I've got a list of names | Glowfic Constellation

Afen is disappointed in the universe. He bounds back and forth across his room explaining why to his wife, his infant granddaughter, the end table, and a reporter flabbergasted by her good luck and cringing silently against the wall in the hopes he won't remember she's there.

"There is no reason to suppose that a species evolving independently of Amentans, with their own evolutionary history and living mammalian species likely related to theirs, would end up looking like us. None. Every explanation every scientist has ventured to the press has been unimaginative and unconvincing retroactive refitting of bad models to baffling data. Aliens shouldn't look like us but with different hair colors. Aliens that are not made out of carbon at all would be unsurprising; aliens with only as much physiological dissimilarity as exists between us and animal species on our planet would be mildly surprising; aliens with opposable thumbs would be truly remarkable. This is not remarkable and biologically enlightening; this is just inconsistent with everything we understand about the universe. It doesn't teach us new things about evolution; it should make us rethink evolution. - don't quote that part, they'll take it out of context."

Reporter nods rapidly.

"All of that said, I've picked up three of the languages and I'm working on building a good machine translator, it's a challenge with as little as they've produced in the way of electronic records. I'm absolutely going there to meet them as soon as the politicians figure out what to do with themselves."

"Do you have any predictions about that?"

"About politics? Why would I have predictions about politics? They deliberately obscure relevant information, for one thing, and for another it's deathly boring."

"- I mean, sir, surely you hear from your son about -"

"I have seven children and some of them are very dense indeed but not quite dense enough to try to interest me in politics."

"I was referring to -"

"I know who you were referring to. If you want a statement from Aitim go bother Aitim."

"Thank you for your time."

"I did not alter my activities in response to your presence and therefore you can't yet be said to have wasted any of my time though you should go before you do."

...out skitters the reporter.

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Sigh.

"It's really on Aitim, not the people carrying out the rules he made."

too-early-and-too-late

"I haven't been blaming the guards and executioners. But if they've got blue hair, they could be making things better, and instead she's -" Sigh.

"Shasali can't afford controversy," says Katin. "She's still barely allowed to exist and if anything bad enough happens to her her kids get it too."

Michael Cyrus Way

"The fuck."

"It's probably safe at this point, it's been a few years, but red's the only caste that supersedes lineality," says Ana.

too-early-and-too-late

"I - appreciate where you're coming from here, but it's hard to be impressed by 'we used to be absolute unmitigated moral monsters and now we just suck, a lot.' And it's truly astonishing how apparently no one could be doing any better than they're currently doing without horrible personal risk and yet the resultant society does not look anything like one where everyone is doing the best they can."

Makel Alasi

"Your world has slavery but you were doing the best you could, right?"

too-early-and-too-late

" - yeah, as in 'ticking all the political boxes to end it before I was Amentan six.' If I was owning human slaves and gravely explaining how I couldn't do better than that I think you'd be entitled to judge me."

Makel Alasi

"There are more than fifty million people alive because of what Aitim and my mother did."

"Rivik was going to ship its reds to Miolee," says Ana. "They were going to send them away to be cleaned there and never have to think about it again and decided to shoot them all instead. There weren't going to be any consequences for it until Aitim came up with a coalition of people who were annoyed that they'd made it harder to get reds to go where they were told in the future."

Michael Cyrus Way

" - why did they - why would they -"

Peka Atan

touchme

"Because they were red!"

too-early-and-too-late

"Is Rivik out conquering other inferior species?"

"They're a really small country," says Ana. "They'll probably wind up going in on a planet with some other countries."

Michael Cyrus Way

Humans do not look happy at the prospect.

"There are probably uninhabited ones. I think Rivik doesn't have its own space program." She pulls out her pocket everything. It briefly flares to life but then dies. She frowns at it.

Minor Finis Way

"Magic interferes with electricity. We've been keeping our devices in a box outside the wards while I try to figure out how to make it not do that."

"Is it busted or just not gonna work here?" asks Ana. "How far out do I have to go?"

Minor Finis Way

"I don't know if it'll work again when you're out but probably. We haven't tried them here because they're expensive and we knew what'd happen. The box is less than three minutes' walk from the house, it works fine as soon as you're outside the wards."