to Ted Snodgrass that Fred had the tailored measles virus Ohio had released onto Virginia.

Fred Mathewson
Fred Mathewson was a resident of Elizabeth, Virginia. He caught the tailored measles virus Ohio had released on its neighbor early in their war.

Hank Meadows
Hank Meadows sold lamps in Elizabeth, Virginia. When neighboring Palestine refused to let Myrtle Berkley and Ethel Snodgrass enter the town (as part of the quarantine that the whole country of Virginia was under), Ethel angrily promised that Hank Meadows would hear of it, and that people from Palestine would be denied lamps.

Millard
Millard was a soldier in the Virginia Army. While stationed in Elizabeth, he and another soldier, Adrian, caught the tailored measles virus Ohio had unleased on Virginia early in their 2097 war.

Mr. Monroe
Mr. Monroe was Justin Monroe's father, and Cyndi Monroe's ex-husband. Justin's parents had divorced in 2090. Everyone was still hurt over that in 2097.

Mr. Royer
Mr. Royer was the husband of Trish and the father of Beckie. He was a bioengineer from California. Somehow he tolerated his mother-in-law, Myrtle Berkley, with the patience of Job.

Trish Royer
Trish Royer was Beckie Royer's mother and Myrtle Berkley's daughter. She was born in California after her mother immigrated there from Virginia.

Trish eventually married a bioengineer. She shared a very frosty relationship with her mother, but a very close one with her daughter.

Sam
Sam was a soldier in the Virginia Army. He participated in quelling the Negro uprising in Charleston. Justin Monroe briefly served with Sam when Monroe snuck back into the city.

Smitty
Smitty was a soldier with the Virginia army. He and his comrade Eddie bonded with Justin Monroe when Monroe disguised himself as a soldier so he could get back into Charleston.

Smitty congratulated Monroe on his first kill in combat. Justin was privately horrified.

Daisy Springer
Daisy Springer (formerly Daisy Brown) was the younger sister of Violet Brown, Myrtle Berkley's best friend in childhood. When Myrtle returned to Elizabeth, Virginia in 2097, she ran into Daisy. The two reminisced about their childhood for some time before Myrtle thought to introduce her granddaughter, Beckie Royer, to Daisy.

Franklin Delano Truman
Franklin Delano Truman was an important North American in an alternate where the United States dissolved in the early 19th century. Ted Snodgrass cited Truman as the type of person everyone had heard of.

Agent Tyler
Agent Tyler was one of three Virginia Bureau of Investigation agents who questioned Beckie Royer and Justin Monroe.

Hattie Williamson
Hattie Williamson was a childhood friend of Myrtle Berkley's. When Myrtle returned to Elizabeth, Virginia, she spent time reminiscing about Hattie and her dog with Daisy Springer.

=The Gladiator= Volume 5

Abbaticchio
Abbaticchio was a classmate of Annarita Crosetti's in Comrade Montefusco's Russian language class. He received a "C" as his final grade. He required a "B+" to get into the university he wanted. Montefusco steadily maintained that Abbacticchio had earned a "C". Angrily, Abbaticchio retorted that his father, a member of the Security Police would make Montefusco sorry. Abbaticchio proudly proclaimed that his father was the officer who brought down The Gladiator, a fact that did not move Montefusco.

Ernesto Albosta
Ernesto Albosta was Marcantonio Moretti's assistant. Albosta did the actual janitorial work for the building. Albosta hired By the Arch Repairs to fix the building's elevator. The fact that the company was headquartered in Rimini tipped off Annarita Crosetti that the repairmen were from Crosstime Traffic.

Alfredo
Alfredo was an older patron of The Gladiator. He spent a great deal of time and energy playing and studying the game "Rails across Europe". When Gianfranco Mazzilli played and lost to Alfredo, he was quite pleased with how well he played, even though he lost in the end.

Alfredo was among the first people to learn that The Gladiator was closed.

Filippo Antonelli
Filippo Antonelli was a senior at Hoxha Polytechnic and the president of the Young Socialists' League when Annarita Crosetti was still a junior. Despite his office, Filippo was a moderate communist. When a motion arose to investigate The Gladiator, a gaming shop, Antonelli set up a committee, comprised of Annarita, Maria Tenace and Ludovico Pagliarone.

While Antonelli was dutiful to Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist principles, his was a tempered devotion. He was sympathetic to Annarita's concerns that Maria wanted The Gladiator shut down without having investigated it first hand. With his counsel, Annarita was able to file a report that ruled The Gladiator sound. Unfortunately, The Gladiator was later shut down by the Security Police, proving Tenace right. Antonelli had to accept Tenace's minority report instead of Annarita's.

After Antonelli graduated, Annarita was elected president of the Young Socialists' League.

The Bombardiers
The Bombardiers were a modern musical group in an alternate where the Soviet Union won the Cold War. The Bombardiers were considered counterrevoluionary, and so purchasing and owning their recordings was illegal and done underground. Annarita Crosetti and Gianfranco Mazzilli found Bombardiers recordings in a shop in San Marino. Gianfranco suggested that they purchase a few. Annarita vetoed it, as their companion Eduardo Caruso's trip to The Three Sixes probably drew too much attention to them.

Burn This Record
Burn This Record was a modern musical group in an alternate where the Soviet Union won the Cold War. Burn This Record was considered counterrevoluionary, and so purchasing and owning their recordings was illegal and done underground. Annarita Crosetti and Gianfranco Mazzilli found Burn This Record recordings (among others) in a shop in San Marino. Gianfranco suggested that they purchase a few. Annarita vetoed it, as their companion Eduardo Caruso's trip to The Three Sixes probably drew too much attention to them.

Carlo
Carlo (b. 2072) was a young university student in Milan. He spent a great deal of time in The Gladiator, avidly playing the game Rails across Europe. He attempted the tactic of "loss leader" against Gianfranco Mazzilli during one of their games. It backfired on Carlo, but Gianfranco remembered the tactic.

Some days later, Carlo went to The Gladiator and found Gianfranco sitting outside the closed store. The two discussed the possibility that the store had been closed down by the Security Police like another store, The Conductor's Cap.

Chiapelli
Chiapelli was a Communist hero of the Italian People's Republic. His image appeared on the uniforms of the Young Socialists' League of Italy, along with that of Moroni, among others. However, their pictures were not as prominent as the Soviet Union's heroes.

Counterrevolution
Counterrevolution was a modern musical group in an alternate where the Soviet Union won the Cold War. Not surprising, given its name, Counterrevolution was considered counterrevoluionary, and so purchasing and owning its recordings was illegal and done underground. Annarita Crosetti and Gianfranco Mazzilli found Counterrevolution recordings in a shop in San Marino. Gianfranco suggested that they purchase a few. Annarita vetoed it, as their companion Eduardo Caruso's trip to The Three Sixes probably drew too much attention to them.

Paolo Crespi
Paolo Crespi was a classmate of Gianfranco Mazzilli's in Comrade Pontevecchio's history class. When called on in class, he correctly stated that the United States had grown tired of fighting the Vietnam War, but he could not give a deeper answer.

Donofrio
Comrade Donofrio was an algebra teacher at Hoxha Polytechnic. He noticed remarkable improvement in Gianfranco Mazzilli's scores, after Mazzillim started playing Rails across Europe. He quizzed the boy, who'd been a terrible student heretofore, to make sure Gianfranco wasn't cheating.

When Gianfranco suggested that his improved scores were attributable to the game, Donofrio admitted to playing it, too.

Marco Furillo
Marco Furillo was a student at Hoxha Polytechnic and a member of the Young Socialists' League. He moved that the League investigate The Gladiator, a gaming shop that was growing in popularity, on the grounds that it wsa subversive.

Iacopo
A Security Police officer named Iacopo or perhaps Iacaomo, was the lead investigator in Gianfranco Mazzilli's "kidnapping". He escorted Gianfranco back to The Three Sixes in San Marino in the hope that Gianfranco could show the Police the location of a secret trap door. Gianfranco eventually was able to take them to a hidden room full of gaudy furniture and burned papers.

Luisa
Luisa was a classmate of Annarita Crosetti's. They were in Comrade Montefusco's Russian language class.

After a brief visit from a pair of Russian diplomats, the class asked a series of questions about Russian culture, in part out of curiosity, in part to avoid actually doing classwork. Luisa was given the last question. She asked how Soviet prison camps were worse than those of the Italian People's Republic. She asked whether non-Russians had fewer right than Russians in the USSR, but Montefusco ignored it.

Massimo
Massimo was an employee of Crosstime Traffic. He was unhappy that Eduardo Caruso brought Gianfranco Mazzilli back to the home timeline. However, he did unbend some, permitting Eduardo to show Gianfranco around their Rimini.

Dmitri Mechnikov
Dmitri Mechnikov was a member of the Russian delegation in Milan to promote fraternal Socialist cooperation and trade. He was from the Volga region. He and his colleague Comrade Terekhova visited Annarita Crosetti's Russian language course. The were both late, spoke casually of corruption in the Soviet Union, and left early. Everyone seemed relieved when they did.

Since Mechnikov came from southern Russia, he spoke with a thick accent that made him sound like a mooing cow. Comrade Montefusco explained it was common in his region, comparing it to Italian spoken in Naples or Sicily. However, the class thought it made him sound stupid, whether or not he really was.

Teobaldo Montefiore
Teobaldo Montefiore was a classmate of Gianfranco Mazzilli's in Comrade Pontevecchio's history course. While Montefiore correctly answered that the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War showed that the United States was merely a "paper tiger," he couldn't say why this was the case, which angered Pontevecchio.

Montefusco
Comrade Montefusco taught Russian language at Hoxha Polytechnic in Milan. He'd studied in the Soviet Union for some years. It was rumored that he'd spent time in a camp there.

Annarita Crosetti took Montefusco's course.

While a good Communist, Montefusco knew that Russians were far from perfect, and shared some of these observations with his class.

Moreno
Moreno was a Crosstime Traffic employee. He drove Gianfranco Mazzilli and Eduardo Caruso from Rimini to Milan, where Gianfranco would be returned to his alternate. Gianfranco never learned if "Moreno" was the man's first or last name.

Marcantonio Moretti
Marcantonio Moretti was the chief janitor in the apartment building that housed the Crosetti and the Mazzilli families. He was quite impressed with the repairs Rocco and Giuliomade on the buildings elevator. Naturally, he behaved as if he'd somehow been responsible for the repairs.

Moroni
Moroni was a Communist hero of the Italian People's Republic. His image appeared on the uniforms of the Young Socialists' League of Italy, along with that of Chiapelli. However, their pictures were not as prominent as the Soviet Union's heroes.

Luisa Orlandini
Luisa Orlandini was a classmate of Gianfranco Mazzilli's in Comrade Pontevecchio's history course. She was able to parrot the "fact" that the United States' decision to back down during the Cuban Missile Crisis proved that it was a "paper tiger". However, she could not say why the United States failed in its aims during the Vietnam War.

Ludovico Pagliarone
Ludovico Pagliarone was a student at Hoxha Polytechnic and a member of the Young Socialists' League. He was part of the committee that investigated The Gladiator. He did not visit the store, but accepted Annarita Crosetti's argument that the store was ideologically sound, much to the rage of the third member, Maria Tenace. In truth, Ludovico wanted an opportunity to get some Romanfigurines.

Pastrano
Comrade Pastrano was a biology teacher at Hoxha Polytechnic. Gianfranco Mazzilli was in his class.

Pellagrini
Comrade Pellagrini taught literature at Hoxha Polytechnic. She was an attractive woman; most of the boys in her class, Gianfranco Mazzilli included, had a crush on her.

As was typical in the education system of the Italian People's Republic, all literature and interpretations of that literature were used to bolster the idea of the inevitable triumph of Marxist-Leninist-Stalinism. This included giving pat answers to troubling questions, such as how the monstrous "English Socialism" system depicted in 1984 had nothing to do with "true" Socialism, and therefore the book did not involve any criticism of the actual world system.

Pierniccolo
Pierniccolo was a student at Hoxha Polytechnic and member of the Young Socialists' League who graduated two years before Filippo Antonelli did. Antonelli was not fond of Pierniccolo; he was the son of a Security Police captain, and so was a ferocious adherrent of Marxist-Leninist-Stalinism.

Antonelli compared Maria Tenaceto Pierniccolo.

Pope Pius XIV
Pius XIV was the pope of the Catholic Church in the late twenty-first century. Although communism dominated the globe, the Soviet Union was aware of the importance of religious tradition in Italy, and so left Pius and the Church alone.

Pontevecchio
Comrade Pontevecchio was a history teacher at Hoxha Polytechnic. Gianfranco Mazzilliwas one of his students. Generally, Pontevechhio wasn't a very interesting teacher, and his students weren't very studious.

Isabella Sabatini
Isabella Sabatini was a junior at Hoxha Polytechnic and the General Secretary of the Young Socialists' League. Annarita Crosetti privately noted that Joseph Stalin had turned the office of General Secretary into the supreme office of the Soviet Union. Annarita doubted Isabella Sabatini had such ambitions.

Sofia
Sofia was a classmate of Gianfranco Mazzilli's in Comrade Pontevecchio's history class. She could not define "popular front" for her teacher, which doomed the class to writing an essay on the subject.

Terekhova
Comrade Terekhova was a member of the Russian delegation in Milan to promote fraternal Socialist cooperation and trade. She and her colleague Comrade Dmitri Mechnikov visited Annarita Crosetti's Russian language course. The were both late, spoke quite casually of corruption in the Soviet Union, and left early. Everyone seemed relieved when they did.

Terekhova's Russian was difficult to follow as she used the Mat dialect rather than formal Russian.

Vittorio
Vittorio was a "Rails across Europe" player at The Gladiator. He wasn't one of the better players; Carlo was confident he'd beat Vittorio when they played the losers' bracket of the in-store tournament.

=The Valley-Westside War= Volume 6

=References=