"I'd say it's not me writing it but at this point I've done half the work anyway, so thanks."

Eventually, there is a book. It begins:

My name is Feris of Leopard Hill, of Sesat, which is in a nonmagical universe adjacent to Edda. I have served on the disputed northeastern border with Iral; I have lived without knowledge of germ theory or antibiotics. When my world was discovered, Azan had just declared their intent to conquer my country and to enslave me and to maim me that I might never dare to take up arms against them again. After my world was discovered, as a direct result of multiversal interaction, that war ended nearly bloodlessly, and afterward, also as a direct result of multiversal interaction, I became king of Sesat. The arrival of Vanda Nossëo’s envoys, and the ensuing sequence of events that first contact caused, is by far the worst thing that has ever happened to me.

He goes out of his way to avoid naming anyone other than himself, though it's not hard to identify some of them.

Nelen asks for an advance reader copy.

He can have one, and a little handwritten note tucked into it that reads:

I only decided to publish it because Tarwë was sure you wouldn't be hurt. You are always welcome in Sesat, and it is my sincere hope that you will be eternally happy.

Aww, that's so sweet.

Nelen sets aside some time and starts in on it.

It starts with obvious objective facts about Sesat that Nelen has surely learned by now, like the pre-contact tech level and tax policies and population size, a little geopolitical context on Azan, and commentary on Sesati culture, such as how being hard to kill relates to gender and class, and...

In Sesat, one must have worth, a messy gestalt of several virtues—exactly which ones depends on whom you ask, but will certainly include honor and courage—which is frequently understood to follow such ideas as ought-implies-can, allowing people to have worth even when mistaken. Being without worth is both worse than death and a shame to your family. After becoming acquainted with the multiverse, I encountered a riddle known as the puzzle of the blue-eyed islanders; I found it painfully familiar.

Communication in Sesat is frequently indirect and involves allowing people to pretend not to have noticed that you just pointed out that their metaphorical eyes are metaphorically blue. The extent to which people are deceiving themselves, deceiving others, or merely genuinely deceived, varies from person to person and topic to topic. For more on this topic see my book On Minds. Suffice it to say here that asking for concessions in Sesati culture typically involves providing a narrative wherein if the person you’re asking concessions from gives you what you want it will neither involve doing something wrong nor constitute an admission of prior fault. Flattery is so common that its absence can by itself indicate contempt in some situations.

Sesat is what is known as a culture of honor, in which insults must be answered. To many, this is important in itself, as a point of pride; to most, it is also strategically important, as people (particularly men, see above) are presumed to want to answer insults, so failure is evidence of inability. As well, I have heard a story from Mîr where one party was trying to exit an enclosed space (a bus) and another party intercepted them and shoved them back inside. I trust my source for the claim that this is not seen as violent or threatening in Mîr, but that only leads me to doubt the translation of “violent” and “threatening”; if this happened to me in pre-contact Sesat I would have killed whoever behaved in such a way, and I would certainly have felt deeply insulted, but I would also have expected it to go very badly for me if I didn’t. Trying to make some relevant heuristics explicit, I can think of a few: when someone makes it clear that he’s willing and in his own estimation able to beat you in a fight and possibly kill you, that’s concerning; when someone tries to trap you, that’s a threat; when someone threatens you, you mustn’t give in; when someone threatens you unnecessarily in public, it’s a performance; when someone tries to put on a show of being stronger than you, that’s part of making it known that they’re better than you; when it’s known that someone is better than you, that’s part of what it means for them to be better than you. I’m not sure whether to expect someone like that to want to trap their victim and beat them up, trap their victim and make demands, or let them go with it understood by both that the victim was their inferior. That is, I would expect all of those things at different times and from different people.

(What do I mean when I say it would be understood that the victim was their inferior? In some sense it’s a thing that merely is, like Amentan beliefs about pollution. But it certainly has effects on other things you can observe, like the likelihood that the victim will be subject to the same behavior again, the likelihood that the victim will be subject to petty theft, the likelihood that the victim will be targeted for some manner of extortion later…)

Someone I know provided as a possible insight the not-literally-true framing that in Sesat everything is a threat until proven otherwise.

And the introductory section finishes with:

It is difficult to convey quickly how to communicate with Sesatis productively. It has not felt confusing to me but I have been unable to convey it despite trying as hard as I could with multiple foreigners. I asked a Sesati who lived in Mîr for a while what he thought of the difficulty in communication; he answered, “You really think that’s the problem? You want my honest answer? If someone shows up and tells you over and over again how worthless you are, and you tell them over and over again how to communicate clearly, and after you spend a month telling them how to communicate clearly with you they tell you again how worthless you are—that’s because they think you’re worthless. It was fucking hilarious watching you try, though. You were really determined.” I asked a different Sesati of my acquaintance, who said, “If I had their power and wanted to give the impression of not holding all of Sesat in contempt I’d have led with gifts, not with demands. ‘Would you like to raise the dead? Would you like to turn into an animal? Would you like to be able to make magic jewelry? We would be delighted to honor our friends the people of Sesat whom we came all this way to meet. Oh, if you wanted to give us a gift, we would accept your slaves.’ Something like that. … No, I think it’s just that they don’t soften it when they talk about power.” (I don’t agree; I have also observed the envoys not to soften their rhetoric about morality, either.)

The task of the envoys was to give us all some excuse to say we believed it would be a virtuous thing to do to join them and do what they wanted, without also saying we were all monsters before, and to give us all some reason to believe they respected us or, failing that, some reason to pretend to believe it. We would have acceded to all their demands immediately. Weeks passed before they gave us the latter; they have still never given us the former.

Oof. The no-lying policy might be too rigid? Except there are certainly places where flattery would have blown up in their faces, too...

The next section is a discussion of the state Sesat is in now. It opens with fully twenty interviews.

Interview 1

Feris: I’m writing the book now. Can I interview you for it?

1: Yeah.

F: Are you glad you were born?

1: Wow, you’re not fucking around. No. I wish I’d never been born.

F: Before Vanda Nossëo made contact, were you glad you were born?

1: I guess. How else was I going to smell flowers or learn to stand on my hands and shoot with my feet? I don’t think I was ever as glad of it as some people but yeah. Man, I miss when people thought I was cool for doing trick shots like that.

F: What changed?

1: [laughs] All my skills are worthless or universal. Literacy’s universal, archery’s worthless, being able to knife a guy too fast for him to react turned out worse than worthless.

F: It did?

1: Oh, imagine you’re on a bus. You’re about to leave. It’s all enclosed. Some guy steps on your foot, you think on purpose, and gets in your way as you try to leave. What do you do?

F: I draw whatever weapon I have on hand and tell him never to touch me again. Unless he’s from Vanda Nossëo and you’re in their territory, then I have no idea.

1: I went with telling him I was sure he was apologizing and then he shoved me.

F: Yeah, you kill him then. Again, unless Vanda Nossëo is backing him and he and can act with impunity. Perhaps even then.

1: It turns out that’s just illegal in Vanda Nossëo no matter who does it. Killing someone like that, I mean.

F: [sighs] Naturally.

1: It turns out that—you know what you’d think if someone didn’t, right?

F: Well, a coward would try to placate him. A woman would scream.

1: Why would a woman scream?

F: I suppose because someone might be around in time to save her and she probably doesn’t want to be—raped? Killed? Insulted?

1: So it turns out actually she should be completely confident that none of that would happen. Because the authorities are so all-powerful it’s impossible that he could ever get away with any crime.

F: Wow.

1: So I guess that’s the other thing. That—do you really want me to say it?

F: Yes.

1: That we’re not people, really. That we belong to them now. We live and die at their whim.

F: I’ve heard that they have a certain pride in their courts, like the fair folk, and if they broke the laws they’ve written to kill someone it would be a terrible thing for them to live with having done. And their teleporters would turn on them.

1: Well, that last part is just untrue, the teleporters can’t turn on them because they’ll take the power away if you try. I used to think I’d be able to feel like it was like a sword I’d been lent or something, but then I got it and I felt like it belonged to me. Like it was part of me. Only it doesn’t really belong to me. It’s part of me that belongs to them, and the more powerful you seem the more you’re actually made of things that belong to the peal. Only, no, that’s still not true, because—I mean, they’d take anything. The reason I’m allowed to have eyes and ears, my tongue, my hands, my feet, is because they’re not afraid I’ll somehow use them to stand against them. We’re slaves, Feris, it just happens to please them to pretend otherwise and give us nice things.

F: Let’s move on to the next question. What in your life has improved the most?

1: I got to fly. That was okay.

F: What in your life has been the most worsened?

1: Knowing that everyone I love is a slave and that someday we’ll probably all wind up in Angband. You know, I think a lot about whether I’m actually in Angband right now.

F: Why will we all wind up in Angband?

1: Lots of Melkors, capable of interdimensional travel, why hasn’t someone evil landed on an Arda yet? Or someone just unable to save it? There could be an evil peal. I’m not saying there are more evil peals or that they’ll spend more time ruling more of the multiverse, just that someday we’ll run into one. Someday we’ll run into an infinite number. Someday we’ll lose. Maybe it’ll take a trillion years and maybe afterward we’ll all escape and it won’t happen again for a trillion trillion years. But why wouldn’t it happen?

F: I suppose. Is there anything you can think of that would make that better?

1: No.

F: What would it take to make you whole now?

1: Indelible magic powers cooler than Loki’s.

F: Not even indelible magic powers as cool as Loki’s?

1: It’s the thing where someday there’ll be an evil peal. I should’ve just said omnipotence.

F: I see.

1: When I finish my indenture I’m going to buy a couple of worldleapers. At least escape off the map. At least have the option.

F: Yeah. Is there any way you wish Vanda Nossëo had handled things differently?

1: Yes, they should have given me Loki’s spells and then fucked off.

F: How should they have figured out that they should have done that?

1: Oh, there’s no way they could possibly have figured that out. I’m not even confident it’s better from their perspective. I think it would have been, though.

F: What would have happened then?

1: I’d have conquered Sesat and made peace with Azan and healed everyone who asked. Actually, it’s probably better to just bring in as many slaves as possible, because some of us might somehow turn out useful when the evil peal inevitably shows up, but I think it’s probably still better to give us all as much power as possible with as few backdoors as possible because we’re not Melkor and that’s the only thing that really matters in the end.

F: Is there something they could say that would cause you to stop believing you’re their slave?

1: They could kiss my feet and beg my forgiveness and actually give me power. It’s not a social thing, it’s not like when slaves ran away to Azan. The gap in power is too big. They could swear that I’m their favorite person and they adore me personally and want to make me happy because they love me so much. One of the female Bells could marry me?

F: That seems like more assurance than the envoys have.

1: Are you sure the envoys aren’t also slaves?

F: I really believe they didn’t mean to do this to us. I know them. They genuinely didn’t.

1: Oh, they didn’t mean to do what they did? Some greater power compelled them? They’re actually helpless?

F: They don’t think they are.

1: Whatever lets them sleep at night.

F: Is there anything they could have said or done, before you knew better, that would have tricked you into believing something less awful than this?

1: Yeah, for sure. They could have pretended not to have any power besides dwarven artificing and technology and then sold us a charp and an artificing class for our slaves and a promise to deliver all our future slaves to them forever.

F: Is there anything that would have held up to actually visiting the multiverse?

1: A political marriage. Coming in and saying “It’s so horrifying that people so courageous and honorable and strong and blah blah blah had to come up in this universe barren of magic, it’s amazing that you did anyway, we’re so horrified and want to teach you all dwarven artificing right away and we’d like to hear what you have to say, so much so that we’ve worked to make you these treasures to pay for them because even your humblest anecdote is worth a bolt of fine silk. We’re so honored to make your acquaintance.” Fucking showing as much respect as learning our etiquette at some point. Not opening with veiled threats. They’d’ve had to not totally radiate contempt all the time, too. I’m not sure they could manage it. There are too many of  them and they hate us too much.

F: What do you hope will happen next?

1: That I’ll discover a magic song that makes me not mind any of it anymore.

F: I think I already know the answer to this, but are you flourishing?

1: [laughs] Nope.

F: And what do you think the starfarers have most misunderstood about us?

1: I don’t know.

F: Is there anything about them that confuses you?

1: Yeah, but I don’t know how to phrase it as a specific question.

 

Interview 2

F: I’m writing a book about first contact, that’s what the interview’s for. These are mostly to get a sense of how people feel about how it went and how people feel about Vanda Nossëo.

2: I like Vanda Nossëo.

F: I’m glad to hear it. I know this is a bit personal, but are you glad you were born?

2: What kind of question is that? Yeah, actually. Just since I moved here. I like my life. I think I’m really cool.

F: And before Vanda Nossëo made contact?

2: I was cool then too but I wasn’t happy.

F: What changed?

2. They treat me like a person.

F: How so?

2: I get to wear my hair however I want. And they talk to me like I’m a person and stuff. And I get paid. And I get to do the jobs I want and not the jobs I don’t want.

F: If you’d been allowed that in Sesat, would it have been fine?

2: Not if it was just me. Also it turns out I’m probably smarter now or something because of the resurrection making it like I never got hit in the head.

F: I would love to be smarter. Learning about lead and fetal alcohol syndrome horrified me.

2: Learning what?

F: There are omnipresent poisons that make people stupid.

2: What? That’s fucked up.

F: So why do you have all these things now?

2: Because I’m not surrounded by horrible people. Gotta hate Sesat.

F: What made them horrible?

2: Well, hurting people on purpose for no reason.

F: I’m going to put it in the book that you were enslaved for a crime.

2: Yeah, why do you think I killed him, because he was such a sweetheart?

F: I see. Well, why did you?

2: He deserved it.

F: I see. Next question. What in your life has improved the most?

2: Everything? Me. I’m improved. My diet is improved. I know cooler people. I have fun. Roller coasters are fun. I guess I think the thing that’s the most improved is that I spend all my time making my life cool instead of reacting to people trying to hurt me.

F: Have you given up on traditional Sesati considerations that are at odds with Vanda Nossëo’s culture, like vengeance?

2: You gonna get in my way if I say no?

F: Not if it isn’t on anyone I care about and you don’t interfere with anyone I care about in the process.

2: Nah, I’m just thinking about how to do it. And… I guess if I think long enough I’ll have to check that they didn’t become better people. I think maybe people are all going to be better now. Sesat sucks.

F: I see. And what in your life has been most worsened?

2: Oh, maybe that people tolerate injustice? They don’t even pretend to care. If whatever bad thing they’re bothered about stops happening then that’s good enough for them. It—hurts. I guess.

F: What would be different if they didn’t tolerate injustice?

2: Oh, they wouldn’t get in my way if I hunted down my so-called owner and gutted him.

F: Do you think you could? If they didn’t stop you?

2: Not if he has a magic ring now. Otherwise? Yeah. I thought I probably could even before. I’m not saying I thought I’d survive it, just that I could do it. I only didn’t because I was working for Termite, the leader of the rebellion we had going on back in Sesat, and it wanted me to lay low and do these fucking subtle things that’d help reshape all of society. Oh, maybe if anyone believed in justice I would get a fucking medal for that.

F: I see. Are you basically happy with how first contact went?

2: Yeah, I’m really happy about almost everything.

F: What aspects of how they acted toward Sesatis led you to feel that way? Was it just acting like you’re a person?

2: Also they don’t hit people much. And I made friends, I guess that’s about me being cool and not something they can just give other people out of pity.

F: I see.

2: Someone told me some things some of the aliens believe about gods. They think you have to forgive people because their gods don’t like revenge. One of them decided to visit an Earth and try to convince everyone to value universal flourishing instead, but they got mad and killed him, but he didn’t stay dead. Anyway, he said if he got what he wanted, he would ‘comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.’ I think maybe that’s right. Vanda Nossëo’s been a comfort to me. Only, yeah, it’s not as good as what you guys had before, and I guess Sesat spoiled you too much and… I can’t believe I don’t even feel smug anymore calling you pathetic and fragile. You are but I just feel sad and I don’t really know why. I honestly don’t get why you don’t just die.

F: I don’t want to only live if someone who doesn’t care about my preferences has the ability and inclination to resurrect me.

2: Oh. That is fucked up, ick.

F: Yes. Next question. What do you hope will happen next?

2: I don’t know, I guess I hope I’ll go on another roller coaster. I hope no one resurrects my father for twenty years and then afterward he’s as pathetic as you and hates Vanda Nossëo and every minute of the rest of his life forever is agony. No I don’t. I think I want him to just stay dead forever except apparently that’s not an option. I hope he becomes a better person who wouldn’t have problems.

F: Do you think the thing that causes people to be miserable in Vanda Nossëo is being a bad person?

2: No. I don’t know. I think it’s pride. No one has more than almost no pride here. It’s a big step up from being treated worse than animals, you know? I get to be in charge of animals now. So it’s a relief for me. I’m not less than a dog. But I’m barely not less than a dog, it’s not like I’m allowed to hit them or anything, and I think you hate being barely not less than a dog.

F: Yes.

2: But the dogs are probably happier not being hit. I think about that a lot.

F: I suppose that’s probably true. Would you say you’re flourishing?

2: Man, I don’t really know what that means.

F: I don’t really know either, though I’ve tried to find out. I can’t tell if it’s what I would mean by it or not, when the starfarers say it.

2: They’re very weird.

F: I don’t disagree. Are there things about them that confuse you?

2: So many.

F: Such as?

2: I only sort of understand who gets to tell who else what to do. I don’t really understand a lot of things. I don’t even know what I don’t know yet!

F: Understandable. Have you noticed them being confused or wrong about anything about Sesatis?

2: They don’t even understand justice, a lot of them, except for the ones I told you about who taught me that saying about their god. I don’t know what else they don’t know.

 

Interview 3

Feris: I come to you not as your friend nor as your brother in arms nor as your king, but as a philosopher. I am writing a book and wish to interview you.

3: How do I address a philosopher, anyway?

F: I think it’s traditional to address us as “you ass” and then run us out of town in frustration.

3: That sounds about right. What do you want to know?

F: Are you glad you were born?

3: What kind of question is that? I absolutely wish I just appeared one day on Stork instead, yeah.

F: Would you rather neither have been born nor have appeared one day on Stork nor have appeared one day in some Arda nor otherwise have come into being?

3: Oh, are you asking if my life sucks? What are you looking for here?

F: I want honesty. I can remove anything I want, or anything you want, don’t worry about saying the right thing. Just tell me what’s true.

3: I guess my life sucks but it doesn’t suck that much.

F: How much does it suck?

3: I’m Sesati. Everyone on a thousand planets thinks I’m scum. I hate them, by the way. They’re all wrong and stupid and none of them could have lived the lives we lived. The fucking Elves would have died of grief the first time someone they knew was killed in a raid. The Amentans would have killed themselves the day they learned where fertilizer comes from. The Earths I guess have humans and humans can survive but Earth humans are so fragile now and when they were at our tech level they were worse at everything and treated their women like slaves. Do you know how much I hate aliens? I can’t sleep at night because I toss and turn thinking about how much I hate aliens. Glad you arranged something to keep us from having to join them. Did you hear what [redacted] said about having to let them all insult him all day? He has to live like a serf now!

F: I did hear about it. Is it truly so surprising, though?

3: Well, no, I’m not saying it’s a surprise that they treat us like that. They can so why not?

F: Because it’s not conducive to our flourishing?

3: [laughs] Ah, right, of course, our flourishing, which they care so much about.

F: Anyway, next question. Were you glad to have been born before they came?

3: My life was great. Wait, do you mean am I glad that I had that time or was I glad back then? Either way, yeah, I had a great life.

F: How so?

3: Had everything I wanted. Women, wine and song. I was good at things. People loved me. People listened to me. This is for an audience, right? That doesn’t already know me?

F: Yes, probably.

3: I was a soldier and I was good at that and it was one of the best things to be good at. People knew I was strong and brave and clever and I basically got what I wanted. There were things I didn’t have yet but I felt basically content.

F: Yeah. I remember. What changed?

3: I hate the aliens. I fucking hate the aliens. They came here to do their best to destroy Sesat and we caught them in their boasts and beat them that way. Well, you did. I’m proud of you.

F: Thank you, it was more harrowing than war.

3: I would hate to be a diplomat.

F: What in your life has improved the most?

3: I have a prestidigitator.

F: Imagine if instead of any of this they just offered to make sure each of us had a prestidigitator in exchange for our slaves.

3: I don’t see how that’d happen. What, they’d come in and just leave us alone? They don’t just leave people alone. They’re power-mad and they need to rule everything and everywhere. As soon as you’re dethroned I bet they come for us again.

F: I am being very careful about finding a successor. Next question. What in your life has been the most worsened?

3: That I have nothing to do. You get tired of being idle eventually. And knowing my friend is off being treated like a serf by the starfarers. And knowing they exist. And all the Melkors that probably exist out there. And all the orcs that definitely exist out there.

F: Is there anything that they could say or do that would make you more positively disposed toward the starfarers?

3: [laughs] They have horrible taste and they’re spoiled and delicate and can’t stand pain and they think they’re better than me even though they’re worse at everything that isn’t being given magic by someone else. Did they train for their magic? Did they work for it? Or did Loki just decide they were obedient enough for it?

F: Right, I understand that you hate them, and why. Is there anything they could do to change your mind now?

3: Why would they want to? They feel the same way about me as I do about them. They think I work for a living and they’re like beautiful ladies with rich husbands.

F: Right, supposing their taste magically improved, hypothetically.

3: I don’t know, maybe the ones with better taste want to spar. Without cheating.

F: I see. And is there anything they could have said or done differently to begin with, to keep you from forming this opinion of them in the first place?

3: They could’ve stayed the fuck away.

F: If I’d asked you before we met them whether not-quite-the-fair-folk-but-sort-of-the-fair-folk visiting from foreign stars would necessarily be terrible, would you have said yes?

3: No!

F: What would have been the best case scenario?

3: Their queen marries the Star-of-Stars? No, their queen marries me.

F: But they didn’t have to have a ruling queen.

3: Their king marries a Sesati woman.

F: Or a king, apparently, they could’ve been a democracy.

3: I guess if they showed up and did diplomacy like normal people. “Hello, Sesat, we’re from the stars, blah blah blah, let’s have trade.” “Hello, starfarers, you’re so welcome, blah blah blah…” and not try to open with “wouldn’t you love to be our vassals? We hate your laws and we’ll make you change them when we subjugate you.”

F: What are you eliding when you say “blah blah blah” like that?

3: You know, normal diplomacy noises. “We’re so happy to meet you. We’re so honored that someone so blah blah blah chose to spend their valuable time gracing us with their conversation blah blah blah.” I don’t know. I’m no diplomat, myself.

F: They told me they didn’t want to subjugate us, let alone that they couldn’t, which they told me the first time I met them.

3: Yeah but that was a word game. “We don’t have to conquer you. We’re so much better that you’ll beg for it. We won’t even let you be our vassals until enough of you beg.”

F: Mechanically, that is identical to wanting to do what pleases us and striving to find out what pleases us so they can obey.

3: Yeah! It’s great that you caught that.

F: I honestly think some of them came here genuinely believing that.

3: Yeah, the shopkeepers vary a lot but most of them aren’t very smart in a certain way. They’re not bad at math or anything but they don’t quite follow conversations or implications sometimes.

F: I’ve noticed. There’s a bit of that with the envoys, too.

3: Really! You didn’t tell me that.

F: Yes! Really! They say it’s hard because subtext is so culturally specific.

3: Is it?

F: I think so. So what do you hope will happen next?

3: We’ll move to Revelation. Have a dozen kids. Fill the universe with happy, powerful Sesatis. Any time they try to slay our children they just rise again more powerful than before.

F: I’m talking with other local kings about that.

3: Good.

F: Would you say you’re flourishing?

3: That’s the thing they keep going on about.

F: If Allspeak thinks it means something close enough to our word, then answer for our word.

3: Allspeak is shit. Remember that whole thing with “person” and “námo”?

F: Apparently Quenya just doesn’t have a word for “person”. That can’t easily be solved with good translation.

3: Anyway, yeah, I’m flourishing, I’m awesome. Not as much as before.

F: I’m glad you’re flourishing. Can you think of anything that the envoys have been wrong or confused about, about Sesat?

3: You’re the one who talks to aliens.

F: True. And are there things about them that confuse you?

3: Why do they even bother? Why not just leave us alone? Why not just kill us all? Why not just send in all their subtle artists to make us how they want? Why this fucking mockery of diplomacy?

F: I think they intended to do diplomacy that wasn’t a mockery.

 

I sent others to do the remaining interviews.

 

Interview 4

V: Someone I know is writing a book about first contact and asked me if I could interview people about how they feel about Vanda Nossëo and stuff. The questions are kind of intrusive but you don’t have to answer them and they won’t put your name in the book. If you tell me anything that’d make him want to hurt you, I won’t pass it on, I like you.

4: I remember who you used to know who wrote books.

V: This isn’t a royal command.

4: I see. Okay.

V: First question. Are you glad you were born?

4: You weren’t kidding about these questions being intrusive. Yes. I am glad I was born. Otherwise how would I be alive today? Wait, do you mean instead of being a Stork person? I’m not glad I’m not a Stork person, that would be fine. Hey, do you know if I have alts there? Some of the teleporters can check for alts, right? Can you do that?

V: I cannot do that. I have no idea if you have any alts. It would be sort of interesting if we all had Earth alts or something, wouldn’t it?

4: Yeah, I want to know how different my alts are. If the gods made me the same but everything else was different.

V: Yeah. Next question. Before they came, were you glad to have been born?

4: Yeah.

V: Next question. What is the most improved thing about your life since the starfarers came?

4: My household has a prestidigitator now and we have these premade meals and the spices sell for a song.

V: Next question. What’s the most worsened thing about your life since the starfarers came?

4: I guess knowing there’s this whole world out there and I might have alts everywhere and there’s no point in visiting because… the envoys in the shops are polite because they were ordered to be to get our guard down, but everyone out there hates us. They don’t even own up to it. They don’t really hate us, that’s wrong. They pity us. But not for being weak. For being who we are.

V: Not everyone, the first person I made friends with out there was worried about what I’d think of the world he came from. They were cannibals there. Vanda Nossëo doesn’t like that any better than we do. And the Amentans had something like slavery and it was outright illegal to aspire to anything your parents didn’t do. And the Elves turned out to have all this awful drama and no idea how to handle conflict. And then there are all the orcs. Now that I put it like this I’m not sure there’s anyone in Vanda Nossëo that actually is what they think of as better. They might all be… you know?

4: Maybe. That’d be funny. Do you suppose they even actually like being like that or are they pretending about that too?

V: Dunno.

4: But we’re too stubborn to be bribed.

V: Next question. Is there anything they could do now that would fix the things you were telling me about?

4: Honestly, it fixes it to know they’re just pretending. Now I’m just sad that most of the aliens have no integrity. But I still like their split pea soup and aniline dyes. And the healing. I can see how tempting it’d be if you didn’t have someone clever to trip them up in their own boasting and make them keep selling their healing without taking over.

V: Yeah. Next question. Do you feel satisfied with how first contact went?

4: I mean, it depends. Do you mean do I feel satisfied with what aliens exist? Not really. Do I feel satisfied that at least we handled it as well as we could? I guess.

V: What kind of aliens would you have liked better?

4: Different ones. I don’t know. Ones that don’t pretend to hold us all in contempt.

V: Makes sense. And what do you hope will happen next?

4: Oh, I don’t know. We’ll all be richer and our kids will be able to pretend to be like they’re pretending to be and won’t get looked at the way we do.

V: Yeah. Have you noticed the starfarers being wrong or confused about us?

4: Yeah, I think that’s what’s up with the shops. They want to understand. They came here not knowing anything at all.

V: Huh, yeah, that makes sense. And are you confused about them?

4: Almost certainly. I haven’t spent all this time listening to countless starfarers tell me stories, right?

V: Well, fair. I was wondering if you knew what you were confused about.

4: No, I don’t.

V: Last question, are you flourishing?

4: What, like a flower garden? Isn’t that the thing the aliens care about? Why do you care?

V: Well, I guess the writer I know wants to know if they succeeded.

4: I was flourishing before and I’m flourishing now. They didn’t succeed at shit. That’s all on me.

 

Interview 5

V: Can I ask you some questions? It’s because someone I know is writing a book about the aliens.

5: [laughs] You just asked one. Clearly you can do whatever they’ll let you.

V: For my first question, have you talked with any aliens?

5: What’s it to you.

V: I’m getting paid to ask people questions.

5: I fucking hate the aliens. I hate them. Why are you writing a book.

V: I’m not but it’s something or other to do with being mad at them and somehow that’s useful.

5: What? How?

V: I am not the one writing the book.

5: Right. Oh. Wait. I know who you know who writes books.

V: I am not going to pass on anything you tell me that would make him want to retaliate. I am not even going to give him your name. I swear I’m not trying to trap you into getting yourself in trouble.

5: What’s he want to hear?

V: I don’t really understand and there’s no obligation here to use anything you say if it’s counterproductive. Please don’t worry about it.

5: Yeah but what’s he want out of this? You must know something.

V: I didn’t really follow it, I think it’s somehow supposed to hurt the aliens or maybe that’s not true. But I really barely know anything and I swear to you, if you tell me something true and it causes problems for you, I will take responsibility for fixing that. I will make you whole. Somehow.

5: Fine. Whatever. Ask whatever.

V: Okay. Um. Do you wish you were never born?

5: What? Obviously. Why the fuck do you think I haven’t been sober for oh gods I don’t remember.

V: Did you feel that way before the aliens came?

5: Is that what you want to know? Fuck. Come inside, let’s talk privately.

V: Okay.

[pause]

5: Anyway, no, of fucking course I didn’t.

V: What changed?

5: If you haven’t noticed, I’m not telling.

V: I have probably noticed but I’m supposed to get your answer, not mine. Even if it’s the same answer.

5: Yeah but what if you’re wrong?

V: I think what I’m thinking is as bad as it can possibly be.

5: Why are you still doing things.

V: Completely unfounded hope that he’s right that the book will matter. Also I ended up in debt to some aliens and I have to pay it off.

5: [laughs] That sucks.

V: Also it doesn’t feel any better to lie around giving up and drinking too much.

5: Speak for yourself. Fine. You’re really sure you want me to say it?

V: I’m really sure.

5: They fucking own us.

V: How did you come to that conclusion?

5: What, am I wrong?

V: You’re thinking the thing I was thinking but I am, again, here to get your answers, not mine. That means asking stupid questions whose answers I could guess. Do you want anything for your time?

5: Will it really do anything? The book, I mean.

V: I think it might. I know there’s nothing else that might.

5: What was the question?

V: How did you notice they own us?

5: By not being a fucking idiot!

V: I have heard people say we’ve twisted them around in their bragging like the fair folk.

5: They’re not the fair folk. I’ve heard one say a thing they didn’t mean exactly.

V: A shopkeeper?

5: Yeah but don’t you know how they filter those?

V: I don’t.

5: Really, really well or something.

V: Good to know. There is also translation.

5: Yeah and if it’s so bad then why can you twist them up in their words, right? I’m right. You can’t. Anyway, they can do anything and they came in here and wanted to get rid of slavery so they did. Oh and I found out that they, that the meat, you know it comes in packages? The plastic? You know plastic?

V: I’ve seen plastic, yeah.

5: So it turns out, I heard about this just a couple weeks ago, the plastic gets into the water and a woman drinks the water and she has a boy baby then the baby will be kind of… not a boy baby…

V: What the fuck? Can you tell me how you found that out?

5: Went to space! Heard two of them talking to each other about it!

V: I am going to look into that.*

5: They can fix it. The angels can fix it. So now we need them.

V: What the fuck?

5: They make them turn out wrong and then they grow up and cut off what’s left of their balls and live as women.

V: Plastic in the water does that?

5: Or whatever! I guess! They can just do whatever they want to us and we can’t have a next generation without them!

V: Wow. Is it poison to grown men too?

5: They didn’t say so. I don’t know, have you eaten their plastic-wrapped meat yet?

V: Yes! And now I’m worried!

5: Well, if it made your dick fall off, you’d notice.

V: Anyway, let’s keep going for now.

5: Sure. If you want.

V: What in your life has been most worsened since they arrived?

5: Everything.

V: Can you give me an example?

5: Everything.

V: Okay. I have to ask this also, I have a list of these questions, what in your life is the most improved?

5: [laughs] I should fucking die.

V: Won’t even help but you can try it.

5: I don’t want to need their permission to be dead!

V: Yeah. I hate that. Next question. Is there something that could happen now that would convince you you were wrong about all this?

5: Well, maybe if we move the planet to Revelation and we still have sons then and they turn into angels and demons for us. Not that I like needing them to move our planet.

V: I see. And it seems like you noticed all this easily. Is there anything they could’ve done if they were competent at hiding it?

5: They don’t want to hide it.

V: What if they did?

5: Then they’d’ve gotten the plastic into our water some other way and they wouldn’t’ve come in threatening us, they would’ve acted like people doing diplomacy, you know? Like if we wanted to fuck with Niazon and didn’t want them to notice we’d act all friendly.

V: I think they might actually think the shops are friendly.

5: Oh, the shops were a good trick, but they replaced the Star-of-Stars and they came in with all that magic, showing off, they could’ve pretended not to be able to do what they wanted to us or they could’ve not replaced the Star-of-Stars.

V: Oh, actually, they didn’t. I personally did that.

5: Oh, really.

V: I did! There were witnesses!

5: D’you teleport now?

V: Yeah. See? I didn’t get it from Vanda Nossëo, I went to Mîr, you heard of them?

5: Not really. I heard the name.

V: They had this grueling test of character that was really counterintuitive, and once I had proven myself both honorable and merciful I got the teleport from them instead. It’s not as cool as Loki’s but it’s an option.

5: Wait, Loki doesn’t control all the magic?

V: No! Mîr is friendly with Vanda Nossëo so if I took their magic and went to Vanda Nossëo to fight them it’d piss Mîr off so it’s not great but yeah, they’re different countries.

5: Do you want me to ask the obvious thing or not.

V: I think you probably should but you don’t have to.

5: What if Vanda Nossëo attacks us and you defend us?

V: That would also piss Mîr off, probably, but maybe not. They could conceivably declare such a stupid casus belli that Mîr would side against them but as long as they can reasonably say they were doing something to help with universal flourishing somehow then probably Mîr would side with them. But Vanda Nossëo and their allies together still don’t control all the magic, there’s the Shadow Noldor and the Federation, which sort of technically doesn’t have magic but they might as well, and daeva and we could move to Hex and all our kids would be spellbinders but I guess I previously thought that the whole “all our kids” thing was more certain than it turned out to be. Could go to Revelation, summon an angel to get rid of all the plastic—I wonder if they’ll catch us—want to save me some time and go learn summoning and deal with it yourself?

5: Won’t work. They’ll catch me.

V: Good. Make them. Make them own up to what they’ve done and to wanting to hold our sons hostage. Most of their people can’t revolt about it but most of them would be furious and I think a few of them can, actually. Besides, how will they know? You don’t put “because I want to get the plastic out of my water” in the binding, what do they even conjure for? And don’t tell anyone you’ve done it for a year and then what are the odds a precog will catch you?

5: There’ll be more plastic in a year!

V: True. Look, I think this problem is solvable and I also think you, personally, could solve it.

5: If you say so. I’ll think about it.

V: Good. Anyway, for now, next question, what do you hope will happen next?

5: They’ll be so incompetent we can get all their magic, daeva and spellbinders and teleportation and healing and everything, and then we run away to our own planet in our own world and they don’t know where to follow us. Apparently two hops off the map will do it.

V: I bet the Star-of-Stars is working on something like that. Probably trying something else first. Anyway, this is a stupid question but I have to ask it, are you flourishing?

5: No but I will be if I can help you beat the aliens. Fucking aliens. I hate them. Do you know how much I hate them?

V: “We can never truly know even ourselves, let alone each other.” I think I have a guess, though.

5: I hate them so much.

V: Yeah. Have you noticed them being confused or wrong about us?

5: They’re awful.

V: Have you specifically noticed them being awful in that they are confused or wrong about us?

5: They underestimate us, the bastards. You’re right. We’ll get them. We’ll pull through.

V: I hope we do pull through. Are you confused about them?

5: Not really. I think I get it. They’re just like Azan and I understand Azan fine.

*The interviewer reported to me the results of his internet research and I am not seriously concerned but could we not have found out how plastic affects human development any other way?

Maybe the fundamental problem here is that they want positional goods, or just desperately need to pretend that they have them, and any honest presentation of what you can actually offer one small countryful of people in a multiverse with trillions is not very positional, especially if you have to do it over and over... Nelen doesn't know what to do about it but maybe he could have polished the rhetoric better with it in mind from the beginning...

Other interviews in which participants declined to answer any questions have been omitted. Of the twenty subjects interviewed, absolutely none had an unalloyedly positive view of Vanda Nossëo, though only a minority reported that they had started wishing they had never been born because of recent events and some had positive views overall. In general almost everyone viewed Vanda Nossëo as a hostile power seeking to subjugate us. I even followed up with my second interview subject about this question and she agreed that Vanda Nossëo did want to subjugate Sesat, she just felt better-treated by her new masters.

I would say that a main theme that stands out to me is wounded pride, especially so the more important the interviewee was before first contact. I noticed also fear and feelings of helplessness. I would not say that the average námo is happier now. Even in interviews with current and former serfs, they mainly seemed afraid and confused. This is partly my own fault, as I have not personally sought to hasten the release of serfs in general; this might have made some of them better off. However, even former serfs seemed to have substantial difficulty in orienting to and navigating their new situations, though I expect they will eventually understand.

Other problems I observed include the aggressive misuse of restraining orders. Sesatis basically do not seek them as a form of protection, but as a form of vengeance. In theory, this shouldn’t matter, if they are only granted for real misconduct and in the presence of a real threat; in practice, they aren’t. Most egregiously, I tracked down a case where someone was granted a restraining order against a person who hit him, plausibly (I estimate about a 10 - 15% pre-contact prevalence of free Sesatis actually believing slaves lacked qualia, more on which topic in part four) while under the impression that he lacked qualia. The two had not seen each other in years and it took detective work to even identify the attacker. Besides which, I have discovered that Sesat and typical peal polities can have different cultural understandings of who started a fight, making it possible for someone who at the time understood themself to be deliberately provoking someone to tell the story later in such a way that a typical restraining order processor living in Vanda Nossëo would think the other party in the story attacked unprovoked.

The section closes with the results of some surveys. None are amazingly high quality but they're more than zero evidence. It looks like the poll Valan wanted to do got done and his stance was a sizable minority of Sesat and correlated with socioeconomic status but the error bars on everything are large.

Section three discusses the accessibility of magic in depth, and section four discusses factors making integration with multiversal culture especially hard.

Section five, on communication, opens:

As mentioned before, Sesati culture makes heavy use of subtext, elision, allusion, and the construction of narratives that allow people to save face. That said, I feel somewhat confident that there were additional problems not attributable only to those things.

Some individual examples of poor communication follow, taken from transcripts of conversations with the envoys, included here to make the discussion more concrete.

There's a transcript of part of one of the first conversations Nelen had with the Star-of-Stars, with commentary:

I spoke with my predecessor about this exchange, and was told, “Yes, I made the mistake of thinking his words meant something. It seemed obvious he was telling me he wanted to increase the fertility of our land with magic he could take back at any time, and keep our children from dying in infancy likewise, and so make us in time dependent. … Of course I was stunned that we would be offered artificing classes! He’d about told me to my face he meant to keep us dependent and weak! I was impressed with you at the time, I thought you’d talked him into it, rather than him being incapable of saying what he meant.”

And excerpts from a conversation between Nelen, Tarwë and Feris, with commentary interspersed:

What I was angling for was not a comparison at all; it was an implication that the multiverse saw us as having value such that it would make any sense to seek our alliance. This would have been difficult to respond well to, as I was asking for help deceiving my people. (So far as I can tell, the multiverse sees very little value in Sesat and opted not to kill us all primarily out of principle, and we were even chosen for contact specifically because we weren’t a threat and it was considered acceptable for us to be the trial ground for incompetent new recruits to practice on since it wouldn’t cause serious harm to anyone else. I found this difficult to spin productively. At this point, the situation has improved, as we have artificers and people with other magic powers, so there is some additional inconvenience in the way of wiping us out, beyond the ethical issues.) But even so, it would not have been impossible to say something true that was evidence of the idea. 

Envoy: The city's actually a lot cleaner than comparable ones elsewhere.

Director: Really?

He appeared stunned; the transcript does not do it justice. I am not really sure how to break down why that was insulting, but it was, and it was unnecessary. He could have looked this up before coming, to have some honest praise prepared, instead of making it obvious just how little he thought of us at all times. He told me, just before this incident, that he didn’t hold us in contempt, and to this day I have nothing even resembling a guess as to what he might have meant by that.

In an interview, our integration director’s former supervisor said, “I recommended him [another of the envoys, whom I hardly spoke to], I think [the director]’s tendency to identify with whoever's worst off in a society can make him forget some of the nuance he usually tries to bring to bear and [the other envoy] has more of that.” This is a lovely sentiment and it was never suggested to me that I should speak to this other person, for all that everyone involved acted very apologetic about how poorly our conversations went. Why was this never suggested to me?

And another incident:

Things not coming up when they should have was a recurring problem. I asked once, “how much more docile do you expect our children to be, that you would be unconcerned about them and yet worry so much about us?” and I was told “I think [docility is] the wrong way to think about it. … Most people don't commit crimes because they have better things to do, not because they're domesticated, or something.” It didn’t quite sit right with me. I felt confident that somehow he was confident that our children would grow to hate us and love Vanda Nossëo, and I couldn’t see why that would be other than Vanda Nossëo’s bribes; and for such bribes to matter to the next generation, Sesat must remain poor and incapable; and yet if it wasn’t that, then why? Had he seen that Sesat must fall? It would have been useful to me to know about lead poisoning, at this point. Perhaps someone else knew; perhaps the charps spoke of it. But I did not have time to learn things I was idly curious about, precisely because I was handling these matters.

After which, Feris goes into detail picking apart specific trends and patterns of miscommunication, and then segues into getting the perspectives of people from elsewhere in the multiverse, including interviews with shopkeepers and with Nelen's former supervisor.

Welp. This is brutal but maybe it will help him one day. Nelen takes a lot of notes on this section. Zanro could have mentioned it, if he thought he'd get anywhere with talking to any of these people...

After a detailed breakdown of communication norms and problems comes part six, on alternatives and tradeoffs.

A recurring theme in interviews with people who worked for Vanda Nossëo was that it would not have been better to do nothing. This seems likely, because I tentatively accept the argument mentioned in part two that the only thing that matters is increasing the power of those who aren’t Melkor, but other goals may matter to the peal both terminally and instrumentally.

I would therefore like to open this section with a selection of other possible strategies and their plausible impacts, considered primarily with regard to their impact on the short-term welfare of my planet. These strategies are not exclusively ones I endorse, but are rather selected for being useful to think about, though I like some of them better.

There follows an entire list, including entries like "only open the shops with no further explanation" and "just teleport all the slaves away annually" and "just move the entire galaxy into Revelation" (with, nonetheless, detailed discussion of the costs and benefits thereof) but also including entries like

Arrive, inform us that for reasons that it would be difficult and time-consuming to explain the continued use of pewter tableware is deeply abominable, offer to replace it with crystal and silver, and leave a charp for each country. This would be close to a strict improvement on leaving us alone entirely, without being nearly as expensive as making contact (see figure 12 for details). I propose that, since people from peal polities often find it unreasonable to suggest leaving a situation alone if it involves an atrocity or several, this instead be used as the standard for comparison.

Give everyone as much magic as possible. (I mean everyone, not only Sesat.) This is the suggestion that came up most often in interviews. The main downside is that those who would seek to harm others would have vastly more ability to do so, and the powers that exist are more offensively than defensively capable. This does seem likely to increase violent crime, done naively. A variant of this idea that involves focusing heavily on making sure people know about and have access to the forms of magic Vanda Nossëo does not object to them getting might work better—a full-ride scholarship for artificers or teleporters from newly contacted worlds would be expensive (see figure 12), but aggressively making it clear to people that they are allowed and encouraged to study magic might help. Dependence was a concern that came up here, and relatedly the ability to take magic away again, but perhaps Vanda Nossëo would have been satisfied had we all studied artificing, bought worldleapers, and disappeared off the map. Perhaps those who are bothered will eventually do that. Perhaps making it clearer that it was an option would have encouraged fewer people to want to escape Vanda Nossëo entirely.

As actually happened, but with genuine respect for the sovereignty of the countries contacted. None of this “if it’s causally downstream of the most disruptive event ever, then it’s in our jurisdiction” or “if you have open borders, then it’s in our jurisdiction”—give up the ambivalence about conquest. Actually commit to diplomacy. Send diplomats, not people selected for being generous and hating slavery. Make it clear that you are not interested in conquest. Make it true. This would have substantial benefits in making people less defensive. I spent nearly all of our negotiations feeling certain that if I didn’t somehow through whatsoever lies turned out to be necessary produce a rigged election in Vanda Nossëo’s favor, it would not go well for me. In the end, this turned out not to be true, but is it any surprise that when it was made so clear to us that we were overpowered, when we were threatened so clearly and repeatedly, that I did not even ask until I was faced with such clear evil that I was willing to stand and die? Some greater person than I might have cared enough to take a stand sooner, over something smaller, or even on principle, I admit, but I do not think I am so unusually cowardly. The very slow and very painful deaths of slaves that followed Vanda Nossëo’s arrival were not in any way prevented or shortened; Vanda Nossëo merely made it clear that on principle they didn’t think we had the right to run our own country. If it doesn’t save those who are screaming for mercy then the policy of claiming absurd jurisdiction over other countries is merely a show of force and a point of pride and does absolutely nothing to promote universal flourishing. It is more fitting for Sesat to have such a policy, than for Vanda Nossëo.

Or just conquer. Something that came up in some interviews was the idea that those Sesatis who felt harmed were the powerful, and the slaves and serfs were instead better off. Death in the face of conquest is not totally limited to the upper echelons of Sesati society, but it is concentrated there; you could have preferentially gotten rid of those who hate you, with your own hands nearly clean, and met an adoring people who care little for those things Sesati warriors see as virtues and who would love you if you fed them. I might prefer the outcome where I still exist and try to come up with a justice system that isn’t wholly barbaric, but you seem quite satisfied with yours, so from your perspective it doesn’t make much sense to prefer that I be alive. Preliminary poll results suggest that dying and perhaps being resurrected later by a loved one in Vanda Nossëo would have been preferable to what actually happened for a significant fraction of those who would have died. It would of course have been much more disruptive, and would have been unpopular with those who are very against conquest, and would have compromised Vanda Nossëo's ability to plausibly claim not to engage in conquest.

Leave it to the missionaries. Let them go where they will, bringing charps and healing. They at least aggressively offer a narrative, true or not. Perhaps they would interfere with one another, as there are many evangelizing religions, but perhaps they could be gently encouraged to focus on different planets. This would cost Vanda Nossëo nothing directly, though Vanda Nossëo would be giving up substantial steering power, and perhaps Vanda Nossëo would not benefit from the evangelizing religions popular with humans being thus strengthened, and there might be less documentation of the pre-contact culture.

We have stories of people taking in travelers and people in need and those people turning out to be the fair folk or gods. It would have been legible to send people to ask for something—food and drink, a place to sleep, directions, non-secret information—and to frame humanitarian aid as a reward. Make an excuse to need to reward a slave or several as well, perhaps. This would have been hard because it isn’t actually one of the criteria Vanda Nossëo uses to determine whether to contact people, and not all cultures may have the relevant sort of stories, though an extremely cursory study of other human societies has turned up similar motifs (cf Matthew 25:31-46). Maybe it should be a criterion, as filtering for societies and people that are more value-aligned seems likely to increase the proportion of first contact resources devoted to societies like Azan, though there is the problem of countries bordering one another.

But the real meat of the section isn't entire reworked strategies. It's head to head comparisons of individual policy questions like the precise details of magic screening, and their plausible monetary costs, effects on various crimes, effects on attitudes toward Vanda Nossëo, and so on.

And then he returns to the topic of communication, again, with an excerpt from a conversation with the previous king.

Feris: Will you pretend I’m an envoy from the stars and it’s that evening again and react as you would if the starfarers had said what I say?

Predecessor: Sure, fine.

F: I am Feris, an Amentan whose people have joined the mutual aid and protection pact known as Vanda Nossëo.

P: Is that what we’re calling it?

F: …Would you have said that?

P: No, no. I meant, are you suggesting lies for them or truths?

F: Truths, I think, though I may misunderstand them. Anyway. Blah blah my people have joined the mutual aid and protection pact known as Vanda Nossëo, which is jointly far mightier than any of its constituent polities. We have journeyed far and discovered Sesat and have chosen to speak to you because it is our hope that we and Sesat can mutually strengthen one another through our alliance, if Sesat will honor us by considering membership.

P: Perhaps we will. What might that entail?

F: Vanda Nossëo offers member states their pick of a variety of joining bonuses, typically defensive support, and depending on Sesat’s preferences. Perhaps a new planet could be made and given to Sesat as its own territory, or perhaps a certain number of Sesat’s dead could be raised. Membership requirements include the willingness of a majority of citizens to join—it would at best be more effort than it’s worth to try to deal with a population that doesn’t want to deal with us, to say nothing of how miserable a time we would have trying to catch feigned compliance before it led to any disasters, and we also consider conquest unconscionable—

P: Do you. Why is that?

F: Well, if we want more land, we can get it by taking it from others, or by creating it fresh. If we want more slaves, we have no need to try to make them out of stubborn human warriors, when slaves that delight in nothing more than service are for sale and tools so clever they’re nearly slaves themselves can be woken by the magic of one of our constituent polities.

P: Impressive claims.

F: We have some of those tools available and were hoping to offer you one smart enough to serve your people as a teacher. It would need no food or drink, and could teach you the secrets of medicine that would let no more than one in a hundred of your children die before they saw their fifth birthday, and the secrets of metalwork and chemistry that would let you travel to the stars on your own.

P: For what price?

F: We want to learn about the process of learning from such teachers; we would want to come and ask it questions about its work sometimes.

P: I see. It is possible I would be interested in such a thing.

F: I’m glad. There is a thing that grieves us about the state we find Sesat in. We come from many worlds with their own strange magics, many that are tied to their places of birth—the song magic of Arda may travel but new magic songs may never be composed in this world; the power of conjuration comes only to those who pass out of their first life in the world of Revelation and are gathered into its afterlife—and so the people of, for example, Revelation, had an easier task than the people of this world when they set out to end hunger and colonize the stars. It grieves us that the task that has faced this world has been so unfairly difficult, that people with such spirit as those of Sesat and in fact all of the countries we have found in this world have had so little opportunity to use their determination and honor and intellect. The mutual defense pact known as Vanda Nossëo hopes to remedy such unfairness.

P: I see. And what else is out there, besides Vanda Nossëo?

F: Worlds with realms of great torment, each of them alike in malice and in many other ways, each of them ruled by one known as Melkor. I told you all the countries of your planet are worthy to join Vanda Nossëo, and have been sent their own envoys; the realms known as Angband are not sent such emissaries, but their rulers slain and their slaves taken and remade so that they can grow in virtue and become worthy of the powers of Vanda Nossëo. In these realms captives taken in war are denied death however they may try, and are tortured and maimed and shown illusions of escape as a cruel trick until actual escape strikes them as merely one more illusion. They are bred with slaves, their children taken as slaves and warped to make them not only slaves but weaker and far uglier than their parents. Not only that, but these realms inevitably start wars with all of the neighbors they can reach. These are not the only other realms in all the worlds, mind you; there are also our close allies Mîr and Elendil, and realms neither closely allied with us nor unworthy like Angband, but merely alien, such as the Federation and the Cardassians. A full list would in fact be prohibitively long, as there are trillions of them.

P: I see. You spoke of power.

F: Yes. Your people can take classes to learn the trick of making jewelry that makes the wearer immortal, or things like that. Some of the other powers are only granted to those who pass certain tests of character.

P: What sort of tests of character?

F: Some are customarily not explained in advance, I’m afraid, but the virtues we care about the most are mercy, generosity, patience, temperance, and prudence. Somewhat because we have had to give up on honor, for there are so few who have it in any measure.

P: Wait, is that true? Do they really think that?

F: I had a conversation about criminal recidivism that led me to think they’ve given up on honor but it might not be true.

P: I see. Uh, starfarer, I have every confidence that many of my warriors will pass your tests, but I am distracted by the war with Azan.

F: Our team sent to Azan will doubtless express their disapproval of the war, and of Azan’s intentions toward Sesat’s army—oh, yes, I got halfway through telling you the membership requirements. The other requirements have to do with the laws enforced within your borders, as we try to maintain cooperation and free movement and need certain commonalities, besides which many of our member states consider certain laws unconscionable. People must be permitted to leave, and laws must be in place forbidding rape, torture, and murder. Oh, do you think they could have caught the Allspeak glitch already?

P: Even if they had, we hadn’t heard the word “námo” yet.

F: True. So people must be permitted to leave, blah blah laws—

P: We have such laws in place already. Why must people be permitted to leave?

F: …Humanitarianism, supposedly, but I think that one’s another bad translation. Or maybe it isn’t. Let’s jut go with it.

P: I see. Humanitarianism. That was invented here in Sesat.

F: Anyway, we don’t have forever to roleplay this, but what does this make you imagine thinking and feeling if it had happened?

P: Like it would all need to be carefully finessed, and is at once good news and bad, and whether it will go well or poorly is hard to say but—it’s different from what actually happened in that it seems like it might go well, and I don’t feel deeply insulted.

F: What policies do you think you’d pursue, in this fantasy?

P: I’d sell the slaves for golems, or maybe cash, as soon as I figured out how to explain it. Probably as “they think they can redeem them and at any rate want to pay us absurdly to let them try.” Then, I suppose, work with them to arrange something not too messy for the serfs. In this hypothetical, I think that’d work fine.

F: And the justice system?

P: Well, I don’t mind sending people I don’t even like to prison. If it was unworkably unpopular I don’t know. Maybe they’d be happier about us doing something else if we were easy to work with.

Maybe Nelen should do a stint on the float teleport team or something. Natsuko can take over the team if Tarwë still wants an Elf while to get accustomed to the idea.

He has lunch and reads on.

The last couple of chapters focus on comparisons to comparable first contact situations, and ideas for where to go next.

Niazon got a delegation whose leader just oozed delight at getting to see their architecture; Feris quotes from some transcripts Niazon's government was willing to show him, where she says things like "Oh, hey, can I just take a closer look at the capitals on those columns? I haven't seen exactly that style before, it's really cool! Right, so, membership requirements, you would need..." They've managed not to come to a meeting of the minds with Sesat yet but that situation isn't stable and might change; they also haven't joined, but they're still in what seem to be productive talks about what to do about their serfs. Azan meanwhile did not really need to be finessed very delicately, and their leaders mostly asked about the technical details of Vanda Nossëo's operations and the expected improvement in recidivism rates from switching to Vanda Nossëo's prison system, and mostly made requests they may not have realized were trivial; Azan's team could almost have been replaced with a pamphlet explaining the membership requirements. Feris looks further afield than his own planet, though, comparing several planets in Warp and earlier events like Marlatia's initial multiversal contact. He quotes from some arguments about the Prime Directive, too, in his analysis of trends and lessons learned.

There's an argument to be made, and he makes it, that his planet is owed compensation for being used as a training ground. They were, after all, taken advantage of as a resource, intentionally subjected to incompetent personnel so that planets more important than theirs might not be.

And one might say it was better for us, that we benefitted anyway, if one ignored everything in part two. Or one might say, yes, I worked for Vanda Nossëo without pay and without the freedom to leave or to stop, but what do I matter to Vanda Nossëo? I am an oppressor, a member of a violent and repressive elite that exploited most of the population. What does Vanda Nossëo care if I suffer? It may be evil when I seek justice, but perhaps it is fine if justice comes to find me. Perhaps what truly matters is the small minority whose welfare is most important and for whom everyone else might be sacrificed: the slaves.

Those who wish to do so may find in the appendix a list of ways slaves were tortured to death as a result of Vanda Nossëo's arrival, as well as typical treatment of slaves under other circumstances and the pre-contact life expectancy of one born into slavery. I invite you to contemplate which you would rather experience. I invite you to contemplate the disrespect you show slaves (such as my second interview subject) who in fact had honor, who in fact had courage, who in fact sought vengeance and have now had that possibility taken from them. I invite you to consider the pride slaves such as the rebel Termite could have taken in their work had they succeeded. They are still Sesati. These things still matter to many of them. My sample of slaves interviewed did endorse being better off now. Sesat's last slave died during the writing of this book, having been available for viewing for much of the time since first contact; I didn't bother to visit, as I don't especially care for gory spectacle. That slave was not interviewed. Perhaps he will have justice done while he is dead, at the hands of those who caused his end to be so terrible; perhaps he will wake one day to find vengeance forever beyond him, because of Vanda Nossëo. Perhaps he will not care. Perhaps he will think only that Vanda Nossëo offers abundant food. I never knew him and could not say for sure.

Vanda Nossëo has wronged my people. I don't know what could yet make it right. In Sesat rewards are often power, in some form or another, but Vanda Nossëo will never offer us such rewards. Not in a trillion trillion years will Vanda Nossëo make those decisions for any reason other than who will serve them most effectively. It is more Vanda Nossëo's way to pay us off in cash; yet now many of us have powers such as resurrection, and find that more money would mean little. There are yet those who would appreciate the gesture just because it would be a gesture and not the uncompromising disregard we have found so far. There are yet those who would appreciate nearly any gesture, who would accept even a bare apology.

Perhaps one day we will all disappear. Perhaps by then Vanda Nossëo will consider it a loss if we do; perhaps not. But I hope that the next time Vanda Nossëo finds a planet of irredeemably evil savages, everyone will be better off for having met.

Nelen puts in for leave and Natsuko sends Feris an email letting him know that she is for the time being in charge of their team, if he needs anything.

Thank you for letting me know.

A while later Nelen gets an email from that one cultural consultant.

If you send a picture of wherever you're hiding a teleporter and I will show up with soup.

I'm not hiding. I'm just at home. It's in Revelation.

Fere and Valan show up shortly thereafter with a pot of homemade soup and about five pounds of individual servings of dry soup mixes that just want boiling water, all of which only use ingredients that the internet says Amentans can eat.

Nelen's out front, sweeping the path, carefully getting all the plant debris accumulated between the cobblestones. It looks like this was last done no longer ago than yesterday. He's dressed as he normally is but has dyed out the gold streak in his hair. "Hi," he says. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Curious what you're up to and I've been practicing cooking," says Fere.

"Do you want an answer that doesn't involve subtext?" says Valan.

"I would love an answer that doesn't involve subtext." Sweep sweep. He hangs up the broom on a rack behind a trellis covered in climbing flowers and opens the front door for them. It's really clean inside.

"We thought you might be too sad to feed yourself and we didn't especially want you to starve to death and we were hoping to find out if they were going to do something besides blame you for everything and get rid of you," Valan chirps. Fere makes the I Guess face. 

"- my aunt cooks," he says, sitting down at the sunlit breakfast nook and gesturing at the kitchen counter as a place to put soup. "I haven't been fired, I took leave of my own accord."