Codrin Bălan#Castor — 2346

Convergence T-minus 3 days, 5 hours, 21 minutes

Codrin was pleased to see that some magic wrought by the Ansible engineers both here on Castor and their counterparts over on Artemis allowed the Artemisians to assume what must be their natural forms and that they weren’t greeted by a gaggle of Douglases. Ey’d never seen Douglas, but it would have been unnerving and difficult to differentiate them. They’d even come wearing clothes — those who wore them, at least, this Iska and Artante Diria — which ey supposed they would appreciate. One of those benefits of System-to-System Ansibles that they’d enjoyed on their transit from Lagrange to LVs, as well.

So it was that they found themselves lined up opposite their counterparts across the table from each other, exchanging their formal greetings.

“Rehasiër munachla achles eslosam. Tapotevier les unachadev itek The-Only-Time-I-Know-My-True-Name-Is-When-I-Dream-am, True-Name itet.” The skunk bowed formally, deep and at the waist.

The firstracer before her bowed its head, a movement that took place solely in the neck rather than the waist. “Greetings, and thank you for letting us join you. I am the leader, and my name is Turun Ka.”

Ey watched the exchange of greetings curiously, making note of what gestures were made, before bowing emself and saying, “Rehasiër munachla echles eslosam. Tapotevier les unechrenum Codrin-Bălanam.“

Turun Ko, opposite em, responded with a similar motion of raised head. “Greetings-hello, thank-you-and-gratitude for allowing our delegation-emissaries. I act as observer-recorder and am called-named Turun Ko.”

Ey tilted eir head, noting the confusion on eir side of the table at the choppy, synonym-ridden greeting, filing away a question to ask of the recorder later.

The greetings continued down the line. Tycho and Stolon greeted each other as scientists. Iska, who startled em in their resemblance to Debarre, and Why Ask Questions greeted each other, followed last of all by Artante Diria and Sarah.

There was a small shuffle as the delegates from both craft sat at the table, Iska politely requesting that their chair be raised and the surface area made smaller so that they could more effectively reach the table, which True Name accomplished with a gesture. Both Turun Ka and Turun Ko set their chairs aside and squatted down on their haunches before the table instead.

“Thank you once again, and welcome to this convergence,” Turun Ka said. Its voice was pleasantly musical. “It is a pleasure to meet those who are new and different from us, and we are always grateful when luck and chance allow us to do so.”

True Name nodded, a hint of a bow from where she sat. “Thank you for joining us, and welcome to the Launch Vehicle Castor. We are honored to have you aboard. If you need anything at all, please do not hesitate to ask me, as I bear full ACLs for the sim. You will find your rest area down there—” She gestured with a paw toward one of the hallways. “—where you will have limited ACLs that will allow you to modify many of the objects there and will allow you to fork once.”

The reactions around the table were mixed. Turun Ka and Turun Ko remained impassive — they seemed to move only with intent, and when not required, they were as stationary as statues. Stolon tilted their head in a quizzical manner. Iska’s expression was hard to read, but were ey pressed to put a name to it, ey would have called it unnerved, or perhaps startled. Given the similarities of her features to the humans around the table, Artante looked quite pleased.

“There will be no time skew?” Iska asked, voice high pitched, each word dipping in tone.

“We were not able to accommodate that, no.”

“You appear-seem displeased or uncomfortable,” Turun Ko said, head pointing down the table toward Why Ask Questions. “Can you explain if able or comfortable?”

She looked over to True Name, who gave a small nod of permission.

“Some of us here on the System do not feel comfortable with unbounded time,” she said. “We will discuss more as the meeting continues.”

“Aën,” it said. Okay.

After a moment’s silence, the skunk continued. “Per our agreement, this meeting here on Castor will be focused on knowledge-share surrounding the topics of linguistics and science, with particular attention to astronomy and spaceflight, while those aboard Artemis will focus on society, politics, and psychology. I would like to open with a round of free questioning, if you are amenable, in order to find a few examples for which directions to take the meeting in moving forward. Do you agree?”

“Yes,” Turun Ka said. “One question per delegate should be an appropriate way to begin. I invite you to begin, leader True Name.”

The response was quick in coming. “We have divided civilizations up into a range of classes depending on their energy usage: planet scale, planetary system scale, and galaxy scale. At what stage were each of your races, and, if you have ran across any additional races, at what scale did they work?”

“Our race lived at the scale of planetary system,” it replied. “We appear the way we do in our post-biological state in order to survive in a variety of environments beyond those of our world-of-origin.”

“Lu,” Stolon said, speaking slowly. “Planetary scale for us. For other three races.”

True Name glanced to Codrin, ensuring that ey was taking notes. “Thank you. Would you like to go next, leader Turun Ka?”

“Yes. By what means do you collect the materials needed for your civilization, whether for the embodied world or this one?”

“Mining on our planet and our planet’s moon,” the skunk said after a moment’s thought. “As well as limited mining of asteroids at stationary points of orbit.”

“You call Lagrange point, ka?” Stolon asked.

She nodded. “Correct.”

“We saw…lu…” They chattered their teeth for a moment, then looked to Iska. “Baenå’ luta’ ‘esbrohakadåt’?“

“Space-constructs,” they said, filling in. “We saw constructs of various size at your planet-moon and planet-star Lagrange points.”

True Name stiffened, but any response she might have had was preempted by Tycho. The astronomer, who had appeared largely overwhelmed by the meeting to date had steadily grown more excited during the questioning phase. “You did? How? Radio? When did you see them? During gravity assist? How–“

“Tycho, hold up,” Sarah said, laughing. “There will be time.”

Stolon, meanwhile, was clacking claw-tipped fingers against the table and bobbing their head. “Za lutatier! Za, za,” they said quickly. “Will say, will say. Excited also, scientist Tycho.”

Codrin grinned, scribbling further notes in eir notebook. Ey was pleased to see that there was also excitement around the table, rather than simply anxiety.

“Scientist Stolon, please answer scientist Tycho’s question regarding how,” Turun Ka said, voice bouncing through tones.

Amusement, perhaps? Codrin thought. The atmosphere certainly seemed to have lightened.

“Radio emanations, anem. Too far for visible light, useless light.”

Tycho grinned, nodded. “Apologies, that will be my question, then.”

“I ask,” Stolon said. “How launched vehicle? We see also another, we learn language from.”

“A station — a construct, as you say — rotating with the Castor and Pollux launch vehicles at the end of long launch arms, released us at tangential velocity, then photon sails, Hall Effect engines, and gravity assists on our way out of the system.”

“You move not so fast, ka? Conserve fuel?” They chattered their teeth again. “Sorry sorry, will ask again soon.”

“I am pleased to see the scientists excited,” Turun Ka said. “Recorder Codrin Bălan? Recorder Turun Ko?”

When Turun Ko did not speak, Codrin asked, “Does your system allow you to forget?”

“Memories degrade-rot,” the other recorder said. “Saves-preserves storage. Garbage collection process trims-prunes old-unaccessed memories.”

Both True Name and Sarah reached for their pens to make note of the answer.

Codrin smiled and nodded eir thanks.

“Recorder Codrin Bălan, do your bodies-physical-forms continue to live after embedding-uploading of consciousness?”

Ey shook eir head. Realizing that the gesture may not translate, ey said, “No, they are destroyed in the process of uploading. Or embedding, as you say.”

Both Iska and Artante Diria took notes of this answer.

“I have a question,” Sarah said, when the silence drew out. “Do you have the concept of mental illness? Depression, disordered thinking, disconnect from reality?”

“Yes,” Artante Diria said. “We have not discovered a means of removing such after embedding. I will ask next. I infer that you have not either. What treatments do you have for mental illness?”

“Talk therapy, mostly. If one is careful, one can reduce the effects by forking with intent to change, though this can have complex effects on other parts of the personality. It’s come up in the past with the–“

Why Ask Questions rested a hand gently on Sarah’s forearm. Both she and True Name were frowning.

“We will discuss later, perhaps.”

“Yes, in time,” the Odist said. “For my question, I would like to know how you manage linguistic drift.”

Iska straightened up. “Our common tongue began primarily that of secondrace, of my race, but has incorporated many aspects of other languages. Languages within each race, including for pure Nanon, the basis of our common tongue, are uncontrolled, but common tongue is managed via central authority.”

“Thank you, representative Iska.”

“I will ask the final question,” they said. “You say that we will have the ability to fork. Is there not risk of divergence?”

True Name answered, “There is. Why Ask Questions is a fork from me, and I am in turn a fork from the root instance, Michelle Hadje. We have individuated in the last two hundred twenty years.”

That unnerved, anxious expression returned to the secondracer’s face, but they bowed their head all the same. “Aët. Thank you.”

Standing, True Name bowed deeply once more. “Thank you once again for joining us. Let us retire to our rest areas to compare notes and strategize, then reconvene in one hour’s time to begin in earnest.”

Both delegations stood and returned their acknowledging gestures, whatever they might be, and each walked toward their respective rest areas.

“What do you think?” Why Ask Questions asked. “Real or dream?”

Tycho frowned. “It’s too early to–“

True Name elbowed him in the side and laughed. “She is being a brat. Do not fall for her trap.”

“Yeah, yeah, fuck you too,” the other Odist said, grinning. “Do keep an eye out, though, my dear. We must act as though they are real for now, and we must not lose focus on the talks, but the answer may well be relevant later.”

“Do not confuse our scientist, please,” the skunk said mildly, then winked to Tycho.

If the comment had been meant to reassure Tycho, it fell flat. The astronomer’s look of confusion only deepened.

Codrin let the three pass em, catching Sarah’s eye to walk slower. Once Tycho had wandered toward the coffee setup and the Odists were several paces ahead, heads together and talking quietly, ey asked, “What do you make of it?”

She shrugged. “I’m not sure yet. The questions were all reasonable, but I wasn’t really able to figure out if there was a direction to them. The question about mental health seemed to be earnest, as though they were looking for an actual solution to the problem, while Stolon’s question about launching was very to the point. Hard facts, that sort of thing.”

Ey nodded.

“Weird that they’d ask about our bodies living on after uploading, though,” Tycho said, coffee in hand. “What could they possibly want with that knowledge?”

“Not sure,” she said. “Maybe trying to figure out incentives for uploading? I really don’t know.”

“I’m feeling kind of lost after all that.” Codrin sighed, hunting down the partitioned ‘room’ ey’d claimed as eir own and stopping outside the door. “It’s overwhelming. I have no idea what avenues to go down from here. I want to ask why Turun Ko speaks the way it does, I want to ask about their opinions on forking, I want to ask all these questions, but I’m not sure how welcome that’ll be in my role.”

“I don’t know about that either, as representative. I hope I get to ask more. Though, well…” Sarah glanced over to where True Name and Why Ask Questions had sat at a table, still talking earnestly within a cone of silence. “I don’t know what’s more interesting. The emissaries or the Odists.”