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-# True Name --- 2125
+# Codrin Bălan#Castor --- 2325
 
-The Council of Eight met before the news of the secession amendment passing was published in the perisystem news feeds for those who tracked such information sys-side. They agreed, without even needing to talk about it, that it would be nice to have a small celebration of success before everyone was doing it. Something comfortable, cheerful, with friends.
+It took Codrin nearly a week to calm down enough to send True Name another message requesting to meet. It began with an apology.
 
-To that end, they met at Debarre's house, a low, rambling house plugged squarely into the side of a hill, walk-out basement looking out over a wooded lawn. The neighborhood had several such houses, widely spaced, where a few of Debarre's friends that he'd met both on and off the System had set up a comfortable living, enough space to be alone, enough friends to make it worthwhile.
+"True Name, first of all, I'd like to apologize for becoming so heated during our last interaction," ey said to er recording instance. "When confronted with information at such a scale, it is easy to become overwhelmed. I have since had time to read through both my notes from our meeting and the notes from my cocladists, and I think I understand better about what it was that you were trying to tell me. With that in mind, I'd like to meet up again to discuss some of the questions I didn't get to previously, and to allow you to explain anything you would like. Please let me know when would work best. Thank you."
 
-The plus-side of the house, in particular, was that the patio for the walk-out basement was beneath an overhanging deck, protecting the occupants from the slow but steady snowfall.
+Dear was nowhere to be found, this time. The fox had spent much of the last week alternating between requesting to be left alone and crying against eir shoulder. The story of what True Name had told em in combination from the news from Pollux had struck a deep chord with it, and when it did speak on the issue, the conversations would quickly end with *"I did not know. I promise, Codrin, I did not know."*
 
-"I don't understand why you had to make it cold," user11824 grumbled.
+So ey waited, ey read, and ey calmed down, and then ey scheduled eir interview.
 
-"It's New Years day, dude." Debarre laughed. "It's supposed to be cold."
+The response came five minutes later, a simple ping of acknowledgement followed by a calm suggestion that immediately would be as good a time as any.
 
-"Fucking Americans, I swear to God. I'm from New Zealand. New Years is not cold."
+This time, when Codrin stepped into True Name's apartment, ey was greeted by the skunk standing where she had the last two interviews, and this time, her expression was one of calm curiosity, rather than that initial warmth and its following coldness."
 
-The wandering discussion took place around a chiminea radiating warmth. An indentation had been made in the side of the clay body of the fireplace into which a kettle had been placed, mulled wine slowly simmering. True Name found it immensely enjoyable. It reminded her quite a bit of winters with her grandparents on the east coast. Made sense, of course, given where Debarre was originally from.
+"Mx. Bălan, it is nice to see you again."
 
-"I like it," Zeke rumbled. "I only ever got to see snow once, and that was in Yakutsk when I was uploading."
+Ey bowed. "Of course. Again, my apologies for getting so upset last time. It's a bit of a first for me, but that was a lot to handle all at once."
 
-The three S-R Bloc goons laughed. "There's not that much snow out there," one of them said. "But I'm glad you got to see it at least once."
+"I understand," the skunk said, returning the bow before gesturing em down the hall once more. "We will have a calmer discussion this time, I believe."
 
-The bundle of rags nodded appreciatively, extending a pseudopod of an arm to ladle more of the wine into his mug.
+They sat down on either side of the desk once more, and Codrin noted that there was now a single notepad.
 
-"Where's Jonas?" Debarre asked True Name.
+"Now, what would you like to ask me? I suspect you will feel more comfortable if you led."
 
-"Running late, I guess. I am not his keeper."
+Ey nodded. "Alright. Let's start with Launch this time. It sounds like you were involved with that as well. Can you tell me about that?"
 
-"I know, I just figured since--" He was interrupted by a muffled doorbell as someone entered the sim, followed by Jonas (Ar Jonas, True Name guessed) ambled around the side of the house to join them.
+"Of course. Is there any particular area you would like me to begin? Launch is a very broad topic."
 
-"*Et voilà,*" she said, grinning.
+"Well, Ne Jonas told Codrin#Pollux that we --- that is, the Bălan clade and the liberal elements of the Ode clade --- were guided toward beginning this project. Is that true?"
 
-"What?" Jonas laughed. "What'd I do?"
+If the phrase 'liberal elements' or its implication that True Name must be one of the conservatives had any effect on the skunk, she didn't show it. Instead, she simply nodded. "Yes. A project such as this was deemed important in that it would add the spice needed to keep System life on its toes, much as Ne Jonas mentioned. We encouraged this in a calm and orderly fashion. Does that make sense?"
 
-"You were late, Debarre was worried, I was bored," user11824 drawled.
+"I suppose. When did the nudges come?"
 
-"Well, sorry about that. Just checking in with our contact phys-side. He's depressed."
+True name sighed and rested on her forearms on the desk. "To answer that question requires answering a different question. We began by canvasing various art institutes, actually. I do not know why we simply did not track Dear or May Then My Name or any of the Pointing At Itself stanza, as that would probably have shortened our search a good deal. All the same, we came across an exhibition at the Simien Fang School of Art and Design on history and its context in the world of the System by one Ioan Bălan. Do you remember that?"
 
-Zeke began ladling a cup of the heated wine for Jonas. "Why was he depressed. It passed, didn't it?"
+Codrin lifted eir pen and blinked up to the ceiling, dredging up the memories of eir own gallery exhibition, so many years ago.
 
-"Yeah, well, apparently he's getting pressure from the NEAC government. They're happy enough about the bill passing, but they want to control his DDR participation going forward. He's just mopey."
+Too many years, ago, ey realized. "But that was in 2298."
 
-Debarre growled quietly, tail bristling out. "The DDR was a fucking mistake, anyway."
+True Name nodded. "It was, yes."
 
-"Yes," True Name said. "But it got us this, at least, and now we do not need to worry about it again."
+"But the launch project was proposed in 2306, wasn't it?"
 
-Debarre shrugged.
+"It was, yes," the skunk repeated. "Publicly, at least. The project began as a collaboration between the Jonas clade and elements of the Ode clade in 2290."
 
-Zeke asked, "So when does it all come into effect?"
+"But you said that Michelle told you--"
 
-"The 21st, same day as the launch," Jonas said. "We shouldn't notice anything except maybe a jump in systime if there's any downtime getting us set up."
+"To "Do something big. Do something worthy of us", yes. My up-tree instances told you a slightly different phrase to better guide your line of thought to where we are today. There is nowhere in there that mentions Launch, though, is there?"
 
-"What's the chance of that happening?"
+"I suppose, not," ey said.
 
-"Around five percent."
+"But perhaps we ought to talk about Michelle, as well. I also said in that interview that I no longer considered myself Michelle Hadje, having diverged too far from her to be the same person. That is why we had no real compunctions about influencing her as well. That began many years back, of course, but when your root instance makes a suggestion to you, especially on the day she dies, you are quite likely to follow it, are you not? That provides quite a useful tool when interfacing with all elements of the clade, so we decided to take advantage of that early on."
 
-"Chance of data loss?"
+"You...influenced Michelle to steer the Clade?"
 
-"Less than a tenth of a percent."
+True Name nodded, smiling. "It is what we --- the clade, yes, but my stanza in particular --- are good at, yes, so we nudged her to suggest what she did to the first lines, all vague pronouncements, which helped us guide everyone toward the project."
 
-"And catastrophic failure?"
+"And did you nudge her to quit?"
 
-Jonas grinned. "There were a lot of zeroes before that six, I can tell you that. I didn't count them."
+The skunk did not speak. A non-answer that was answer enough.
 
-True Name added, "It would have to require not only the launch going wrong, but the backup System failing, and from what our friends say, it is far away from the launch site."
+Codrin spent a minute tamping down eir temper. Ey had, after all, promised to remain calm. When ey felt like ey could speak in a level tone of voice, ey asked, "So you began the project of the launch long before it was really an open discussion. What was involved in that?"
 
-"In the North, yes. Launch site is in Western China."
+"There were three aspects involved. Phys-side political, sys-side political, and technological. Sys-side was, as always, the easiest. Hardly anything to be done. Phys-side, we had to pull quite a few strings. Technologically, it simply involved the right organizations funded, the right people hired at those organizations --- as our dear Douglas was --- the right scientists put in charge of the right projects. Do you need further details on that? I can speak at length, but want to respect your time and energy, if you have additional questions."
 
-Zeke nodded, sipped from his wine, and rasped, "Best we can hope for, then."
+"To confirm, you influenced Michelle Hadje to ensure the clade worked with the launch project, influenced politics phys-side to ensure that support would be there, and made sure Douglas was part of the team?"
 
-user11824 shrugged. "It'd be a boring as hell end. Are we going to have a big celebration or anything?"
+"We made sure that the team was the team it needed to be, Codrin. Douglas was a bonus. He was impressionable at a young age, so we steered him toward being an Ansible tech, ensured he made it to the station, and were happy to see how good a fit he was for the role of launch director." True Name smiled. "I have talked with him a few times, though he did not know who I was when I did so. He is very nice, and very happy in his position. He is proud of how far he has gotten, and I am proud of him. Do not confuse influence with numbing mind control. It is important that the people we work with do things of their own, happy volition, even if they were originally our ideas."
 
-"I do not see why not," True Name said. "We can get a few of the sims to set up fireworks and we can spread the word through perisystem news."
+Codrin nodded. "Well, if he's happy, then I suppose that's a good thing."
 
-"We can celebrate now, too," Debarre said, grinning. "I went through all this fucking trouble and we're talking shop. Drink your wine, warm your hands by the fire, *literally* anything but more shop talk."
+True Name beamed. "Of course."
 
-And so they did. They talked, they stayed warm around the chiminea, and they drank. Debarre was the first to get truly drunk, breaking into Auld Lang Syne. When no one joined in, the weasel laughed and danced around the ring of council-members, calling them all boring, which got a grin out of even user11824.
+"And Michelle quitting? Ioan told me that May Then My Name put it, "She could not do but what she did"."
 
-As the evening wore on and, one by one, the rest of the council joined Debarre in his drunkenness, the conversations grew more earnest, more heartfelt. Several toasts were made. The final one was to, per True Name, "The chance to do whatever the fuck we want."
+"If that is how she felt, then I suppose there is little that I can do to change it, given that she is gone. I apologize that May Then My Name feels upset about it, but again, there is little that I can do to change that."
 
-After that, they agreed to meet the next day and give statements for the wider celebrations, and then all headed back to their home sims.
+Ey sighed, nodded, and wrote down her answer. "And how have you felt now that you've pulled all this off?"
 
-Others headed back, perhaps. But after an appropriate delay, True Name let the drunkenness fade and went, instead to Jonas's apartment. Two of the Jonases were sitting on the couch, talking possibilities for the next year.
+True Name looked genuinely thoughtful. "I hesitate to say 'proud', but I am pleased that it went off as smoothly as it did. There were a few bumps on the road, but nothing difficult to overcome. We --- the Odists you have called conservative --- continue to work as we will. Jonas, bless his black heart, continues to work as he will. We stay in contact and keep divergence to a minimum until we are out of harm's way, and then we ensure that we will keep our own projects safe. Castor, Pollux, and the L<sub>5</sub> System. It is all going as close to plan as we could have expected."
 
-"Well?" one of them asked. Prime, she supposed.
+"So you're...happy?"
 
-"Well, we made it," she said, slouching on the stool Jonas had long since added to the furniture once the skunk had started coming by regularly. "And now we can finally work on something else."
+"Pleased," she repeated, laughing. "I will have time to be happy when I am dead. Until then I will continue to be pleased and continue to work."
 
-He laughed. "Getting bored of the same old secession arguments?"
+Codrin re-capped eir pen and folded eir hands on top of eir notebook. Ey had dozens of other questions ey could ask, but ey felt full. Full to overflowing.
 
-"Oh, I have been working on other things on the side, do not worry, but it will be nice to do so more openly."
+"Does that mean we are done with the interview, Mx Bălan?" True Name asked, smiling.
 
-"Tell me about them."
+"I'm out of energy, as you put it." Ey sighed. "Unless you have anything else to share, maybe we can put off any further questions until next time. I'm sorry it was so short."
 
-She thought for a moment, tallying up the ones she was comfortable discussing with Jonas. "The three big ones are, I think, ensuring stability and growth via financial and political means, which I have other instances currently working on. The second is disrupting and then disbanding the Council--"
+True name stood, brushing her paws down over her blouse to straighten some imagined crease. "Then I must thank you. It has been surprisingly fulfilling to be able to talk through all of this. It is, as your partner states, irreversibility. We cannot un-launch, we cannot un-diverge from Pollux or the System. You can surely appreciate that."
 
-Jonas sat up straighter at this.
+"I'll have to tell it that when I get back. It'll be excited to hear its idea out in the wild."
 
-"--in order to give us more latitude to do our work without having to run it by others. It is not like the System needs any governance, anyway."
+The skunk walked with em to the door and grinned. "It will be fucking pissed, Codrin Bălan, and we both know that."
 
-"Any *open* governance," Jonas corrected.
+When ey returned home and set down eir notes on eir desk, ey quit to merge with the Codrin that had remained behind, who, bearing the sudden weight of exhaustion, walked into the house proper, into the bedroom, and slipped, fully-clothed, beneath the sheets. The interview had not lasted more than half an hour, and yet ey felt drained.
 
-"Of course. There will still be work to do."
+Ey must have dozed off at some point, as ey was woken by Dear crawling into the bed behind em, one of the fox's skinny arms slinking around eir chest, and then a cold nose pressed against the back of eir neck.
 
-"And what's the third?"
+"Afternoon," ey mumbled.
 
-"Finding any patterns that we have left in our wake and smoothing them out. The first step will be convincing Yared to upload. He is less dangerous up here. I do not expect that to be difficult."
+*"Evening, actually. I wanted to let you sleep, but dinner will be up shortly."*
 
-Jonas nodded. "Makes sense. Do you think we've left many patterns?"
+Codrin nodded. "Thanks. Stressful day."
 
-She shook her head. "No, not yet. But I think it best to get in the practice. I would like to begin to think on the scale of centuries, and if we are to do that, I think it best to shape history both as we go and in retrospect."
+*"It is difficult, is it not?"* Dear murmured against eir neck. *"I apologize that this was the way that you had to learn the truth. I apologize that I was not able to tell you what I did know, and I apologize that I did not know the rest. I apologize for many things, my dear. I cannot apologize for what the other elements of the clade did, but I am sorry all the same."*
 
-"Good plan," he said, slouching back into the couch and grinning.
+"You don't have to apologize for her. For them. What did you call them before?"
 
-The skunk grinned back, far more toothily, her tail giving a lazy swish. "And if you are thinking of calling me a politician, I would like to cordially invite you to consider the consequences of your actions."
+*"Batty,"* the fox giggled. *"They are all batty."*
 
-"Fine." He laughed, rolling his eyes. "So, are you at least happy with the way things are going?"
+"Very, very batty," Codrin mumbled, and there was a pleasant silence between the two.
 
-"I am pleased, yes. It is a good first step. There is almost no chance of the decision being reversed down the line, and if we make it another fifty years, the concept of the System or any individuals living here remaining under the wing of any national entity will have left the collective subconscious. It will also work to our advantage that there is no un-uploading. An irreversible process that lands one in a place that appears to have no influence on the outside world will nullify the arguments of many of our detractors."
+A loud clatter and a shouted curse from the kitchen was followed quickly by Dear forking off an instance to go help its partner, leaving the original fox and Codrin to sit up in bed.
 
-"Just ensure they upload, right."
+"You know," ey said. "True Name said that you'd get fucking pissed if I told you this, but I'm going to anyway, because I can't leave well enough alone. She said that the divergence between the two LVs and the System was irreversible."
 
-True Name nodded. "Yes. And once the Council is out of the way, we should be good to go."
+*"Oh, did she?"* Dear said, laughing. *"What a fraud."*
 
-"And how do you propose to do that?" he asked.
+"That's not fucking pissed. I was promised fucking pissed."
 
-"It will be easy enough. Just take on more and more responsibility under the guise of helping out, start accepting less and less assistance, then begin suggesting that, since it is all going so smoothly, maybe it is not needed anymore. If we work with phys-side techs in order to drop the reputation cost of forking and sim creation, that will also help."
+Dear nipped at eir shoulder and grinned toothily at em. *"I am no good at 'fucking pissed', but that will have to do."*
 
-"Think any of them will complain?"
+"Ow!" Ey pushed at the fox and grinned. "It'll have to do. I'm sorry I came home and crashed. Thanks for coming to wake me, Dear."
 
-"Not until it is too late, and by then, it will all be too difficult to form another Council, right?"
+*"It is my pleasure, of course."* It blinked as, apparently, its forked instance quit and merged. *"Dinner is ready, by the way."*
 
-Jonas nodded. "Works for me. Shall we start divvying up tasks, then?"
+"Alright. I'll probably feel better after food, too."
 
-The skunk nodded. "There is much to be done."
+*"Do you really feel bad, Codrin?"*
+
+"Kind of," ey said. "It was just...a lot. I feel jerked around. It's depressing."
+
+Dear nodded and crawled out of the bed, reaching out a paw to help em up. *"It is not a great feeling, no. The results are not so bad, though, are they? We are on a hunk of metal and carbon and silicon and whatever the fuck the LVs are made of hurtling through space at some unimaginable speed. There are two of us, of our little families, living two completely separate lives, and both of us are in love. And Ioan and May Then My name are back at the station being adorable nerds together or whatever it is they do, and perhaps even they are in love."*
+
+Codrin lauged.
+
+*"The means were unsavory, to put it lightly--"*
+
+"Extremely lightly."
+
+*"Well, yes. The means were unsavory to an extreme, but the ends are not so bad, are they, my dear?"*
+
+"No." Codrin finally allowed emself to be pulled to eir feet, smoothing out eir rumpled clothing. "No, I suppose not."