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DanoShanter

DanoShanter

Private
Mar 31, 2022
21
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:FIRST POSTING:

=========================================

Chief Research Director Arani Khell'Bizar slowly .... ever so slowly ... sank her aching head into her cupped hands. Very slowly, and trying not to be too obvious about it. The subprefectoral attaché who’d been sent over without warning or procedure from Third Under-secretary Brael’yn’s Interstellar Astrogation Department (Riparian Office, Dark Quark Hyperlane Currents Mapping Subdivision, and a few other categories, subcategories, subsubcategories, and subsubsubadnauseam,etc.), and who was currently bouncing off the walls of her meditation chamber, knocking the teaware and beakers all over the place with his flailing arms and raving at her, was obviously highly unstable. Wildly excited. Any usable data irretrievably corrupted by his emotion over … over … well, something or other ... and just a LITTLE incoherent in consequence. That was all. The man wasn't DELIBERATELY trying to make her already gigaparsec-sized headache any worse than it already was. He was just ... She paused, took a breath and sighed.

She tried. She really did. She tried to be so patient with all the echelons, from highest senatorial level department head all the way down to lowest titration pipette scrubber. And look what it got her. She really, truly, deep down in her fundamentally decent soul, really BELIEVED in the Credo. And that was the true beginning of the problem. She left herself too open, too vulnerable. No one, from absolute alpha to the meanest of the most abject omega, even respected her SELF, much less her time, her personal space or the dignity of her elected office. They all just saw her as ... she didn't know what. Someone safe though. Someone so lofty, and therefore paradoxically so inconsequential and objectified, that it was OK to waste her time for twenty minutes with an incoherent, emotional, IRRATIONAL outburst that still hadn't enlightened her as to any actual data, OR any actual poetic truths, except that the ISS D'oh was somehow involved. That was absolutely all she had to go o...

.

  • ' ... wait. ​
  • ... Wasn't the 'D'oh one of the deep survey vessels exploring the absolute fringes of the farthest hyperlane clusters the Interstellar Khell'Zenti Confederation had yet -- ...' A flash of light before her eyes, wasn't that supposed to be the first symptom of a migraine? … ​
Click to expand...
​



… as that thought brought up memories of all the particularly hellish last few days ... weeks ... months ... years, essentially every single moment since she was first elected, of nothing but trials, challenges, and testpad disasters trying to get this fragile interstellar nation off the ground of one single planet, when up until a decade ago her people hadn't even known hyperluminary interstellar travel was even possible; all the damn fool press releases claiming ... again ... "WE'VE FOUND OTHER SAPIENT LIFE!"; all the shamefaced, very quietly soft=floated followups that, "Um ... Well, yeah, it's ... ah, it's life all right, Jim, but I'm afriad it's just dumb as a box of rocks again and that's all there is to it. Ah... -- Sorry ..." ...
... And now, at the end of a very bad day dealing with the fallout of yet another false alarm of other sapient life being discovered out there by the very same dear but omniverse-shatteringly ANNOYING childhood friend who was currently trying to drive her to madness sending her low level couriers who are absolutely and completely incapable of framing a coherent, logical …



  • ' ... (note to self: irrationality appears to be contagious. Just perceived desire in own mind to murder subprefectoral attaché. preferably utilizing the slowest and most gruesomely painful modus operandi I can possibly employ consistent with the need to not actually kill him until the very last possible moment, and then to prolong that as long as … )'​
Click to expand...



"attaché?"

(Incoherent response)

"attachÉ!"

(What>I>if>the D'oh>the transmiss...>ohmyGODS>...what?)

"this won't work. you are too involved. it impairs the efficiency of your communication. tell Braelie to come and tell me herself."

(But>what>wait>NO!>she specifically ordered … )

"attaché."

(Wh>sh>yes?)

"am I currently Chief Research Director of the Interstellar Khell'Zenti Confederation?"

(Well>b>yes m'…)

pardon?”

(Ah>ah> … )

“its very simple. classic binary reasoning. nothing more involved than that. am. I. currently Chief Research Director. or. am I not? yes/no, on/off, 1/0.”

(Ah>m>ah>0>ah>imean>Yes)

"did you vote for me?"

I>wh>what doe...>...>...> *gulpbreathgulp* "Yes, Director. I did."

  • *3.141592653589793238 millisecond pause*
"... braelie. "

  • -- *Same pause x 10* ...​
"NOW."

=============================================================

:END FIRST POSTING:
===========================================================================================================================​

Background:​

This story comes from a Stellaris game where I’d actually picked the non-hegemony federation origin for a culture that I envisioned as a polar opposites-fusion scientist/poet culture similar to the way some warrior cultures around the world became warrior-poets; this being my author’s conceit to give an in-universe explanation to the extra creative and energetic spark that actually IRL indicates the presence of a human player who is capable of thinking creatively and intelligently. Although the encounter I’m starting the tale with happened in-game after the federation was already formed, it makes a much better story if it is cast as their very first first-contact ever, the one that led to there even BEING a research federation in the first place; they’re absolutely perfect for the role as you'll find as the story unfolds and you see what about this particular first contact made it interesting enough to want to write about. Also I think the portrait of my first Science Director looks totally elegant-classy-cool. :cool::p;)

And yes, I did get a randomly rolled SCIENCE ship named the ISS D'oh. Laughed my Apu off when I saw that one :oops:o_O;):):cool::Do_O

Then I thought about Homer actually being in CHARGE of a science department or ship ... :oops::rolleyes:o_O:confused::(:eek:o_O:eek:o_O:eek:o_O:eek:o_O ...
 
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What does the purple text represent? It feels like it disagrees with her conscious mind a bit...
 
HistoryDude said:
What does the purple text represent? It feels like it disagrees with her conscious mind a bit...
Click to expand...
Oh, I'm so glad that came across! :D Yes, I was too excited and autistic to explain sooner, but in fact I was thinking that I would use quote boxes to represent some sort of internal dialogue, where the purple text and single quotation marks represents actual internally verbalized dialogue and the white non-quotated text represents general observations or "noticings" within the mind that don't necessarily have to be thought out in precisely quoted words. In this case, I wanted the thought boxes to reflect the stress and conflict in the Chief Research Director's mind between the absolute professionalism of her exterior and how she would seem to be dealing with this underling to anyone else but her. and the total irrationality of what she actually WANTED to do to the idiot .... ;):mad::eek:o_O:oops::confused:

Not to mention, the cleaning bill to make her meditation chamber resemble something other than a slaughter pit would probably break the treasury anyway... There's a few little interesting tidbits about the CRD and her past that I'm just starting to find out about yet ...

Should probably also mention this is very first AAR post for me, that I was a poet first, a surrealist and hippie second, writer of many things INCLUDING poetry third, and though been playing similar 5X games the whole times I'm very new to forums about them and to games with the intricacy and detail of Stellaris ... in other words, if I post something that breaks the fifth wall of what an AAR post is 'supposed' to be, please do let me know and I'll be glad to adjust the problem and appreciate the feedback. Same if you read a post and are like, "No. This DOESN'T work. No WAY would she ... "; since I'm also a firm believer in the theory that I've no more CREATED these characters than you do in (re)Creating them in the process of reading and reCreating the whole story in your mind; that in some metaquantum universe they exist as just as real a reality as we are, and that all I'M doing is getting to know them and telling you all some of the more interesting stuff about their lives, but am subject to human error in perceiving and understanding the vast infinity of them.
 
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DanoShanter said:
this is very first AAR post for me, that I was a poet first, a surrealist and hippie second, writer of many things INCLUDING poetry third,
Click to expand...
In that case, welcome to AARLand! There have been poetry/musical AARs in the forum before, now you've got me hoping to see them again in the future. :)

DanoShanter said:
if I post something that breaks the fifth wall of what an AAR post is 'supposed' to be, please do let me know and I'll be glad to adjust the problem and appreciate the feedback.
Click to expand...
Well the good news is, the definition of what an AAR is 'supposed' to be is very broad and intentionally ill-defined. If anything, an AAR that breaks into a new style or format will probably garner some positive attention. Keep posting and have some fun along the way!
 
:SECOND POSTING::

====================================================================

"Director?"

Arani paused to reflect that that was probably one of the things she appreciated most about her chief of staff. Bruustian perfectly epitomized the Khell'Zentaii ideal of taking an absolutely calm and rational and at the same time poetically stylish approach to all that one did; to combine within oneself the clear-eyed zeal and the calm abandon of the warrior-poets and the poet-warriors of old. He was a pool of calm water within the swirling maelstrom of the tabik wave around him. All the other raving idiots she was forced to deal with on a daily basis were so flustered by her office that she was lucky if they confined themselves to "Chief Research Director", and didn't throw in some bizarre politicohierarchical grooming ritual of tangled compliments and obscure metaphorical references likening her to the world-elephant that held up the scientific universe from her ivory throne at the pinnacle of the Kkell'Zentaii mountain, and on and on they would flourish while her eyeballs nearly cracked trying not to glaze over, all the while the window of opportunity for whatever wonderfulness it was was inexorably and often rapidly closing every millimuon they nattered on with their floridity. Bruustian, no. HE just called her, "Director", and got the flaming fluctacte on with ...

"Director???"



She allowed her left shoulder to startle slightly. "Yes, Primus?"




The left corner of his mouth quirked up slightly at the antiquated title. That was all.




"Third Secretary Brael'yn is here. She's just about to turn into the corridor leading to your conference chamber. You wanted to be apprised."

She smiled, for the first time that week. "Thank you, Primus. Please be sure she has her single malt properly warmed, and let her know I'll be there as soon as I finish "

========================================​

“Brae. Um. You’re SURE that whiskey’s just the way you like it right? I got it from the old place, the one on the corner of Beaker Street, and … here, I know you haven’t had time to relax in forever, just sit down here and take it easy, and …

“Ari. Cut the crap. You’re fussing me like a mother my’erdrtsk, but you’re not listening!”

“HOW CAN I POSSIBLY LISTEN, YOU’VE BEEN RAVING YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR THREE HOURS AND YOU STILL HAVEN”T SAID ONE COHERENT WORD I COULD UNDERSTAND. This is not Brae’lyn Nab’taxrani in there, not the Brae I know, now please come back and tell me what. The. Squick. You. Are. Talking. About.”

“WE FOUND THEM! AND WE FOUND THEM AND OH GOD YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT WE FOUND THEM BUT WE FOUND!”

“Brae. You have found them on a regular basis for … “

“Direct confirmed videographic evidence.”

“WJHAT! Why didn’t you say that FIRST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m so sorry, Brae, that’s …”

"That’s minor.”

"Th … what?”


"Listen to me. When the D’oh entered the Yri’dinxi system they were contacted, on VIDEO FEED, by …

…
MACHINES.”


“An automated comm station?”


“NO. There is NO evidence of creator species. There is no evidence of organic maintenance techs, no evidence of organic operators, no evidence of any kind of energy feed connection whatsoever to a remote organic operator in or out of system. There was, however, at least residual evidence of DROID personnel performing these roles.

Ari.

We have not only found our first sentient species in this entire universe, besides ourselves. That in itself would be universe shattering enough, but the inescapable conclusion that all my xenocontact theoreticians unanimously agree upon … UNANIMOUSLY, mind you, and you know that bunch … is that we have also found …

an artificial, 100% machine based species that is as completely and fully sentient ...

.. as ourselves.”​


<= *&%&* +>​


Cut to the shadowy, vastly impressive Acadame des Artes et Science senate chamber. Time stamp reads previous temporal coordinates plus one hour. Shadows drape their solemn webwork all around, the occasional whir hum and glow of technology is perceptible in the distance.




There is no other sound or motion.




The scientist/senators are sitting absolutely still, their jaws dropped as far upon their breasts as nature will allow them in a state of total muscular stunnedness. They have been in this state since the Chief Researcb Director informed the legislative body of the news before taking up her place at the Director's workstation and freezing into a similar state. Perhaps there is a young page insufficiently educated to grasp the full ramifications, and therefore not totally unconscious but just high enough level trained to sort of understand the general framework, worriting in the shadowy corners and wondering what the hell to do when they suddenly might as well be in a postapocalyptic scenario as far as the total consciousness-absence of anyone who knows the news is concerned, and they'd know just enough to know they can't get help because anyone they have immediate access and even begin to describe the problem to will immediately fall into a similar state.




Cut to the same chamber a month later.




The autocomms have just tickered the news that the lower echelons fuctioned just well enough, before freezing up totally, to set the diplomatic corps in motion. The diplomatic corps is made up of individuals whose personality type makes them immune to revelatory brain freeze (if a little inclined to snark at the scientist higher echelons who aren't.) and therefore, the Khell'Zenti Science Directorate is suddenly engaged in direct diplomacy with a hitherto unsuspected alien artificial intellgence hive mind who jus happens to be the first sapient life the Khell'Zenti were aware of in the universe besides themselves.




The scientists are completely unaware this is going on.




They are in the same position and state they were in the last time we saw our heroes. Except that some clever maintenance tech has rigged up autoIV feed lines and other basic life support technology to keep them at least minimally functional until they can recover from their stun and actually begin to respond to the situation.




This is probably a different lower level tech from the one who remarked that after all this star empire was supposed to be a science directorate that followed rationality and objective uncorrupted data wherever they might lead, and that all data sources so far seemed to indicate that while the functions directly associated with the Director herself had indubitably suffered, the rest of the government actually seemed to be functioning more efficiently than it had while the senators were conscious and operational. She went on to say that she at least saw no need to compromise that efficiency by wasting resources trying to revive anyone but the Director herself, and that the rest were probably happier on life support anyway than incessantly wrangling about whether the distance between Belgarion's planet and the location of the accident that tore apart the Prophecies in David Eddings' Belgariad universe was so many parsecs, or so many parsecs PLUS ONE INCH, a question that superheated plasma, ink, CRT photons and blood had (spinning the metaphor out just a little longer) all been shed over before the poor Director had finally managed to coddle the species over the planetary doorstep to even get to space in the first place.
 
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Well, somebody's annoyed.

It's interesting that your first contact was a machine empire. I wonder if they will ally with you?
 
I could answer that now, actually, since I've had a diplomatic response from them ... a series, actually ... that's pretty inextricably defined our relationship already ; but I don't know how to set up that spoiler thingy so that people who don't want to know until they read it don't have to. If you're curious I could either PM you or ask you to teah me how to do that so I can put it in the thread masked
 
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Hello

Either type SPOILER surrounded by square brackets ([]) and end with [/ + SPOILER + ] or click on "inline spoiler" in the dropdown menu from the three dots at the bar at the top...
 
Great! So, in the "real" game,
they were irenic xenophiles to start out with, and they and the non-techie power in the actual federation I started out in thanks to my origin were the first in a sequence of about half the sector throwing themselves at my feet and begging to be my vassals. I'm pretty much the 500-pound gorilla on the galactic stage now and not doing too badly in either material production or tech. When I started out it looked like it might become a pretty tall empire just bc of the way the starlanes were laid out, but we made it to the critical chokepoints first to have not a huge amount of space but at least some decent breathing room, and as we got new species with vassals new colonizable planets kept popping up as they suddenly jumped into the habitable zone for me. Not bad, all in all, for a murderously calm Chief Research Director and her crazy flustered xenoexploration research division chief, eh bas?[/ + SPOILER +]
 
: THIRD POSTING :

================================================================================
A few months later still. The startled scientists had ... finally ... managed to regain their composure, and a careful interdepartmental AND interstellar diplomatic dance was now in full bloom.

<= *@&@* =>​

Brael'yn paused a little way up the path and turned to the Chief Research Director.

"Ari. Let me run something by you."

"Sure, Braelie."

"Do I have this correct. We fought the Silver Guard tooth and nail for months so we could get them to ONLY keep us on navsat view, subatomic detail level and be ready to launch all the tactical nukes we've got if anything happens, rather than smothering us with bodyguards and military technicians to the point where we couldn't have even drawn the few free breaths of air we can gulp now and probably setting off the AI polity's default hostile-approachers subroutine. We then burned all the political and relational bridges we had, to actually get the trip APPROVED.

We did all this, for the privilege of climbing this three thousand mile high jagged steel mountain all alone, to meet with the high priest Chief Research Director and then some, whatever term they consider most honorable, the grandmommy CENTRAL central processing unit of all, essentially MEET DIRECTLY with this empire instead of through drones and have it put us through some kind of test or initiation ritual or greeting protocol or we have no idea what or what it will entail. And on the outcome of this test, the entire future of the relationship between our two interstellar powers solely depends."​

"Um ... yeah, that's about my recollection of the sequence of events."

"Good. I'm glad I'm not the only one who's completely insane."

<= *@&@* =>​

Chief Directorate's Liason Adram'ys Bruustian took a second glance at the admiral, and observed that she was particularly agitated. He observed (strictly to himself) that these military technician types were certainly useful in an unprecedented situation like this -- this particular response, even, was often not only useful but absolutely necessary -- but by the very fire of their warrior poet souls that allowed them to respond so, they were not particularly good at modulating those responses. The information he had just conveyed to her was concerning, certainly, but on a second analysis did not yet rise to the crisis level that would require expenditure of the entire Khell'Zentii nuclear stockpile. At the same time, he deeply admired her professionalism and (in his mind's most shrouded corner) might perhaps need to confess to himself a certain personal admiration for First Admiral Maer'ln : but the second factor did not cancel out and indeed to some degree grew out of the first. An observer who had not had his unique combination of training, experience and natural bent would have noticed no change in the admiral's features or voice whatsoever.

"An energy spike, you say?"

"Yes."

"In the heart of the mountain."

"Yes."

She paused, observed him narrowly with a something in her eyes even he could not read.

"But you're not showing any concern."

"No. More like considering how to prevent the lower ranks from panicking."

"Which means you ... ah. Tachyon burst?"

"A very short one. Just long enough to make ... it, I suppose will have to do for a pronoun until we get to know it better ... aware that we are paying attention. But we'll need at least one level-headed noncomm energy scan technician who will pause long enough to realize it IS a solution instead of beginning the funeral keens that would set the whole ship off into five-day mourning orgies."

She allowed a brief, dry chuckle. "Orgies?"

"Well, they do get rather primitive, and I've only seen the ones where the only wider significance was within the circle of family and friends."

"Primitive, but not sexual. At least the ones I've seen ..." She flicked a glance at him. Just a papercut of a glance, and he still had no idea what was written on the other side.

<= *@&@ =>​
 
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Well, that's just weird. I'm assuming it's just a ritual, but the backstory behind that ritual might be interesting...
 
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