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-# True Name --- 2124
+# Codrin Bălan#Castor --- 2325
 
-The Only Time I Know My True Name Is When I Dream walked.
+While he didn't quite have the singular ability to immediately make em like him as many of the Odists seemed to, Codrin found emself immensely charmed by No Jonas.
 
-She walked from sim to sim, finding intricate ways to build up a sign, a sigil from them. Finding ways for disparate streets to connect, finding alleyways to open into deer paths, finding breathlessly exposed parks that, when a corner was turned around a tree or perhaps a low hill, might open out again into the lobbies of libraries, the shelves of which could become a hedge maze.
+"I got the short end of the stick." He laughed, gesturing Ioan into what appeared to be a living room of an apartment quite similar to the one ey had interviewed True Name in. A little less perfect, a little more lived-in. "Jonas Prime decided to name all of his instances with a syllable, I got stuck with No, of all things. I'm sure there are sillier ones, at least. We Jonas? Oi Jonas? Just call me Jonas so we don't get confused."
 
-Perhaps there was more to the sims that she walked, but she did not notice. As soon as she felt herself drawn to any one particular place, any one particular feature of any one particular sim, as soon as she began to feel anchored, she left. All of the things that people --- her people --- built passed beneath her feet, passed before her eyes.
+Codrin grinned and sat on a reasonably comfy --- if slightly ratty --- chair  across the table from the couch that Jonas flopped down onto. "I suppose there has to be some scheme for dispersionistas to use to keep track of each other that isn't just the default random string of letters and number."
 
-And all the time, her thoughts soared above her, watching her path, the steps she took. They watched all of her left turns. They viewed the sigil that her walking drew and imbued in it new meaning.
+"Of course! You know the Odists. I should've done something like that. Take an old rock song and name myself after each of the lines." He shrugged. "But no, I think they've got a lock on that idea. This one's inventive enough without being too annoying. Usually."
 
-A thought: *What dire emotional need caused one to build an office building in a place of no corporations?*
+"They do pull it off quite well," ey said, pulling out eir pen and paper. "Though some of their short names work better than others. I like Dear, and I think True Name works well as a...well, name."
 
-She stepped into that office building from the dry bed of a river, walked up two flights of stairs, and into a floor of empty cubicles. She turned at random, moving through the rows, and sat down at one of the desks and thought a while.
+"Oh? Did you talk with her?"
 
-A thought: *Why is the first instinct upon creating a wholly blank medium such as this to build in the nature we remember?*
+"Yes, she was the last Odist I interviewed, actually. At least, here on Castor. The Codrin on Pollux is interviewing others, and my down-tree instance on the System is taking yet another path. This way, we get a good spread while transmission times are short."
 
-She stepped from the cubicle and turned left, out into a rolling, open field, dotted throughout with dandelions. She bent down and picked one, twirling it between finger and thumb, then tucking it behind her ear where the yellow could shine bright amidst the black fur there.
+"How is Ioan, by the way?" Jonas asked, winking at Codrin. It was a sly enough way to let em know that he'd done his reading.
 
-She could almost feel em, sometimes, as part of the very fabric of existence within the System. Almost. A dream of a dream of her friend, always just out of reach.
+"Oh, well enough. We've all been stressed in our own ways."
 
-A thought: *Why do we drag our memories around with us like luggage?*
+"I'm sorry to hear that. I'm curious, though, in what ways do your stresses differ?"
 
-So, she walked, and as she walked, she strove to draw her thoughts in the other direction. She strove to draw them forward, away from the past, so that she could consider the future.
+Codrin tilted eir head. "Well, Codrin#Pollux recently had a dinner party with some other Secession-era people. Some from the Council of Eight, and a Yared Zerezghi, who was apparently important phys-side."
 
-What would this place look like, after seceding from the rest of the world? What would a land --- if such could be said of the System --- of those who had already seceded from the rest of humanity look like? How many would notice and rejoice? How many would notice and hate every second of it? How many would notice and not care, and how many would not even know that it had happened? That it had even been on the table?
+"Ah!" Jonas said, grinning. "How is Yared? Though I guess you weren't there."
 
-Would they build differently? Perhaps they would stop bringing along with them the structures of their pasts. Perhaps there would be fewer office buildings and more cabins in the woods. More idyllic houses. More mountain landscapes and main streets of cute towns with hole-in-the-wall restaurants that no one knew about and yet which served the best curry, the best hot dog, the best cupcakes that one could possibly imagine.
+"He sounded alright. He told a story about how he worked with politicians both here and phys-side." *About you and True Name,* Codrin thought to emself.
 
-Would they live differently, love differently? Perhaps they would still pair up as always they had. Maybe, when they picked up feelings for someone, they would fork to have a separate relationship with them as well. Maybe collectives of families would live together as they always had, finding comfort as much in each other as in their chosen relatives. Maybe a taboo would grow around having a relationship with oneself, of forked instances living together and loving each other. Would that be narcissism forever, or only before individuation? Would it be incest?
+"We spent a lot of time working together, yeah. Nice guy. Did Codrin#Pollux have much to say about Debarre and user11824?"
 
-Would they choose life? Choose death? Would they pray?
+Ey froze in the middle of eir note-taking.
 
-She knew that it would happen, of course. Secession. She shared none of Yared's dread, his pessimism. This was fine. She was the politician, he was the puppet. She saw the big picture laid out before her in her sign, her sigil. He would handle the pessimism, her the optimism.
+Jonas held up his hands. "Just a guess. Ezekiel never leaves his border of Jerusalem, the Russians are gone, and I doubt Dear would've let True Name visit."
 
-No, not optimism; surety.
+"Good guess, then. They all certainly sound interesting. Debarre seems nice, user11824 seems weird. Ey also talked to me about eir interview with Ezekiel, which was apparently quite prophetic."
 
-The bill would pass, the System would secede, the station launch would go off without a hitch. The bill could not but pass, the System was bound to secede, and the station launch was as safe as could be.
+Jonas laughed.
 
-Yared would upload, or he would not.
+"And Ioan is getting hounded by strange historians while also doing eir best to keep up with interviewing the Odists." Ey hesitated, considering whether to pass on the warning that Ioan had received from End Waking, then decided to plow ahead. "One of them told em to be careful interviewing you, that you'd control the whole thing."
 
-The DDR would care, or it would not.
+"Did he now? Well, I suppose I will. It's one of those second nature things, you know. I apologize if that sounds sinister, I promise it isn't. I do as Jonases do, just as you do as Bălans do, and that is to speak to the things that interest me. I'm just better than others at ensuring that that happens."
 
-Earth would dream of them, up there on the System, or it would not.
+Codrin nodded as ey wrote. "Alright. Are you okay if I start asking questions, then?"
 
-The only thing, the only important thing, was to ensure continuity. A continuity borne of safety, of stability, and of an intense desire not to let the System come to harm. It had to be desired, prized, cherished even by all those who stayed behind.
+"Of course, ask away."
 
-As she ruminated on this, the need to be desired as a form of stability, a memory bubbled up to the surface, spun around once, twice, and then came into focus.
+"First of all, and I'm not sure how well this applies to a dispersionista such as yourself, but did you --- No Jonas --- leave an instance back on the L<sub>5</sub> System?"
 
-A memory: *"Two thirds of our power structure still thinks child restrictions are a good enough idea that those laws have bled into Russia, too."*
+"Oh, sure. There didn't seem to be any reason not to, you know? I figure there's enough of us Jonases up here to have our fun, and plenty back down on the System to keep things interesting."
 
-Who had said that? One of the three, doubtless. They were so interchangeable.
+"Did any of you invest entirely in the Launch?"
 
-She stepped into her apartment from wherever her thoughts had taken her, and she forked off a new instance, relying on that subtle trick that Jonas had taught her, letting her reputation stay pinned to where it was.
+"Yeah, a few of the A branch did. And before you ask, plenty stayed behind, too. It was all pretty well organized. We figured out who was doing what and then followed the plan."
 
-"I suppose that makes me Do I Know God After The End Waking."
+"Was there any particular rhyme or reason to it?"
 
-She nodded.
+Jonas waved a hand vaguely. "Basically just who was specializing in what."
 
-"Someone had to wind up with the name with a typo in it, alas." The other skunk smirked.
+"Was there any danger for those who specialized in stuff back on the System coming up here?" ey asked.
 
-"Everyone gets something, yes," True Name said, plucking the duplicated dandelion from behind End Waking's ear and adding it to the one already behind hers. Two suns amidst black fur. "Let us start with some differences. I do not want you looking too much like me, so that we can work separately."
+"Terminal boredom?" He laughed. "Really, though, there's stuff that needs doing there and it's better to be efficient."
 
-End Waking nodded, thought for a moment, and then forked several times in quick succession to lead to greater and greater differences, until a new Odist stood before her, unique in so many ways. Masculine, kind-faced, dressed in a business-casual outfit that retained both the competency and friendliness that Praiseworthy had helped her attain.
+"Do you think they'll miss the excitement of the journey?"
 
-"If you think this is acceptable, we can start strategizing."
+"We all have our jobs to do, Codrin. System politics aren't like those back phys-side. There's no reason to slack off and not do your job just to have some fun when you can send a fork to do the same for you and then enjoy all those memories, right? No3 Jonas is out on a date right now, actually."
 
-True Name nodded, and the two skunks walked to her office.
+Codrin nodded as ey jotted down the answer. "I suppose it's the same as with me and Ioan. At least to an extent, the Odists also infected us with their hopeless romanticism."
 
-"So, if we are to follow the timescale that Life Breeds Life suggests, what are some good milestones that we can set for ourselves?"
+"Of course they did. That's what they're built for. A life in theatre primes one to keep a tight focus on manipulating emotions. They're all incredibly focused on stories, aren't they? All of the interesting ones, at least."
 
-"I was thinking that it would be nice to have uploading incentivized within fifty years. That would mean that by the hundredth anniversary of Secession, we would primarily be seeing uploads who knew nothing but that idea."
+"There are boring Odists?"
 
-End Waking nodded. "Probably best to begin as early as possible, yes, at least in terms of planning. I think that ensuring that the failure rate is below one percent within ten years would be good first step, followed by reducing the cost of upload by half ten years after, then half again in another decade. That gives us twenty years to work with when it comes to getting to a point of incentivization."
+Jonas shrugged. "Michelle and Sasha were boring. Those who stuck around with her or focused on their little art projects, they were pretty boring."
 
-"Alright, that sounds good. I will leave you to it, for the most part. I do not expect that there will be any news for another few years."
+Codrin frowned.
 
-The other skunk laughed. "Of course."
+"Don't get me wrong, of course. I like them all! Delightful, to the last, but I'm the dangerous politician, remember? All those I find interesting are the ones who tickle all my politician instincts. It wasn't an insult."
 
-"And, End Waking, a favor." When he nodded, she continued, "There are inquisitive minds. Always are. We already have Life Breeds Life helping on that front, but while you were talking through the timeline, I realized that it would be best if this conversation, these plans, didn't start, as far as anyone but you and me are concerned, until perhaps the 2150s."
+"Alright," ey said, quelling a low rise of anger; after all, if Dear was anything, it was one keenly focused on its art projects. "Either way, thanks for answering. The next question I had was about your involvement with both Secession and Launch. Were you involved in both?"
 
-He tilted his head. "How come?"
+"Oh, more heavily in Launch than Secession. I was forked slightly after Secession, but there was still work to be done. I did a lot of wrangling of notes, data collection, stuff like that. For Launch, I did the same, just front-loaded. It's some of the boring work that goes into politics, but work that still needs to be done."
 
-True Name smiled faintly. "I always find it surprising just how quickly one can deviate from one's down-tree instance after all that forking."
+"And in between the two?"
 
-"Of course. You have been thinking your thoughts while I have my own."
+For the first time since the interview, Jonas grinned in earnest. It was writ so plain across his face that the shift cast all of the previous smiles in doubt. "You've been getting some interesting answers to your questions, haven't you, Codrin? All of the Bălan clade has, I mean."
 
-"Yes. Well, we are quickly getting to the point where our efforts both sys- and phys-side happening all at once are reaching levels that might be considered uncomfortable in retrospect. Life Breeds Life is working on this already. If we can minimize our visible impact, then we should do so. Same date for the Council, same date for Jonas, same date for other Odists."
+"Why do you ask?" ey said, digging eir heels to keep from being dragged into a defensive stance.
 
-"Mm, probably a good idea. I forked in 2143, then."
+"You got to that question surprisingly fast."
 
-"2143. Got it." True Name smiled. "Thank you for this. I think it will work out quite well for us in the end."
+Codrin nodded, waiting Jonas out.
 
+"Between Secession and Launch, I was pretty boring. I did some data collection for some of the other work that was going on. Phys-side is always changing, beholden as they are to the whims of Earth and the restrictions of being tied to a single body in a single location."
+
+"So you followed that? Kept up on the data gathering?"
+
+He nodded. "Yeah, that was my area of focus. Some of the others were digging around sys-side, but life changes much more slowly here without those external factors. We kept on working with the Odists, too, as I'm sure you've heard. There was much to do."
+
+"It certainly sounds like. Did you or your clade guide much beyond Secession and Launch? I know that there was some work done surrounding the finances of uploading in the mid to late 2100s. Were there other areas of activity?"
+
+Jonas leaned back against the couch, toying with a loose thread at one end of it with his fingers. "Here and there, yeah, but I'm not really the person to ask about that. I'm sure one of you will get into it with True Name, or maybe even snag some time with Jonas Prime."
+
+Codrin nodded and made a note to that effect.
+
+"You have to understand though, Codrin, none of this was like some sort of shadowy conspiracy, like you may be thinking. We did what politicians do: we represented our constituents and duked it out --- metaphorically, of course --- with other politicians."
+
+"Are we your constituents?" ey asked. The words were out of eir mouth before ey had time to consider it.
+
+Jonas laughed, shaking his head and tugging that fiber on the couch all the looser. "In a way, yes. We may be a separate legal entity, but we don't work the same. We're not a government. There are no representatives. We don't vote. Better to say that the System is our singular constituent. You are our constituents only in the sense that there are still some who have to work on keeping the System going. We're the ones who organize with the phys-side engineers to keep everything ticking along. We're the ones who ensure that new uploads are smoothly integrated. We're the ones who ensure that the System keeps growing."
+
+"Keeps growing? Can you expand on that?"
+
+"It's nothing complex. The larger a system --- that's system with a lower-case 's' --- is, the more stable it is because it tends towards stasis. This applies to political systems, as well. The Western Fed and the S-R Bloc kept their stalemate for God knows how long because they were too large to do anything but, and the only reason they stopped was that they were each subsumed into even larger political entities."
+
+"So, if I'm understanding you right, keeping the population of the System growing over time--"
+
+"Not just the population," Jonas interrupted. "The capacity. The complexity."
+
+"--the more stable it is because it tends toward stasis?"
+
+"You put it more succinctly than I did."
+
+Codrin waggled eir pen at Jonas. "I'm the writer out of the two of us, you're the politician. What do you mean by stasis, though?"
+
+"If we were phys-side, conservatism would probably be the word one would reach for, if only because the sheer burden of legislation grows exponentially complex with the size of the small-s system that all of the other aspects of the system start to fall under its branch.
+
+"Here, though, we tend towards stasis. It's a type of stability that implies a cessation of change. It's not a bad thing. Boring, maybe, but boring is safe. Still, it's only a tendency, and it approaches that point asymptotically. The bigger the system, the smoother things run because the rough spots and sharp edges are harder to feel. It needs to be gardened and nourished. That's all we do."
+
+After ey caught up taking down eir notes from Jonas's short speech, Codrin sat in silence for a bit, considering the next path to take on the interview.
+
+"Do you have any other questions?" Jonas asked. "Not to rush you or anything. I'm just wondering if I should fork to get some work done."
+
+"Just one more, I guess. Not one of my prepared ones, but you've given me a lot to think about. How does Launch fit in with your concept of stasis? That feels like an awful big change. It even decreased the population of the System back home."
+
+Jonas shook his head, chuckling. "I'm not the one to ask that one, Codrin. I've specialized way too much into data analysis. You can ask True Name about that, or Jonas Prime. I'm just parroting things we talked about a century and a half ago."
+
+"I will, I'm sure, but can you give me your best guess? I'd still like to hear it," ey said.
+
+"Best guess? The System was deemed stable enough to undertake the launch project, and the project was deemed likely to produce a secondary stable society. Beyond that, beats me."
+
+Codrin nodded and, seeing Jonas begin to rise, stood from eir seat, shaking the offered hand.
+
+Jonas saw em to the door, saying, "I hope I didn't add to your stress, Mx. Bălan. You're doing good work, and I hope it's also enjoyable."
+
+"It's certainly intriguing. You've given me a lot to think about, and I'm sure Ioan will agree."
+
+"Of course. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask." He smiled to Codrin, and the smile was the least earnest ey had seen yet. "And I look forward to seeing what you come up with."
+
+It wasn't until Codrin was back at the house on the prairie, back with eir family, back where ey was comfortable enough to work on transcribing eir notes, that ey came across the phrase that had left em so wrong-footed during the interview.
+
+Ey frowned, stood up, and paced around eir office for a few minutes, stopping at the end of each circuit to stare out at the prairie beyond the windows. Ey was starting to feel as though there were coils of some sort wrapping around em. Thick, fleshy things that squeezed around eir middle, bound eir hands, held em silent. They did not kill em, did not force em to move, to watch. They did not force em do do anything. They just held em there, letting em know that, at all times, they were present.
+
+So ey sat at eir desk and wrote a footnote for eir transcript that ey'd send back to Ioan and May Then My Name.
+
+> Check my work, Ioan. As you have read, Jonas asked what each of our stressors were, and I mentioned a sentence or two about each of us and what we'd been doing that had been keeping us busy.
+>
+> You'll notice that, for you, when talking about End Waking, I said, "One of them told em to be careful interviewing you, that you'd control the whole thing."
+>
+> His reply: "Did he now?"
+>
+> I don't think I messed up the transcription, and you know as well as anyone that our memories are all there for our perusal. I've thought and thought and thought on it. I shouldn't doubt, and yet I do, so check my work.
+>
+> I said "one of them", and Jonas said "did he now". I asked Dear, and it said that there were relatively few male Odists in the clade (*"one fewer, now"*).
+>
+> Did you tell anyone that you were interviewing End Waking other than May Then My Name? I don't mean to cast doubt on either of you. I think you feel just as bound up in this as I do, but I need some clarification as to how Jonas knew that you had interviewed one of those relative few. I need that clarity. I think we're beyond wants, now.