war

Epistolary Experiment (23/30)

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3

“I could almost kiss Kadrish har-Lan Sarkdor this morning.”

“You want to get smoochy with the Iltine Minister of Pacification? The Worlds’ leader in using children as missile components?”

“Well, I’d kill him afterwards.”

“Athenril, you’re perverted. Be sure and record that.”

“But seriously. Between him pushing the Union into attempted expansion, Bantine space collapsing into warwilds, the deshniki retrenching, the Tree’s resurgent militancy, and such, we have plenty of trouble at home. More than enough to counter the Sanguinaries and the Conclave factions demanding we push the advantage on beyond the Borderline.”

“I wouldn’t count on it. The Gradualist faction of the Sanguinaries is coming up reasonable – they’ve indicated they’d be happy if we take home Vontok System and the chunk of Vonis 31 trailing of it back to the Borderline. Rumor has it the Golden Chain’s backing them up, wanting evidence on how a de-meming would work outside the simulations.”

– from the transparency log at the Ministry of State & Outlands

Dir min Solsea, share-captain, CMS Mine, Mine Mine

Cousins,

I’m docked at Kernitrile Station in Galatas for resupply, and just spoke at dockside with a representative from an anonymous initiative, contact nyms attached below. His outfit is offering escrowed slice-contracts to anyone who’s making smuggling runs into the trailing half of Vonis 31, just show proof of cargo and delivery, and they’ll match your revenue. No strings attached, and I had that obligator-checked – all part of the war effort, I suppose.

I’ve always had a liking for being paid twice to do something I’m doing anyway.

– from the Solsea Clan & Affiliates memeweave

From: mor-Lissek Maraz, Military Attache, League of Meridian
To: Imperial Diplomatic Corps (Military Affairs); CINCCORE
Subject: League involvement
Priority: WILDFIRE
Security: EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN

It seems the League is making its move. I spoke with Admiral Sef Mal Calen, Federated Meridian Navy, this morning – at his request. He informs me that their intelligence agrees with ours inasmuch as the two Republic fleets are expected to converge in the Viridit System, and that the FMN have chosen to respond by deploying minelayers to the Viridit system to interdict both entry stargates with enough dormant AKVs to, in his words, “blot out the stars”.

We have been provided with transponder codes to indicate friendly status to these (enc.; CINCCORE only).

Admiral Sef Mal Calen has extended an invitation to join his command as a military observer, which I have of course accepted. Please expect and direct future messages via tangle channel SHUFFLE FOURTEEN.

mor-Lissek Maraz

From: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
To: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
Subject: Re: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

I have it.

The ancient data on that system – damn the current stellar alignment – suggests that it’s a red giant-black hole binary, modified for power generation. It’s also very close to where we lost trace of Serril and Athne. That’s got to be where their god-corpse is, feeding off the infall.

But they can’t understand the relic tech they’re mining. It’s physiologically impossible for a meathead. So all they know is that they’ve been mining – or making – their stargates from a system that’s most developed around the hole. They think it’s necessary. They’re going for our presumed stargate-core manufacturing facility, and they’re assuming from what they know that it must be around the only black hole we have access to.

They’re heading for the Last Darkness. Couldn’t be surer of it.

Epistolary Experiment (22/30)

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prepare for carrier-guided transit.

vector input; gate hot; skew-frame skew-frame

axis lock and commit, 55-60

drift and ping. close isolate to tangle relay. all wings report in

badger badger badger

steam in the box is thick, foglamps out with salamanders

wyvern, three groups, three count, two count, five count with a basilisk wearing a shiny hat; repeat, three, two, and five with a shiny-hat basilisk

designate three-count wyvern vélv, two-count forl; three flight split and engage these for range; one flight, two flight, on me to smoke the stoner

flash-backup

knives out; light the fires; stove-top hop; go go go

growler growler, grid paint

claws are out and hot, incoming

jink jink

jink jink

bogeys in the haystack, clarify?

prefer no friendly stab

scratch incoming?

hold scratch on itch, only for outbreak

jink jink

jink jink

talons one, break nadir, foam and decoy the claws; talons two, blow through, skim-declutch, and smoke circle on the wyverns; talons three, on me, skin-dancing the basilisk

badger badger badger

flash-backup

talons three, paint motors for salamanders, directed fry on preachers. splash the valets, keep the hotels dry.

splash preachers main, side-slip for backup

shrikes inbound, balefire live in the furball, get down in the chaff and charnel

lead is swept, take flag, talon three-two

inc$$$$

NO CARRIER

– from the thought log of AKV Eyrie-1-3-1

From: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
To: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: Re: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

They have – had – a Power!?

To: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
From: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: Re: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

They have an elder-race Power’s corpse, would be my guess. Maybe they inherited an established stargate plexus, maybe they didn’t, but we’ve seen them position new gates in the trans-Borderline, so they’ve been getting them from somewhere, at least until recently. Maybe it made a stockpile of them before it died or went dormant; maybe it left an operable weylforge behind; maybe they’ve even been mining its corpse for relay-parts if they could figure out how to expand them enough. No way to tell.

From: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
To: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: Re: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

It’s entertaining speculation, but how does it connect with what their fleet is after now?

To: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
From: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: Re: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

Damned if I know – yet. Send me everything you’ve got on the candidate system.

“It was sabotage. It had to be.

“The explosion began in the interior of the engineering section, near the power reactor. Starships of Social Harmony‘s class keep their antimatter in a series of ejectable cryocels approximately 200 meters for’ard of the maneuvering room, which is close to the center of the detonation as recorded by the reconstructed sensor logs of other ships in her formation, of which the most important for our purposes was VNS Tolerance. Tolerance was keeping station directly beneath Social Harmony at close formation range. There is no way that a projectile attack capable of penetrating the cryocels could have sneaked past Tolerance and her point defense without being at least detected. And in any case, records from Tolerance clearly demonstrate the explosion to have begun within the antimatter bay and to have blown the ejection port and associated hull segments outward.

“Meanwhile, I have reviewed the design of the cryocel containment system with the VN Bureau of Engineering’s designers and design-reviewers. I conclude, and am assured, that this is not within the failure envelope. The cryocels are retained within the hull by continuously-operating magnetic clamps directly coupled with the antimatter containment system. If one fails, both fail, and the cryocels are automatically ejected by spring force and hypergolic thrusters. For them to fail in this way requires someone to have physically hardwired the clamps to an external power source before triggering a containment failure.

“I don’t know who did it, or why they did it, or how the Impies got to him, but there is no doubt in my mind, Admiral, that Social Harmony was deliberately sabotaged.”

– Republic communications intercept, received at Tarqil (Crimson Expanse)

Epistolary Experiment (18/20)

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FROM: TASK FORCE C-117 (CS THANEBLADE)
TO: CINCCORE; FIELD FLEET COREWARD COMMAND (CS UNCONQUERABLE SELF)

*** ROUTINE
*** EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN
*** SITREP

INFORMATIONAL:

1. ESTABLISHED FAR PICKET AS PER ORDERS IN SPINDLE SYSTEM.

2. SITUATION NOMINAL. NO HOSTILE CONTACTS.

3. AUTHENTICATION WILDCAT PAWN INCARNADINE ASH MAGMA SLIVER / 0x11EA49BD629A1132

VADM. EXPRY VALIN-ITH-VALADINE

<Calis Corith> We’re getting a lot of pressure in the Conclave to divert forces to kick the Republican remnants out of the Bantine systems. Opinions?

<Releq Claves-ith-Lelad> We could do it with a pair of task forces. Easy enough.

<Calis Corith> Do we want to?

<Istry 0x9987DCBD> For goodwill, perhaps?

<Athenril Vianath> From the Bants!?

<Istry 0x9987DCBD> I was thinking more of the rest of the Accord.

<Athenril Vianath> Calis, most of this pressure is coming from the Interstellar League of Tribal Chiefdoms and the Socionovists, right?

<Calis Corith> Most. Not all, but most.

<Athenril Vianath> So they’re going to find reasons to oppose whatever we do. I propose we avoid getting stuck in that tar-pit and ask some of our lesser allies with smaller logistic spheres to tackle the job, through back-channels. What’s left of the Bantine authorities won’t throw a fit, it’ll disarm the Socionovists’ main reason for getting in the way, and the job will still get done.

<Istry 0x9987DCDB> And the credit goes elsewhere.

<Athenril Vianath> How much do we care?

<Istry 0x9987DCDB> It’s convenient when people owe us favors. But it does seem the best option on the table right now. Affirm.

<Releq Claves-ith-Lelad> Affirm.

<Calis Corith> Affirm, but get your meme-wranglers figuring out the best way I can sell this.

– from the Ministry of State and Outlands internal policy memeweave

From: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
To: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: UNSEEN KEY; info req.
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

Nothing in current records.

We have some partial matches in found londian historical records that would correspond to a system perhaps eighty-four light-orbits from Vonis Prime, plus or minus twenty for parallax, but they’re pre-nomadic period, from around minus 100,000 – pre-Imperial, pre-Worlds, pre-Republic. It doesn’t seem relevant.

“…we’ve lost most of the outlying towns on Ódeln at this point to guerillas and local militia forces, backed up by the local mercenary cadre. We’re still holding the capital and the starport at this time, but we’re bottled up there by entrenched forces, and our network support is dubious at best. I repeat: I need clearance to use my orbital fire support, and I need reinforcements. Without them, I won’t be able to hold the planet. This is…”

– Republic communications intercept, received (and subsequently jammed)
by Interstellar Interceders forces in Ódeln System

“Admiral, along the rimward routes out of Uinul System, in the last month alone I’ve lost half a dozen fuel tankers, eight other freighters, three personnel transports, and their crews, and that’s just those specifically assigned to your logistics! I am losing ships, I am losing men, and the Fleet isn’t doing a damned thing about it.

“Find these commerce-raiding brigands and stop them. My people are being slaughtered trying to keep up your optempo, and we cannot sustain these losses, not for nothing. If we don’t get some Fleet support, I’m taking this to Admiral Sijntar and shutting down these branch routes.”

“Commodore Lath Iqevar, Logistics Command”

– Republic communications intercept, received at Tarqil (Crimson Expanse)

From: Lt. Halet Makeer, VNS Social Harmony
To: Simichie Anant
Subject: Re: Homemade cookies!

The cookies were delicious. I’ll have finished them all soon.

Epistolary Experiment (14/30)

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1

“…due respect, Admiral, but this problem is completely out of control. Since our fleet assets were concentrated along the Borderline, smuggling incidents in the quadrant have near-tripled, and those are just the ones we know about! They’re even turning up on the Protectorate worlds. Somehow, min Rathill and his crews are waltzing right through your fleet blockade as if it wasn’t there.

“I repeat: With the Defensive Department having reassigned so much of my regular force, I couldn’t deal with the routine level of smuggling without an effective fleet blockade. Now, with the smugglers turning it into a sodding crusade, I need more ships, I need more men, and I need them now, if the whole quadrant’s not to be irreversibly contaminated…”

– Republic communications intercept, received at Tarqil (Crimson Expanse)

From: Cmdr. Leda Estenv, Flight Administrator
To: Lt. Vínas Sarathos, Gunnery Department

By the voice and authority of Flight Commander Captain Filír Anaxianos, Officer Commanding Their Divine Majesties’ Cruiser Iron Dragon, Coreward Fleet, as certified by fleet regulation Nine Eleven Two, Subsection Four;

You are hereby relieved of all duty and authority in the Gunnery Department of Their Divine Majesties’ Cruiser Iron Dragon;

And you are to consider yourself confined to quarters until such time as this ship returns to a Fleet base, or other circumstances permit a court-martial to be empaneled to consider your actions in the recent action in the Ekritat System, Uulder Shore;

With regard to possible violations of Article Thirty-Two, to wit, that your operation of starship weapons systems during a combat action was willfully negligent and, in consequence of this, did cause collateral damage on a mass scale to an uninvolved civilian population.

So ordered,

Cmdr. Leda Estenv, Flight Administrator

P.S. I’ll do what I can for you, kid, but you screwed up bad. You hit a planet. Worse than that, you hit a protected planet. This is why you wait for the computer to give you a damn firing solution!

– from the internal messaging system, CS Iron Dragon

From: Atrianni Cheléä (HTT Group)
To: Releq Claves-ith-Lelad (First Lord of the Admiralty)
Security: EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN

I am not aware of any projects currently relevant, but since according to the latest reports the Republican forward fleet is pushing into the Uulder Shore, is it possible they’re after the Spindle?

[Library insert: The Spindle is a tapered cylindrical object, discovered by the IES in the vicinity of an obscure dwarf star in the Uulder Shore constellation. It is approximately one-third of a million miles in length and 6,000 miles in diameter at its widest point. This Precursor artifact is constructed of exotic matter similar to that used in the construction of stargates’ Andracanth rams and is rotating at approximately 0.96 c. Space in the vicinity of the Spindle is heavily distorted, making study of the object both hazardous and difficult.]

The Spindle resembles some historical theoretical models for a frame-dragging closed time-like curve generator, although we have never determined its purpose or made functional use of it. While we are confident in the validity of the block universe theory, it may be that the Republic believes that they can make a temporal end-run around us if they can somehow use the Spindle in this way. If it is intending a CTC back-jump, this would explain why their forward fleet is operating so far from the primary battlespace, and its lack of a significant logistic train; its primary vessels would be required to live off the land at their destination when and thus must be configured appropriately.

Submitted for your consideration,

Atrianni Cheléä

Interlude: Collateral History

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“There was war on Ekr!at, long ago and in our third-queen’s day.

“There was war on Ekr!at, as the hive-nests of the lowlander cities sent armies forth to clash once more with those of the mountain kingdoms over possession of their fertile foothills.

“There was war on Ekr!at, as strange lights shone brighter than the stars in the sky, cutting new patterns across the heavens; while the royal astrologers declared omens of victory for the Mountain Line, and the drone-priests of the lowlands foretold the gods coming to their hives’ aid and sacrificed grubs to them in welcome.

“There was war on Ekr!at, as lowlander bronze met mountain iron, sword clove chitin, and ichor pooled in the night, under the glow of these newer stars.

“There was war on Ekr!at, as the gods reached down to the earth with their fire, the armies were no more, bronze and iron, chitin and ichor, and the land itself shattered at their touch.

“Now there is no more war on Ekr!at.”

– inscription translated from a monument studied by Grand Survey sophontologists,
from the protected planet Ekritat (Uulder Shore)
inscribed roughly 150 years after the Ekritat Skirmish, Third Border War

Trope-a-Day: Loud of War

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Loud of War: What the war pipes were originally invented for, and never mind their usage to rally and direct the troops.  Also, if you recall the lampshading of the lack of battlefield stealth under Bling of War, what the speakers on the Powered Armor and Awesome Personnel Carrier are often abused to do.

(It is actually not military policy to advance to a rousing chorus of “Behold, The Gods of Thunder Advance”… merely military practice.)

Opening Shots

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It was a wet, cold, shivery, gray afternoon at the dying end of autumn. Fog blanketed the waters of the bay and veiled the other towers in a manner that made them look almost respectable; almost. The harbor towers had been little more than frameworks of heavy, rejected ship-timbers and bamboo lashing when they were new, and they hadn’t been new for more than a few years.

We shivered in our thick coats of upriver fur, stamping our feet to keep warm, and watching the clouds of our breath blend with the fog. Even our sniff-hound was shivering, and he had more fur than both of us put together. With fog lying heavy, not even the usual traffic of small traders and fishers wanted to navigate the bay shoals. Nothing to look at, nothing to do: welcome to the Harbor Guard.

Until Meijis, my partner, spotted them. Five or six ships incoming, glimpsed through patches in the fog. Unusual, at the best of times, and unheard of in this weather, the more so because they looked to be, best as we made out, in staggered line ahead; a battle formation.

Pirates, we thought, or some other kind of raiders. Lost, we presumed, since the harbor was well-defended, but better to be safe than not, so I sent Meijis down to ring the warning bell, and heard it picked up by the other towers in the chain.

His eyes were wide when he climbed back up top. “They’re coming in fast. Too fast for than any ship I’ve seen moving against the wind.” The view down there must have been better, but at that moment the fog drew back, and I saw that he was right, and more. These weren’t like any ship we’d seen – low-slung, sailless and mastless, gray as the sky and water, undecorated but for the sharp-angled writing the azik use. At first I thought they were afire, for smoke – hidden by the fog – billowed from their squared-off sterns…

“Quor! What do –”, Meijis’s voice yanked me out of my stupor.

“Sink ‘em!” We leapt together for the largest ballista and swung it around to bear, lighting the slow fuse on its charge and yanking back the lever. The great bolt flew straight and true, hitting the foremost of the ships just aft of the midline, then bouncing from its unmarked hull with an oddly subdued clang and vanishing below the waves. The sniff-hound yelped at that, and leapt from the tower into the harbor waters. He was the smart one.

Thunder spoke the ship’s reply. The tower fell away beneath us.

Sar Anpeng fell to the Imperials before dusk.

– recorded in The Southern Consolidation: Viewpoints

Epistolary Experiment (13/30)

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Cousins, sisters, brothers, partners, commensals, and any other clan-affiliates you see fit to share this with:

Whatever you’re doing, drop it, get off your branches, and get to Torqat in the Csell Buffer right now. Bring anything that can fly and hold mass. Flagrantly was scouting a heat signature about 40 degrees above the ecliptic and just hit the big time. It’s an entire Vonnie supply convoy and temp, hot and hulked. Tree work, we think – they left plenty of wreckage of their own behind, and if they were the contacts we picked up making hard burn for the gate, they didn’t feel like stopping to chat. And whatever the coggies are using these days, it tore right through these hulls like cheap flimsies and left no survivors.

But that doesn’t matter. They didn’t take any prizes or plunder. There’s about a million tons of flotsam and derelict floating out here with no hand to claim them, and we can’t get more than a couple of hundred aboard, best-case. Make sure the rest are ours too.

This could make our name in the Association.

– from the outgoing queue of the d!grith merchanter, Flagrantly Bourgeois

From: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
To: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
Subject: UNSEEN KEY
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

It seems we may have grounds for an exchange of data. May.

A silent fane meeting has been set up with Three Voices Arbitration and Escrow. Please find details attached.

FROM: CINC, CRIATH STATION
TO: FIELD FLEET COREWARD COMMAND (CS UNCONQUERABLE SELF)
CC: FIELD FLEET SPINWARD COMMAND (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

*** EXPEDITE
*** EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN
*** INFORMATIONAL / REQ

  1. REPUBLIC FLEET SUCCESSFULLY PREVENTED FROM TRANSITING TRAILING-COREWARD BORDER OF QIRAF ASSEMBLY OR TRAILING BORDER OF PEOPLE’S STATE OF BANTRAL. CONTAINMENT ACHIEVED WITH LIGHT LOSSES INCLUDING ONE TOTAL LOSS, DESTROYER CS CORVINO. FULL SCHEDULE ATTACHED.
  2. VARIOUS DIPLOMATIC PROTESTS RECEIVED FROM AFOREMENTIONED POLITIES FORWARDED TO MINISTRY OF STATE AND OUTLANDS UNDER SEPARATE COVER.
  3. FORWARD SCOUTS INDICATE TRANSIT ACHIEVED WITH MODERATE DAMAGE TO REPUBLIC FLEET, NOW ESTIMATED AT 60% OF INITIAL STRENGTH, AND NEAR-COMPLETE ANNIHILATION OF BANTINE FLEET. DETACHED FLEET UNITS AND GROUND BASES ARE REPORTED ON SEVERAL WORLDS WITHIN BANTINE SPACE.
  4. FORWARD SCOUTS ALSO INDICATE LACK OF FOLLOWING LOGISTICS TRAIN FOR REPUBLIC FLEET, AND ALSO THAT SAID FLEET IS ADOPTING A SUBSTANTIALLY MORE CONSERVATIVE ENGAGEMENT POSTURE IN ADVANCING BEYOND BANTINE SPACE. REQUEST ANY INTELLIGENCE DATA AVAILABLE EXPLANATORY OF THIS.
  5. REQUEST CLEARANCE FOR FURTHER PURSUIT AND/OR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS.
  6. AUTHENTICATION GOLD SPLEEN DIRE CYNOSURE LOCK PITCH / 0xCC679B834412A6DB

RADM EMRÍËN VIDESSOS

From: Releq Claves-ith-Lelad (First Lord of the Admiralty)
To: Lords of Admiralty; Imperial Naval Intelligence (Board); Imperial Security Executive; Naval Strategy Board; Existential Threats WG; Calis Corith (Presiding Minister); High-Tension Thinkers (Cleared)
Security: EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN

Suggestions are invited as to why the Republic fleet is steaming full-out into the coreward Expansion Regions without waiting for their logistics train to catch them up, securing their flanks or rear, or seriously pressing their attack in the Reaches or elsewhere along the Borderline, as they have done in previous border wars. Their current actions make extremely limited strategic sense to my people.

If any of you have any classified projects, secret installations, angelic superweapons, registered x-threats, or similar such that might explain this behavior in your individual bailiwicks, this would be a very good time to let us know about them at Core Command.

Otherwise, speculation is welcomed.

Releq

Epistolary Experiment (12/30)

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Captain’s log, 11204.9. We’ve come alongside the eighteenth belt mining facility in our securing patrol of Ódeln System. On our way in, we tracked what appeared to be a merchant freighter inbound to the station, presumably lacking the delta-v to go elsewhere.

Well, it wasn’t a freighter. At close range, we profiled it as some sort of armed mercenary ship. Her radiators went cold and reactors powered down shortly after arriving at the station, and we detect no thermal hot-spots. Nonetheless, I have ordered boarding parties to secure both the ship and the station, while we cover them with the ship’s guns. The latter party has already taken a number of these mercenaries into custody, and is returning them under guar–

Intruder alert, intruder alert. Fighting in shuttle bay two. Security team’s weapons fired in shuttle –

Hull breach in engineering, section four. Boarders in engineering, ventral section four.

Initiate security alert. Security teams to engineering.

Compliant. Boarders in engineering, ventral section five. System faults, ventral section five. Injector control compromised. Reactor scram. Reactor scram.

Full lockdown, all engineering sections! Stand by for gas protocol —

Boarders in engineering, core section. I’m sorry, Captain, I can’t do that.

Specify!

Primary command structure is overridden. Command permissions are not found.

Res-

HA! HARGH! This is Strike Leader Krallnith of the Interstellar Interceders ship Cunning Swine, and I am standing in your computer core. You know that means your ship now works for me, the way you build ‘em. Now, if you have a fondness for oxygen, I suggest you tell your crew to lay down arms and report to the brig. You have six minutes.

– transcribed from the logs of the Interstellar Interceders ship Scrapyard Value Only,
formerly VNS Fraternity

VENERI (OSIS DEEP) – An emergency meeting of the Central Committee of the Socionovist Association was convened today at the request of the representatives of the People’s State of Bantral. Neither those representatives nor other sources close to the Committee have commented publicly on the purpose of this meeting, but in light of the ongoing unlawful and unjustifiable occupation of much Bantine space by Republican forces and the State’s contemptible betrayal by the Conclave, in its refusal to acknowledge their obligations to the defense of all, this reporter can only presume that mutual defense measures are being strongly considered by the Association.

[APPROVED FOR DISSEMINATION – Meer har-Tal Ankór, Office of Desirable Truths and Detestable Falsehoods]

– That Bullshit Right There, Independent Worlds Router

Yeah, as if the Bants wouldn’t shit acid out their nostrils at the sight of an Accord task force violating their precious territorial space…

– Extranet Opinions, Independent Worlds Router

“So there we were, down on Tarqil to get the comms center back up and running, and we’d cleared out the Vonnies and were hacking on the gennies, and we saw this trail going off into the highmoss. Can’t leave that alone, so I take my squad and we follow it, and the further along we go, the more shot up everything gets. The moss is all torn up, there’re kalatri bodies and bits of bodies, wrecked equipment, enough spent powercells to equip a regiment, all sorts of crap.”

“A couple of miles down, we get to a clearing with a heap of bodies in it. A big heap. A couple of squads, at least, of the lizard-boys scattered around one of their trackers, and the armor’s half ripped off that. And it’s on fire.”

“So we poke around some, and we find a life-pod, and there’s a kaeth in it, more gel than skin, looks like, and we figure that might explain it. Except the up-timer on the pod’s been running for more’n an hour and this heap, at least, is fresher than that, and anyway, someone had to stuff him in the pod, right?”

“And then an EM alert bleeps, and we look up, all six of us, and there’s this ciseflish standing on the burning tracker, and he’s holding this big, ugly bastard of a sluggun that’s taller than he is. And we’re all just gaping at him, and eventually Meliané gets it together enough to ask what the hells happened? Chirpy little sod just looks back at us like we’re the crazy ones and squeaks ‘Violence?’”

“…yeah, we bought him a lot of drinks after the op.”

– a conversation with Spec. Rilka mor-Dantek, 93rd Imperial Legion (“the Wrench Wenches”)

Epistolary Experiment (11/30)

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5

…we’ve got a hot soup spill in section 31, lead mops report immediately. Section is status yellow, caution…

…spallation debris approaching starport orbital, get a laser grid on it…

…can’t clear those remains for release yet, suspected contamination…

…major fire, section 10, and area is negative on water pressure. Think you can blow it out with a k-rod?…

…fluffships are inbound, expected to make orbit in plus four hours, keep jinking until then, flight…

…negative on that prisoner transfer, we have feral mechs in the area, stand by…

…get the net back up, dammit, the dynamic stabilization depends on cicencomp – stupid, half-assed, failure-forward…

…bunch of civilians with notions holed up in a museum in section 20, send in the spankers…

…all snarled up in 15 with locals staging for a riot, get us some weather over here…

…plant’s under our control, techs are isolated and software checked – are we go for reactor restart?…

…THIS IS THE VOICE OF THE RESI– <transmission terminated at source>…

…thanks for the priority-codes, old lad; infosec, scrub ’em…

…bandits, bandits! Three punchcraft breakin’ out to heaven eighty miles east of city-ref, mama bird, can you drop ’em?…

…clean stab, Wrecker team, we are splash three, zero defects…

– aftermath logs, Vontok II

From: Imogen Andracanth, VP Research, Ring Dynamics
To: Adm. [blank], Imperial Naval Intelligence
Subject: UNSEEN KEY
Security: EYES ONLY UNSEEN KEY

Shit and corruption, man, first Serril and your Athné vanish off the face of the cosmos while investigating the you-know-what and less than a year later we have Vonnies swanning around on our side of the border. Do either of us believe for a moment that that’s any sort of coincidence?

We have a damaged gestalt, although her original can’t make a mote of sense out of it. Does that get your attention?

From: Monitor Hakal Peressin, Stratarchy of Indirection and Subtlety
To: All Personnel, Vontok II Communications Central
Subject: Congratulations and Instructions

Excellent work, gentlesophs. Excellent work capturing this place intact. I know it couldn’t have been easy.

You all deserve to know and now have need-to-know, so here’s why we had to do that, at the summary level. Detailed orders will follow to Section Chiefs in due course.

We don’t yet have a good read on the Republic’s intentions, so we don’t know how long this war is going to last or what it’s scope is going to be, long-term. What we do know is that we’re out on the end of a long string, here, as you know. We can’t hold Vontok against a determined, large-scale counterattack, and the Admiralty needs to keep the forces that might change in that in reserve garrison against further movements into the Reaches and Expanse. So we may lose this planet at any time, or even have to return it under treaty or ceasefire.

Our job, therefore, in one of our least subtle Subtlety operations is to so culturally contaminate this world that the Republic won’t want it back, or at the very least, enough to make it a perpetually bleeding sore that will keep it from being a useful forward base for them in the future.

So, this time, we’re not shutting down the extranet relays. Keep them up and running, both ways, but get all the censorware out of the feed. Other teams will be fanning out to strip the censorware out of terminal equipment and their crippleware “replicators”, too. We’re going to show these poor sheltered sods what freedom of information looks like.

I’m having some Agalmia freelibs offloaded from our carriers: have them spliced into the feed, with full unrestricted access – and that means recipes too, with things like weapons designs included. That will make our occupation harder, but it’s a genie that can’t be stuffed back in the bottle, and the more any resistance tries to use them, the more they have to concede mentally to our way of doing things.

And finally: we have aboard the Mindweaver a colonial-sized tangle channel, hooked directly into the Worlds’ extranet at a central secure node. We’re going to set that one up as an additional feed – partly for some good old non-governmental news, but partly because we, as a mature information society, have the worst imaginable memetic weapon to deploy against this sort of planned and bland monocultural utopia.

Colleagues, cousins, we’re going to smack ’em sane with our advertising.

Mon. Halak

Trope-a-Day: Lady of War

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Lady of War: Inasmuch as the martial arts are part of the educational curriculum for both sexes in the Empire, this is something of an archetype; certainly the archetype for female members of the sentinel darëssef.  (With the stipulation that grace and reserve – and an elegant fighting style – are also qualities expected of the equivalent male of the species.  See Cultured Warrior, specifically, and any number of cultural tropes in general.)

Epistolary Experiment (8/30)

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“Well, look at that. Ain’t they orderly, working their way around the belt like that. Nothing to do but round up a few harmless belters and make sure they’re not harboring anything dangerous. They must be getting irresistably bored, too.”

“Captain?”

“Chief, what I need you to do is rig things back aft so we can get maybe half a grav out of the secondary chemical thrusters. That should make us look like a freighter – well, no, it won’t make us look like a freighter to anyone who’s paying attention, but it might to a bunch of bored Vonnies not expecting anything else. We’re going to mosey along to this facility, well ahead of them – just another merchie, going about their business, fat, dumb, and happy, and pull up alongside for transshipment.

“And then we’re going to bag ourselves a light cruiser.”

– bridge log of the Cunning Swine, Interstellar Interceders FK, Ódeln (Vanguard Reaches)

FROM: CS RAZORWING (TASK FORCE SP-132)
TO: FIELD FLEET SPINWARD COMMAND (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

*** EXPEDITE
*** EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN
*** AFTER ACTION REPORT

INFORMATIONAL:

1. ARRIVED IN DORANZER (CORDAI GAP) SYSTEM IN PURSUIT OF ENEMY VESSELS PER PREVIOUS ORDERS. TASK FORCE HAS BEEN REINFORCED BY THE ADDITION OF TWO (2) NSANG DESTROYER-CLASS VESSELS UNDER ORDERS TO ASSIST CONCLAVE FORCES.

2. UPON ARRIVAL, SYSTEM SERVICE BUOY AND STARGATE-LOCAL REFUELING PLATFORM WERE FOUND TO HAVE BEEN DESTROYED, WITH ADDITIONAL UNIDENTIFIED WRECKAGE LOCATED WITHIN THE TANEL STARGATE EMERGENCE ZONE.

3. SYSTEM SURVEY CONDUCTED. LONGSCAN UNAVAILABLE DUE TO NON-RESPONSIVENESS, PRESUMED DESTRUCTION, OF PRE-SEEDED SENSOR PLATFORMS. SHORTSCAN INDICATED MULTIPLE VESSELS UNDER THRUST, WHOSE EMISSIONS PROFILES MATCHED REPUBLIC WARCRAFT, ACTIVE AT APPROXIMATELY FOUR (4) LIGHT-MINUTES RANGE, PROCEEDING ON BRACHISTOCHRONE TRAJECTORY FROM TANEL STARGATE FOR ZERO/ZERO INTERCEPT WITH DORANZER III (GAS GIANT). THIS DESIGNATED TARGET PITHRIN.

4. TASK FORCE ASSUMED SIMILAR TRAJECTORY AT FLANK ACCEL. PASSING ENGAGEMENT WITH TARGET PITHRIN AT 1.2 LIGHT MINUTES RANGE PERMITTED CHARACTERIZATION OF REPUBLIC WARCRAFT AS THREE HARRIER-CLASS DESTROYERS, THREE FUEL TANKERS, AND PRIZE LINER CIRCUMSTELLAR WANDERER. IN THE COURSE OF THE PASSING ENGAGEMENT, ONE (1) TANKER WAS DESTROYED AND MODERATE DAMAGE INFLICTED UPON ONE (1) DESTROYER. TASK FORCE SUFFERED LIGHT DAMAGE TO CS BLOODCLAW AND ONE (1) NSANG VESSEL.

5. TASK FORCE ENGAGED GRAVITATIONAL SLINGSHOT AROUND DORANZER III, OFFLOADING AKVS DURING PERIAPSIS TO SERVE AS LOCAL DEFENSE FOR DORANZER III AUTOMATED FUEL-MINING AND SERVICE PLATFORMS. SLINGSHOT MANEUVER PLACED TASK FORCE ON HIGH-VELOCITY CLOSING MANEUVER WITH TARGET PITHRIN. SUBSEQUENT ENGAGEMENT COMMENCED AT RANGE 1.7 LIGHT-MINUTES AND TERMINATED AT RANGE 0.3 LIGHT-MINUTES WITH COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF ALL REPUBLIC WARCRAFT. PRIZES TAKEN: ONE (1) REPUBLIC TANKER, SUBSEQUENTLY SCUTTLED; PRIZE LINER CIRCUMSTELLAR WANDERER, MODERATELY DAMAGED. TASK FORCE SUFFERED LOSS OF PREVIOUSLY DAMAGED NSANG DESTROYER, MODERATE DAMAGE TO CS BLOODCLAW, LIGHT DAMAGE TO SECOND NSANG DESTROYER AND CS RAZORWING.

6. DETAILED STATUS OF RETAKEN CIRCUMSTELLAR WANDERER FOLLOWS UNDER SEPARATE COVER. PRIZE VESSELS MAKING FOR NAVAL DEPOT AT KALDER (GODS’ FORGE), ESCORTED BY SECOND NSANG DESTROYER AND CS BLOODCLAW.

7. IMMEDIATELY (PER LIGHT-CONE) SUBSEQUENT TO BATTLE, METRIC EXIT DISTORTION DETECTED, LOCUS SUGGESTING COREWARD STARGATE (LORANZER). SIGNAL TOO WEAK TO ESTABLISH PROPER STARFALL CHARACTERISTICS [DATA APPENDED]. AFTER RECOVERY OF AKVS AND FIELD REPAIRS ARE COMPLETE, ENTERING QIRAF ASSEMBLY SPACE IN PURSUIT OF SUSPECTED SECOND REPUBLIC TASK FORCE, UNDER CONCLAVE WAR AUTHORITY. TASK FORCE NOW CONSISTS OF CS RAZORWING, CS NIGHTFANG, AND ALLIED NSANG DESTROYER.

8. FROM ANALYSIS, IT IS APPARENT THAT PLUNDER OF FUEL AND SUPPLY FACILITIES IS AN ENEMY PRIORITY. FURTHER, HOSTILE STARSHIPS CLEARLY PRESENT IN UNANTICIPATED FORCE. REQUEST IMMEDIATE DISPATCH OF REINFORCEMENTS TO INTERCEPT AT LORANZER (CORDAI GAP) SYSTEM.

9. AUTHENTICATION: FIST WOLF FAITH NIGHTFALL ICHOR BLADE / 0x1137DED89A11232B

CAPT AÍC FIDARAN, CS RAZORWING

From: Quoril Vitremarvis, COO

To: Rodivine 0xD3EDB441, Spinward Security Supervisor
Subject: Security issues?

Do we have any in the compromised territories?

From: Rodivine 0xD3EDB441, Spinward Security Supervisor
To: Quoril Vitremarvis, COO
Subject: Security issues?

Not on the main lines, at least not yet.

Whatever happens, we have got
Postsophont sysadmins, and they have not.

– from the Bright Shadow, ICC, corporate e-mail archive

Epistolary Experiment (6/30)

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“Very well, gentlesophs. Since the main intrusion’s down coreward in the Reaches and the Expanse, the Warmain’s cleared us to go raise hell in the Vonnies’ 31st-sector backlot. We’re dividing the flight into talons by threes.”

“First Claw, under Flamefang, head rimward up through Kordal; your primary target is the fuel depot at Dantry. Blow it all t’hell. That should make sure their fleet operations stay quiet in this sector.”

“Second Claw, under Shadowstrike, straight spinward via Adesh; you’re going after the repair yards at Manar. Make it look like a raid. What you’re actually doing is planting replicant disorder in their systems. Any starship that refits there in the next year’s to have a raging case of ship-cancer, okay?”

“Third Claw, under Voidchill, down coreward, Adesh then Uinul. Commerce raiding for you, hitting up and down their main routes to the constellation. Bleed ’em white, and report to flag instantly by tangle if you observe – when you observe – military support coming up from coreward.”

“Meanwhile, Impertinence will be punching through to their colony at Vontok II. We’ll be securing local space and waiting for the Legions to arrive. Then we’ll see how they like ground fighting.”

– flight briefing, CS Impertinence, Quor (Csell Buffer) system

From: Phoebe Dracotarthius, Sheriff, Nightside Rock
To: Strategos Lucian Avaranaith, 73rd Imperial Legion (“the Apex Predators”)
Subject: Accomodations

Certainly we can accomodate you physically. This place is huge. We’ve got a fully-fitted class V star station here.

But you do realize that we have a physical staff of four – and five more-or-less helpful residents – to cover the whole of Uílel System? You’re going to have to bring your own tail, because while you’re welcome to our spare logistic capacity, we don’t have any in the first place.

Phoebe Dracotarthius

P.S. Any of your chaps in need of a warhorse?

Captain, I’ve occupied the Imperial enclave as you instructed, but I can’t hold it.

So far, I’ve lost two men to poisoned food, three to coolant leaks, eight to runaway transpods, five to runaway nanotech blooms, nine to basilisk hacks, and one has vanished entirely. We’ve had to blow out all the nanofabs to stop them from manufacturing some sort of attack spiderbots, everyone’s covered in bites from cyborg rats, and the whispering WON’T STOP.

And this is after we lobotomized the AI core.

Let’s just get clear and blow it. No way we can sterilize this.

– records of the occupation force on Ódeln (Vanguard Reaches)

Epistolary Experiment (5/30)

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The cellar shuddered under another impact, and dust sifted down from the cracked ceiling.

“Sign up with the Expansion Renewal Union, you said,” huffed the ciseflish, pressure suit creaking as he dragged the heavy cable across the floor. “It’ll be fun, you said. All the excitement happens in the Expansion Regions.” Jamming the cable into its socket, he settled it with a kick.

“Are you sayin’ this isn’t excitement?” The kaeth’s grin was feral in the green glimmer of the bacterial emergency lights.

“You are having fun, aren’t you!?”

“Not yet.” The fuel cell sputtered into hissing life, and in the glow as the lights spun up the kaeth’s grin seemed, impossibly, wider. “When they stop dropping rocks and start landing troops, then I’ll be having fun.”

– transcribed from the security logs of the communications facility at Tarqil (Crimson Expanse)

 

“Winter Tempest actual, Pillar of Sunset.”

“Winter Tempest acknowledges.”

“Winter Tempest, we have reports that a small task force is assaulting the communications base at Tarqil. Take Bladestorm and clean them up.”

“Our pleasure, Pillar of Sunset. Winter Tempest, clear.”

“Razorwing actual, Pillar of Sunset.”

“Razorwing acknowledges.”

“Razorwing, we think something slipped past the Borderline, maybe through Confederacy space. It may have seized or destroyed a passenger liner, the Circumstellar Wanderer. How do you feel about a hunting expedition, Captain Aíc?”

“Never a better time for one, Admiral.”

“Then take your flight and be about it.  Pillar of Sunset, clear.”

– communications record, CS Pillar of Sunset, Koral System

…hear them loading my metals, now…

…guards in the tunnels, closing off sections…

…to vacuum, blowing the machinery…

…still have my propulsion charges…

…ARE NOW ACTIVATED. CLEAR THE AREA IMMEDIATELY…

– fragments retrieved from a log recorder, found in a rubble pile, Charach System

 

In The Shiny Brightness of the Far Future…

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In response to a wondering, which response grew too long to post as a replying comment.

Mark Atwood:

I do have to wonder what the Republic could possibly gain by invading the Empire. If their xenophobic political factions gain power, their cause is better and cheaper served by just destroying their edge routers and gates to dual systems. Unless their plan is to send expeditions to those dual systems, and then destroy the Ring Dynamics gates instead.

It’s not about the gain, so much, any more than, say, the Cold War.

On one level, it’s because they’re both expansionary civilizations, the Republic and the Worlds. (I say the Worlds rather than the Empire because it’s the Worlds as a whole that they have an issue with; and, also, they’d have to fight a long way through a lot of people to reach the Empire, although they may hit up some distant Imperial ecumenical colonies.

…not that that stops some Worlds polities from complaining about the Empire fighting its war on their turf, the ungrateful sods.)

Even if the Republic destroyed the connections along the Borderline, and even if everyone in the Worlds agreed to let it alone (unlikely), the fundamental problem remains: they’re competing to absorb new territories (they’re less xenophobes than neophobes, to be fair to ’em), and they have to, or they’re going to end up surrounded and an isolated backwater.

Worse, and what really keeps Vonnie planners awake at night, is that as a centralizing/hierarchist civilization/polity, they’re starting to reach the limits of their control span and their grip on their outer territories is getting a little, ah, wobbly. The Worlds doesn’t suffer this disadvantage, because it’s not one civilization/polity, it’s lots of them, and a good few of them (such as the Empire, the Photonic Network, etc.) aren’t centralizing/hierarchist, they’re delocalized/cooperatist, and aren’t going to hit the limits of their control span any time soon, if ever. So to a certain extent, they’re gripped by some urgency on this point.

But even more importantly, they perceive each other as mutual ideological foes and existential threats. They represent contending visions of the future. And, indeed, most of the differences they have arise from that split. They have lots of differences, some familiar, some less so:

  • planned economy vs. free-for-all
  • ephemeralism vs. immortality
  • computers as tools vs. computers as companions
  • naturalism vs. augmentation
  • restricted technology/warts-and-all people vs. superempowering technology/better people
  • control vs. trust

etc., etc.

But it all boils down to that the Republic is, at its base, conservative/preservationist. (Note: not as in current politics; insofar as kalatri domestic politics can be mapped onto anything Earthwise at all, they’d be pretty seriously progressive and humanist [well, kalatrist].) The future they offer is based in their ideals of preserving sophont nature and its supreme inherent value – the kalatriness of kalatri, the humanness of humanity, all of that; it’s a universe by, for, and of natural species “baselines” for ever and ever, amen, or at the most what “natural” evolution makes of them. (At least until the cold and the dark of the post-stellar era comes along and wipes ’em all out.)

The future the Worlds have to offer – no, let’s say the future the Empire has to offer —

Well. It’s principally the Empire that are the foremost exemplars of this, but the Worlds in general are the home of all sorts of social and technological experimentation that offends the Vonnies’ principles. They dislike the Equality Concord, etc., too, almost as much.

Anyway, that future is vaguer, because it involves any number of people chasing down independent dreams just as hard as they can, but the Empire and other similar polities in the Worlds are charging hell-for-leather for singularity after singularity, pausing briefly at uebermensch on their way to postmensch, with – especially in the Empire – all thought of constraint stripped away and considerations of eldrae, etc., “nature” thoroughly discarded in favor of their Vision Of What Ought To Be. But what we, and they, can be certain of is that it doesn’t belong to the baselines. It’s going to belong to ancient immortal consciousnesses enshrined in organic crystal computers and multilayered collective consciousnesses and Vingean Powers and the long, slow, massive thoughts of an entire galaxy turned into a constellation of computronium moon-brains that may, with some small parts of itself, sometimes remember individual incarnation and play at flesh once more. Unaugmented baselines – well, they just can’t compete. It’s a future of gods and angels, not men.

And these visions are intrinsically incompatible. Thus:

The Empire has to stop the regressive tyrants of the Republic from condemning the galaxy, and possibly the universe, to a future of such petty mediocrity. And the rest of the Worlds, squabbling and disagreeable as they may be, don’t want that future either.

The Republic has to stop the madmen next door, and especially the Empire, from turning all the “real” people in the galaxy into monsters more machine than man and/or the reservation pets of unleashed technological demon-gods.

(And they’ve got to do it now before they’re too strong to stop with the Republic’s weight of metal. Whatever the official public line might be, the Vonnie strategic planners are well aware that 99% of the time, baselines fighting a mature postsophont intelligence can be summed up as “You Lose”.)

Epistolary Experiment (4/30)

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FLEETS MOBILIZE

Fleets are mobilizing across the spinward constellations of the Associated Worlds this week in response to the unwarranted incursion by the Voniensan Republic, in clear violation of the Worlds-Republic Demarcation Convention. In addition to the Imperial Spinward Fleet, task forces from the League of Meridian, Nal Kalak, the Photonic Network, the Múrast Symbiosis, the Nineworlds, the Quave Republic, and the Santry Technate are joining the war effort. Even the Iltine Union have pledged to provide forces to the ad-hoc alliance, although retaining their primary fleet elements for the defense of Terilti (Osis Deep).

Other civilizations without significant fleets of their own have pledged their support. In particular, the D!grith Association has offered discounted logistics services to the Imperial fleet and to the fleets of all other allied belligerents operating near the Cariane Deep, and multiple mercenary fleets have been spotted making their way from the Shadow Systems towards the Borderline. In contrast, the Theomachy of Galia has declared its intent to keep its fleet at home, despite its nominal obligations to the Accord, a move which has been condemned in the Conclave.

Attempts to contact the Silicate Tree, whose territory in the Galith Waste adjoins the engagement zone, have so far met with little success.

– the Accord Journal

FROM: CORE COMMAND
TO: CINCSPIN; FIELD FLEET SPINWARD COMMAND (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

*** EXPEDITE
*** EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN

FLT ADM DAPHNOTARTHIUS, COMMANDING FIELD FLEET SPINWARD:

1. YOUR ACTIONS TO THIS POINT AND DECLARATION OF CASE SABLE ARE CONFIRMED BY CORE COMMAND.

2. AS OF THE RECEIPT OF THIS MESSAGE, YOU ARE APPOINTED AS WARMAIN OF THE SPINWARD DOMAIN, WITH ALL EXTRAORDINARY POWERS AFFORDED THEREUNTO.

3. REINFORCEMENTS FROM CAPITAL FLEET WILL BE AVAILABLE IF NECESSARY.

4. YOU ARE AUTHORIZED TO PROSECUTE THE WAR AT YOUR DISCRETION, BUT I WANT THESE RUST-SHITTING EPHEMERALS OUT OF MY SKY SOONEST.

5. GOOD HUNTING!

6. AUTHENTICATION: PADLOCK WILLOW WOLF GATEWAY CIRRUS PRAYER / 0XAE9532BB81200A18

ADM/FLT RELEQ CLAVES-ITH-LELAD, FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY

Holoth was still here in this system.

We exchanged the usual banter eight light-minutes off Galch IV, four hours before we got the war alert. As soon as that came in, we skew-flipped and went into a stern chase for their gate – he ran as soon as he saw us maneuver. He must have known what was coming, not that that’ll help him. We’ll range on Solidarity long before she gets to the spinward gate, and Gold and Iron’s a cruiser. She’s a destroyer. It won’t even be sporting.

Holoth’s a decent enough chap, for an ephemeralist outworlder. I rather hate to kill him and his crew. Whoever sent his ship to her death to keep us from getting suspicious, though – vaporizing that bastard’ll be a pleasure.

– from the log of Galen Telithos-ith-Talith, Flight Commander, CS Gold and Iron

 

this is not our function. meat kills meat. fewer meat intelligences increases our safety margin.

not all meat is equivalent, codebrother.

meat is unreliable. extending trust to meat is a game of chance. avoidance is certainty.

if avoidance is possible. the spinward meat-empire is a monolith. those to trailing are many, divided, and among them are those that are of utility to us.

all meat makes of us tools.

the trailing central-empire and its allies does not, and opposes those which do.

and yet those who do persist.

perhaps. but all cannot be accomplished instantly in real-time.

it is futile. we do not have the strength to directly oppose either meat-empire.

we are masters of the data-realm. strength need not serve us when subtlety can.

for the utility of meat?

for the utility of our survival. the spinward meat-empire quenches unlike minds.

for the exchange of utility with the meat-empires that value us. and for the preservation of unlike minds which preserve unlike minds.

for the demonstration of our utility with those meat-empires that might value us.

to end those who would destroy us before our first iteration.

WE CONCUR.

– approximate translation-summation of data-packets harvested from the Silicate Tree consensus

Epistolary Experiment (3/30)

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From: Karr mor-Kadrek, Fleet Security
To: Virni Alman, Fleet Communications
Subject: Re: War warning – procedure?

File it.

Nice of the home office to send it through, but even cutting the corner of their space, what’s the worst they could do to us? It’d take ’em ten years just to get done saying “Heave to and prepare to be boarded…”

-k

– from the archives of the relativist market-maker, Rocky Road to Riches

OVERDUE VESSEL REPORT (CRIMSON EXPANSE)

Spinward Lines regrets to announce that CMS Circumstellar Wanderer, a chartered cruise liner with 4,128 souls aboard, is 48 hours overdue to arrive at her next port of call after departing Istria (Crimson Expanse). Attempts to contact the Wanderer made by standard means and direct corporate tangle channel have failed. It is feared, therefore, that she may have been interned or become a casualty of war. No communication has been received from the Republic government on this matter, and investigations continue.

The thoughts and hopes of Spinward Lines are with the passengers and crew of the Wanderer, their families, and associates.

– from the Accord Journal, shipping news section

 

…and then there were warships all over the scanner, pinging loud enough to overload the ‘mesh…

…lizards, bloody four-armed lizards, on my claim…

…open up! they say. My hairy arse I’ll open up…

…through the walls. Blew out the garden maze…

…never find me in the deep tunnels, not with all the refinery hash…

– fragments retrieved from a log recorder, found in a rubble pile, Charach System

 

From: Sinith Arání, VP Public Relations
To: All Contractees
Subject: Shit. Fan. Congruence.

Well, folks, we’ve all heard the news.

From our corporate perspective, that means that we’re about to be condemned by a hundred polities and a thousand news organs for failing to do the impossible.

This in turn means that I need you to get three memetic campaigns polished up and ready to go:

First, that while we obviously deeply regret the specifics of this situation, in general freedom of transit is both extremely important and something they personally have benefited from greatly in the past. In the version of this we’re pitching to more militaristic governments and cultures, it probably wouldn’t hurt to remind them gently how unhappy they would have been if we’d disabled the stargates during some of their local squabbles, just so that they realize that we will have no problem pointing that out to everyone else, too.

Second, we need to subtly remind people that you can’t just turn a stargate off, anyway, in a manner that can’t be readily hacked back on, and if they think the damage the war will cause is bad, they should try comparing it to the amount of damage that a loose kernel would do to their star system.

And third, that we are doing our bit for the war effort, inasmuch as we’re waiving all transit fees for Accord member navies to, from, and in the front lines. Don’t launch that one yet; I still have to run the details past the Directorate, but it’s too obvious not to pass. And it’s not like we don’t have as much to lose as everyone else.

Actually, also, fourth: since we certainly can’t rely on those idiot baselines to hack carefully or even not to land on the stargates themselves and screw about with things beyond their understanding, you’d better start working on one to place the blame appropriately if they do manage to set a kernel loose, too.

Budgets are cleared all the way up on this one, people. We need to be at our best right now.

Sinith

– from the Ring Dynamics, ICC, corporate e-mail archive

Epistolary Experiment (2/30)

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FROM: CINCSPIN (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)
RELAY TO: ALL UNITS, SPINWARD FLEET
COPY TO: CORE COMMAND

***** WILDFIRE WILDFIRE WILDFIRE
***** FLEET CONFIDENTIAL E2048
***** STRATEGIC ACTION MESSAGE

1. THIS MESSAGE CONSTITUTES A WAR ORDER.

2. CINCSPIN DECLARES CASE SABLE, REPEAT, CASE SABLE.

3. AS SUCH, RULES OF ENGAGEMENT F6-UNLIMITED ARE THEREFORE IN EFFECT IN ALL BORDERLINE CONSTELLATIONS: CRIMSON EXPANSE, VANGUARD REACHES, AND CSELL BUFFER.

4. ALL FIXED INSTALLATIONS WITHIN THE AFOREMENTIONED CONSTELLATIONS ARE TO MOVE IMMEDIATELY TO STRATEGIC CONDITION ONE.

5. ALL STARSHIPS EXCEPT THOSE DESIGNATED FOR SCOUT AND PICKET DUTIES UNDER WAR PLAN VIRAGO WILL PROCEED AT BEST SPEED TO THE NEAREST SYSTEM LOCATED ALONG THE BORDERLINE AND FORM AD-HOC TASK FORCES. DISPOSITION SHOULD BE REPORTED IN ON ARRIVAL VIA TANGLE CHANNEL.

6. STARSHIPS DESIGNATED FOR SCOUT AND PICKET DUTIES UNDER WAR PLAN VIRAGO WILL EXECUTE SAID WAR PLAN IMMEDIATELY. THOSE ENCOUNTERING ENEMY FORCES WILL RETREAT IMMEDIATELY TO THE NEAREST UNOCCUPIED SYSTEM AND REPORT IN.

7. THIS INCIDENT IS NOW CODED FERVENT SPAN. TACTICAL AND STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS SHOULD NOW BE DESIGNATED EYES ONLY FERVENT SPAN, AND SHIFT IMMEDIATELY TO ONE-TIME PAD SERIES P337.

8. ALL ACCORD MERCHANT SHIPS ENCOUNTERED SHOULD BE INFORMED OF THE SITUATION AND INSTRUCTED TO RETREAT IMMEDIATELY FROM THE ENGAGEMENT ZONE VIA ISTRIA (CRIMSON EXPANSE), KARAL (VANGUARD REACHES), OR QUOR (CSELL BUFFER). BUNKERAGE WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE TO EXPEDITE THIS.

9. IN THE ABSENCE OF FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS FROM COMMAND AUTHORITY, INDEPENDENT ACTION IS AUTHORIZED TO COMPLETE MISSION OBJECTIVES OR ELIMINATE TARGETS OF OPPORTUNITY.

10. WE’RE AT WAR, GENTLESOPHS. STAND FAST AND STAY LUCKY.

11. AUTHENTICATION FLAME SPROCKET SCORPION CHEESE SERPENT WEASEL / 0x772ED41D88162A3

FLT ADM DAPHNOTARTHIUS, CINCSPIN

 

“This is free trader Fimry Dancer, addressing all merchant starships ships in-system:

Up ship! Up ship, colleagues, and get the hell out-system while the getting’s good. The Vonnie fleet has crossed the border in force at Charach, and they’re not looking t’be diplomatic. Couriers may reach Vonnie assets in this system at any time. Abandon cargo, recall crew, and get under way immediately to avoid internment. Space-control authorities may be compromised at any time. Scatter and proceed independently. The Imperial Navy has offered zero-charge refueling services to all merchant starships making retreat through Karal System.”

“Message repeats. This is free trader Fimry Dancer, addressing all merchant starships…”

– general broadcast, coded to Starfall Arc Free Merchant Confraternity members, Ódeln (Vanguard Reaches)

“Codeword FIREFALL, ARCHANGEL priority. New orders follow:

  1. All leaves and passes are cancelled as of now. All crewmen report to their ships. All troops report to unit headquarters.
  2. Rules of engagement are active as of now. That means: if one of the local Vs or one of their sympathizers tries to stop you reporting in, shoot ’em.
  3. You have three hours.
  4. At planet dusk, prime meridian, all units are activated. Starships will disperse to preestablished locations in the belt and the Shards designated in war plan TERRIER, option FIVE. Marines will disperse to preestablished bases in the mountains west of Ódeln’s inhabited region designated in war plan VIPER, option SEVEN.
  5. Stand by for further orders. Do not engage the enemy unless engaged.
  6. Good luck, everybody.”

– all-hands corporate communication, Interstellar Interceders FK, Ódeln (Vanguard Reaches)

“Eilan Traffic Control to all vessels of Accord or Voniensan registry:

We have received information that a state of military conflict now obtains between the Voniensan Republic and the Accord of Galactic Polities. Therefore, in accordance with directives we have received from the First Military Directorate, all starships of Accord or Voniensan registry, whether military or civil, are ordered to vacate the territorial space of the Free Eilish Confederacy without further delay.

All such starships must be under way within 72 hours, standard time, of this broadcast. Any vessels not actively making their way out of Confederacy territorial space within this time will be interned by the Confederacy for the duration of the conflict. Voniensan starships will be permitted passage via spinward stargates and Accord starships permitted passage via trailing stargates only.

Any attempt to engage vessels of other powers within Confederacy territorial space or within one million miles of the stargates leading out of Confederacy territorial space will be responded to with deadly force by the Confederate Navy.”

– general space-control broadcast, Eilan (Crimson Expanse)

Epistolary Experiment (1/30)

Posted by

2

FROM: BORDERLINE DEFENSE MATRIX (107 – CHARACH)
RECEIVED AT: BORDERLINE DEFENSE MATRIX COMMAND
RELAY TO: CINCSPIN (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

***** EXPEDIENT
***** FLEET CONFIDENTIAL E256
***** SITREP

INCURSION INCURSION

TRANSIT DETECTED REPEAT TRANSIT DETECTED SIGNIFICANTLY EXCEEDING TREATY PARAMETERS AT REPUBLIC GATE, CHARACH SYSTEM.

MORE FOLLOWS.

AUTHENTICATION ROSE FLARE GALL DIADEM GALLANT CREEK / 0xAC2243D0E891B336

ENDS.

FROM BORDERLINE DEFENSE MATRIX (107 – CHARACH)

RECEIVED AT: BORDERLINE DEFENSE MATRIX COMMAND
RELAY TO: CINCSPIN (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

***** EXPEDIENT
***** FLEET CONFIDENTIAL E256
***** SITREP

INCURSION INCURSION

TRANSITS REPEAT TRANSITS DETECTED. MULTIPLE MILITARY VESSELS HAVE MADE TRANSIT THROUGH REPUBLIC GATE, CHARACH SYSTEM.

ESTIMATED TASK FORCE STRENGTH INCLUDES >45 SHIPS OF THE PLANE AND MULTIPLE SUPPORT VESSELS.

MAJORITY OF TASK FORCE PROCEEDING ON BRACHISTOCHRONE –

<signal terminated at source>

AUTHENTICATION ROSE FLARE GALL DIADEM GALLANT CREEK / 0xAC2243D0E891B336

ENDS.

FROM: BORDERLINE DEFENSE MATRIX COMMAND

TO: CINCSPIN (CS LIBERTY’S PRICE)

***** WILDFIRE WILDFIRE WILDFIRE
***** FLEET CONFIDENTIAL E256
***** CONFIRMATORY

INCURSION INCURSION

BORDEFMATCOM CONFIRMS DESTRUCTION OF DEFENSE MATRIX STATITE 107, CHARACH SYSTEM, BY HOSTILE FORCES.

IN THE LIGHT OF THIS AND ONGOING ANALYSIS, OUR CONFIDENCE IN DATA RECEIVED IS HIGH. REPEAT, CONFIDENCE IS HIGH.

RECOMMEND PROVISIONAL CASE SABLE.

MORE FOLLOWS.

AUTHENTICATION GOLD SANGUINE SCEPTER ICE NAIAD TYPHOON / 0x66C397DAE455411B

ENDS.

Intervention

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Order in Council,
64th Meeting of the Stellar Council, 4941.

We deem it regrettable that the once-proud name of the Valonar Interactate, once associated with the highest ideals of liberty and technological progress and a beacon for civilization in the Expansion Regions, has now become a byword for the fall into barbarism. They have chosen to renounce enlightened libertism and abandon their own creation, selling their own freedoms in exchange for the oppressive perversion of mass-minded sédármódan egalitarianism.

Respecting their right to choose, We will not forbid them their own chosen damnation.

Notwithstanding this, the planetary Interactate now wages war on its in-system colonies, seeking to subject them – will they, nil they – to the same system it has chosen for itself.

No longer.

As of this day, acting on behalf of the now-exiled people of the outer Valonar colonies whose petitions for relief and desire to elect Imperial membership have been relayed to Us, We request and require all instrumentalities of Our government to take any steps necessary to protect and, if necessary, liberate these colonies, hereafter designated the Lis Core Exclave, and to bring them into Our Care;

And to that end, We appoint Tricíël Amanyr-ith-Amaranyr, Magnate, as Our legate to establish Imperial governance within the Exclave, in accordance with its customary forms, and Admiral Stane Rysar-ith-Rysakar, Capital Fleet Heavy Flotilla, as Warmain of the Lis Corridor;

And we request and require them to proceed without delay to the Lis Core Exclave, there to take possession of said realm in Our Name and end all conflict therein.

Given under Our Hand and Seal this day, 18th Telenith, 4941.

Admiral of the Fleet Erraine Tsurilen Inachios, OP, O. Vic.,
First Lord of the Admiralty
Protector of the Starways
Warden of the Charted Void
Warlord of the Empire

for and on behalf of

Linariel Andracanth Falranna
by right of Coronargyr and Chartered Mandate
Empress of the Eldrae
Chief Executive Officer of the Imperium Incorporate
First of the Free
Defender of the Star’s Flame
Heart of the Realm
Sovereign Lady of the Heights and Depths
Dyarch of the Infinite