update from sparkleup
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<p>“I don’t know the political reasons, but there was also a worry about DSN capacity…”</p>
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<p>“Is there an actual concern about the DSN?” Selena asked.</p>
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<p>“I’m even less of a space nerd than I am an information theorist,” Günay said, smiling wryly.</p>
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<p>Dry Grass asked, “I am assuming that you are gating communications from the LVs under a similar embargo. After all, to their eyes, we disappeared quite suddenly, yes?”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass asked, “I would assume that you are gating communications from the LVs under a similar embargo. After all, to their eyes, we disappeared quite suddenly, yes?”</p>
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<p>She shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine, but I’d be surprised if that wasn’t the case.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass laughed, not unkindly. “Yes, fair enough.”</p>
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<p>“Are you able to ungate communications to a limited subset of clades?” Jonas asked.</p>
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<p>Günay looked thoughtful, lips moving faintly and fingers twitching as she queried something in her HUD. “That should be possible, sure. You want your four clades ungated?”</p>
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<p>“The Ode clade, the Jonas clade, Debarre’s clade, Selena’s clade, and the Marsh clade, yeah. We’ll get a list to you later with more.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass nodded. “The Ode clade, the Jonas clade, Debarre’s clade, Selena’s clade, Yared’s clade…” She trailed off, thinking. “And the Marsh clade, yes. We’ll get a list to you later with more.”</p>
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<p>I frowned, shooting a glance over at Sedge who only shrugged.</p>
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<p><em>“What would that buy us?”</em> I asked over a sensorium message.</p>
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<p><em>“What would that get us?”</em> I asked over a sensorium message.</p>
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<p><em>“We could hear from those on the LVs, I guess.”</em></p>
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<p>My frown deepened. <em>“So we could hear from Marsh, then?”</em></p>
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<p>She sighed. <em>“I guess. I don’t know what that buys us. I’m not exactly about to tell Jonas to stop, though. I’m scared enough of him as it is.”</em></p>
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<p>She sighed. <em>“I guess. I don’t know what that buys us. I’m not exactly about to tell her to stop, though. I’m scared enough of these guys as it is.”</em></p>
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<p>I snorted, nodded, turned my attention back to the front of the room.</p>
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<p>“–will have a separate meeting regarding the ungating of transmissions,” Need An Answer was saying. “That falls under the realm of politics, yes? It is hardly something you need worry yourself about, Günay.”</p>
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<p>“Thank God,” she said, laughing nervously.</p>
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@ -201,7 +201,7 @@
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<p>“What was with all the cageyness?” I asked. “That Jakub guy, sure, but it seemed like a more…I don’t know, systemic thing.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, it very much is,” Dry Grass said. “Jakub is a putz, but an innocent one. He is doing what he was hired to do, and he was hired by the System Consortium, which works with the world governments. There are several layers above him, and all of them are trained to act cagey.”</p>
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<p>“So it’s just politics?”</p>
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<p>She nodded. “I would say so, yes. It is more nuanced, but that is not my area of expertise. He is withholding the information he was told to withhold. They are locking down communications for whatever reasons they have, which I am sure are good. It is our job, then, to press at that, to find all of the weak and sore spots and try to divine why all of this is being done.”</p>
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<p>She nodded. “I would say so, yes. It is more nuanced, but that is not my area of expertise. He is withholding the information he was told to withhold. The NDAs quite literally prohibit speaking about the things they cover. They are locking down communications for whatever reasons they have, which I am sure are good. It is our job, then, to press at that, to find all of the weak and sore spots and try to divine why all of this is being done.”</p>
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<p>Sedge’s expression soured. “We can’t just ask?”</p>
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<p>“Of course not. There is a protocol to follow.” Dry Grass laughed. “And that includes all of the little jabs Need An Answer and Jonas shot at phys-side. It was less that we were making a demand for that information as it was letting them know that we knew that they knew more than they were letting on and that we were not happy with it.”</p>
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<p>“Why promote Günay, then? She looked really uncomfortable getting stuck in the middle of that.”</p>
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@ -15,12 +15,12 @@
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<article class="content">
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<p>We sat around the table, saying nothing, each doubtless lost in our own thoughts. The decision to pare down our dinner hadn’t been made all in one go, but in fits and starts.</p>
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<p>We arrived back in Marsh’s study quickly enough, finding it far more full than when we had left. The initial offer of dinner was well received, but the longer we talked about it, the more that seemed to cool. </p>
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<p>Lily, of course, had stepped away almost immediately after we’d arrived. Although she appeared to have made the decision to reconcile with Dry Grass, that didn’t mean that it’d be easy for her. She still had her anger, her resentment for what she felt that the Odists had done in their shaping of the System and its history, their role in Marsh uploading in the first place, and for that, I could hardly fault her. I’d had my own share of feelings over the years that had lingered, that I had bathed in helplessly, struggling to escape the odd comforts of depression or angst or anger. I could hardly expect her to climb free immediately.</p>
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<p>“I do not blame her, either,” Dry Grass had said shortly after she stepped away and I voiced these thoughts. “It is not comfortable, to be clear. I do not like that she hates me. My role — the role of my whole stanza — is to revel in feelings of motherhood. I saw myself as mother to the System on a very real, very mechanical level, back when I was working as a systech. To have a citizen of the very System I love hate me is perilously close to having a child hate me. Everyone wants to be liked.”</p>
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<p>Lily, of course, refused almost immediately. Although she appeared to have made the decision to reconcile with Dry Grass, that didn’t mean that it’d be easy for her. She still had her anger, her resentment for what she felt that the Odists had done in their shaping of the System and its history, their role in Marsh uploading in the first place, and for that, I could hardly fault her. I’d had my own share of feelings over the years that had lingered, that I had bathed in helplessly, struggling to escape the odd comforts of depression or angst or anger. I could hardly expect her to climb free immediately.</p>
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<p>“I do not blame her, either,” Dry Grass had said when I voiced these thoughts. “It is not comfortable, to be clear. I do not like that she hates me. My role — the role of my whole stanza — is to revel in feelings of motherhood. I saw myself as mother to the System on a very real, very mechanical level, back when I was working as a systech. To have a citizen of the very System I love hate me is perilously close to having a child hate me. Everyone wants to be liked.”</p>
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<p>Sedge had was the next to turn down the invitation.</p>
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<p>“I’m feeling stretched really thin, all of that research over the last few days. I love it, don’t get me wrong, I just can’t think anymore,” she’d said, shoulders slumping. “My brain has turned to mush and I just kinda want to find a really dark sim and stare at nothing.”</p>
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<p>Rush, initially quite interested in a communal meal, bailed not long after, saying that ve was too sleepy, that the night was coming on too quickly, it felt, with so much new information coming at ver too quickly.</p>
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<p>And finally, Hanne stepped away without warning. She sent me a sensorium message a minute later saying that she was meeting up with her friends, with Warmth In Fire leading a memorial for Shu. That was more important than dinner, and the prospect of forking of engaging with the mechanics of our world, felt fraught to her.</p>
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<p>Rush, initially quite interested in a communal meal, bailed not long after, saying that ve was too sleepy, that the night was coming on too quickly, ve felt, with so much new information coming at ver too quickly.</p>
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<p>And finally, Hanne refused. She sent me a sensorium message saying that she was still out with her friends, with Warmth In Fire leading a drunken memorial for Shu. That was more important than dinner, and the prospect of forking of engaging with the mechanics of our world felt fraught to her.</p>
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<p>So it was that Cress, Tule, Dry Grass, and I sat around a table, hotpot bubbling away in the center, in a nearly deserted restaurant. We said nothing, each doubtless lost in our own thoughts, as we dredged veggies and tofu, thin strips of fish and surimi, and thinly sliced lamb through the spicy broth, carefully fishing them back out after the scant few seconds it took for them to cook so that we could eat them atop bowls of rice.</p>
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<p>It was Tule who broke the silence. “This is all incredibly fucked, but at least the food is good.”</p>
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<p>We all bust out laughing. Cress, most of all seemed caught up in the humor, laughing uncontrollably until tears streamed down its face. That laughter briefly veered into hysterical sobs as it hunched over in its seat. We had long since set up a cone of silence, and I think we were all glad for that now, as it made the space feel more intimate, more comforting as Tule and Dry Grass bookended Cress and rubbed their hands over its back.</p>
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<hr />
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</article>
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<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-03-26</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-04-13</p>
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</footer>
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</main>
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