update from sparkleup
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<p>Instead, he walked around the small hill in the center of the clearing, muttering now down to the grass, shouting now up to the sky. Half words, half sentences, anything to vent the pressure he felt building inside him, but there was nothing to be done.</p>
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<p>When the response finally came, he realized he’d only made it halfway around that hill. Less than a minute must have passed. Time seemed to have stretched itself out long. The response was a mumbled, sleepy-sounding address.</p>
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<p>Tycho left before his next footfall hit the ground.</p>
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<p>Low clouds hung above the low house on the shortgrass prairie. He forced himself to walk, not run, up to the house, where he could already see a light turning on, vague shapes moving behind the glass. The soft chime that announced his arrival led those two shapes, one human, one not, to look up up, and before he even made it to the house’s door, Codrin was already there, much as he remembered, though much more tired.</p>
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<p>Low clouds hung above the low house on the shortgrass prairie. He forced himself to walk, not run, up to the house, where he could already see a light turning on, vague shapes moving behind the glass. The soft chime that announced his arrival led those two shapes, one human, one not, to look up, and before he even made it to the house’s door, Codrin was already there, much as he remembered, though much more tired.</p>
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<p>“Tycho Brahe, yes?” ey asked. “Is everything okay?”</p>
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<p>He tore his eyes away from the figure beside the historian, what looked to be some large-eared vulpine standing on two legs, looking just as tired as Codrin.</p>
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<p>“Uh, yes.” He stammered. “No? I don’t think so, at least. I’m sorry for waking you. I don’t think things are okay, though.”</p>
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<p>“Uh, yes,” he stammered. “No? I don’t think so, at least. I’m sorry for waking you. I don’t think things are okay, though.”</p>
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<p>Codrin nodded and stepped aside, gesturing to welcome the astronomer in and guiding him to a seat at the table.</p>
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<p><em>“I will make tea,”</em> the fox said. <em>“Though I think perhaps one without caffeine.”</em></p>
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<p>“Who…?”</p>
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<p>“You understand why I’m concerned, then, right?”</p>
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<p>The historian set eir mug back down on the table without taking a sip, saying, “Tell me all that you can.”</p>
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<p>So he recounted the events of the previous hour. The sudden interruption of an impersonal message, a simple note from the perisystem architecture informing him, the astronomer on duty, of the signal received.</p>
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<p><em>“What signal was it? Were the primes echoed back to us?”</em> Dear, asked.</p>
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<p><em>“What signal was it? Were the primes echoed back to us?”</em> Dear asked.</p>
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<p>He shook his head and recited from memory, “We hear you. We see you. We are 3 light-hours, 4 light-minutes, 2.043 light-seconds out at time of message send. Closing at 0.003c relative velocity. Closest intercept 5 light-minutes, 3.002 light-seconds in 972 hours, 8 minutes, 0.333 seconds. We understand the mechanism by which we may meet. We have similar. Instructions to follow.”</p>
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<p>There was a long moment of silence around the table as the words sank in.</p>
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<p>“The mechanism,” Codrin said, finally breaking the silence. Ey sounded hoarse, unprepared. “The Ansible? The instructions for creating a signal that it’ll recognize?”</p>
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<p>Ey sighed, leaned over and patted him on the shoulder. “Well, since I’m sure as hell not sleeping anymore, I guess coffee’s next. Coffee, and figuring out what to do with our wayward astronomer and upcoming guests.”</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-03-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-05-13</p>
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<p>“Yep, it’s free energy.”</p>
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<p>She rested her cheek on her shoulder to look over at him, grinning. “Or perhaps simply to hide where they came from. Maybe they are using the possibility of that assist to obscure their trail!” She laughed, waving a paw up at the stars. “Or they are spying on us, investigating us, Earth, Lagrange. But listen to me, here I am speaking like this is some grand space opera. I have read too much science fiction over the years.”</p>
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<p>He nodded, grinning as well. “Their speed and the laws of physics make all of those very unlikely. The only reason they may have even bothered to contact us is because we have a chance at some sort of contact that won’t immediately fade into light-days.”</p>
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<p>“They did say that they were moving fast, did they not? I suppose that helps alleviate some of those old space-opera-fueled fears.” She returned her gaze up to the sky. “Though, you know, it got me thinking. How many things like this LV might be zooming around the galaxy at incredible speeds? We can be sure now that there are at least, three, yes? Our dear home, Castor, then Pollux way on the other side of the sun, and now this new one.”</p>
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<p>“They did say that they were moving fast, did they not? I suppose that helps alleviate some of those old space-opera-fueled fears.” She returned her gaze up to the sky. “Though, you know, it got me thinking. How many things like this LV might be zooming around the galaxy at incredible speeds? We can be sure now that there are at least three, yes? Our dear home, Castor, then Pollux way on the other side of the sun, and now this new one.”</p>
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<p>“True. Maybe everyone’s just figured out that this is the safest and easiest way to travel.”</p>
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<p>“You took the words from my mouth,” she said with a chuckle. “It makes one wonder, perhaps this is the Great Filter. Perhaps Kardashev was wrong all along, and we should not be looking at the energy usage of a civilization but on the scale from Earthbound, spaceflight, and then uploading, and it is only civilizations that reach that third state that might pass through that filter.”</p>
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<p>“I’d not thought of it that way.”</p>
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<p>After True Name and Tycho#Artemis left, he stood there on the top of his hill, in the middle of his field, surrounded by his ring of trees, and looked up into the night sky, thinking on all that it meant to be powerless.</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-05-08</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-05-13</p>
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