update from sparkleup

writing/post-self/toledot/index.md

@@ -95,8 +95,8 @@ Nearing the 200th anniversary of System secession from humanity, the System and
     * [o] [Launch: launch-side: Codrin#Pollux](launch/launch/Codrin-pollux/006) - Has Yared, Debarre, and user11824 over, who talk about how the council was undermined, then overridden by Jonas/Odists after secession, Yared talks about Toledot Yeshu, Demma as Paul (left unsaid whether or not Demma was influenced by anyone sys-side, implied no; phys-side still had its own politics, then) - 2856
     * [o] [Secession: sys-side: True Name](secession/sys/True-Name/006) - Meets with Debarre, who says he understands better now, thanks her for all her work; after he leaves, meets up with *Life Breeds Life,* But Death Must Now Be Chosen (human male, scholar type) to help keep up appearances during secession work that the clade isn't growing, minimize actions in history so that the clade doesn't appear to have done anything, that Michelle was on the Council and the clade just helped. - 2317
     * [o] [Launch: launch-side: Codrin#Castor](launch/launch/Codrin-castor/006) - Interviews No Jonas, hints at how big an influence he and Odists (not just TN!) had on both phys/sys side after secession, anything to keep System growing - 2471
-    * [ ] [Secession: sys-side: True Name](secession/sys/True-Name/007) - walks sims, thinking about what the System will look like after secession (doesn't share Yared's pessimism), how to keep it running, remembers conversation about birth laws in S-R Bloc, forks End Waking to investigate that, revealing that at some point, Jonas showed her how to manipulate reputation markets to make sure she could always fork. - 1378 Expand?
-    * [ ] [Launch: phys-side: Douglas](launch/phys/Douglas/008) - Sabotage attempts, hinting that there are those phys-side who have also picked up patterns and really don't like System
+    * [o] [Secession: sys-side: True Name](secession/sys/True-Name/007) - walks sims, thinking about what the System will look like after secession (doesn't share Yared's pessimism), how to keep it running, remembers conversation about birth laws in S-R Bloc, forks End Waking to investigate that, revealing that at some point, Jonas showed her how to manipulate reputation markets to make sure she could always fork. - 1378 Expand?
+    * [o] [Launch: phys-side: Douglas](launch/phys/Douglas/008) - Sabotage attempts, hinting that there are those phys-side who have also picked up patterns and really don't like System - 2624
     * [ ] [Secession: phys-side: Yared](secession/phys/Yared/008) - Sure enough, support rapidly swings sys-side, long conversation with TN/Jonas about what it means, starting to see how having his name on the amendment is diving people not just on the subject, but on him
     * [ ] [Launch: sys-side: Ioan](launch/sys/Ioan/010) - Ioan interviews Jonas Prime, who has grown pessimistic, life wants to spread and multiply to make itself stronger, this is the root of the launch: offsite backups; thus why dreamer module was frowned upon: has broadcast w/ information about system, earth, interfacing, etc
     * [ ] [Launch: launch-side: Codrin#Castor](launch/launch/Codrin-castor/007) - Interviews True Name for second time w/ more info, confronts for truth about the Odists' role in post-secession, confirms, laughs down concerns.

writing/post-self/toledot/launch/phys/Douglas/008.md

@@ -143,3 +143,55 @@ So, when he returned back to his room to a series of messages that felt loud, br
 **May Then My Name:** Do a lot of people phys-side think that the System is interfering with politics?
 
 **Douglas:** Not really, no. There was a kerfuffle around it when uploading was incentivized that essentially no one remembers except for boring people like me who had to study it. There have been a few gripes here and there as other large political changes happened, like when governments merged or recessions hit. When things like that happen, I think a lot of people instinctively look for a boogeyman to pin it on, and the System is pretty convenient because it's not like you all can fight back, so you all turn into shadowy figures behind the politicians.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Oh, that bit is definitely true.
+
+**Douglas:** Yeah, figured as much. You all up there steepling your fingers and talking in hushed tones about how you're going to do everything from crash the economy to hire Michelle Hadje's distant ancestor specifically to work on your nefarious plot.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Yep, got it in one.
+
+**May Then My Name:** I am glad that none of these were successful on the scale that they had hoped. We do not know what happens to us if the System breaks. There have been a few instances of discontinuity over the centuries, but we don't see them except that systime jumps ahead. Were the System to explode in some fiery spectacle, we would just stop.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Theologians and mystics have been disappointed to find no answers in what comes after death when one quits, so we are as in the dark as you are.
+
+**Douglas:** Maybe a bit less, because at least one possibility of what comes after death for us is living sys-side.
+
+**May Then My Name:** This is true! We are ghosts up here, haunting silicon and whatever else makes up the physical elements of the System these days.
+
+**Douglas:** You may as well be ghosts, as far as people think planet-side. There have been various attempts at casting uploads in the light of ancestor worship in some places. I have no idea how those who are worshipped sys-side feel about being asked for courage or a healthy crop or whatever.
+
+**May Then My Name:** I would be honored, personally. I have no one to haunt after two centuries but you. I am afraid that you are stuck with me.
+
+**May Then My Name:** All I can do is bother you on a terminal, though, so I suppose that I am not that bad of a ghost.
+
+**Douglas:** You're a pretty good ghost, I'd say. I'm looking forward to meeting you in person some day.
+
+**May Then My Name:** I will beg you once more: please come join us soon. I know you said within a year, but if you do not live up to that promise, so help me God, I will move into your implants and never let you sleep again.
+
+**Douglas:** Don't worry! I promise. You'll see me within the year. I've already put in word with both the launch commission and the clinic here, and they're fine having me stick around station-side until I can upload, so it's already (loosely) scheduled.
+
+**May Then My Name:** !!!
+
+**May Then My Name:** I am eager to meet you, Douglas Hadje, Master of Spaceflight and Doctor of Other Boring Shit!
+
+**Douglas:** Goes both ways, May Then My Name Die With Me of the Ode clade.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Excellent, excellent.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Now, I should head off. Ioan is coming up for air from eir writing, so I am going to go chase em around the house, frothing like I am rabid. 
+
+**Douglas:** Have fun, say hi for me, don't stay up too late.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Yes, father.
+
+**May Then My Name:** Bye!
+
+Douglas leaned back from his terminal and stretched his arms up toward the ceiling, leaning back in his chair.
+
+Every time he talked with Ioan and May, he was once again faced with the realization that he had hardly needed Ioan to convince him at all. The two were the first people he could call friends that he'd had since school. Beyond that, though, something about May Then My Name seemed as though she was simply built to be liked, as though, whenever he talked with her, he had no choice but to like her.
+
+It wasn't quite charisma, as, whenever he tried the word on for May Then My Name, it carried far too many implications of manipulation, and the last thing he could picture her doing was being manipulative.
+
+She was weird, yes. Goofy, even. But there was nothing about her that was calculating or cold.
+
+*One more walk around the station,* he thought. *Then I'll get to bed. January can't come soon enough.*