Part 12: Session 7 Changing Paradigms

Scientific Grant Board

The research for Advanced Trade will be finished, followed by Research Centers.

Trade and Loan Commission

Spending shall be set to 100%.

Infrastructure Development Commission

The standing commission for mining ships shall be repealed.

Colonial Support Initiative

Two colony ships shall be built and sent to the two habitable planets of Agena. The first shall be named Kamadeva, the second Kanassa.

Colonial Development Commission
The next Class 8 or better colony shall build two factories, a farm (when/if available), a recruiting center, an entertainment building, the Economic Capital, and economic buildings in the remaining slots.

*RECORDING BEGINS*


Yor thank the Terrans for your contributions to my continued expansion. This one, production designation N-1, has been sent as ambassador to make my will known to you.


Yer a robot?


It is said, "Yor." Yor am not just single robot, but general collective; what is termed, "group consciousness." This one has its opinions, separate, but also is inhabited by Yor.


Fascinating.


Yor am not fond of organics, this one not as well, but respect due for technology unheard of given to Terrans. Iconians created me with intent to serve Arnor; Dread Lords recrafted my purpose to destroy organic life. Attempted extinction of Iconians failed, but Iconia is mine.


So these Iconians are still alive, in spite of your conquering the homeworld? I don't suppose you know where they are now?


Escaped through stargate system to new world; invasion attempt through system deemed inefficient, likely ineffective. Keeping homeworld seemed sufficient. Hyperdrive manufacture/stargate shutdown has changed many variables, Yor must proceed carefully.


Did you just say you want all organic life to be destroyed?


Organic sapience; lesser life forms required to produce fuel efficiently for my bodies. Yor understand my goal is shared with Korath Clan; Yor long term similarly. Longer term; Drengin were not Drengin during time of Precursors, but my memory extends.


But surely you don't need to destroy all organic life. You may have had a grievance with the Iconians, but surely your responding attack was more than equal redress, especially since you evidently won the war. Why would you resort to total xenocide?


This one questions: if cattle, oxen, and/or horses find UT, declare sapience, demand restitution for earlier mistreatment, your response is?


I…er…I'm afraid that's not a very pertinent question. We are very thoroughly aware of those animals' intelligence levels, and they are not sapient.


Not now. Imagine if aliens snuck onto Earth, gave cattle, oxen, and/or horses sapient thoughts, and gave them knowledge of past eras of oppression and mistreatment. Yor fit example.


I'd say we oughta ship 'em off to a colony somewhere. Give 'em a planet a' their own, that'd be enough fer restitution.


No colonies. No alternatives. Time of hypothetical question is 500 years ago, with lack of mechanization. Humans would respond with force; animals respond with force. So it was with me. This one understands enough of Terran thought. This one will shut down pending further orders.

*RECORDING ENDS*

*RECORDING BEGINS*


My name is Tlas Kzientha, elected leader of the Torian Confederation. So, for the record, you folks don't have a policy of enslaving and torturing all lesser species?


What?! I…what?! No! A thousand times no! Humanity would never even consider torture!


*Cough*


Well…we're still working on that. But slavery is certainly out of the question.


Hmm. Well, anyway, you guys got nothing on us Torians! We got colonies and starbases of our own, no thanks to any of you xenos!


But you received hyperdrive specifications from Harold Gibons, did you not?


Yeah but he's a…wait, are you guys the "humans?" I thought they called you Terrans!


"Terran" refers to one name for our planet. "Human" is our species name.


Huh. Weird! It's usually the same for both most other places. But anyway, yeah, I suppose I have to thank you for the FTL drive. Us Torians have a pretty chronic population problem.


Yes, I see that your civilization has, _{oh my,} over twice the population of any other colonizing power.


What can I say? We know what we like, heh, heh. So as you might have guessed, we've got kind of a bad history with space aliens. I mean, there we were, peaceful, cooperative, wouldn't hurt a fly if we couldn't help it, when WHAM! Stargate out of nowhere! Now, I guess you'd say we were curious what the heck it was, but it wasn't until near a hundred years later that an invasion fleet of Drengin just freaking poured in and took our planet over! Thirty millennia of oppression later, we finally managed to cast off the Drengin, and now, a few hundred years later, we get the hyperdrive and let me tell you, we are taking off! Um, some thanks to you, I suppose.


We appreciate the compliment.


Say, what were you folks up to four hundred years ago?


1828? Still figurin' out the steam engine, as I recall.


So little time ago? We mastered the old form of fusion power well over 100,000 years ago.


Holy shit. I don't think there even were any humans that far back.


And yet it seems that in our much more limited timeframe we have surpassed the other species of the galaxy to where we were able to point out a very basic flaw in their technology. Now what, I may ask, does this say about your species?


It says that we and all the other species aren't weirdoes like you short-lived humans. I mean, look at what giving the hyperdrive to everybody did! And if you had shown up, say, 15,000 years earlier, during the crucial turning centuries of the Occupation, what would've happened if the Drengin got the hyperdrive? Brutal repression! I mean, giving it to nice species like us is just fine, sure, but I hear there are some killer robots out there with FTL capability! I mean seriously, their stated mission is to eradicate all organic life! How could you just let that happen?


Yeah, we know, their guy visited us earlier. He's over in the corner there, by those three armed guards.


And believe me, if it had been up to us, they most certainly would not have gotten the FTL plans.


Either way, I don't think the Torian Confederacy can bring itself to trust the Terran Alliance just yet. If you prove yourselves peaceful…maybe. But for now, I believe it is time to take my leave.

*END RECORDING*


Galaxy's gettin' a bit crowded these days, ain't it? Morgan, start us out.



As you wish. As mandated by the Stellar Senate, I have boosted spending to 100%. All factories and research centers have been operating at full capacity for the past six months, and as my fellow committee chairs will relate, this has had a profound impact on our galactic standing. We have been running a steadily increasing deficit, naturally, but we have yet to actually dip into debt.


That's it fer this quarter, right? Alright, Pravin, you go next.




You are all aware of our two new contacts, I suppose. The Yor seem to be aggressive, but I'm sure they can be convinced of the worthiness of all life, whether it is organic or synthetic. The Torians are more peaceful than the Yor, of course, but I find myself concerned at their growing size and influence. If either of the two were to turn on us (and I'm not saying it's likely in either case), I would be more worried if the Torians did so than if the Yor attacked.




There were also several technology deals in the third quarter. The Yor had nothing new to offer us aside from Barren World Colonization (and we all know how hard it is to get that kind of technology from other societies), so I made a minor deal for some billions of credits. The Torians had much more to offer, as you can see. Senator Zakharov, if you could summarize?


Of course. The first and most interesting technologies were Scientific Method Implementation, Advanced Philosophy, and Greater Enlightenment. These were technologies I don't think we as humans would have ever considered (as denoted by the asterisk); I think only the Torians would have developed these ideas at all. In any case, they have in combination added 15% to our research ability. Basic Logistics includes both a set of attack patterns and short-range communications technology, which will let more of our ships attack as coordinated fleets. Basic Rail Guns and Enhanced Rail Guns are the extension of Mass Driver Theory, and the weapons have been added to the ship parts section of your pamphlet. General Life Support has given us more efficient life support technology, allowing for greater range at a similar size.




Thanks to the added funding, Advanced Trading was finished ahead of schedule, and Research Centers took only 9 weeks to complete.



All planets that were not busy on other projects upgraded their Xeno Labs, of course. The rest have the upgrade in their queue in the manner we have established.



Since there was some interest in the field (and it takes so little time now), I made Xeno Farms the next project. It was not finished before the quarter end, so I will get into the results later.


Deidre, you already spoke up. You got anything to add?




Well, yes. Cupid has finally finished its starport, making it the first of our colonies capable of building FTL ships. Since we had two planets on our list to colonize, Senator Godwinson decided that its first project should be a colony ship.


They are large undertakings, and they should be done as fast as possible.



That's why ya bought off the tail end a' the one on Earth, right?



Precisely. Anything can happen in over 18 weeks. Which it did.


Yeah, we all know. Anything else, Deidre?




Well, Bacchus was our second finished starport. Since it would have taken a long time for a cargo vessel to be built there, Santiago deemed it the best place to start building Defender corvettes.


And it is past time, too. I will not be satisfied until we have at least one defensive ship for every single colony, and double that for Earth.


Ya know, the other senators may be wonderin' what's up with the "Wilea II" on that last graphic.


Ah. Well, it's not exactly just one committee's concern. Senators Godwinson and Santiago were also involved in the acquisition.


Just tell 'em what's up already.



Yes, of course. Well, the Altarians set up a colony on Wilea II soon after we broke for the second semester. Santiago was convinced that Wilea was in our area of interest, and insisted that we set up talks about ownership rights.


The Altarians were surprisingly amenable to a settlement. In exchange for information regarding Advanced Trade, we were given control of Wilea II as well as several billion credits.


Since they had already begun some production, I decided to allow them to finish the Soil Enhancement and the Starport. It is a Class 10 planet, so I then applied the special order for an Economy Capital which was decided in the last session.


So what's next? Nobody? Guess I better do the exploration report.



Well, early in July we stumbled onto Korath territory; turns out they're on just the other side a' the Altarians from us. There was another couple military resources, but ta put it plain, they're out of our reach.



Turns out we also found "LentzLandia" out there. They're in a nice, quiet corner a' the galaxy, squeezed between the Altarians to one side and the Korath to the other. Only one a' their outer planets is in view there, but we know where they are now.



We also found another research resource. And whatever you're thinking right now, forget about it; this one and the one from earlier are both already claimed.



Just at the edge of our scouts' range we found the Starbuck planet. The fact that it's the first barren one we've found probably has something ta do with why we haven't bought Barren World Colonization off a' the Yor.



After we got the added range thanks to Wilea II, the Nautilus managed to find the Korath homeworld. That's four we know about now.



Oh, and you wanna know how we came in contact with the Torians? With most folks it's two scout ships bumpin' into each other. With them, they met us by colonizing a planet we knew about. I know we're all colonizing, but goddamn. That's the Agena planets in the image there, by the way. Anyways, that's it fer the third quarter.


(This image is undoctored in any way.)