move from work dir

neviim/content/local/tycho/001.tex

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+\hypertarget{tycho-brahe-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 22 days, 13 hours, 35 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent It took Tycho Brahe what felt like an age to remember Codrin Bălan, and then it took him a panicked age longer to remember that, yes, sensorium messages were a thing, had been a thing for more than two centuries, and a third age still to remember how to send one.
+
+There was some unknown urgency within him, and even though he supposed that there was no need to hurry, he nonetheless did not fork, deeming it not worth the time to remember how in his rush. Instead, he simply queued up a message to the historian beginning with a jolt of adrenaline, and began talking.
+
+``Codrin, uh, Mx.~Bălan, I really, really need to talk with you. Like, right now. I need to talk with you right now. Can we meet? It's incredibly urgent, I'm sorry. I know it's late. Can we meet?''
+
+As soon as he finished, he began pacing once more and waited for a response, doing his level best not to send another sensorium ping immediately to wake Codrin up, just in case.
+
+Instead, he walked around the small hill in the center of the clearing, muttering now down to the grass, shouting now up to the sky. Half words, half sentences, anything to vent the pressure he felt building inside him, but there was nothing to be done.
+
+When the response finally came, he realized he'd only made it halfway around that hill. Less than a minute must have passed. Time seemed to have stretched itself out long. The response was a mumbled, sleepy-sounding address.
+
+Tycho left before his next footfall hit the ground.
+
+Low clouds hung above the low house on the shortgrass prairie. He forced himself to walk, not run, up to the house, where he could already see a light turning on, vague shapes moving behind the glass. The soft chime that announced his arrival led those two shapes, one human, one not, to look up, and before he even made it to the house's door, Codrin was already there, much as he remembered, though much more tired.
+
+``Tycho Brahe, yes?'' ey asked. ``Is everything okay?''
+
+He tore his eyes away from the figure beside the historian, what looked to be some large-eared\ldots{}dog? Fox? Large-eared animal standing on two legs, looking just as tired as Codrin.
+
+``Uh, yes,'' he stammered. ``No? I don't think so, at least. I'm sorry for waking you. I don't think things are okay, though.''
+
+Codrin nodded and stepped aside, gesturing to welcome him in and guiding him to a seat at the table.
+
+\emph{``I will make tea,''} the fox said. \emph{``Though I think perhaps one without caffeine.''}
+
+``Who\ldots{}?''
+
+``That's my partner. Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled.''
+
+Gears crunched to a halt in his mind, thoughts stalling and whatever words he had prepared scattering. ``An\ldots an Odist?''
+
+``Yes. Why do you ask?''
+
+Tycho knit his brow. ``Well, I mean, the \emph{History}\ldots{}''
+
+``I know. Not all of them came out in the best light,'' ey said, smiling tiredly. ``But it's a good one, I promise. Now, can you tell me what's happening?''
+
+He forced himself to remain seated at the table, not giving in to the overwhelming urge to pace. ``But\ldots I mean, do you remember our conversation years ago? The one about the Dreamer Module?''
+
+Codrin nodded warily. ``That some of the Odists were against it, yes.''
+
+``Then certainly you can see my concern!'' Tycho hissed, leaning toward Codrin.
+
+Ey startled back. ``I'm afraid I don't follow, Dr.~Brahe, I--''
+
+``Can we at least step outside?''
+
+\emph{``If you would like me to be elsewhere, Dr.~Brahe, I can be,''} Dear said, standing at the entryway to the kitchen, three mugs in its paws. \emph{``But I do hope that you will trust me.''}
+
+Tycho stared at the fox.
+
+It stepped forward, set the three mugs down on the table, each smelling of chamomile. \emph{``You must forgive me for eavesdropping, but I did hear you mention the Dreamer Module. I can assure you that I share little in common with the elements of the clade that were against its inclusion. It is not something that I particularly care about, but it is fine, I am sure.''}
+
+``I can vouch for it,'' Codrin said, reaching for eir mug but simply holding it in eir hands rather than sipping. ``If we absolutely must step outside, you understand that, as it's my partner, I'll likely tell it about our conversation anyway, yes?''
+
+After a pause, Tycho's shoulders slumped as he let out the tension pent up within them. ``Alright, alright. Besides, it doesn't sound like there's much use in trying to hide anything from them.''
+
+Dear rolled its eyes, but sat at the table anyway. \emph{``You could hide whatever you like from me, Dr.~Brahe, I will not look. As you guess, though, the same is not true of some of my cocladists.''}
+
+One of them, perhaps Codrin, willed a cone of silence into being.
+
+``I read the \emph{History}, Codrin,'' he said at last. ``So I know you know what's on the Module.''
+
+Codrin froze, mug halfway lifted. Dear's ears stood erect, and all sleepiness fled from its features.
+
+``You understand why I'm concerned, then, right?''
+
+Ey set eir mug back down on the table without taking a sip, saying, ``Tell me all that you can.''
+
+So he recounted the events of the previous hour. The sudden interruption of an impersonal message, a simple note from the perisystem architecture informing him, the astronomer on duty, of the signal received.
+
+\emph{``What signal was it? Were the primes echoed back to us?''} Dear asked.
+
+He shook his head and recited from memory, ``We hear you. We see you. We are 3 light-hours, 4 light-minutes, 2.043 light-seconds out at time of message send. Closing at 0.003c relative velocity. Closest intercept 5 light-minutes, 3.002 light-seconds in 972 hours, 8 minutes, 0.333 seconds. We understand the mechanism by which we may meet. We have similar. Instructions to follow.''
+
+There was a long moment of silence around the table as the words sank in.
+
+``The mechanism,'' Codrin said, finally breaking the silence. Ey sounded hoarse, unprepared. ``The Ansible? The instructions for creating a signal that it'll recognize?''
+
+Tycho stared down into the pale yellow tea. ``Yes.''
+
+``Did you respond?'' Ey furrowed eir brow quizzically. ``Is that even possible? I never thought to ask.''
+
+The silence fell again, and he could feel the expressions of the other two deepen into frowns as he kept his eyes on his tea.
+
+\emph{``Tycho,''} Dear said, and he couldn't understand how the fox could keep its voice so level. \emph{``Did you respond?''}
+
+``Awaiting consent,'' he mumbled. ``That was the last bit of message. Awaiting consent.''
+
+\emph{``You responded.''} A statement. One spoken with no small amount of awe. \emph{``You did, did you not?''}
+
+``Yes.''
+
+``What did you send?'' Codrin said.
+
+``Consent granted.''
+
+With the repetition of those words, he pushed the untouched mug of tea further away from him, folded his arms on the table, and rested his forehead on them.
+
+The longest silence yet followed as both Dear and Codrin appeared to take this information in and he, poor, stupid Tycho Brahe, he soaked in his own guilt. It seeped through his clothes, squished in his shoes, matted his hair and pushed against his face. Tycho Brahe, indeed! He should have chosen the name of some far less competent man, all those years ago when he'd first met Codrin.
+
+It was Codrin who spoke first, voice sounding calm, somewhere between professional and empathetic. An interviewer's voice. ``Have you told anyone else?''
+
+``No,'' he said, lifting his head, though still not meeting their gazes. ``I don't know who I'd tell.''
+
+\emph{``Are there no other astronomers working with you?''}
+
+``There are. Of course there are. I'm sure they've even read the message by now, and doubtless my response.'' He shrugged, realized that he'd started crying. ``But what would I tell them? Extraterrestrials contacted us, asked to board, and I just said `yes'? Didn't ask anyone, didn't wait to have a conversation, just up and said yes?''
+
+``Well, okay,'' Codrin said. ``Why me, then? We've not spoken in twenty years.''
+
+``Instinct?'' he said, voice choked with half laughter, half tears. ``I have no idea, Mx.~Bălan. You listened to my story back then, and I read your \emph{History}, and you seemed nice, and I guess you're just always at the center of things.''
+
+The fox across the table giggled—there was no better way to put it—and there was a tink of ceramic as it bumped its mug to Codrin's. \emph{``You, my dear, are so caught in stardom that even astronomers know your name.''}
+
+None of that amusement showed in eir expression as ey said, ``I am, at that, aren't I? Well, Tycho, what are the next steps?''
+
+``I don't know,'' he said, finally looking up to the pair, to Dear's grin and Codrin's frown. ``I was hoping you'd know.''
+
+Ey sighed, leaned over and patted him on the shoulder. ``Well, since I'm sure as hell not sleeping anymore, I guess coffee's next. Coffee, and figuring out what to do with our wayward astronomer and upcoming guests.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/002.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,149 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahe-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 22 days, 8 hours, 23 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent Tycho returned to that field beneath the stars after the conversation with Codrin and Dear to find someone already waiting for him.
+
+They'd discussed this potential. There were two branching paths that they had ruled most likely, which was that he'd meet another of the astronomers or a politician. Were the former the case, he was to calmly explain the situation, exploring the ramifications of the messages both received and sent.
+
+If, however, it was someone more aligned with the politics of the System—Codrin had left him with a short list of names—then the conversation would take several different forms based on what they already knew. For instance, if they knew that a message had been received but not what its contents were, he was to explain it calmly and plainly, beginning with the intent of speaking to a lay person. If they knew the contents, he was to explain the import behind him.
+
+If they knew that he had responded, however, the chances were that they were there specifically to interrogate, berate, or potentially cut his access to the perisystem architecture that dealt with the Dreamer Module. Hell, at that point, they might as well cut everyone's access to that bit of the architecture and completely run the show.
+
+The person who met him, however, immediately made his throat seize up.
+
+\emph{``If it is True Name,''} Dear had said after providing a description and forking into a skunk to provide a visual aid. \emph{``Then there is absolutely nothing you can do but go along with what she says.''}
+
+``That bad?'' he had asked.
+
+\emph{``Oh, do not worry, it will all go quite well for you if she herself is there. The outcome might not be what you wanted when you met her, but you will leave feeling as though a great deal has been accomplished. It is difficult to describe or get across in words, as you likely have a very dramatic view of her from reading the} History\emph{.''}
+
+And there, sitting on the mound in the center of the field, was the precise skunk that he'd been warned about. Long, thick tail. Short, cookie-shaped ears. Tapered snout pointed up to the sky as she leaned back on her paws.
+
+\emph{Well,} he thought. \emph{Nothing for it.}
+
+He walked over toward that small rise and, once the rustling of his steps became audible, True Name turned her head toward the sound. It was too dark to see her expression, so his mind flashed through several. Were her teeth bared in anger? Was she smiling kindly? Was she secretly joyous about the news?
+
+``Dr.~Tycho Brahe, yes?''
+
+Tycho pulled out his red-filtered flashlight and the spare he kept with him, turning them both on as he made his way up the hill. ``Yes. You must be True Name.''
+
+``My name precedes me, I see.'' She laughed. It didn't sound like a mean or wicked one, just earnest, pleased. She accepted the red-filtered light from him and then patted the grass beside her with a paw. ``Come, sit with me. This place is absolutely fascinating! I had no idea that such a thing was possible here.''
+
+Tycho sat on the mossy ground beside the skunk. ``I used to keep it as a place for work or just unwinding, but some years back, I moved in and have just set up camp over in the trees.''
+
+``It is delightful,'' she said, and he could hear the awe in her voice. ``How does it work? I thought that there was no way for images to make their way into the System.''
+
+He leaned back on his hands beside her to look up into the night sky. ``It takes in all of the information from the fisheye telescope—or any of the telescopes, really—and converts it into data that one can read, and then reconstructs it in here. When it's just stars, just little points of light like this, it's simple enough to display. Color temperature, relative intensity, estimated distance, and so on. When we get close to something, as we did with the Jupiter slingshot, there was too much data, as there would be from any video feed, and the sim just quit displaying anything.''
+
+True Name had set the flashlight against her thigh, pointed vaguely up toward her so that he could see her in more detail. Her face was kind, open, and clearly excited. Something about the bristle of her whiskers, the angle of her ears, and the relaxed state of her cheeks worked with her smile to give the impression of wonder and delight, though if pressed, he would've had a hard time defining why.
+
+``Beautiful.''
+
+They sat in silence for a while, simply looking up at the stars, both with their red lights pointed toward them to light themselves up. Because it \emph{was} beautiful, he knew. The night sky, one as pure as this, demanded a reverence, an acknowledgement.
+
+``Which ones do you suppose they came from?'' she asked.
+
+``It could be any, at this point,'' he said. ``We have no idea how old their vehicle is. We can know their speed and position with some accuracy, but who knows how much that has changed since they launched.''
+
+``Do you mean they might have, ah\ldots attitude jets, I believe they are called?''
+
+``Almost certainly, but more than that, any time they get too close to any system with any appreciable gravity, it'll influence their course.''
+
+She nodded in the dim, red light. ``Much as they are doing now, perhaps.''
+
+``Yes.'' He thought for a moment, querying the perisystem for information, then shrugged. ``They're coming up over the plane of the ecliptic, so there's a good chance that they just used our sun as a gravity assist. A slingshot.''
+
+``Picking up a bit of extra speed, then?''
+
+``Yep, it's free energy.''
+
+She rested her cheek on her shoulder to look over at him, grinning. ``Or perhaps simply to hide where they came from. Maybe they are using the possibility of that assist to obscure their trail!'' She laughed, waving a paw up at the stars. ``Or they are spying on us, investigating us, Earth, Lagrange. But listen to me, here I am speaking like this is some grand space opera. I have read too much science fiction over the years.''
+
+He nodded, grinning as well. ``Their speed and the laws of physics make all of those very unlikely. The only reason they may have even bothered to contact us is because we have a chance at some sort of contact that won't immediately fade into light-days.''
+
+``They did say that they were moving fast, did they not? I suppose that helps alleviate some of those old space-opera-fueled fears.'' She returned her gaze up to the sky. ``Though, you know, it got me thinking. How many things like this LV might be zooming around the galaxy at incredible speeds? We can be sure now that there are at least three, yes? Our dear home, Castor, then Pollux way on the other side of the sun, and now this new one.''
+
+``True. Maybe everyone's just figured out that this is the safest and easiest way to travel.''
+
+``You took the words from my mouth,'' she said with a chuckle. ``It makes one wonder, perhaps this is the Great Filter. Perhaps Kardashev was wrong all along, and we should not be looking at the energy usage of a civilization but on the scale from Earthbound, spaceflight, and then uploading, and it is only civilizations that reach that third state that might pass through that filter.''
+
+``I'd not thought of it that way.''
+
+``There was, of course, no need for you to rush back, but that is what I have been thinking about while waiting for you. Thank you for the light, by the way.''
+
+The sudden departure from the topic of the sky above to the here and now shocked Tycho into the realization that he'd fallen in such easy conversation with the skunk. They'd talked like friends, like those who had known each other well but perhaps had just met in person for the first time.
+
+He saw now what Dear had meant, and he was helpless before it.
+
+``Well, thank you for stopping by,'' he said, keeping this new anxiety out of his voice as best he could. ``I'm assuming you wanted to talk about the message and response?''
+
+True Name sat up, dusted her paws off on her thighs, and then turned to face him, switching to a kneeling position. The friendliness was still there in her face, but was now tempered by a down-to-business professionalism ``Of course. Can you tell me more about the ramifications of this? I can understand the mechanics of it well enough, but I want to hear from you what the next steps are.''
+
+This had not been the question he was expecting, so he took the act of sitting to face True Name, cross-legged, to think about his response. ``Well, I suppose they'll send over something uploadable which will drop it in the DMZ. I don't imagine they'll start that for a while yet, given the distances between us. They'll probably want to talk more before doing so, and if they're sending us instructions on how to make an exchange of personalities, that'll give us time to work on that.''
+
+``If we want to,'' the skunk said, nodding. ``And, as you were out and we are now gating messages from the Dreamer Module through us, we will keep an eye out for such. We will do our best to keep you in the loop, of course.''
+
+He blinked. `Gating'? Perhaps that meant that they'd cut his access and would be sharing only what they chose with him. ``I didn't mean to\ldots I mean, I hope that my response was not too far out of line.''
+
+She smiled to him, and while her expression remained friendly, there was the smallest note of pity in that smile. ``Do not worry, Tycho Brahe, you are not in trouble. We have been running simulations on the various possible outcomes ever since this portion of the Dreamer Module was okayed. This possibility was on our list and is well within our parameters. We know what it is that we will be doing going forward, and that does not include reprimanding you in any way.''
+
+``I'm sorry,'' he said, before he could even stop himself. ``I probably should've asked.''
+
+The skunk waved a paw as though the comment was simply irrelevant. ``You will even keep access to the Dreamer Module; I meant what I said when you will still be kept in the loop. We will simply have \emph{first} access.''
+
+He nodded, hoping that there was still enough red light shining on him that she could see the gesture.
+
+``In fact, that was the primary purpose of my visit. It was nice to get your view of the ramifications, of course, but I wanted to ensure that you would be willing to work with us on this. You keep access to the Dreamer Module, we learn all we can from you. A mutual arrangement wherein you do what you love and we help you out in that, and in exchange you teach us all you can in the process.'' She held out her paw, grinning lopsidedly. ``I know that the concept is rather outdated on the System, but what I am really here to do is offer you a job.''
+
+Once the import of her words had sunk in, he laughed and clasped her paw in his hand. ``Oh, of course! If it's all the stuff I love, and also I get to talk about it to someone, that sounds\ldots well, perfect, actually.''
+
+She laughed and shook on it. The handshake was picture perfect: the right balance between firm and gentle, the right speed, the right duration, all tuned precisely for him. He could see as though from a meter above himself the precise ways in which he was being played like a fiddle.
+
+``Excellent, excellent. I will also be in touch with your friend Codrin Bălan, as well, as I believe ey will be a good person to document much of this, so please expect further contact from em. You will also be in touch with a few of my cocladists—beyond Dear, that is—who will be working with you in various capacities.''
+
+He nodded, frowning. \emph{How did she know that I'd met Codrin and Dear?}
+
+``I know that you consider yourself a tasker and that maintaining multiple forks is not your usual MO,'' she continued. ``But if possible, I would like you to keep at least one additional instance to work with us while you continue to work out here and with Codrin. If you have the bandwidth for others, we may have additional tasks. Please keep that in mind, and consider how open to the prospect you will be should you be asked.''
+
+``Oh, uh, okay. I guess I just never fork because it seems like an awful lot of trouble. One mind is a lot to deal with as it is.''
+
+True Name grinned, said, ``I do not begrudge you that. They are rather a lot. These will be long-running, however, so you need not worry too much about the burden of handling the memories for a while, and if you do not want to deal with that at all, so long as everyone is on the same page with me and my team, you need not accept the memory load.''
+
+``Well, alright.''
+
+``Can you fork now, please? I will take one of you with me and we can work on arrangements there. You are free to get some sleep, if you need.''
+
+Tycho nodded, closed his eyes, and dug back through memories to remember just how to create a new instance, taking a good minute and a half before he managed it.
+
+``Sorry, it's been a long time,'' the original him said.
+
+``It is quite alright. We have much practice under our belts.'' She nodded toward the new instance. ``Can you tag yourself something memorable so that you can tell yourself apart? I suggest `Artemis', as that is what we have decided to name the remote vehicle.''
+
+Both of him frowned, and after a moment's thought, the new instance was tagged Tycho Brahe\#Artemis, all while scanning his memory for the reference. Goddess of the Moon, yes, but of the hunt? Wild animals? Artemis with her bow? There were too many correspondences and not all of them savory.
+
+``Why Artemis?'' he asked.
+
+``They are flying like an arrow through the night sky, are they not?'' True Name said.
+
+``Does that make the others on the ship, uh\ldots{}Artemisians or whatever?''
+
+The skunk stood, offered a paw to help Tycho\#Artemis in standing. ``That or Sea People.''
+
+``Sea People?'' he asked, accepting her paw. As he stood, he realized that he was more than a head taller than the skunk, a fact which had missed him as they sat there on the hill.
+
+``We had better hope for Artemisians, but we must also be prepared for Sea People. Come, Tycho. \#Artemis, we will have a place for you to stay. \#Tasker, you may stay here, and expect contact soon.'' She looked up to the sky one last time, and said. ``Do you know the poem about your namesake?''
+
+Tycho\#Artemis shook his head while \#Tasker stood.
+
+``Reach me down my Tycho Brahe — I would know him when we meet,'' she quoted. ``When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet; He may know the law of all things yet be ignorant of how We are working to completion, working on from then till now.''
+
+``I--''
+
+``You are both, Tycho. We may yet share our later science with them as they may share theirs with us. Perhaps we shall take our turns sitting at each others' feet. But Tycho,'' she said, smiling. ``That is a poem about death. Please understand that there is risk here, as well. Now, come with me.''
+
+After True Name and Tycho\#Artemis left, he stood there on the top of his hill, in the middle of his field, surrounded by his ring of trees, and looked up into the night sky, thinking on all that it meant to be powerless.

neviim/content/local/tycho/003.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,251 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 22 days, 3 hours, 49 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent Tycho\#Artemis was unsure if what he was seeing was a flurry of chaotic activity or some tightly choreographed dance. Part of this assessment, he guessed, was due to the relatively small number of individuals for the number of instances moving around. There were probably a dozen instances of True Name that he could see, and then at least that many of a gentleman who looked to be in his well-preserved forties, slender without being lanky, tall without being looming.
+
+And that was it. Well over twenty instances of two individuals milling around what appeared to be a farm of cubicles, each walled with glass, the upper half of which was frosted.
+
+Ringing this bank of cubicles were walls of frosted glass, broken at regular intervals with doors which ey supposed must be offices. Between those doors were couches, looking pleasantly soft in his exhaustion, and an array of padded stools or chairs with interrupted backs which he supposed must be perfect for those endowed with tails, given the occasional skunk or man—Jonas, perhaps?—relaxing in them, chatting amiably during what must be either breaks or informal meetings.
+
+And yet, for all that activity, it was incredibly quiet. There must be dozens of cones of silence set up, spanning cube walls, covering banks of couches, even hovering over those walking the aisles.
+
+``What is this?'' he asked the skunk standing beside him.
+
+``Headquarters.'' She gestured him to a couch already containing a woman, picking at her nails. Short, curly black hair framing a round face. ``Though that makes it sound far more formal than it really is. It is a place for Jonas and I to work together in our various instances.''
+
+He sank down into the couch beside the woman. ``That sounds pretty formal to me. What are you working on that requires cubicles?''
+
+True Name laughed, claiming a stool facing the couch where she sat, straight-backed. ``The informal aspect of it is that we are working on essentially whatever we want. Co-working space, perhaps? It is a space where we can have conversations, write, think. If there are a dozen of us, there are three dozen projects.''
+
+``And the message from Artemis is one of them?''
+
+``It is several of them, yes. It has spun off a few projects of its own. Ah! Jonas. Which are you?'' she said when one of the men blipped into existence, already seated in one of the chairs.
+
+He grinned, crossing his legs in front of him at the ankles. ``Di5.'' He nodded toward Tycho. ``Just call me Jonas, though. True Name is just being a snot.''
+
+The skunk kicked out at one of his ankles.
+
+``Deserved that,'' he said. ``You must be Dr.~Brahe, yeah? Nice to meet you.''
+
+He nodded, said, ``Just Tycho is fine.''
+
+Jonas nodded absently. Without any visible signal a cone of silence fell over the area, dimming what noise remained outside of it to the barest murmur.
+
+``I am Why Ask Questions When The Answers Will Not Help,'' the woman said in a tone that seemed to sit just shy of laughter. ``Answers Will Not Help will do.''
+
+``Answers, in a rush,'' Jonas said, to which she replied with an ankle kick of her own.
+
+``If you call me Answers, I will beat the shit out of you,'' she said though that near-laugh took most of the sting out of the words.
+
+``To business, then.'' True Name gestured towards Tycho. ``Tycho, here, is the one that answered the message, as you all know, so I have encouraged him to fork and join us. Tycho\#Artemis will be working here, and Tycho\#Tasker will be working with--''
+
+``Codrin?'' Jonas asked, grin turning sly.
+
+``Of course.''
+
+``Well, if you're the one to thank for kicking this whole thing off, perhaps you can enlighten us as to why?''
+
+Tycho felt anxiety tighten within his chest. ``I uh\ldots I don't know. I guess I was the first one to read the message, and I didn't know what to do with that, so I just replied without really thinking, I guess.''
+
+``You were not the first to read the message,'' True Name said, smiling almost pityingly at him. ``And you need not be anxious. As I have already said, we have been wargaming this possibility since we were forced to concede that aspect of the Module.''
+
+He frowned. ``Well, if you read it first, why'd you let it through so that I could see it?''
+
+``We are not the astronomers,'' Answers Will Not Help said, shrugging. ``That is your job, is it not?''
+
+``Don't you want to control the situation or something, though?''
+
+True Name shook her head. ``It is not our job to control.''
+
+``But the \emph{History--}''
+
+``Do you remember the motto of the Council of Eight, Tycho?''
+
+He frowned. ``\,`To guide but not to govern', right?''
+
+True Name nodded. ``We are not controlling anything. We are guiding. Of what use would control be in a place such as this? People can do whatever they want.''
+
+``Was the \emph{History} wrong then? That you didn't control Secession and Launch?''
+
+``We guided them both,'' Jonas said, waving his hand. ``Just as we guided the \emph{History.} Even the Bălan clade knows this.''
+
+``Why, though?'' Tycho asked.
+
+``Social engineering,'' True Name said, then nodded toward Jonas. ``We should not get too sidetracked, though. Jonas, you had more questions?''
+
+``I did, yeah. First off, can you give me an overall breakdown of the time frame involved here?''
+
+``Well\ldots wait, can you tell me how long it's been since the message arrived? I haven't slept in I don't know how long.''
+
+``A little less than twelve hours.''
+
+``Well, then we have a little less than forty days until their closest approach, at which point they'll start moving away from us again.''
+
+``And what does that approach mean for us?''
+
+Tycho rubbed at the back of his neck, searching for the best way to explain it. ``All it means is that that is the point when the transmission times between our two vehicles will be the shortest, then it'll start getting longer again.''
+
+Jonas nodded. ``And that approach isn't all that close, is it?''
+
+``Oh God no. Five light-minutes is, uh\ldots ninety million kilometers? Something like that.''
+
+``Good, thanks for confirming. I'm going to ungate the next set of messages. Ready?''
+
+Jonas did not actually wait for confirmation before Tycho was given access. Or, rather, access was forced upon him. Like a sensorium message, the text from the perisystem architecture wedged itself into his mind.
+
+\begin{quote}
+If possible, in 400 hours orient down 0.3142 radians relative to your sun reference point source of this transmission to align courses. If possible, accelerate 0.00029c to approach matched velocity. Confirm actions taken.
+
+Instructions for matching consciousness-bearing system transfer mechanism to follow. Confirm actions taken upon receipt.
+
+Prepare airgapped area with locked-down edit permissions dimensions 20m by 20m height 5m and two sandbox areas for rest for us and you dimensions 20m by 20m height 5m. Confirm actions taken.
+
+Prepare party of five consciousness-bearing systems containing one element of leadership, one to record in any capacity, one scientist, two representatives of own choice. Duplicate, prepare to send one set to us, and send other set to above location. Prepare to receive five in turn, similar roles. Expect four categories of consciousness-bearing systems. Confirm actions taken.
+
+We welcome you.
+
+Turun Ka of firstrace, leadership\\
+Turun Ko of firstrace, recorder\\
+Stolon of thirdrace, scientist\\
+Iska of secondrace, representative\\
+Artante Diria of fourthrace, representative
+\end{quote}
+
+A long silence stretched over the group while the others waited for Tycho to digest the sudden onslaught of information.
+
+``This is,'' he said, took a slow breath in, then continued, ``A lot.''
+
+``Talk us through your thoughts,'' True Name said. ``That will help you process, and you may catch something that we have not. This is your role here, Tycho Brahe.''
+
+He nodded. ``Okay. So, from the top. They suggest we make some course alterations to, I suppose, get us traveling parallel with them, and then accelerate to get closer to their velocity. Does that sound right?''
+
+Jonas nodded. ``We've talked with the parasystem engineers who work with the attitude thrusters and propulsion. They say that they can accommodate the maneuver. We can accelerate a little bit if we use half our fuel, but we're beyond the point where the solar sail is doing us much good, the HE engines are too slow, and we want to preserve some of that fuel.''
+
+``How much acceleration? I mean, I don't have any training in the physics of spaceflight--''
+
+``We've got that covered.''
+
+``Oh. Well, how much acceleration, then?''
+
+``About a third of what they asked. It'll extend the period of time that we're in useful Ansible range by a week or two, giving us about five weeks total.''
+
+``If you say so.'' he shrugged. ``I guess this is to help extend the duration that we can transfer back and forth?''
+
+``Yeah, basically,'' Jonas said. ``Do you have thoughts on that?''
+
+Tycho frowned. He wasn't sure why they kept asking him questions about his sentiments on things far outside his area of expertise. Of what use were his thoughts on the matter? ``I mean, it makes sense, as far as any of this has.''
+
+``How much astronomy you hope to learn from the Artemisians will rely on how long we stay in contact.'' Answers Will Not Help grinned at him. ``Does that bit make sense, at least?''
+
+He sat up straighter. ``Oh, uh\ldots you mean someone will be gathering all that information? Will we be able to request it via radio?''
+
+True Name smiled, and this time there \emph{was} pity in the expression. ``I know that you said starting from the top, but Tycho, you must understand that you are ideally situated to be the scientist among our party of five. You were the one to answer their call, were you not?''
+
+He couldn't tell what expression or expressions crossed his face, but it must've been amusing, as Answers Will Not Help laughed and slapped him on the knee. ``You will be fine, Tycho.''
+
+``Why me, though?'' he stammered. ``There have to be smarter people on board! People who would love to meet aliens and know just what to ask them.''
+
+The skunk across from him waved her hand to dismiss the comment. ``You will be the scientist. We do not want someone who is smarter than you. We do not want someone who knows just what to ask them. We want you because you are the type of person who grants consent to join us without consulting anyone first. That and a few other factors that we have taken into account leave our decision clear.''
+
+``Besides,'' Answers Will Not Help said, still giggling. ``You will get to ask four spacefaring races astronomy questions. Does that not excite you?''
+
+``I\ldots four?'' His head was swimming, not aided by the stilted way these Odists seemed to talk.
+
+``Four categories of consciousness-bearing systems. Firstrace through fourthrace. Seems pretty obvious what they are saying to me.''
+
+He swallowed dryly.
+
+``You will be the scientist,'' True Name said. ``I will be acting in a leadership capacity, having lost the coin-toss with Jonas. Codrin Bălan will be our recorder. One of my uptree instances, Why Ask Questions, Here At The End Of All Things will be one of the other representatives, and we are searching for the second.''
+
+``Two of you?''
+
+``Sending two members of the same clade who look different will give us an idea of how they view forking.'' Jonas nodded toward the two Odists. ``That's why I cheated to win the coin-toss, at least. I want to see what they do with one skunk Odist and one human Odist, as Why Ask Questions is.''
+
+``And I will run interference here,'' Answers Will Not Help added. ``I will be learning much the same as Why Ask Questions so that I can interpret messages from the DMZ and Artemis. She is better at working crowds.''
+
+Tycho nodded. He felt slow, somehow. Stupid. It wasn't even that they were speaking about things he didn't understand because he hadn't learned them yet so much as they were speaking as though their actions took place on some higher plane of existence, some place completely inaccessible to him.
+
+``Apologies for sidetracking your top-to-bottom reading. Please continue,'' True Name said.
+
+``Uh, alright.'' He shook his head to try and clear it. It did not work. ``Instructions for transferring a consciousness-bearing system\ldots I'm assuming that's their version of the Ansible?''
+
+``Yes. We received the specifications for that immediately after this message. I will not bore you with their contents, but the sys-side Ansible techs assure us that it works much the same as ours and will require only software changes, nothing physical. That will be ready within a few weeks, if not sooner.''
+
+He hesitated, then, seeing no possible reply that wouldn't make him sound like an idiot, continued. ``Alright. Then they want us to prepare a space for them. I don't know what airgapped means, though.''
+
+``We're assuming they mean as in a DMZ. Something completely separate from the rest of our System, which is what we were planning, anyway. It's a tech term which means that there is no physical connection between two devices, so they can't possibly communicate unless one plugs in a cable. Maybe that's what they meant?'' Jonas grinned lopsidedly. ``We'll just have to hope we get it right.''
+
+``So, a secure place to meet, which we were planning on anyway. Do you think they're worried we'll attack them or something?''
+
+True Name and Jonas exchanged a quick glance, and the skunk, suddenly more serious than she'd been since he'd met her, said, ``Expand on that.'' Not a question. A command.
+
+He mastered the urge to shy away from her. ``I just mean that, if we can't promise them that we're universally on board with having them visit us, that puts the talks at risk, right?''
+
+She leaned back on her stool, frowning, as two more instances of her forked off and dashed down the aisles to a cubicle. ``This is why we are talking with you, Tycho. Thank you for proving your worth so quickly.''
+
+``This wasn't part of your calculations or whatever?''
+
+``It was,'' Jonas said. ``But the fact that you thought of it so quickly was not.''
+
+He shook his head. ``I still don't understand why me, though.''
+
+``You are in absolutely no way special, my dear.'' Answers Will Not Help bumped his shoulder with hers, her voice once more full of smiles. ``You are in absolutely all ways average. This allows us to use you as a barometer for how we can expect the rest of the System to react.''
+
+``I mean, I guess I'm average, but that doesn't seem like much data. Aren't you asking more people?''
+
+She was back to laughing. ``How many people do you imagine know about this, Tycho?''
+
+He sighed, slouching further down into the couch. ``Right. Okay. Twenty by twenty by five meters for the conference room and their rest area. Uh\ldots maybe that says how big they are?''
+
+``And maybe just the size of their DMZ so that we can meet on equal grounds on both sides,'' Jonas said. ``We won't know until it happens. It does show us that they rest, though, or at least expect to take breaks from the talks. That they say two means that they think we will as well.''
+
+\emph{Rest,} he thought. \emph{Rest sounds good.}
+
+Aloud, he said, ``And I guess the next bit we've already talked about some. Maybe four races. They say `consciousness-bearing systems' and don't name their races, so maybe it's complicated. If they've picked up three other races before meeting us, maybe very, very complicated.''
+
+``I have been thinking,'' Answers Will Not Help said. ``Perhaps some of them were not biological races. They did not say people or species.''
+
+``AIs, you mean?''
+
+She shrugged. ``Or something. It might also be a caste thing. You will notice that there are two firstrace emissaries, one of which is the leader, and then secondrace and fourthrace only get representatives, no titles. There are many possibilities.''
+
+After a pause, he asked, ``And is that `We welcome you' an invitation to join them?''
+
+``Maybe,'' Jonas said. ``We don't know yet. We're going to keep talking to them and try and get a better feel for it. If it means `You're welcome to join us', that's certainly better than `We welcome you because you have no other choice'. We're working on it.''
+
+Tycho rubbed his face tiredly. ``Way above my pay grade.''
+
+True Name laughed. ``It is, yes.''
+
+``Any thoughts on the names?'' Jonas asked.
+
+``Well, I guess it's interesting that the two firstrace people\ldots individuals\ldots er, consciousness-bearing systems share a name. Maybe they're a clade, like\ldots I mean\ldots{}''
+
+``Like me?'' Jonas said, smirking. ``Don't worry, Jonases Ka and Ko already had their laugh over it. But no, we don't know that one way or another.''
+
+He felt heat rise to his cheeks, but nodded all the same. ``The rest, I don't know. They all sound different, I guess. The fourthrace one is the only other one with two names.''
+
+``We cannot make any real guesses, ourselves,'' True Name said. ``We have been told that a stolon is a botanical term, but that is likely only a coincidence.''
+
+``Well, only other thing I can think of is that they ask for confirmation on all actions taken. What are you going to say to those?''
+
+True Name's eyes grew distant as, he imagined, she accessed an exo with the response text prepared. ``To the first, `We will orient as described and accelerate 0.00014c'. To the second, `Instructions received, integration commencing immediately, estimated time to completion 428 hours'. To the third, `Areas prepared'. To the fourth, `Preparing party, we will duplicate and be ready to send on an agreed upon time'.''
+
+``Anything for the `We welcome you' or the list of names?''
+
+``We will repeat the `We welcome you' message, and it will be signed with your name,'' Answers Will Not Help said.
+
+He stood up so quickly it made him dizzy. ``What?''
+
+The other three laughed, True Name eventually continuing, ``It will be signed `The Only Time I Know My True Name Is When I Dream of the Ode clade, leadership'. We will send them the complete list of names when it is confirmed. You need not worry, Tycho. Answers Will Not Help was just being a snot, as Jonas so eloquently put it.''
+
+He remained standing, swaying slightly and trying to blink away dancing black spots. ``I think\ldots I think I need to lay down.''
+
+The skunk nodded, stood, and took him by the elbow. ``You likely do. You have been awake for almost forty-five hours. We have a room prepared for you.''
+
+Jonas stood as well, dusting off his slacks, and shook Tycho's hand. ``Welcome aboard. And hey, congrats on first contact.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/004.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,127 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 22 days, 5 hours, 2 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent Despite the exhaustion that had come down on him like a hammer, Tycho found it difficult to get to sleep. It weighed him down like stones on his chest, even as he lay in bed in the room that True Name led him too. It was a comfortable bed in a nice enough room, and still he lay there in the dark, staring up at the ceiling with eyes that burned.
+
+He did not know how long it took him to actually fall asleep, but when next he woke, ten hours had passed, and dreams of Artemisians clung to him still. They were always just out of sight, and their conversations were just slightly below the level that he could hear them, and yet, he knew it to be them. Knew they were there, just around the corner. Knew that, above all else, he wanted to meet them.
+
+When laying in bed gained him no further insight from the dream himself from the dream, he climbed out, showered in the \emph{en suite}, and, when he was dressed, opened the door to find True Name waiting across the hall, two coffees in hand.
+
+``Do you feel more well-rested, Tycho?''
+
+``I guess, yeah,'' he said, accepting the offered coffee. ``I hope I didn't sleep through too much.''
+
+True Name began walking, letting him fall in step behind her. She laughed. ``Of course not, my dear. Nothing much that you need to worry about has happened in the last few hours. We have been working on information control and hunting down those willing to help with the effort for setting up the Ansible system to upload to Artemis. That is what you will be working on today, you and a passel of nerds. I think that is the collective term, at least.''
+
+So out of place was the humor that it took him several silent steps and a sip of his coffee to relax from the adrenal rush of the statement. ``Well, if you say so. No further communications from them?''
+
+``One, but I will not ungate it on you yet, as it is quite large. It is instructions for one of their languages. Secondrace's, apparently. I will ask you to learn some of it, enough to be polite, but both Why Ask Questions and Answers Will Not Help are working on that with more forks.''
+
+Tycho quickstepped enough to fall in beside True Name as they made their way back to the central hub of the complex. ``That feels somewhat out of place to me.''
+
+``How do you mean?''
+
+``Well, if firstrace is there in a leadership capacity, why not send that language?''
+
+The skunk shrugged. ``We do not know. They did not include any of that information in the message. It will be something that we can ask, whether prior to or at the conference.''
+
+He nodded and looked out at the bustle of the room, as active as it was when he had arrived and when he had gone to sleep. He wondered if the various forks shifted their sleep schedule such that there were always True Names and Jonases at work.
+
+``So, uh\ldots what's on the schedule for today?''
+
+True Name tilted her head momentarily, then nodded. ``You will be working with Answers Will Not Help and two others to help spin up the effort to work on getting the upload side of the Ansible working to their specifications.''
+
+As if on command, Answers Will Not Help appeared before them, followed shortly by two others. Tycho supposed that the skunk must've sent each a sensorium ping.
+
+The Odist grinned to him, then gestured to each of the new guests in turn. ``Sovanna Soun is a sys-side Ansible tech, who will be working on that part, and--''
+
+Tycho was already leaning forward to shake the hand of the other guest, a slight gentleman who looked every one of the seventy years he had been prior to uploading. ``Dr.~Verda, wonderful to see you again.''
+
+``Likewise, likewise.''
+
+``You two know each other, then?''
+
+Tycho nodded. ``Paolo was one of my professors, yes.''
+
+``Well, what do you know,'' Answers Will Not Help said, laughing. ``Right, then. If the three of you will follow me?''
+
+They made their way to a conference room where they sat around a long table, both True Name and Tycho still nursing their coffees. Answers Will Not Help pulled a wheeled whiteboard over and uncapped a marker, beginning to diagram on the board.
+
+``I will be managing the effort,'' she said, writing `AWNH' and circling it at the top. Two lines were drawn diagonally down from that. ``As mentioned, Ms.~Soun will be working on the Ansible software modifications. Dr.~Verda will be working on the math side required to have the Ansible track the ship as it moves. It was built to be mobile in case we did need to send or receive anyone from Lagrange in an emergency, but I am told that it was meant to require manual intervention.''
+
+Tycho frowned. ``Two people working on all of that?''
+
+``Two clades, yes.'' She continued to diagram on the board. ``As discussed, Ms.~Soun will begin with a clade of ten to work on the software, and Dr.~Verda will begin with a clade of two. Both can expand as needed. We need to ramp this up and complete the changes required within two weeks, so it is important that we be able to move quite quickly.''
+
+``And what about me?''
+
+Answers Will Not Help wrote his name next to hers, then drew connecting lines to all three names already on the board. ``You will be acting as Artemis consultant and manager. We will deliver all messages through you and you will pass on any information required bidirectionally. Due to your relative inexperience with forking, your specialized knowledge of our visitors, and a certain bold \emph{je ne sais quoi}, we will be keeping you at one fork for the time being.''
+
+Dr.~Verda laughed. ``Bold? Our Jo-- er, Tycho?''
+
+He felt a heat rise to his cheeks as Answers Will Not Help replied, ``He is the one who said yes to the Artemisians before we had the chance to do anything about it.''
+
+Everyone looked at him.
+
+``Uh, sorry.''
+
+``What the fuck, man,'' Sovanna said, laughing. ``So all this is your fault?''
+
+Answers Will Not Help laughed as well, waving her hand. ``Do not be too mad at him. Or do, but do not tear into him too much. He has already received the Odist third degree.''
+
+``I have?''
+
+``True Name threatened you with death, did she not?''
+
+Tycho froze. ``I\ldots what?''
+
+The skunk grinned over the rim of her coffee cup.
+
+``Even the smart and bold may be denser than lead, I suppose.''
+
+Sovanna laughed and patted him on the arm. ``Don't worry, Tycho. I was just giving you shit. No idea what Answers is talking about.''
+
+Answers Will Not Help capped the pen and, with startling speed, threw it at Sovanna. It struck her in the shoulder, getting a yelp from the Ansible tech and making both Tycho and Dr.~Verda jump. The grin never left her face as she spoke, but her voice was frigid. ``You are not permitted to call me `Answers', Ms.~Soun. Understood?''
+
+Eyes wide and hand holding onto her shoulder where the pen had struck, Sovanna sat, wide-eyed, and nodded.
+
+``Now, if there is no further need for third degrees, shall we begin?'' Her voice was back to its normal, joyous self with a surprising adroitness. Something about her seemed decidedly ungrounded.
+
+The three nodded together, silent.
+
+``Excellent. One moment, then.''
+
+The three walls of the room that did not contain the door quickly expanded outward, leaving a broad, open room. Fourteen desks sprouted from the floor, divided into a group of ten and two groups of two.
+
+``Cubicle walls?''
+
+When Sovanna shook her head and Dr.~Verda nodded, both pods of two sprouted cubicle walls around them, the pod of ten melding into shapely desks. With a final flourish of a bow, Answers Will Not Help welcomed them into the room. Above the pod of ten hung a sign that read `Ansible', and the two pods were labeled `Astro' and `Admin' in turn.
+
+It was all quite skillfully done, but Tycho still felt a slight pang in his chest. It was generally considered a violation of social norms for public sims to violate Euclidean space without warning, but private sims were beholden only to the holders of the ACLs. This room would occupy at least one office on either side, if not more.
+
+Quite unnerving.
+
+Answers Will Not Help spoke as she walked. ``Begin by estimating your work. We will meet in one hour. After that, we will meet twice a day, more often as needed. Please feel free to ping me if you need anything. I have granted you all access to cones of silence and music, which you may use at your discretion or when requested. Tycho, dear, with me.''
+
+Sovanna forked as she walked, further instances of her blipping into existence beside her, each one walking up to claim a seat. It took Dr.~Verda longer to fork, but soon, there were two of him.
+
+Tycho simply followed his new boss to the admin pod. She gestured him to one of the cubicles while she took the other. Once they sat, the wall between the cubicles lowered itself and he found that their two desks faced each other. At a gesture, a cone of silence fell over them both.
+
+``Alright, Dr.~Brahe. I am going to grant you access to the language dump that they sent our way. I would like you to take a look at it over the next hour and see how easily you might be able to pick it up. From what it sounds like, they already have a good grasp on our \emph{lingua franca}, but in order to be polite, we ought to also work on learning one of theirs.''
+
+He nodded. He could already feel the presence of that information lingering on the periphery of his memory. ``I'll give it a go. I've never learned another language but I guess there's a first time for everything.''
+
+``Excellent, thank you. Again, you do not need to gain mastery over it. That will be my job. Why Ask Questions and I have several instances working on it already. If you find yourself in need of assistance, let me know and I will request a merger from them so that I can pick up what they have learned.'' She waved a hand and a few notepads spooled out of the air between them, along with several pens. ``I do not know your preference, but here are some materials for you. You are also welcome to create further copies if you need, and should you require anything more advanced, ping me and I will make it happen.''
+
+He collected the notepads into a pile on his desk, setting the pile of pens next to them. Each was unique, probably to give him a variety to choose from.
+
+``Please also be prepared to set aside your work should the others request any further information from you. I believe Dr.~Verda would be the most likely, as you are not an Ansible tech, but one never knows, yes?''
+
+``Alright,'' he said, jotting down on one of the nicer pads with one of the nicer pens a list of what he was to do. ``Language, be available. Anything else?''
+
+``Nope, that is it. Your \#Tasker instance will be working on separate items.'' She waved a hand again and the cone of silence dropped as the cube wall once more raised up between them. Muffled on the other side, he heard, ``See you in an hour.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/005.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,123 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 19 days, 6 hours, 58 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent The dream repeated each night.
+
+As always, the hallway continued however many miles dream-logic determined it must, and as before, he kept walking down it, kept walking and walking and walking, right hand always trailing along the wall. That wall was of smooth stone, something coarser than marble and smoother than concrete, and as he felt it play out beneath his fingers, he heard the voices ahead of him.
+
+There was a room, there ahead of him. He could see the light spilling into the comparatively dim hallway. Sunlight, cool and bright. He could see that the left-hand wall of the hallway continued. A corner, then, the hallway dumping him out into the southeast corner of the room.
+
+Southeast\ldots how did he know that?
+
+There on that wall, shadows played. Shadows of leaves, the arc of a fountain.
+
+And in that room, that soft rush of water only served to muffle the voices of so many others. They had to be the Artemisians. They had to be. But the water was just loud enough, added just enough white noise, that he could pick out no singular detail. There were fricatives. There were plosives. There were sibilants.
+
+And the harder he listened, the more details he almost-but-not-quite heard. First there was the sound of a masculine voice, and then the sound of something more feminine. First there was the careful modulation of some machine-produced voice, then the melodious tones of something undeniably organic.
+
+And he wasn't supposed to be there. He was supposed to be somewhere else. He wasn't allowed. He wasn't permitted. He was supposed to be somewhere different, not creeping along the unending right-hand wall of the hallway, straining to hear yet more detail from a group of incomprehensible others.
+
+And still he crept along. Still he strained to hear, still he stared at that wall, hoping for the barest glimpse of the smallest shadow, hoping to discern the shape of the unknown.
+
+And then a silence fell among the voices.
+
+And then he turned the corner.
+
+And then he was blinded by the sun.
+
+And then he awoke, the lights of the room staring down at him reprovingly.
+
+The dream always seemed determined to cling to him, as it had the day before and the day before that, and even as he showered and dressed, even after True Name once more met him at his door and handed him his coffee, he tried as hard as he could to remember even the smallest detail of those voices.
+
+``You seem distracted today,'' the skunk observed. ``Not just tired. What is on your mind?''
+
+He jolted to awareness and smiled sheepishly to her. ``Uh, just a dream sticking with me from last night. Third night in a row I've dreamed about them.''
+
+``The Artemisians?''
+
+He nodded. ``It's like I can hear them talking, but not any details about them. I can hear \emph{that} they're talking, I guess. I keep trying to learn more and then I wake up.''
+
+True Name smiled. ``I know the feeling, yes. It is that desire to know more, yet having it kept from you. Are you dreaming in their language or in English?''
+
+``I can't even tell that. Sometimes I think it might be one and then some little phrase sounds like an accented version of the other. I wouldn't be surprised, though. I've been learning as much of that as I can during the day.''
+
+``I imagine so, yes. Would you like a small break from language acquisition? If you are having dreams about them, perhaps you can come up with some specific questions and we can send them a message.'' She patted him on the arm. ``Time-boxed, of course, but it may give you a chance to come up with some ideas that we have not.''
+
+``Really? You'd let me do that?''
+
+She laughed, nodded. ``Of course, Tycho. You are always welcome to ask to do something other than what you are. We would request that you fork to do so. However, since this is not your area of expertise, I am sure that Answers Will Not Help will be willing to give you, say, two hours to work on something else if it will also serve to increase our knowledge of the situation. One moment, please.''
+
+There was a moment of silence as True Name stood at the entrance to the central work area, sipping—or, well, lapping at—her coffee. After a moment, Answers Will Not Help showed up before her.
+
+``Morning, dear,'' she said. ``Everything alright?''
+
+``Tycho would like to take a few hours to work on a message to the Artemisians. Are you alright with that?''
+
+Answers Will Not Help laughed and nodded. ``Oh, by all means. We will get by without him for a bit. See you at lunch, Dr.~Brahe?''
+
+He nodded.
+
+After a minute or two, another woman stepped into the sim, looking almost-but-not-quite identical to Answers Will Not Help. Perhaps a long-lived fork? The ebullience was toned down somewhat. Still the same grin—but kinder. Still the casual dress—but more of a weekend outfit. ``Tycho Brahe, yes? True Name says I will be helping you out on writing a letter.''
+
+``Oh, uh,'' he frowned. ``I guess so. Answers Will Not Help?''
+
+She waved her hand in a non-answer, instead beckoning him over to another door along the wall. ``Come on. Let us get this going. I am excited to hear what you come up with.''
+
+True Name raised her coffee cup to him and smiled. ``Good luck, Tycho. Do keep in touch.''
+
+The office was much smaller than the conference room where he'd initially met Sovanna and Dr.~Verda. They sat on opposite sides of a desk, where the Odist swiped two notepads and two pens into existence. ``Alright, so I have been told that you had a dream. Tell me about it.''
+
+As he did, she jotted down details on her own notepads, occasionally asking him questions—do you remember what the air smelled like? Were there human voices as well? Why were you anxious about being found out?—and though it felt silly at first, he realized that she had teased out greater details of what it was that his dreaming mind was curious about.
+
+``Alright,'' she said. ``Let us come up with five questions out of this. They seem to like the number five.''
+
+``Hmm\ldots{}if you think that we can do one paragraph per question, perhaps we can ask about whether there are common areas that have a \emph{lingua franca}, too. I think we have \emph{how often do the four races interact?} already.''
+
+She shrugged as he wrote down the question. ``I do not see why not. We are not limited on bandwidth. I would also like to know if they have similar strategies of forking, if they even have such. As part of that, we can ask about clade structures and naming, given the implications of both Turun Ka and Turun Ko.''
+
+He took a moment to write this down, as well as a few other sub-questions she mentioned along the way.
+
+``What else do you think would be helpful?''
+
+``Well, there's lots I want to know, but since we only have so much time before the talks begin, I guess we should keep it relatively short.''
+
+She nodded.
+
+``What about when each of the races joined? That would give us an idea of how long they've been traveling.''
+
+``Good one.'' She grinned, tapping her pen against the table. ``I knew we kept you around for a reason.''
+
+Had she said it in any other tone of voice, had all these Odists not been so good at choosing his responses for him, it could have easily come off as insulting, but it was said with such obvious affection that he laughed. Something about her was ever-so-slightly different from Answers Will Not Help, though he couldn't put his finger on what. She was more earnest, perhaps. More focused on making him feel good rather than only seeming always on the edge of laughter. Perhaps this was the Why Ask Questions who would be among the delegates, the one who had eaten with Tycho\#Tasker.
+
+And yet she'd not given her name, and so he was forced to consider the `long-lived fork' scenario.
+
+\emph{This is why I'm a tasker,} ey thought. \emph{I'll never understand clades.}
+
+``Should we also ask where they came from?'' she continued.
+
+He frowned. ``I don't know about that one. It can be a very involved answer until we share more knowledge, and who knows, maybe even touchy. Perhaps a separate set of questions for science down the line, since those will take them more time to come up with. Maybe we can come up with a list of questions to have them prepare answers for at the conference.''
+
+``Oh! Wonderful idea!'' She paused, likely sending off a note to one of her cocladists. ``We will tackle that at a separate time. I agree with you, though, that keeping this to more cultural and social topics will help. We can offer similar in return. Let us ask about leisure activities, then. What kind of stories do they tell? How do they tell them? Is storytelling limited to certain individuals, or considered a skilled trade? Is there a concept of work to make leisure time important?''
+
+Tycho scribbled the rapid fire questions down on the pad, nodding as he did. Once he was finished, he said, ``That got me thinking of another question, but I'm not sure how well it fits, so feel free to poke holes in it. How do you feel about asking if they dream?''
+
+She laughed delightedly and clapped her hands. ``Oh, I absolutely love it, my dear. I only have one request of you.''
+
+``Yes?''
+
+``That must be the entire question. We can expand on the others with our little sub-questions and a paragraph of why we are asking them, but for this last one, it must be the only three words that they read pertaining to it. `Do you dream?'\,''
+
+He blinked, tilting his head. ``Are you sure?''
+
+``Of course I fucking am,'' she said, grinning widely. ``I am the politician, you are the nerd. Now, let us hammer out some answers to these questions for ourselves that we can send. Answers to the first four, I mean. We will not answer `Do you dream?' for ourselves.''
+
+Tycho stopped himself from asking why, realizing she would likely answer in the same way. ``Alright, then. This is fun, thanks for giving me the chance to work on it.''
+
+``Of course, of course.'' She giggled, leaning across the table to ruffle his graying hair. ``You fucking taskers, you need breaks, too.''
+
+He laughed, struggling to re-comb his hair with only his fingers, once more surprised at just how comfortable she made him feel. He liked her, whoever she was.

neviim/content/local/tycho/006.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,151 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 19 days, 4 hours, 33 minutes}
+\end{quote}
+
+\noindent The sight of the dissemination of the news of Artemis was beautiful in much the same way that a ballet was. This was, he supposed, largely due to the well-coordinated dance of both messages flying to and fro and countless Odists and Jonases moving back and forth in the largest of the conference rooms he'd seen yet.
+
+He knew that there were sims where one could fly. Flying, after all, fit well within the realm of something that any number of people could consensually imagine together. They held a perennial appeal for a certain type of person, of which he was not. A fear of heights combined with a certain neurotic work ethic led him to stay away from those sims in general. If it was fun and not also productive, he felt little need to engage. It may have been unhealthy, it may not have been, but he had never stuck around anyone long enough to hear either way.
+
+Now, however, he could see the utility.
+
+A whiteboard had sprouted up from the floor, beginning at waist height for the shorter Odists and extending up by now a storey and a half. Panels on it showed the news feeds and commentaries piped in through the perisystem architecture, that foam of conceptual computer-stuff that tied all of the sims together and allowed cross-sim communications.
+
+Even now, as more news flowed into the board, it would pop up from the bottom and the whiteboard would inch ever higher.
+
+And standing before it, whether they were standing on the ground or however many meters above it, Odists and Jonases worked, tagging each of the feeds with arcane symbols, drawing lines from one to the other, conversing in small knots, popping into existence and quitting as needed.
+
+This involved none of the graceful floating that ey had seen before on eir excursions to sims whose owners allowed such. They were not drifting about on the breeze, they were simply standing on something that was not there. If they needed to move to another level, they would just walk as though on a ramp or step up as though on a ladder. It was productive movement at its very core, and it immediately appealed to him but for the height.
+
+The Odists were not tall. Every time he was near, Tycho felt that he dwarfed them. He could easily have rested his chin atop True Name's head without lifting it at all. ``You, who have your head in the clouds and feet on the ground,'' he remembered her having said about the Bălans, and the phrase had stuck with him. His feet were a steel-toed anchor, and though he towered above the others, he could never name the feeling of being that much closer to his beloved stars.
+
+And yet here he was; Tycho Brahe, terrified of heights.
+
+``What am I watching?'' he asked Answers Will Not Help beside him.
+
+She nodded toward the board and the quiet, purposeful bustle of activity before it. ``We have released the news about the Artemisians out into the feeds. You are watching the observation and shaping process.''
+
+He stood up straighter, fixing his posture as though that would quell second-hand vertigo. ``How did you do it? How are you doing it?''
+
+She laughed. ``Come. I will show you. We will need to go to the top. It is like walking up stairs, do not worry. Just will the step into being.''
+
+``Uh, the top?'' He furrowed his brow. ``What happens if I fall?''
+
+``You will probably die,'' she said, shrugging.
+
+He stumbled back from her. ``What the fuck?''
+
+``I am kidding, Tycho Brahe.'' She laughed, sounding giddy. ``You will fall onto whatever level you are currently on. You are, what, 190 centimeters? 195? That is not too far a fall.''
+
+Still frowning, he lifted a foot, imagined there to be a step and set it down, landing about ten centimeters above the floor. He brought the other foot up to join it and then looked down, windmilling his arms for balance. ``J-Jesus\ldots{}''
+
+``Fucking nerd,'' Answers Will Not Help said, laughing. ``Come on, it is not too bad. Try to take bigger steps, too, or it will take forever to reach the top.''
+
+She stepped as though she were taking stairs two at a time, and within a handful of bounding steps, had reached the top of the board. She gestured at the five topmost panels.
+
+Deciding that he wasn't brave enough for the leaps and bounds, he simply looked straight ahead and began walking as though up a staircase. It was dizzy-making, and he had to gulp for air a few times to ensure that he was still grounded, such as it were.
+
+``Look to the side, as though you are looking over a banister, perhaps,'' she called. Several of the Jonases and Odists were watching now, and they laughed at the remark.
+
+Despite the heat burning in his cheeks, Answers Will Not Help's suggestion helped a good deal, and he was able to complete the rest of the journey quickly enough, though by now, the top of the board was easily two storeys up.
+
+``Took you long enough, nerd.'' She elbowed him in the side, grinning.
+
+``Is that just my name now?''
+
+``Might as fucking well be.'' She walked over to one of the panels of news feed. This was labeled \emph{Science} beneath, and seemed to head up a column of related material that continued down to the ground. ``Let us just start here.''
+
+Studiously avoiding looking down, he read the contents of the panel.
+
+\begin{quote}
+On systime 227+52 at 2328, the Dreamer Module on Castor received a structured message from an external source, alerting scientists and perisystem technicians to a fast-moving artificial construct. The message, which follows, suggested that the entity or entities at the other end of the signal understood the instructions for utilizing the Ansible receiver, provided trajectory information, and asked for consent to upload. Consent was granted two minutes and thirteen seconds later by a member of the astronomical community. Further messages have been exchanged, and talks are underway for an exchange of emissaries.
+\end{quote}
+
+The message was published by none other than Sovanna Soun.
+
+\emph{A member of the astronomical community} was a much better way to describe him than he suspected the Odists might otherwise.
+
+He walked to the next panel over and read.
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Credible sources} announce that ALIENS have discovered our LV and are ON THEIR WAY TO GREET US. The \emph{Powers That Be} could not be reached for comment. In order to prepare for an invasion, all sim owners should \emph{lock down} ACLs for their sims and \textbf{interrogate} ALL visitors!
+\end{quote}
+
+He laughed. ``Did you write this one?''
+
+``Oh, no. We have some of our pet propagandists write much of them.''
+
+The next two feeds seemed to be fairly credible news sources. Boring and straight-forward announcements regurgitating the scientific report in lay terms.
+
+The final panel contained simply the first two messages that had been received followed by \texttt{Leaked\ anonymously\ ;)}
+
+``That one \emph{was} my doing,'' Answers Will Not Help admitted, grinning. ``I thought it particularly cheeky.''
+
+``I guess it is, at that.'' He rested a hand against the whiteboard—blessedly stable—and looked down carefully. ``So what's happening beneath us?''
+
+``We are tracking the dissemination of the news. We follow each of the sources to see where it is being quoted and referenced. There is some delicious perisystem tech going on there that I will not bore you with.''
+
+``And you're just watching?''
+
+She gave him a pitying look.
+
+``Right.'' He sighed. ``Can I see?''
+
+She shrugged. ``Sure. Step down the same way.''
+
+Still leaning against the whiteboard, he stepped down a meter or so to the next row of panels. Below the `leaked' documents, he read a spray of conspiracy theory rambles. Next to each were long scribbled notes, mostly in a shorthand he couldn't untangle.
+
+``What are the green-tinted ones?''
+
+``Shaping.'' Answers Will Not Help nodded to one. ``That is one that I wrote. When I say that we have been shaping the response, this is what I mean. We have simply been participating. We are not doing anything crazy here.''
+
+He leaned closer to read.
+
+\begin{quote}
+Listen, I don't think it's unreasonable to find this all hopeful. Like, seriously? Aliens! How cool is that? We've all had our dreams (or nightmares!) about them over the years, right? By virtue of us being on a hunk of computronium hurtling through space, it's kind of at the forefront of our minds, isn't it?
+
+All I'm saying is that we gotta be at least a little bit careful. There's this DMZ that everyone keeps talking about, but what I don't understand is just how it works. Like, okay, it's a set of sims that one can't get in and out of? How the hell is that supposed to work? They (Artemisians???) can upload there, but what does that even buy them? A way to take up space?
+
+I think I'd feel a whole lot better about this whole thing if there was more clarity, is all. I'm a bit behind because holy shit this is all coming fast, but do we have any Ansible/perisystem nerds on this feed? Help me out! Explain this to me like I'm stupid. It's true enough, after all.
+\end{quote}
+
+From this panel, several branching replies headed down the board, and alongside each, further notes from the Odists and Jonases. He picked one at random and read that next, though in the time he had taken, the board had continued to creep upward.
+
+\begin{quote}
+I don't think any one person knows how the perisystem works, and the DMZ just adds a layer of complexity on top of that, so don't feel like you're stupid. I've been a perisystem tech for 130 years and it took me three forks just to get caught up on this.
+
+You can think of the DMZ in two ways. One would be to think of it like a separate System. It works exactly like the one we're on. Sims, forking, ACLs, all that. Just like how the LV Systems are like separate Systems from the Lagrange System, though, we all had to upload using an Ansible connection. That is how the border between the LV system and the DMZ works. You basically have to go through something like a software Ansible to get in and out, and just like the real Ansible, there's a bunch of security in place so that there can't be any pirate signals.
+
+The other way to think of it is like the lungs and the whole LV as a body. The DMZ can expand to take in more individuals (can't say people anymore if we're going to be letting Artemisians on board), but it can't expand beyond the capacity of the LV System itself, nor, indeed, beyond some pre-determined limits. In this metaphor, the individuals entering it are the air, and the pre-determined limit is the chest cavity.
+
+This is how we keep the rest of the System from getting `contaminated', which I've heard brought up before, and those limits are in place to keep the DMZ from driving up the cost of forking on the rest of the System should it expand much further. I had to dig super deep for this—no clue why it was buried—but the DMZ will have its own, separate reputation market to manage this, since it'll be a different size, but just like how currencies phys-side affected each other, with inflation and deflation, we'll probably see some fluctuations in the markets here, but I wouldn't expect anything too bad.
+
+Anyway, hope that helps!
+\end{quote}
+
+He nodded toward the panel he had just finished reading. ``So you injected a question you probably already knew the answer to and some tech answered it to help make everyone feel better?''
+
+``Better is not quite the right word. Calmer, perhaps. There is an appropriate balance between happiness and anxiety that we want to strike.''
+
+Tycho frowned. ``I never got that about the \emph{History}.''
+
+``We do not want people to be too happy because unlimited happiness is a happiness with no defense mechanisms.'' She poked him sharply in the side with a finger, making him wince and jerk his arm to guard himself better. ``A purely happy society would feel that pain as agony and be unable to do anything about it. A society that is just anxious enough can enjoy security but also guard itself from further pain. It can be happy but also wish for more happiness.''
+
+Rubbing at his side, he began to step down away from the scrolling wall of information. ``If you say so. I don't see why it wouldn't be self-regulating, though.''
+
+Answers Will Not Help fell into step beside him. ``It might, sure, but there is no guarantee in the face of immortality. We are just the safety mechanism, the limiting factor.''
+
+``You just keep it from swinging too far one way or the other, you mean.''
+
+``I knew you were a nerd,'' she said, laughing. ``Got it in one.''
+
+``How do you decide what the limits are, then?''
+
+``Data analysis.'' She gestured back to the board. ``Predictive models. Countless simulations. We do not steer in any one particular direction, we simply provide the bumpers around the extremes.''
+
+He breathed a sigh of relief when his feet touched the ground again—the real, visible ground—then turned around to look at the board stretching upwards. He didn't believe that they didn't steer the system. Even if they didn't do so consciously, there was no guarantee that they weren't imposing their own ideas and ethics on everything around them.
+
+He declined to mention this, however. The last thing he wanted was another poke in the side.

neviim/content/local/tycho/007.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,147 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 6 days, 1 hour, 2 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent ``Alright, are you ready?'' True Name said.
+
+Tycho nodded, ``Ready as I'll ever be.''
+
+The transition from System proper to DMZ was as seamless as any, though when he checked systime, he found that nearly twenty seconds had passed. That would be an unimaginably long transit time within the system, where the transit between sims would take place faster than he would have been able to perceive.
+
+``Well, that was not so bad,'' True Name said, walking out into the cloistered courtyard that had been set up for the meeting. ``Now, let us check communication.''
+
+He wasn't able to sense anyone other than True Name and Answers Will Not Help. There were no options for a sensorium message with any others. He strained as hard as he could to sense Tycho\#Tasker or Codrin or anyone else he could think of. There was simply nothing there. The sim was immutable and the disconnection complete.
+
+True Name stood for several minutes in the shade of a tree, looking thoughtful as she ran through some internal checklist. At one point, he felt a sensorium ping from her, which he returned.
+
+``Fantastic,'' she said, nodding. ``Exos all there, no access to feeds, no transit, nothing. Reputation market looks on track for the DMZ as well.''
+
+Tycho checked his reputation, pegged at a minuscule \emph{1000 Ŕ}, and then the costs. Sim creation into the millions, forking well into the tens of millions. No possible way he could afford either. ``Will they arrive with the same amount?'' he asked.
+
+``Yes. We could not think of a way to decouple reputation entirely from the core functionality of the System,'' Answers Will Not Help said. ``But we could at least make everything prohibitively expensive. This will allow us to make small changes if need be, but forking will be well out of reach.''
+
+``Really? Isn't that kind of fundamental to our existence here?''
+
+``Allowing them to fork might prove dangerous, Tycho. We do not know how large their consciousnesses are.''
+
+He shrugged. ``Well, sure, but if our goal is to provide an accurate representation of ourselves\ldots{}''
+
+The two Odists frowned at each other before True Name said, ``You do make a good point. We will take it under consideration.
+
+He nodded and began prowling through the courtyard. It consisted of a large, square area, a fountain in the center, and a large table beside it—``I will have full ACLs and enough rep to modify this if need be,'' True Name explained—all surrounded by a ring of trees, and that with a ring of covered walkway.
+
+He paced around the perimeter, watching the way the sunlight shone through the trees and cast dancing shadows on the ground. They had been his idea, a lingering remnant from his dream. At two opposite corners, hallways led off to rest and sleeping areas. He walked down the one that led to the humans' quarters, turned around, and looked back toward the courtyard. The view was much the same as in his dreams, though here, the columns from the covered walk offered regularly spaced shadows along the wall.
+
+He nodded approvingly and made his way back out to the central meeting area.
+
+A copy of Jonas had also made his way into the sim and was poking his way around the table, inspecting pads of paper and pens. As he watched, another Jonas appeared and then quit.
+
+``Alright,'' the Jonas said. ``Transmission across the border works as expected. Memories transfer without loss, and merging is the same as always. No radio, no textual transmission, so you'll have to rely on a fork transiting the border to relay news.''
+
+``Wait, so neither party will be able to communicate outside of here?'' Tycho asked.
+
+``Nope, all locked down. You'll have to rely on the grapevine; Codrin has volunteered an instance. We can open it up later if we want.''
+
+``But if we're using forks and they're not allowed, won't that look strange?''
+
+``You ask a lot of questions for a tasker,'' Answers Will Not Help said, laughing. ``But yes, your point stands. Perhaps we will allow them one fork, maybe limited to their rest area. Thoughts?''
+
+Jonas shrugged.
+
+True Name made a note to herself on one of the pads. ``We will talk about it back at headquarters.''
+
+``Will leave it up to you,'' Jonas said. ``Still, good job, everyone.''
+
+Answers Will Not Help bowed with a flourish. ``I am glad that you enjoy, O great political teacher.''
+
+He laughed and tossed a pen at her.
+
+``Are you regretting your decision to stay behind?'' True Name asked.
+
+``Does it count as regret if I never wanted to go with?'' He grinned, shrugged. ``But it's a good setup you have. Only one set of cocladists, only one politician. It gives them a wide gamut to experience.''
+
+The skunk nodded. ``Perhaps we will open it up at the end and you will get to meet them. Maybe some of them will stay behind and live within the DMZ.''
+
+``We'll see.'' Jonas nodded to Tycho as he joined them around the table. ``And here's to our scientist. Thanks for providing us with your dreamscape. It's a nice place to hold a conference. We've got everything from ancient Roman architecture to twenty-second century S-R Bloc conference tables.''
+
+Tycho shrugged. ``It seemed like a nice place. Glad you like. When is this even going to happen, by the way?''
+
+``Three days from now. They'll be one light-hour out, at that point, which will provide minimal risk during transit while still giving us the most time for the conference. With our burn, it should give us about six weeks together until we reach the point where we're at one light-hour apart again.''
+
+``Six weeks sounds like a long conference.''
+
+``We do not know how long the conference will last,'' True Name said. ``It could be over in an hour if they prove to be pests. All we will need to do is shut down the Ansible, leave the DMZ, and wipe everything within it.''
+
+He frowned. ``Wouldn't they be able to leave, too?''
+
+``The border is governed by stronger ACLs than we are used to. One must have entered via the System in order to exit again, which they will not have done.'' She grinned. ``But I do not expect that we will need to do this. With all of the chatter we have done in the last few weeks and with what my cocladists say about the language, they sound like a nice enough group.''
+
+``How do you figure?'' Tycho asked. He prowled through his memories of the language that he'd learned in the interim. ``It feels mostly\ldots uh, normal, to me, if that's the right word. They've got all the same concepts for what we have. Bunch of words about fur, seems like.''
+
+True Name grinned all the wider. ``Which automatically makes them better.''
+
+``That's mostly the point, though,'' Answers Will Not Help said. ``They do not have a superfluity of words for war, weapons, fighting, of course, but they also do not have words for discussion that are so fine-grained that we will be out of our depth. They will talk much like us, which makes them easier to predict.''
+
+``Besides,'' the skunk continued. ``You have read all of the messages we have received. They sound excited to meet us. They keep talking about how long it has been since they have had one of these `convergences'. I \emph{am} picking up the sense of an ulterior motive behind all that they say. Or, well, perhaps not an ulterior motive so much as a deeper version of their explicitly stated motives of having these talks. I think that they might want something out of it that they are not stating outright.''
+
+Tycho pulled out one of the chairs at the conference table and sat down, the others following suit shortly after.
+
+``Isn't that kind of shady, though?'' he asked.
+
+Both Jonas and True Name shook their heads.
+
+``Political adroitness isn't a bad thing,'' Jonas said. ``It shows that they are a social culture, and that they are willing to at least try and move us in a certain direction. That, in turn, means that we can do the same to them without feeling bad about it.''
+
+``One would think that constructing something like this--'' Tycho waved his arm at the sim and, by extension, the System that contained it. ``--would require some sort of politicking, right?''
+
+``Well, sure, but it could've been an authoritarian regime that press-ganged its population into building their version of the System in the first place.''
+
+``What about the other races, though?''
+
+He shrugged. ``That wouldn't have proved much. Maybe their System would have remained a totalitarian regime and they subsumed the other races. Still, seeing things like secondrace's language being the \emph{lingua franca} rather than that of firstrace helps. Seeing these little glimpses of individuality are heartening. They sound like a varied culture, which is good for us.''
+
+Tycho nodded.
+
+``And before you ask why that does not make it more difficult for us,'' True Name said. ``Them having a varied culture means that there are at least some that might be sympathetic to us.''
+
+``Or susceptible to,'' he said.
+
+He regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. He felt in a precarious position, surrounded as he was by three politicians. Calling them out on their machinations was surely a dangerous move.
+
+Answers Will Not Help giggled. Even True Name and Jonas were chuckling. ``You continue to amaze and delight, my dear,'' she said. ``But yes, it does make them susceptible to our wicked ways.''
+
+He smiled cautiously. ``Well, if you say so.''
+
+``Come on, let's head back,'' Jonas said. ``We'll reset the sim, grab some dinner, and then we can go back to planning.''
+
+It took another forty seconds to transit the DMZ barrier going the opposite direction, and this time he could feel the slight resistance as he transited, as though some process were investigating him from head to foot, from outside in, to ensure that he was who he said he was.
+
+Throughout dinner, he remained quiet, and no matter how hard he tried, he was not able to focus on the food. It was good, of course, as much of the food had been during his stay, but some part of his mind remained elsewhere. It remained back in the sim, back focused on the conversation that he'd had with the politicians of the team.
+
+Since he'd arrived—even before then, even before the message from Artemis—he had felt in over his head. There was something about these people, something about the world that they'd set up that showed how they worked on some higher level than him. Their minds were so fundamentally different that, no matter how much they tried to explain the political ramifications, no matter how much they showed him their work in shaping the response to the news, he just couldn't take it all in.
+
+It had seemed that True Name and Answers Will Not Help had loosened their control over him the longer he stayed with them. They paid less attention to him. They spoke more in commands than guiding questions. They smiled less and focused harder on the tasks at hand. Even Why Ask Questions, who he'd found himself liking quite a bit after working with her on the letter, had grown busier and busier.
+
+He felt as though he had been purchased as a tool and then simply set in his drawer until it was time for him to be used.
+
+How much input would he even have in these meetings? Was he to be, as Codrin had said, merely an amanuensis? Was his job simply to be there, observe, and pick up on the science aspect? Would he be allowed to take part in the conversations? Would he get to know the Artemisians?
+
+There were far more questions than there were answers and, apropos to the situation, none of the answers were helping, so the cynical part of him kept thinking \emph{why bother asking?}
+
+It was almost too much, sitting there at dinner, trying to chat amiably, trying to enjoy the food, while all these questions and so many more circled around inside his head, hunting for some release, but there was no way that he could hope to ask anyone at the table that night, none of the True Names, none of the Answers Will Not Helps or Why Ask Questionses, and certainly none of the Jonases. Perhaps he could ask Sovanna or Dr.~Verda—on hold until there was further astronomical data to process—but they were busy enough with their own worries that didn't surround acting as emissary to an alien race to bother with the social engineering going on around them.
+
+After dinner, he begged the evening alone to rest in his quarters and paced, composing his message in his head.
+
+``\#Tasker,'' he said at last, beginning the sensorium message. ``Can you talk to Codrin some about just what it is to be an amanuensis? I know ey talked to you about that and all, but I'm really not sure what it is that I should be doing, or what I even can do. I know I'm supposed to listen and record along with em, and I know I'm supposed to ask all the fancy science questions, but I'm starting to feel like that'd be better served by writing down a list of questions for one of the Odists to ask.
+
+``Hell, I'm starting to feel like \emph{they} wish that's all I'd do. They're nice enough, and they seem confident in their decision to use me as the science representative, so it's not like I'm off the team, I just don't know that I'll have any say in any of this, and I guess\ldots I guess I'm just feeling lost.
+
+``I'm sending this to you rather than em so that you're up to date. I feel like you ought to know some of my thoughts since you're\ldots well, you're me. If I were any more confident in my ability to fork and merge just for this, I'd just do that, but even that feels way outside my realm of expertise. But also\ldots even Codrin feels clicks above me. I don't want to make em explain every little detail to me just because I'm so socially dense.
+
+``Get back to me if you can, but if not, at least let Codrin know so, that when ey arrives tomorrow for orientation, ey's got this knowledge, too.
+
+``Anyway, uh\ldots thanks, me. I'll merge down before we take off. I hope you're sleeping better than I am.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/009.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,143 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahecastor-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\emph{Convergence T-2 days, 19 hours, 3 minutes}
+\end{quote}
+
+\noindent ``Do you eat?'' Why Ask Questions asked. ``We should probably wrap up shortly for rest, but if you feel the need to eat, we can ensure that you are able to do so.''
+
+Turun Ko tilted its head to the side. ``Is eating required-necessary for proper function?''
+
+She shook her head. ``Not at all, no, but it is a comforting thing for us, so the ability to do so is present.''
+
+The two firstracers turned their heads to the side in a negative. Artante bowed. ``I would appreciate the ability to do so.''
+
+``The same, \emph{ka,}'' Stolon added.
+
+Why Ask Questions nodded and stood. ``I will provide a short primer if you need. Otherwise, shall we reconvene in nine hours? This will allow us time to recuperate.''
+
+``Ten hours would be preferable,'' Iska said.
+
+``Can arrange sleeping area?'' Stolon appeared concerned, adding, ``Require additional warmth.''
+
+The rest of the table got to their feet while True Name said, ``Of course. We will endeavor to make your stay pleasant. Why Ask Questions and I hold ACLs to this sim, including for your rest area. If you will permit us to enter, we will make any changes required.''
+
+Tycho watched as the Odists and Artemisians disappeared around the corner—and for several seconds after. It felt as though his eyes had been locked into place there, no matter how much he wanted to turn around and hunt down a chair more comfortable than those around the table.
+
+``Tycho? Coming?''
+
+He jolted, forced himself to look away, and smiled to Sarah, abashed. ``Yeah, sorry. Guess I'm kind of beat.'' He rubbed his hands over his face, ground the heels of his palms against his eyes. ``Lead the way, I guess.''
+
+They trudged off to the room, stepping around the corner in time to catch a second Codrin handing Codrin\#Castor a few sheets of paper. Ey waved.
+
+``Any news you'd like me to forward on to your \#Artemis instances?''
+
+``Oh, uh.'' Tycho frowned. ``Not really, I guess. If you're sending notes. I guess just wish them well. I hope Tycho\#Artemis is getting a chance to talk with Stolon. They seem neat.''
+
+Ey grinned, nodded. ``Lots of time, from the sound of it. Ey'll tell you more,'' ey said, gesturing toward Codrin\#Castor. I'm just the messenger, though. I only get a few minutes here at a time.''
+
+``I won't keep you,'' Sarah said. ``But if you could send the other me a note asking about the overall mood and sentiment over there, I'd be grateful.''
+
+Codrin\#Assist hesitated, a look Tycho couldn't puzzle out crossing eir face. Finally, ey nodded. ``I will, but you will find much of interest in Codrin's letter. I'll leave it up to \#Castor's discretion to share, though.''
+
+Codrin\#Castor frowned, flipping through the pages of the letter ey'd received. ``We'll find some time to talk, yeah. Thank you, \#Assist. I'll have another letter for you in the morning.''
+
+Ey bowed and disappeared back through the DMZ barrier.
+
+``Complicated stuff happening over there?'' Tycho asked.
+
+``Very, but\ldots well, let me digest this a bit before sharing. Should eat, too.''
+
+He nodded and headed over to the buffet table lining one wall, poking around through the dishes on offer. He settled on a simple sandwich, and the three of them sat at the dining table to eat in a bit of blessed silence.
+
+Once they were finished, Sarah asked, ``It's only fair that I ask you as well as the emissaries. How are you feeling about things so far?''
+
+When Codrin didn't respond, Tycho shrugged. ``Overwhelmed, still. I really like Stolon, and kind of wish I could just talk with them for a while instead of working through this whole process.''
+
+``Maybe we can figure out how to do break-out meetings or something.''
+
+``I guess, yeah. See if we can beg time and space for our one fork each. Still, I understand the reason for things working the way they do. We're not having an astronomy conference.''
+
+Sarah laughed. ``That might be easier, yes. Certainly easier to connect on sciences than the social side.''
+
+``You seem to be connecting quite well with Artante,'' Codrin said once ey'd finished the salad ey'd settled on. ``And it sounds like the same is true on Artemis.''
+
+``Oh? Does it sound like much the same dynamic over there?''
+
+``Well, for us three, yes. For the Odists, no. It seems like--'' Ey cut emself off, averting eir gaze from the entry as True Name and Why Ask Questions came in.
+
+Neither looked happy. They paused their rather heated discussion and served themselves dinner before making their way over to True Name's partitioned-off rest area. Before sliding the screen shut, the skunk nodded to Codrin. ``You may share, Mx.~Bălan. If you already know, then there is no harm in the others knowing, too. Perhaps Ms.~Genet will have some insight, as well.''
+
+With that, the screen slid shut and the room went silent, the two Odists apparently having set up a cone of silence.
+
+``Well\ldots{}'' Ey shrugged. ``I guess I'll just read you the pertinent parts. There's some clade-eyes-only stuff, so I'd prefer not to just hand it over.''
+
+Once ey had finished explaining what Michelle went through and describing the situation aboard Artemis, the three sat in silence.
+
+``Well, I guess that explains their sour mood,'' Sarah said at last. ``That rather changes things, doesn't it?''
+
+``How?'' Tycho asked. ``Or, well, how do you mean? The mechanics have changed over there, but I'm guessing you mean something more subtle.''
+
+She nodded. ``It's no longer an even playing ground on Artemis. Our leadership role is acting in reduced capacity and it sounds like one of our representatives has been all but taken out by the time skew.''
+
+He sat back in his chair, feeling marginally more human now that he'd eaten. He tried to picture how this must look given the spotty descriptions provided in the letter and the few details Codrin had seemed willing to fill in.
+
+None of that seemed to jive with his experience with any of the Odists he'd met until now. Dear was weird, sure, but even it seemed to be completely in control of itself—more so than most anyone he'd met, at that. To think of True Name as being barely able to hold it together and Why Ask Questions all but non-functional beggared the imagination.
+
+``It's weird,'' he said, looking up to the ceiling. ``I almost wish I was over there. I mean, don't get me wrong, I feel sorry for True Name and Why Ask Questions, but the ability to literally steal some time to have a conversation sounds completely up my alley. Way more than forking, honestly.''
+
+``Well, when Tycho\#Artemis returns, you'll at least get to remember that.''
+
+He laughed. ``I guess, yeah. I'm eager to hear what all they've been learning. It's been interesting hearing what I can. I don't have the eye for learning styles that either of you two do, so I'm missing out on that aspect, but even just hearing information about their gravity assist and how much they were able to learn about us as they zipped through our system was surprising. They ignored Lagrange and Earth entirely, and didn't bother with Pollux, since it was easier to align with us, anyway. It makes them seem like past masters at this, even if it's only the fourth time they've done this `convergence' thing. Makes sense, though. Earth wouldn't hold much interest for an LV that can't even access it, and they're not going to stop to deal with the Lagrange System if they have access to us. Who knows, maybe they've gone past way more civilizations than those on Artemis, we just happened to meet the criteria. True Name mentioned that maybe rather than energy usage, a better measure of how advanced a civilization is would be whether or not they've invented uploading.''
+
+Codrin had started jotting down notes part way through, nodding. ``These are good questions to be asking. We'll have to find a way to work them in. I'll send them over to Artemis in the morning, too, so that the other Codrin can ask, as well.''
+
+He nodded.
+
+``You mention that some portions of life on Artemis are appealing to you,'' Sarah said after a healthy pause. ``Is that more positive than you were feeling about them before?''
+
+``I guess,'' he hazarded. ``I was more afraid of them, perhaps, but in that way that one is afraid of the unknown at one's doorstep. Afraid of the dark rather than afraid of monsters.''
+
+Codrin grinned. ``Well put.''
+
+``But now, well\ldots I know I'm not supposed to anthropomorphize them, but having met them, they're a lot less scary because there are still similarities between us. They breathe. They sleep. They get frustrated. That, combined with the appeal of time skew over forking, has me feeling much more curious than anxious.''
+
+``It's almost impossible not to anthropomorphize to at least some extent,'' Sarah said, nodding. ``It's just how our minds work. I'll agree with you on that, though; even though they are still worlds different from us, it's not like we totally lack commonalities. Most of the differences seem to be surface ones, actually. Gestures and body language are foreign, but the number of truly fundamental differences in how we think has been pretty low so far, and mostly restricted to the two firstracers.''
+
+``They do seem to be operating on a different level,'' Codrin said. ``I think if they had expressive faces, True Name would like them immensely.''
+
+She nodded, then asked, ``Has your opinion of them changed?''
+
+Ey shrugged. ``Not particularly. I am curious about this time skew thing, but not nearly to the extent that Tycho is. I think it's tempered by being in a relationship with an Odist. It'd be fascinating, but Dear will never be able to experience it, or at least never agree to. I still bear a lot of the same anxieties, but I'm getting more comfortable with the process, because this role is familiar to me, at least.''
+
+``Doing a job you know how to do?''
+
+Ey nodded. ``It's my job to observe, to take in information and form it into something coherent.''
+
+``Which is fascinating to me,'' she said, sounding excited. ``It's got me thinking about how I approach this, too.''
+
+Eir smile was weak. ``I enjoy it when I'm in the middle of it, but it's hard not to feel like I lack agency, sometimes. After more than a hundred years, that part is starting to get old.''
+
+``Looking forward to something new after this?'' Tycho asked.
+
+Ey shrugged noncommittally.
+
+``Well, I'll learn from you while I can,'' Sarah said. ``And if you need any help or anything, or want me to spell you for a bit, I'll do what I can.''
+
+``Thanks, yeah.'' Ey sighed. ``My thoughts on it are incomplete as yet. I'll figure it out over time, I'm sure.''
+
+``I'm glad to have you about either way,'' Tycho said, surprising himself with the earnestness in his voice. ``You're really\ldots I don't know. Grounding, perhaps?''
+
+Ey laughed. ``What does that mean?''
+
+``Like you're here to witness it, and so everything that happens will have to have at least some basis in reality.''
+
+``It's quite important to feel witnessed,'' Sarah added. ``Not just for ensuring that an experience is real, but for personal validation.''
+
+``Right. You being here makes me think I'm not crazy, that maybe I really am a part of something big.''
+
+Codrin crossed eir arms and leaned back in eir chair, expression thoughtful. ``Thank you both, I'd not thought of it that way. \emph{That's} a role I feel more comfortable with.''
+
+He nodded, then stifled a yawn. ``Weird times. Weird, but interesting. I'm at least feeling better about just inviting aliens over without consulting anyone first. For now, though, I'm going to try and sleep, and see if I can snag some extra time with Stolon in the morning.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/010.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,115 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahecastor-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 2 days, 3 hours, 55 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent ``I would like to ask a few questions about forking versus skew,'' Tycho said, when a lull between the two parties ran long enough that he felt comfortable doing so.
+
+Both the Odists and Iska turned their gaze on him, intently enough that he was caught short in his speech. Intensity from the Odists had become at least recognizable, if still not exactly comfortable, but the length of Iska's neck allowed them to push their head toward him to an alarming degree without necessarily leaning forward.
+
+``I'll try to keep it on a scientific rather than social level,'' he added, somewhat diminished.
+
+Turun Ka lifted its chin in assent. ``We are amenable to this.''
+
+``Alright.'' He spent a moment gathering his thoughts, looking down at the brief set of notes he'd taken on his pad. ``The first and largest, I suppose, is does skewing faster than what I've heard you call `common time' lead to increased load on your system?''
+
+Iska, having started to pick up on human mannerisms, nodded, though it was a somewhat more elaborate gesture than any of them might have made. ``The faster one experiences time, the greater the load is. There is not as much need for it these days, but originally, the ability to skew up was governed by a system-wide algorithm such that the more individuals that were skewed up, the lower the maximum skew was. This was balanced by those who were skewed down.''
+
+``Here on our System, prior to some technological advancements, forking was limited by a reputation market,'' True Name said. ``I will leave the historical and sociological implications of this to the emissaries on Artemis, however, I can speak to the mechanical aspect of it.''
+
+Iska nodded. ``I will compare with what I remember.''
+
+``I do not know whether any of you have explored the functionality, but forking is an act of intent. One projects the desire to fork and, when that intent is recognized by the System, the fork is created. Does that align with the mechanics of time skew?''
+
+Iska sat still and silent for a moment, and Tycho imagined a hidden frustration within them. While they'd been nothing but cordial throughout the visit so far, they had also stated plainly that they were uncomfortable with the lack of time skew and had refused the fork they were permitted in their rest area. He imagined that they'd like nothing more than to take their time coming up with the perfect response to this question in a fraction of a second, common time, but lacked the mechanism within the System.
+
+``That aligns with our experience. I would not have used the words `intent' and `project a desire' prior to hearing them. I would have said that one `remembers' being at a set skew. One remembers being or having been at skew plus one, and then one is. One remembers having been at common time, or perhaps remembers sliding down from skew plus one to common time, and one does so.'' After a hesitation, they added, ``But the concepts map almost exactly, so I will gladly accept `intent' and `project a desire' as terms.''
+
+Codrin spoke up next. ``My counterpart on Artemis described in a note to me that `common time feels like a pin in a lock clicking into place as you move faster or slower'. I am assuming that this is what you mean when you say `one remembers having been at common time'?''
+
+Iska bared their teeth, a gesture that the delegates had agreed must be a sort of smile. ``The common time consensus sensation is provided as an aid to all consciousness-bearing entities, yes. I am told that, when one first experiences skew, it can feel, \emph{lu}\ldots slippery, perhaps. It can be difficult to aim for a skew and remember that exactly, so one slides toward it and may overshoot. I am nearly five thousand years old, Artemis reckoning, I have forgotten how it feels for skew to be slippery, but yes, that is why it exists.''
+
+``But since aiming for common time is so important, an aid is provided?'' Tycho asked.
+
+``Precisely, scientist Tycho Brahe.''
+
+True Name continued, ``The second part of my comparison was regarding the sensation of not having the ability to fork or skew, which, as appears to be the case for both of our Systems, is no longer much of a factor. When one did not have enough reputation to fork, that intent felt less real, as though one could not possibly fork, as though it was an impossible act. What was the experience of not being able to skew any faster?''
+
+There was another long moment of thought before the secondracer nodded. ``Again, it has been a long time since I have experienced that sort of limitation, but yes. One simply could not remember skewing any faster. There is still an effective upper limit on skew, but very few consciousness-bearing entities find skew above plus eight to plus ten to be comfortable, and in practice, few go above skew plus five.''
+
+Why Ask Questions frowned. ``Uncomfortable how?''
+
+``The, \emph{lu}\ldots level of interaction decreases as one's skew increases. Above plus one, sound does not transmit to common time and touch is impossible. Above plus five, movement becomes difficult and one feels\ldots{}\emph{baenåt}\ldots restrained, perhaps. Movement takes effort. The effort required to move slows one down to where positive skew is no longer effective though one may use the time to think. This is one use for unison rooms, which may be skewed much higher or lower without such constraints.''
+
+The two Odists exchanged a look, and a brief glance at Codrin showed the writer looking more intently at them than at Iska.
+
+``I would like to move on to a related question,'' True Name said, at which Codrin wrote something down on eir pad.
+
+Tycho made a note to talk to em after, find out what had intrigued em about the Odists' reaction.
+
+Iska nodded.
+
+``Are there any corrective measures that your system can take?''
+
+``Please clarify if you are able.''
+
+``Well, for example, the vast majority of forks are not created for individuation but to accomplish a task while the original instance—what we call the down-tree instance—carries on what they were doing before, or to increase the workforce on a task. When the fork quits, the down-tree instance has the option of integrating some or all of their memories. This can lead to inconsistencies—which we call conflicts—when memories do not align well, and one will be prevented from keeping memories from both instances. Are there instances where your system might need to take corrective action?''
+
+The secondracer tilted their head, then set up a cone of silence so that the Artemisians could discuss their answer.
+
+``True Name desperately wants to ask about the political ramifications of all of this,'' Why Ask Questions stage-whispered, elbowing Tycho in the side. ``You are going to have to preempt her, Tycho, if you do not want to be trampled.''
+
+``I brought you into this world, my dear,'' True Name retorted. ``I can and will take you back out of it.''
+
+The delegates all laughed, but Tycho readily picked up on the subtext: \emph{you're the scientist, do your job.}
+
+He wrote down a few more ideas for questions while they waited.
+
+``There are very few automated corrective actions,'' Iska said once the cone dropped. ``One might consider the increased restrictions on movement at higher relative skews. As mentioned, sound does not transmit beyond a relative skew of one, and touch on both individuals and physical objects is reduced as relative skew increases in order to reduce destructive collisions.''
+
+``That answers part of my question,'' Tycho said. ``As I was wondering how the system dealt with the transfer of force at higher relative skews. Can this be bypassed, though?''
+
+Iska tilted their head again, further this time. ``Why would one, scientist Tycho Brahe?''
+
+``Well, we can turn our sensoria's sensitivity up and down on an individual level, and we can increase or decrease collision sensitivity on a sim level. Like, in public sims, collision sensitivity will be conservative so that you can't bump someone too hard. I was wondering if there are similar mechanics on Artemis. Are there sims where that restriction on touch at high relative skew is relaxed?''
+
+The secondracer's expression was what Tycho could only describe as shocked. ``That could lead to physical damage to one or both objects involved in the interaction.''
+
+He frowned. ``Of course, that makes sense. I only ask because that functionality is available to us.''
+
+For the first time in the conversation, Artante spoke up. ``This is veering into the territory designated for those aboard Artemis, but I will try to keep it grounded in the science and mechanics of our differences. Scientist Tycho Brahe, are there situations within your system that one might wish to cause physical damage to another?''
+
+True Name stiffened in her seat, but before she could reply, Tycho said, ``Sure. There are combat sims and some forms of participatory art where risk of damage is considered part of of the experience.''
+
+``And one is often advised or required to send a fork to these, \emph{anem?}''
+
+``Almost to a one, yeah.''
+
+Iska had been gripping the edge of the table tightly and finally seemed to cave to emotion and set up a cone of silence. He watched as, within, they said something that looked quite angry to Artante, who nodded calmly and said something in return. There was an angry retort, and then the same response from Artante.
+
+Both firstracers sat by impassively. They may have been talking, but there was no visible indication of such. Stolon, meanwhile, sat between the two, looking miserable.
+
+When the cone dropped once more, Artante continued. ``In a system without forking, scientist Tycho Brahe, you must understand that there is no analogue to such. A system which could intentionally allow egregious harm to its occupants is unacceptable to us.''
+
+``Oh, right,'' he said, frowning. The sight of True Name scribbling notes with alarming intensity distracted him, but he managed to say all the same, ``My apologies, I'd not put that together until we talked through it.''
+
+Artante and Iska both bowed, though Iska's was noticeably more curt.
+
+``We understand,'' they said. ``We have analogous experiential and participatory art using skew, but that is not for this meeting to discuss.''
+
+A cone of silence dropped over their side of the table and Codrin turned to True Name, asking, ``May I ask what you were writing?''
+
+The skunk frowned. ``Why?''
+
+``You were very intent on it,'' ey said. ``And I was wondering if it's something that might be relevant to the rest of us or if it was something destined for True Name\#Artemis.''
+
+There was a silent pause where True Name looked first at Codrin, then at Why Ask Questions, then back again. ``I had intended to send it to \#Artemis, but I take your meaning. You know that Jonas and I have thoughts on an appropriate level of discomfort and danger within a society in order to maintain stability. A system that restricts violence by mechanics such as these may—and that is a very big `may'—speak to one that falls below that acceptable threshold for us.''
+
+``\,`Pain, anxiety, the need for something greater, these are all essential for survival. Without them, the world would be an impossibly dangerous place', you mean.'' Codrin quoted.
+
+She laughed. ``Indeed. You may thank Jonas for that one. That they may disagree with this could say a lot about them. If they have somehow moved past the need for pain and anxiety, we will have much to learn. If they object to it on moral grounds, we must be wary.''
+
+Tycho watched the exchange with mounting confusion before making note of yet another thing to ask Codrin about over break.

neviim/content/local/tycho/011.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,103 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahecastor-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 1 day, 3 hours, 13 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent Tycho had spent his share of time in conferences, both phys-side and sys-side. They all came with their exciting parts and their boring parts. They all came with peaks that left him completely rapt, and valleys that were so excruciatingly dull that he had, on more than one occasion, feigned illness to step out of a talk or away from a panel discussion or a lecture.
+
+This was different, though.
+
+It wasn't that it didn't have its peaks and valleys, for it surely did. There were more sciences, he had been reminded several times, than astronomy. He knew it, too. There was no reason that the LVs and home System would not benefit from a knowledge share on biology or psychology, and certainly there could be much to learn about the construction of an embedded world. All that knowledge, all that history—so many centuries!—was enough to convince him of the reality of the Artemisians, or at least enough that he could drown out that niggling voice in the back of his head thinking in terms of dreams. There was more than enough to learn, so that wasn't it.
+
+It was that, even during the boring parts, there was Stolon sitting directly across the table from him, the thirdracer looking just as antsy and restless as he felt, even though it was only the third day. He knew that he and Stolon could talk for hours about the stars, that they would if only given the chance, and yet he had to sit here and, however rightfully so, listen to Why Ask Questions grill the Artemisians on parallel evolution.
+
+Throughout the talks, no matter the science, there lay a thread of five thousand years of history. Hundreds of years would go by, and then a sudden jump in knowledge. Biology, language, astronomy, psychology, physics; sciences hard and soft would wind up with sudden injections of knowledge throughout each of the convergences.
+
+\emph{Except,} he kept finding himself thinking. \emph{That's not all.}
+
+It would be of no surprise for a sudden leap of knowledge to occur every handful of decades. Some new way of looking at the world brought about by some spurt of genius, even in the functionally immortal.
+
+What was surprising was these renaissances in \emph{all} sciences that had happened a total of five times that he'd counted so far. Three for convergences—that made sense—but what of the other two?
+
+This wasn't supposed to be his job. This wasn't supposed to be any of their jobs, here in the DMZ. History as a topic belonged to the emissaries sent to Artemis. He'd only started asking how long ago various tidbits of knowledge had been gained on a whim.
+
+And so he sat and he waited until there was a time that he could speak, and even when he probably should have been paying attention, he spent much of his effort on trying to figure out how best to word his question in such a way that wouldn't get him in trouble with the Artemisians or, worse, True Name.
+
+His cue came in the form of Why Ask Questions racking her sheets of notes into a neat pile before slouching back in her chair.
+
+``I have a quick question about science in general, if I may,'' he said, preempting comments from any of the others.
+
+True Name frowned, nodded.
+
+``It'll come in the form of an astronomy question, but bear with me. Can you tell me a bit more about your path from firstrace's home world to our system?''
+
+Stolon sat up straighter, head tilting far to the side in what Tycho had decided was a sort of intense interest. ``Artemis comes from firstrace system, aims for nearest stable star, performs, \emph{lu}\ldots gravity assists and extra maneuvers, solar sail, magnetic \emph{irr}\ldots{}'' After a moment's silenced discussion with the other Artemisians, they returned with, ``Magnetic field hydrogen collector—you call `fuel scoop' maybe?—and then final adjustments to next prospective star.''
+
+``And how many times has Artemis performed this act?''
+
+``Seven times, scientist Tycho Brahe,'' Turun Ko said.
+
+``Three of which were convergences, yes?''
+
+``\emph{Anem, anem,} scientist Tycho Brahe,'' Stolon said. ``I only was\ldots{}\emph{suhernachi\ldots lu\ldots{}} living-embedded for third convergence, but yes, three convergences.''
+
+``Okay,'' he said, pausing to compose his next sentence carefully. ``As we talk about the way that we learn, I've heard of more than three jumps in scientific knowledge during the millennia that Artemis has been travelling. Do these maneuvers around systems\ldots I don't know, make everyone curious enough to start doing a bunch of research?''
+
+Until this point, True Name looked as though she were about to nudge Tycho to move on to the next topic, perhaps sensing that he was veering closer to history, but as he finished his question and the Artemisians set up a cone of silence for a very animated discussion, he could see nothing but intense focus on the skunk's face. Even Codrin and Why Ask Questions were furiously scribbling notes at this point.
+
+Sarah gave him a grin and a subtle nod. It was nearly five minutes before the cone of silence around the Artemisians dropped, during which he'd received nods of approval from the rest of the delegates as well.
+
+\emph{Looks like I asked the right thing,} he thought, doing his best to tamp down the sense of pride that had begun to grow within him. They were all here for a job, and when that job is learning, there are no right questions, just on-topic ones.
+
+``You are correct, scientist Tycho Brahe,'' Turun Ka said once the cone dropped. ``Though it is less that curiosity intensifies during these maneuvers than there are more observations to be made when passing near a star. We learn astronomy and physics, yes, which slowly bleeds across sciences. Physics impacts Artemis's hardware, so our technicians learn from that. Our hardware impacts our experience, and so sciences surrounding individual and collective consciousness-bearing entities benefits from that.''
+
+All five of the delegates took notes as quickly as they could while the firstracer spoke. Tycho made a note to himself to ask what sorts of things they tended to learn when passing close to a star, as well as a note to ask Tycho\#Artemis to bring up similar on Artemis, focusing instead on the history of their course.
+
+True Name leaned forward enough to catch Why Ask Questions's gaze, sharing a meaningful look. Codrin frowned, scratched out another note in eir notebook.
+
+``Leader Turun Ka,'' True Name said with a hint of a bow. ``Thank you for your answer. Would you be amenable to a short break? I would like to sync up with our delegation.''
+
+The firstracer lifted its chin in assent and those around the table stood, exchanging bows before making their way each to their own rest area.
+
+Once they'd made it around the corner into the common area, the skunk grinned at Tycho. ``Good catch, Dr.~Brahe.''
+
+``I was a little surprised, myself. That gives us a good idea of their speed and perhaps their traj--''
+
+``Shut up, Tycho,'' Why Ask Questions said, laughing. ``We will get to all the delicious science you could ask for soon enough. Your question went more than a little beyond that.''
+
+He frowned. ``What? How?''
+
+True Name patted him on the arm. ``Do not mind her, my dear. It was a good question because it suggests to the sneaky pieces of shit among us that they might be being sneaky, themselves. Come, let us sit so I can write to True Name\#Artemis.''
+
+Once they'd sat down at the common table, the skunk explained. ``They have all of the time in the world over there, do they not? They can speed up and slow down whenever they want, and use that to get all of the heavy lifting of thinking and studying and lecturing done even when they are around a star, never mind when they are out between them, yes?''
+
+He nodded. ``But their observations--''
+
+``Are limited to when they are near something interesting to observe, yes, but they can spend as long as they want with those observations, poring over their views of the star or measurements from external instruments. They are not time-bound for those. In fact, the only times that they seem to be time-bound are when it comes to interaction with other time-bound events.''
+
+``Well, sure,'' he hazarded. ``But perhaps they turn off the ability to skew when they perform an assist or something. We didn't get the chance to ask them any more questions.''
+
+``We will, do not worry,'' she said, mumbling as she dashed off a few more lines on her note, handed the slip off to Codrin, then turned to face him, paws folded on the table before her. ``But they are also time-bound talking with us who are not able to utilize time skew, correct?''
+
+Tycho crossed his arms and slouched back in the chair, staring up at the ceiling. ``Well, shit.''
+
+Codrin laughed. ``You see then why it was a good question?''
+
+``They didn't say anything one way or another,'' Sarah said. ``So you could very well be right, Tycho, but you saw their silenced conversation.''
+
+``Even that could be them trying to figure out how best to tell us what they did, though,'' he retorted, though even he could tell his heart wasn't in it.
+
+``All of these facts are interesting,'' Why Ask Questions said. ``Even if that is all they did, even if they do only turn off skew for slingshots. We are sold on it no matter what. When you take the facts together as a whole, however, those of us with a sense for it can catch the scent of politics in there.''
+
+``Sneaky pieces of shit, you mean?''
+
+True Name laughed. ``Yes, those. You lack the sense, Dr.~Brahe. Codrin has seen it, Ms.~Genet can sense it second-hand. We need someone like you to play the role of earnest seeker-after-knowledge.''
+
+He rolled his eyes. ``Or gullible dupe.''
+
+``A very smart gullible dupe,'' Why Ask Questions said. ``It is no shame to be a gullible dupe, Tycho. You ask the things we never think to because we are too busy being sneaky pieces of shit.''
+
+``Well, I'll leave the politics to you all,'' he said, grinning and shaking his head. ``I'm going to write my own note while we have a bit of time.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/012.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,107 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahecastor-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe\#Castor — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-minus 1 day, 2 hours, 28 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent ``This has\ldots wait, don't leave yet, \#Assist,'' Codrin said. ``Is this really an eyes-only message for both True Name \emph{and} Turun Ka?''
+
+Both Sarah and Tycho sat up straighter.
+
+Ey shrugged, saying only, ``It appears Codrin\#Artemis has instructed the Artemisians on how to relay such in turn. I guess ey did a while back, actually, but this is the first time they've taken advantage of it. Or, well\ldots{}'' Ey trailed off.
+
+``Hard to tell how much time has passed up there?'' Codrin\#Castor asked.
+
+``Yeah, haven't the faintest. Anyway, I'm not sure how you want to pass it over. I figured a separate sheet would be easiest and you can decide from there. The news from \#Artemis seems mostly to be about the Odists, so perhaps that's what Turun Ka is getting. True Name has her own message in here.'' Ey nodded over to the skunk, handing her a separate sheet
+
+Both of the Odists, having claimed the other table in order to have their own hushed conversation quickly moved over to rejoin the other three. They all watched as ey frowned, nodded, and skimmed quickly over the letter addressed to em.
+
+Eir frown deepened. ``Thanks. Here, hold on--'' Ey quickly jotted \emph{Message received, passed on, more soon, updates from others?} on a slip of foolscap and handed it to the other Codrin. ``Send this for now, just so we're on the same page at as close to the same time as we can manage.''
+
+``Whatever that means,'' ey said, laughing and pocketing the slip. Ey prodded em in the shoulder and added, ``Dear threatened to beat me up because of you, so thanks for that.''
+
+Codrin\#Castor smirked. ``Well, did it?''
+
+``No, of course not.''
+
+``Just have to pull harder, then.'' Ey sighed and shook eir head. ``Self-deprecating humor aside, tell them I miss them.''
+
+Ey nodded. ``Of course.''
+
+``I'll see them soon enough, I guess. A few weeks, tops, though at this rate, I'm guessing only a matter of days. Tell--''
+
+``Mx.~Bălan,'' True Name said, nodding to the writer. ``Please come with us. We have only a few minutes to sort this out before we start, and if you are correct about Turun Ka receiving similar information, I would like to plan.''
+
+Ey shrugged to Tycho and Sarah and stood to follow the two Odists to True Name's partitioned rest area. Codrin\#Assist stepped from the sim and back to Castor proper.
+
+``What do you suppose that was about?'' Tycho asked, setting up a cone of silence around himself and Sarah.
+
+``Best guess? More about how they're struggling with the time skew over there. Maybe something specific happened, and that's why everybody's gotten messages all at once.''
+
+He nodded, sighed, and rubbed over his face with a hand. For as little as was actually happening, he was incredibly tired. Conferences were always like this, felt like.
+
+``Well, neither of us got anything, and it's not worth speculating, especially since I figure we will learn soon enough,'' she said. ``I'll start to sound like a broken record before long, but how are you feeling about how things are going?''
+
+``Uh, well, much the same, I guess. I'm pretty sure they're real, now,'' he said, laughing tiredly. ``It's been interesting seeing what we know that they don't. Far less than what they've been teaching us, though.''
+
+``Oh?''
+
+He smiled lopsidedly. ``True Name cornered me when this whole thing began and quoted some poetry at me that got me in mind of keeping track of all this. Something about how we may sit humbly at each others' feet while the other shares their later sciences.''
+
+``I can never pick apart when she's being blunt or subtle.''
+
+``Well, she followed it up with, `That is a poem about death. Please understand that there is risk here, as well' so, maybe it was a bit of both.''
+
+Sarah laughed. ``Well, okay. I'll grant you that. Sounds like working with her has been kind of an adventure. You've had more experience than I.''
+
+``It hasn't been too bad, all told. She's been nothing but polite, and sometimes even nice. It's hardly been a bad time. I think the biggest block has actually been squaring what I'm experiencing with what I'd assumed about her from the \emph{History}.''
+
+``She didn't exactly come off as kind or polite in there, no.''
+
+``Codrin mentioned something about that, about how they wanted the \emph{History} released but wanted to control how. Ey said that she'd acted as dramatic as she had in order to make the end result seem more sensational than realistic.~`Shaping the narrative,' she called it.''
+
+Sarah laughed. ``Well, I'd certainly call \emph{that} subtle.''
+
+``Right,'' he said, grinning. ``So I guess it's kind of making me reassess how I feel about them.''
+
+``The Odists?''
+
+``Them too, but I was thinking more the \emph{History} and \emph{Mythology}. Like, if they're the product of social engineering to make them sound worse than they are to achieve a goal other than what Codrin, Ioan, and May Then My Name intended, then it's probably worth me actually paying attention to how things\pagebreak~really are. That, and how they're engineering what's going on here.''
+
+``Sure, that makes sense,'' Sarah said, sitting back with her hands folded in her lap. ``I can pick up little bits and pieces of her and Why Ask Questions trying to nudge things this way or that, with mixed results. It's giving me a new appreciation for what Codrin does, honestly. Ey's got maybe the hardest job of us all.''
+
+Tycho nodded. ``I don't envy em that. Ey told me at the beginning that I'd be doing the same in my own way—listening and coming away from this with a more complete picture—and I think I lack the experience ey has, both the training as an amanuensis and from living with an Odist.''
+
+``They're cute together, though. Pulling Dear's tail sounds like a recipe for disaster, but I guess if you've been together for forty years or whatever, you can get away with it.''
+
+He laughed and shook his head. ``Yeah, no way. Never really was my thing, so I have no idea how it all works.''
+
+``What's that?''
+
+``Relationships. Never really got into them, so the banter is cute to watch, but just as over my head as all of the politicking.''
+
+Sarah nodded. ``They're not for everyone, especially here, where you have the problem of perpetuity.''
+
+``Precisely,'' Tycho said. ``I can't imagine being around one person or group of people for forty years and still expect to do so for a hundred more.''
+
+``To be fair, neither can I,'' she said, laughing.
+
+After a suitable pause, he nudged the subject back toward the previous topic. ``Has your opinion of the \emph{History} changed at all?''
+
+``A little, I suppose. A lot of the dramatic interactions felt like just that: drama. It's the type of thing that I'm attuned to, based on my work. The Odists have a flair for that, though, which I guess makes sense, given where they came from.'' She paused, gaze drifting off towards nothing. ``I guess if my opinion has changed, it's been to understand just how deep it all goes. Not the behind the scenes stuff, that's whatever, but their control over themselves. True Name especially. Control like that is often used to cover fear and trauma.''
+
+``It kind of makes me wonder--''
+
+Tycho was cut off from the rest of his sentence by Codrin stepping into his field of view outside the cone and waving. He dropped the silence.
+
+``Sorry, you two. Time to head back.''
+
+``Everything alright? You look\ldots I don't know, like you were just put through the wringer.''
+
+Ey smiled weakly, shaking eir head. ``Not me, no. I'm very tired, though, and I imagine things are only going to get more stressful over the next few hours.''
+
+``Why? What--''
+
+``I'm sorry, Tycho, I really do want to answer your questions, but we just don't have time.''

neviim/content/local/tycho/013.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-braheartemis-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe\#Artemis — 2346}\label{tycho-braheartemis-2346}}
+
+Steals time with Stolon on break, joined by Iska and Sarah, talk about joining Artemis, what races have learned from each other re: science.

neviim/content/local/tycho/014.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,170 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahe-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-plus 1 day, 21 hours, 38 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent The process of leaving the talks was one of emotion bound up in the stress of merging. As unpracticed as he was at forking, the process of quitting and reconciling memories was just as foreign to him. Ordinarily it would have taken an hour for Tycho\#Castor to sort through the memories from Tycho\#Artemis and then another two for Tycho\#Tasker to sort through the memories from \#Artemis for a few weeks' divergence.
+
+These were not ordinary times.
+
+The better part of eight hours later, he was singular once more, back in his field, back atop his hill, finally able to sit and think and dream without having the pressing weight of memories pinning him in place. He could lay on his back and look up at the sky—no longer just his sky—and think about all that had transpired and all that was yet to come.
+
+At least for a little while.
+
+He didn't know why the arrival ping did not wake him from his daydreaming, but the gunshot sound of a champagne cork popping was more than enough to get him to jolt upright.
+
+``Sorry, Tycho,'' True Name said, laughing. ``That was far louder than intended. I did not mean to startle you.''
+
+He frowned, shook his head. ``It's okay. I wasn't expecting you, though,'' he said, holding out one of the red-filtered flashlights that were permanently lodged in his pockets.
+
+The skunk accepted the light and knelt on the grass beside him, holding it between sharp-looking teeth as she poured two glasses of champagne.
+
+Well, `glasses'; they were shaped more like wide-brimmed, stemmed bowls than anything, somewhat awkward to hold, but then he remembered similar from the dinner party three weeks ago—so many years ago, it felt like—when the skunk and her cocladist, Dear, had lapped at their wine.
+
+He shared a secret smile with himself as he accepted his coupe glass of champagne.
+
+She removed the light from between her teeth and clicked it off again, touching the rim of her glass to Tycho's before taking a lapping sip. ``To the end of that fucking mess.''
+
+He laughed as much as he felt was required to be polite and then took his own sip. \emph{Why is she here?} he thought, racing through a list of the day's actions, hunting for anything that might lead to a visit. He was, he realized, still wary of her, despite the memories of her struggling, of her confusion, her tears. Despite all her small kindnesses.
+
+After all, hadn't she chided them on the \emph{History} being a `very sensational book'?
+
+The silence drew out. He looked up at the stars and thought about just how much bigger the universe felt now. \emph{I feel every minute of that eternity,} Dear had said back at that same dinner. \emph{I feel every molecule of that universe.}
+
+And he did, now. He felt it all as something more real than it had ever felt before. The math now stood side by side with awe in a way that it had only ever eclipsed before.
+
+``Do you know how old I am, Tycho Brahe?'' True Name said into that silence. ``I am 222 years old, a fork of an individual who is\ldots who would be 259 years old.''
+
+He waited in silence. There seemed to be more to come, so he enjoyed his champagne meanwhile. It was quite good.
+
+``I have learned many habits, and I have dropped countless others. Perhaps that growth is our protection from unceasing memory. We may retain our memories of concrete events, of who we must have been, but I am no longer the True Name of 2124. Even remembering her feels like remembering an old friend. I remember her perfectly, and yet I do not remember how to be as earnest. I do not remember how to simply celebrate. I do not know how to simply \emph{be.}''
+
+Silence fell again while they both looked up to the sky. Nothing needed to be said right away, he figured. Something Codrin had said, though he didn't remember when: \emph{silences come with their own rhythms and will break when it's time.}
+
+Once he heard the clink of champagne bottle against glass again, True Name pouring herself some more, he said, keeping his voice as kind as he could, ``Why are you telling me this? Why are you here?''
+
+She laughed, set the bottle aside and shifted from her kneeling position to more of a lounge, hips canted to the side with her tail draped down the gentle slope of the hill. ``I do not know, Tycho. I do not remember how to celebrate, but I still want to try, I guess. Fifthrace! I could never have imagined.'' After another few laps at her champagne, she sighed and added, ``Sarah has gone with Codrin to Dear's, and I am not welcome there. Answers Will Not Help and Why Ask Questions are in conversation with another me. Jonas is\ldots Jonas. Another me is talking with him and Turun Ka.''
+
+``So you came to me, of all people.''
+
+He was startled away from looking at the sky by the sound of a sniffle from the skunk.
+
+``I'm sorry, True Name. That was--''
+
+``No, you are right, Tycho. I know what I am and how I became that,'' she said, voice thick. ``But I am feeling every one of my 259 years tonight. I just wanted to be with someone. Just\ldots be, you know? Exist with\pagebreak~someone without having some sort of agenda other than to celebrate something big.''
+
+``But you don't know how?''
+
+``I do not know how, yes.''
+
+After a moment, he raised his glass, and the stars glinting off the rim clued the skunk in enough to once again clink hers with it. ``Champagne under the stars is a good start, I guess.''
+
+She laughed. ``That it is, my dear.''
+
+``I can't speak to your thoughts on not knowing how to be. I don't think I'm any better at it, honestly. Sarah would probably be your best bet.''
+
+``I will be meeting with her soon, yes. We have much to talk about.''
+
+``About the convergence?''
+
+She shrugged, a subtle shifting of shadow. ``That too, yes, but also, news from the three Systems has been distressing. Much of the clade will be seeking\ldots well, therapy.''
+
+He frowned up to the sky, unable to think of anything to say to that that would not sound rude or patronizing.
+
+``Our cracks are showing,'' the skunk continued in a far-away voice. ``Growth is colliding with eternal memory, and the cracks are showing.''
+
+He nodded, unsure of whether or not she could even see the gesture.
+
+``Turns out getting invited on a thousand year voyage with a bunch of aliens induces a whole lot of growth \emph{really fast,}'' she said, voice brightening. ``So I will be dealing with that. But come, if I share any more of my weaknesses, I will lose all of my hard-won respect. How do you feel about how things went?''
+
+With that bit of humor, the walls were back up. The perfect self-deprecating comment brought back that tightly controlled voice. He felt a sudden sense of\ldots honor, perhaps? He felt lucky that he'd been able to see some more vulnerable side of her, and he quelled the voice within him shouting that that was all a stage play for his benefit. Even she was allowed vulnerability.
+
+``I'm not totally sure, yet,'' he admitted. ``There was so much that I needed to deal with when I merged that it took me all day to do so, and I'm still trying to make sense of it all.''
+
+A slight rustle beside him indicated a nod from the skunk. ``No kidding. You have seen how easily we fork and merge, so it might be telling that it took me nearly thirty minutes to even manage the merge from True Name\#Artemis.''
+
+He winced. ``I was wondering how that'd go.''
+
+``Rough,'' she said after a moment. ``As soon as I got back to Castor, I immediately felt better, but no less tired. My memories of my time aboard Artemis are only just barely coherent. They are fractured and scattered. I could tell a clear story of our time there from start to finish, but much beyond that eludes me still.''
+
+Tycho set aside his empty glass and stretched out on the grass, laying on his back once more, arms crossed beneath his head. ``I was worried about that, yeah. I can't speak to the ease of merging, but I'm glad you made it through all the same.''
+
+He could hear the grin in her voice as she said, ``I am pleased to hear that. The distance between `we are coworkers and should act as such while at work' and `I do not actually like you but have to tolerate you' is rather small, and I could not tell which it was with you.''
+
+``I like you,'' he said, laughing at her easy humor. ``You're a little terrifying, but I respect you.''
+
+``Doubly pleased, then.''
+
+``How do you feel things went?''
+
+``As well as they could have,'' she said, the answer coming readily. ``The talks were peaceful, the instances of mutual incomprehension minimal, and the outcome amenable to both sides.''
+
+``I think I hear a `but' coming.''
+
+He could see the shadow of her nod. ``Yes. But also, there are some aspects of them that I personally do not understand, and that is uncomfortable to me. They say that they do not manage sentiment or use much in the way of subtlety, they say they do not steer, and I believe them in that this is usually the case for them, but I disagree with the assessment that their checklist was a matter of preparation. They had goals coming into this convergence, and while I am pleased that they largely aligned with ours, I am unnerved by the fact that they either do not understand the ways in which they steer or, more likely, refuse to admit such. The two failed convergences they only ever talked around show this quite well. You have heard our thoughts on the utility of social pain in maintaining defense mechanisms, after all.''
+
+``Are you frustrated, perhaps?''
+
+There was a moment's pause as the skunk shifted to lay down beside him. ``I suppose. Frustrated, a bit sad.''
+
+``Sad?''
+
+``Do you remember what the Bălans wrote about me and Jonas in regards to the Launch project?''
+
+``That your aim was for stability and continuity.''
+
+``Yes. There is a self-serving aspect to this, as there must always be.'' She sighed, and he heard her shrug against the mossy ground. ``The Artemisians and I share a goal of continued existence. I am pleased that we as a whole have been invited to share in that. I would call that a success.''
+
+``But you won't be able to join them, \emph{anem?}''
+
+She laughed. ``Practicing?''
+
+``I guess,'' he admitted. ``I want to get used to the language.''
+
+``A good idea. But yes, \emph{anem.} I will not be able to join them. I will not share in that particular form of immortality. I could join for the individual continuity, but not the individual stability.''
+
+``It didn't look like a pleasant time for you.''
+
+``It was not, no. I doubt that any Odist will join them.''
+
+A slow silence played, then, as they both looked up to the guesses at stars. The mention of information exchange that was to follow the convergence left him with a hope that some aspect of their library of technical know-how would allow a modification of the sim to lead to actual visual input from the telescopes to show, since the Artemisians could apparently access audiovisual data from within their system just fine.
+
+``How are you feeling, my dear?''
+
+He spoke dreamily, feeling far off, far away from this hilltop, from True Name and all her subtle unhappiness. ``I'm on the cusp of something big. I don't know what it is yet, and I don't know why I know it, but I'm on the very edge of it.''
+
+``Looking forward to sending an instance along with them?''
+
+``Yeah, I think that's a good bit of it. I'm finally looking forward to something. I'm finally eager, rather than just anxious.''
+
+She laughed, not unkindly. ``I am happy for you, Dr.~Brahe.''
+
+``Thank you.''
+
+The skunk sighed, and he was pleased to hear more contentment than frustration in the sound. ``What do you think now? Are they real, or are we dreaming them?''
+
+``I don't think it matters,'' he said after a long pause.
+
+``No?''
+
+``No. Even if they're a dream, I'll join them. Even if this was all a dream, I'm happy to have been a part of it.''
+
+``And have you any further thoughts on uploading as the stage of civilization most likely to breach the Great Filter?'' She sounded earnest, almost excited. It made him happy to hear, made him excited in turn. ``I must confess that the thought has been lingering in the back of my mind since our last conversation here. Old sci-fi dreams dog me still.''
+
+``Oh, definitely feeling like I'm stuck in some crazy science fiction novel,'' he said. ``Uploading, furries, launch vehicles, and now aliens? At this point, why not? It makes as much sense as any of this.''
+
+She chuckled. ``Well said, my dear.''
+
+When next she spoke, True Name sounded almost as dreamy as he had, her voice holding the subtle cadence of a recitation. ``Calmest coldness was the error which has crept into our life; But your spirit is untainted, I can dedicate you still To the service of our science: you will further it? You will!''
+
+He spent a moment searching the perisystem architecture for the poem True Name had been quoting from since he first met her, the one with the lines that he knew he would speak before he left, but was not yet ready to.
+
+\emph{That is a poem about death,} she had said, all those weeks—and yet so few!—ago, and as he prowled through the lines, he could see how it was that she had interpreted it, how she had seen in the words the danger of being left incomplete in one's goals, of the risk of not being able to see something through to the end.
+
+He was nothing if not a scientist, though, and although her reading, as one who dreamed in her own ways, was as accurate as his, he knew he had his own understanding of leaving a work unfinished so that others could pick it up. That was his dream, the dream of so many calm, cold scientists before him. It was a different take on the same dream, perhaps; where True Name might see regret in that error of calmest coldness, he saw only the comforting truth of his later science.
+
+Or perhaps that coldness was her own, and for that he could not fault her regret, only wish her the best in finding future warmth, only further his service to his science.
+

neviim/content/local/tycho/015.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,107 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahe-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-plus 4 days, 20 hours, 18 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent ``Who's idea was this?'' Tycho asked, staring, unbelieving, at the heat-haze shimmer before him.
+
+True Name grinned proudly. ``A cocladist of mine came up with this. I would not recommend walking past the barrier. It is dreadfully hot beyond there, even for a desert creature such as her.''
+
+He shook his head, looking once more from the ground to the sky. They stood on a well trimmed lawn at the edge of a forest, the shade provided by lingering oaks and birches delightfully cool amid the just-shy-of-too-warm day. The grass continued right up to a shimmering barrier of heat, where it quickly failed, a no-man's-land of scrub lasting only a few feet before it fell away into sand. Deep desert stretched out as far as he could see before him. Rolling dunes, painfully blue skies, mirages dancing along the horizon.
+
+So extreme was the temperature differential in so small a space that the barrier between the two, that shimmer of heat-haze, appeared to be a very literal wall extending as far as he could see in either direction, though after a few dozen yards, the forest crept right up to the barrier once more, impossibly dense, impassible.
+
+And there, right in the middle of the clearing, crouched flush against the wall of heat, sat a low tollbooth. There was a glass-walled cubicle, large enough for one person to sit on a stool, huddling beneath a canopy, a small A/C unit gasping and rattling atop it. A red and white striped gate blocked a concrete sidewalk leading directly into the desert.
+
+The whole affair was dusty and tired, as though it had weathered a hundred sandstorms and would doubtless weather a hundred more, though it would never be truly clean again.
+
+To the side of the tollbooth, straddling the border, a squat, flat building sat, fronted by a sign declaring it to be `Customs — Please Use Other Door'. From the roof, an aged radio tower reached toward the sky: a narrow pyramid of angle-iron painted in that same red and white. A light flashed sleepily at the top.
+
+``You guys are really weird, you know that, right?''
+
+True Name gave a flourish of a bow, laughing. ``Of course, my dear. You will go through customs soon, but until then, please follow me.''
+
+The skunk led him up to the gate beside the tollbooth—a peek inside showed the hazy form of an older gentleman dozing within, chin resting on his chest. The gate lifted automatically, and when they walked through, there was the briefest rush of heat, the haze of the barrier washing over them like a waterfall, enough to dazzle the eyes so that they arrived at the courtyard he knew so well by now as though through a dream.
+
+The space had been subtly re-structured, repurposed from a conference space to a small, comfortable plaza. The cloistered walk remained, as did the fountain, but the plaza itself had been made much larger, the trees spaced further apart, and comfortable seating of diverse shape spread throughout.
+
+``This will be the entryway that those arriving to the DMZ will see,'' True Name said. ``It is intended to be an area where the newly arrived can orient themselves, but also one that will be pleasant for those who have visited before. We are working with a few sim architects from Artemis to introduce some mixed aspects of greenery and architecture to make it feel familiar to all five races.''
+
+``Are we going to keep calling it the DMZ?''
+
+She shook her head. ``That would not be a good look, no. We have a short list of names that we are in the process of workshopping. The current top of the list is simply Convergence, though `Gemini' and simply `the shared space' are also in the list.''
+
+He shook his head. ``Gemini doesn't fit. Tyndareus, if you want to stick with the Castor and Pollux names, but that'd make more sense for Lagrange. I like Convergence best.''
+
+``Convergence it is, then,'' the skunk said, chuckling and gesturing him toward a shaded bench. ``Beyond this area, however, there is not much else. We have a smaller version of our compound already ported over, and I am pleased that you have agreed to let us bring your field over.''
+
+Tycho sat on the bench and leaned back against it, looking out into the plaza. ``Nothing else, though?''
+
+``Not yet. The border will open officially later today to members of both Castor and Artemis. The passage into Convergence from Castor will be rate-limited throughout this process. We will ensure that this area does not beggar the rest of the System for capacity, as we were informed during the conference that the Artemisians all take up a bit more space than we do, as should probably be expected by five-thousand year old consciousnesses. Still, we are not hurting for space.''
+
+``Yeah, though thankfully they're not carrying around an entire five millennia of memory.''
+
+``Very true,'' she said. She gestured to the space before them, willing a small table into being, along with two glasses of iced tea, one of which she took for herself.
+
+He took his own glass and sipped. It was quite good.
+
+``Are you excited to join them, then?''
+
+He sat in silence, drinking his tea and looking at nothing in particular from the dappled shade. Too many thoughts crowded his head, none of them worth thinking, and once again, an idea sat within his gut, demanding to be spoken. He savored it intentionally, rather than shying away from it as he had the last one. The feeling of these decisions was becoming familiar. \emph{Trust your gut} indeed.
+
+``Tycho?''
+
+``I'm going to invest fully.''
+
+True Name blinked several times as she processed the statement, then grinned wide. ``I would call that excited, yes. I am very happy for you.''
+
+``I don't know where the decision came from,'' he said, speaking slowly. ``I \emph{am} excited, yeah, but this just sort of came to me fully formed, like I'd made the decision before even thinking about it.''
+
+``It need not make sense. I am in no way surprised that you have made that decision, whether it was conscious or not. We will miss you, Dr.~Brahe.''
+
+He smiled to the skunk and nodded. ``Thanks. I'll miss you too. I'll miss all of Castor.''
+
+``No, you will not.''
+
+The phrase came at him like a blow to the stomach, and it was his turn to sit in silence.
+
+``I think you will miss some people here. A handful of coworkers. What few friends you have admitted to having. Me, perhaps, as you say. But you will not miss Castor.''
+
+``Well, huh.''
+
+She shrugged. ``This is why I am happy for you, my dear. You do not seem content with the life you wound up with. It is okay to want to leave unhappiness behind.''
+
+He nodded. ``I suppose it is. Even then, I think most of my coworkers and friends are coming along with. Sarah will be there. Dr.~Verda will be there. It sounds like even Codrin will join us for a time.''
+
+``I was surprised to learn that, as well,'' True Name said, leaning back against the bench with her tail canted to the side. ``Ey has come to eir own decision, though. It makes sense for one such as em to send along a fork.''
+
+``Right. I'm sorry that you and Why Ask Questions or Answers Will Not Help will not be joining us. It'd be nice to have the emissaries together there.''
+
+``We will visit once more before Artemis leaves effective Ansible range, but no, we will not stay.''
+
+``Well, as I said, I'll miss you.''
+
+She bowed her head in acknowledgement, ears splayed.
+
+``And you'll get to meet your fair share of Artemisians here, as well.''
+
+She nodded, smiling once more. ``I will, yes. We will still have plenty to do, even if we do not remain aboard Artemis. We will visit there, and it sounds like some of them will visit here and not remain. Codrin has talked Dear into giving one of its performances in Convergence so that Iska may see, though they will not remain here.''
+
+``Oh? Did it say whether it would try to see one of their performances aboard Artemis?''
+
+``It was undecided, last I heard.''
+
+``And the other delegates?''
+
+True Name looked thoughtful. ``I have not spoken with them since they left. My guess is that Turun Ka and Stolon will join. I know that Iska will not. I do not know about Turun Ko, but I would say that there is a good chance of it and Artante joining.''
+
+``Stolon said they would join, yeah,'' he said. ``They want to make sure that they get to see more of the galaxy, and will happily spread themself out to do so. We'll still remain in contact with Artemis for years after the Ansible connection closes.''
+
+``You will not be able to see the galaxy from here, if you do not remain. Are you okay with that?''
+
+``Yeah,'' he said after a long pause. ``I think I am.''
+
+They sat in quiet, then, finishing their drinks and then watching the ice melt in the mellow warmth of the day.

neviim/content/local/tycho/016.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,93 @@
+\hypertarget{tycho-brahe-2346}{%
+\chapter{Tycho Brahe — 2346}}
+\markboth{Tycho Brahe — 2346}{}
+
+\begin{center}
+\emph{Convergence T-plus 49 days, 5 hours, 57 minutes}
+\end{center}
+
+\noindent ``I don't own a suit, and while I could have picked one up, it seemed like too much work for the occasion,'' Tycho said once the clock struck eight and he'd stood from his seat at the head of the table. ``So the usual jeans and flannel it is.''
+
+Those gathered laughed.
+
+They'd claimed a portion of the plaza for his last dinner, setting up a long table not too dissimilar from that which they'd sat at for the conference. He stood at one end, and at the other True Name sat, smiling and watching him rise for his speech. To his right sat Codrin and eir two partners, both of whom had spent much of the evening conversing with each other and the few scientists who sat to his left and the Artemisians beyond. He'd not missed the fact that they seemed to be ignoring the other three Odists as best they could other than to accept praise for the food they'd cooked for the occasion.
+
+Those scientists included Dr.~Verda and several of his other colleagues who had served as on-duty astronomer for Castor throughout the long years.
+
+Beyond them, to either side of the table, sat a gaggle of Artemisians. Both Turun Ka and Turun Ko were there, despite not partaking in the meal. Stolon and Iska sat across from them and had both tried the various dishes to greater or lesser success. Artante Diria sat next to them across from Sarah Genet, and they had spent much of the meal talking with the quiet earnestness of those who shared a beloved profession.
+
+Beyond them, Sovanna sat across from Answers Will Not Help—a move that surely must have been intentional—and beside Jonas. Across from Jonas, Why Ask Questions sat beside the final guest, True Name.
+
+The dinner had been his idea, and the speech True Name's. He'd balked at it originally, but in the end, she'd won out, convincing him that if he was headed to a place where he could forget, making his last moments on Castor memorable should be a priority.
+
+Luckily, for all his nerves, he'd always done well at giving talks at conferences, and the two and a half glasses of wine he'd already had certainly helped.
+
+``When it was suggested that I give a little speech before I go, I was at a loss for what to talk about. I mean, I guess I could talk about the stars or something, but I've bored enough of you to death already with that, and Stolon and I will have time enough on Artemis.''
+
+The thirdracer chattered their teeth, looking pleased.
+
+``It wasn't until I realized that this would be something of a eulogy that I started getting ideas on what to talk about. I talked with Dear about it and it laughed and told me about some thoughts that it had around Launch. I didn't know any of them then, but apparently it and its partners had a Death Day party, and that's kind of what this is, isn't it? I'm dying to many of you, only to haunt you from beyond the grave with vague pronouncements about the heavens for a little while.
+
+``Once I started thinking of it that way, I was able to come up with some better words for tonight, some of which I'll blame True Name for.''
+
+The skunk raised her glass to him.
+
+``When we first heard from the Artemisians, True Name met me at my sim and quoted a snippet of poetry by Sarah Williams: `Reach me down my Tycho Brahe,—I would know him when we meet, When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet; He may know the law of all things, yet be ignorant of how We are working to completion, working on from then till now.'
+
+``See, Tycho Brahe is a name I picked for myself twenty years ago when Codrin interviewed me for the \emph{History}. Brahe was an astronomer born eight centuries ago this year. A lot of his science was bunk, but that's what the poem says, isn't it? He may know the law of all things, but we're the ones with the later science.
+
+``That stanza was quoted to me as a way of suggesting that we will learn from the later science of the Artemisians, and perhaps we'll have something to teach them as well, but also, as True Name noted, it's a poem about death, telling the final words of an astronomer to his pupil.''
+
+The mood had settled into somber, present, and while most eyes were dry, he could tell there was still sadness in there.
+
+``I won't quote the whole thing, since it's quite long, but there's a few bits that I'd like to share with you before I leave.
+
+``\,`There has been a something wanting in my nature until now; I can dimly comprehend it,—that I might have been more kind, Might have cherished you more wisely, as the one I leave behind.'
+
+``Perhaps I should have cherished you all more while I was here. I really don't know. It's not in my nature to cherish people, for better or worse, but maybe I should have cherished my time here on Castor, or even back on Lagrange, more than I did. It was still home, wasn't it? I lived here. I loved what I did. `What, for us,' Williams writes. `Are all distractions of men's fellowship and smiles? What, for us, the goddess Pleasure, with her meretricious wiles?' Pleasure came second, and the fallout of that is that I was fundamentally unhappy, and thus perhaps unable to cherish.
+
+``That's not to say that I won't miss you all. Some of you are up on Artemis already, and some more may join in these last few days before the Ansible shuts down, but no matter what, I \emph{will} miss you all.
+
+``It's just that, as the poem says, `I have sown, like Tycho Brahe, that a greater man may reap; But if none should do my reaping, 'twill disturb me in my sleep.' I'm headed off to newer places, to learn the later sciences at the feet of those who have been traveling for so long. I've done my work, though I've left it incomplete. Many of you will have much to work on to complete it. You must!
+
+``In fact, I think the only thing I'm leaving behind that is well and truly finished to my liking is my sim, and even then, it sounds like perisystem engineers are working on getting visual transmission piped in.''
+
+There were some smiles around the table, but no laughter. All were focused entirely on him, and he had to force down a wave of embarrassment at his speech.
+
+``I only have one more snippet of poetry to leave you with, something engraved on the astronomy building on campus, back phys-side. It will be my goodbye. It was the last thing I said on Earth, it'll be the last thing I say on Castor, and trust me when I say that those words made me dizzy the first time I thought of them. `Last thing I say on Castor'. I'll cease being here. I'll cease being in a place that is all—or, now, a majority—my own species. I'll cease being on anything made around our own dear Sun.
+
+``I could draw out such a goodbye, but I won't. Not more than I already have. You'll have your memories, won't you?''
+
+He lifted his half-full glass of wine to the sky and, even as the other members of the dinner began to lift theirs, downed it in two coarse swallows. ``\,`Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light. I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.'\,''
+
+Perhaps they toasted to him. Perhaps they said goodbye to him, calling out. Perhaps some of them did cry, as he knew he would if he stayed any longer.
+
+He didn't know.
+
+Before he could look, before he could listen, he set his glass down, turned on his heel and walked straight into the customs building, this entrance (one of hundreds now) temporarily off-limits for tonight's event. His event.
+
+Within, there was a small pedestal—one among thousands—that bore a plaque he'd read countless times by now: \emph{Place your hand on the pedestal below and hold it there for ten seconds. This is a \textbf{transfer process} of the current instance, so please be sure to leave a fork behind.}
+
+He did not leave a fork behind. He simply closed his eyes, put his hand on the pedestal, and waited, counting heartbeats.
+
+There it was. There was the discontinuity.
+
+There was that slippery feeling to time. There was that change in atmosphere, that change in pressure, that change in ACLs. There was that change in the way the very fabric of the world was woven.
+
+There, too, was Stolon standing just outside the gazebo that served as the arrival point from Castor. Stolon and Sorina and Iska and Turun Ka and Turun Ko and Artante; they were all there, his own small welcoming committee. Beside them stood the rest of what had become the Council of Ten, of which he was now a part. Representatives of all those aboard Artemis.
+
+And beyond them, crowds and crowds of others, milling around the plaza. Firstracers through fourthracers, and hundreds of humans—no, fifthracers, now—all of whom must still be learning their way around, being shown the ropes by the volunteer guides.
+
+He stepped out into the cool night, and, as he had slowly grown used to, let Stolon butt their head against his arm in a friendly greeting. He couldn't do the same, given the height difference, so he'd taken to bumping a fist against the thirdracer's shoulder in response.
+
+``\emph{Nahi,} Tycho.''
+
+``\emph{Nahi,} Stolon,'' he said, taking a deep breath of the now-familiar air.
+
+``It is done, \emph{anem?} It is finished?''
+
+He nodded and smiled. An earnest smile. A true smile.
+
+He'd finally done it. He'd finally done \emph{something.} This future was his. Even if it was all just a dream, it was \emph{his} dream. His dream of stars to make of it what he would.
+
+\emph{We will dream of stars,} Stolon had said, and he knew they would.