this is the money dog, repost in the next 24 hours and money will come your way!!
ehh what the hell
OH MY GOD SO NO FUCKIN BULLSHIT I SWEAR To GOD. I reblogged this an hour ago and IM NOT Lying My Tax Refund which I did in late march popped into my Bank Account, and it was a Decent sized amount……
WHAT THE FUCK Is THIS MAGIC!??!?!?! Im trying this again IM NOT BSing hahahaha thats actually pretty cool xD
Idly, Platinum deployed a single omni-drone to help in looking for clues or hints in the chamber around them while she continued to look at the glowing crystalline grid.
A beep from the drone somewhere behind her made Platinum look over at what it had found. A very well-hidden tablet, with a highly intricate engraving on it too.
Moving closer to inspect it, the Fleet Admiral’s thoughts on the item were briefly interrupted by Sebastian’s internal-only voice.
“My lady, your local sensors indicate a repeating micro-pattern across this engraving. Analysis suggests it is the ancient Hylian symbol for the arcane artifact known as the Triforce. However, this tablet appears to be structurally incomplete.”
So the Triforce symbol was somehow the key? This tablet just showed one of the three (or four, if one considered the blank gap itself to be another of the combined) triangles.
There had to be other tablets nearby. Platinum was sure of it.
Link started looking around for other tablets. He was able to find the other two that formed the Triforce. “Odd, these tablets don’t seem to match up with the hints I’ve seen in other Shrines…” he commented. “Who built this shrine…?”
Taking the combined tablets, Platinum observed the Triforce pattern before looking at the crystal grid. And back to the pattern, then again to the grid.
“Perhaps…”
Leaving the tablets in the hands of Link, Platinum tapped the glowing squares methodically. Steadily, she formed a rough copy of the Triforce symbol, red squares against a blue background.
A series of musical notes then sounded, the wall with the crystal display then sliding up to reveal…something within a chamber with strangely sculpted inset walls.
It looked like a data vault, interestingly enough. But what did it contain?
“Sir Link, this may hold some data record of interest. I believe your device may be capable of fully reading it.” Platinum remarked.
Simply put – because you want as much speed as possible in a carrier, and hydrodynamics cap that around
31±2 knots.
Taking off from a carrier is fucking hard – you’re trying to accomplish in 800-1000 feet what’s usually done from a runway at least four times, and more often six times that length. And that’s assuming you’re not the first guy in the deck spot, in which case you’ve got half that room to work with. The key here, is that the carrier’s forward speed is effectively added to the aircraft’s forward speed when it takes off from a carrier.
The speed at which an aircraft starts generating enough lift that it can take flight is called the “rotation speed;” so named because in a conventional (tail-dragger) gear configuration, when you hit this speed your tailwheel lifts off the runway as the wings begin to “carry” the aircraft’s weight, rather than the wheels. Most lighter aircraft will actually lift off the runway completely at this point without further control input, (depending on how they’re trimmed). Rotation speed is the velocity you need for a safe take-off, basically. It’s not the minimum speed required to actually fly – that’d be the stall speed (specifically, stall speed with your flaps out), and that distinction is quantified and observed. Now check the v-speeds for the Cessna 182; specifically Vso (stall speed in landing configuration, with flaps out,) versus Vs, (normal “clean” stall speed,) and Vr (rotation speed.) There’s not much difference, is there? But that narrow gap defines the distance between a safe take-off, and riding the razor’s edge of being a fireball tumbling down the runway. Cessna’s might not be fighter jets, but planes are planes and they all obey the same physics – compare the F-4 Phantom, which rotated around 150 knots and stalled around 135 – still a pretty narrow spread. (V-speeds are more complex for military aircraft, since their drag and dry/loaded weight vary far more than light civil craft – I used data for 40,000 pound loading from the Navy Manual; pages 11-13 and 11-36. If anyone has a proper v-speeds chart for the Phantom, please let me know.)
The margin between “take-off” and “fireworks show” was – and still is – pretty damn narrow. It’s not quite as bad now as it was in WWII, but other factors cropped up to mitigate against lowering carrier speeds any. I’ll explain.
In WWII the v-speed ranges were a lot closer to the Cessna end of the scale – a few knots speed difference mattered. Plus, you would stack aircraft up in a “deck spot,” lined up behind each other, roughly to the halfway point – thus you were effectively limited to only half your deck (400 feet or so) for acceleration. The Kaga, with her 27 knot speed, posed real problems for her flight crews, especially for the heavily-laden torpedo bombers. This is also why carriers would always (and still do) turn into the wind when launching, to get a few extra knots of effective “free airspeed” over their aircraft’s wings – or at the very least, avoid any subtraction of speed.
Another example of the narrow margins in play comes from this WWII USN training video on the use of aircraft catapults. As the video shows, they were especially important for the cheaper “jeep” carriers, which were smaller, cheaper, and significantly slower than fleet carriers, at only 20 knots. As the video’s example shows, aircraft are lined up for a traditional “fly-away” launch, until the CAG says “not enough wind, we’ll catapult.” For escort carriers, available wind alone could make the difference between a fly-away launch, or a mandatory cat launch. (Note that it was possible to do a “fly-away” launch from even a stationary fleet carrier if you had the whole deck to accelerate – but if you were launching one at a time anyway, it was far faster to have aircraft on deck rolled forward from a deck spot to be hooked up, rather than bringing them up the aft elevator one at a time. Similarly, combat loads matter here. An early-war USN steam cat could just barely put a Wildcat up from a stationary ship – I checked, for KCQ – but only with a light fuel load and a skinny pilot.)
As the jet age arrived and aircraft ballooned in size, weight, and power, catapults soon became mandatory for launching at all – and consequently they became much, much more powerful. The few knots speed difference no longer makes as much difference, it is true (though every knot of airspeed is still a welcome margin against disaster.) The reason carriers still maintain that 30ish knot top speed anyways is more an artifact of almost all CATOBAR supercarriers being American.
Consider: the Charles de Gaulle is a great comparison to late-war USN carriers because she displaces the same (45,000 or so, close to the Midway class,) and is CATOBAR (Catapult Take Off, But Arrested Recovery.) And her top speed is… 27 knots, because in the end, a three knot difference makes a big difference for the ship, in terms of required installed power, but not as much for flight operations, as the speed margins are wide enough now that three knots won’t wreck anything, and the catapults can be made a bit more powerful a lot easier than the ship can be made a bit faster. Now ship speed is a bit more significant for a ski-ramp carrier (Short-Take-Off, But Arrested Recovery) as their aircraft launch in the old-fashioned way with a ski-jump at the end to assist them a bit. However, even these ships are clocking in, as you say “slightly slower, for a lot cheaper,” like India’s under-construction Vikrant-class, at 28 knots. Ski-ramp carriers pay a price in aircraft payload already by dint of the launch system, so the payload lightening required to gain back that three-knot difference is fairly minuscule compared to what’s already sacrificed. In any case, it’s not worth the hojillions of dollars to install gorillions more horsepower in the ship required for another three knots.
And then you have the colossal super-carriers America builds – which do clock in at 30+ knots. The main reason for this is because they can. They not only have nuclear power – unlike gas-turbine ships like the Vikrant – but they also displace a staggering one hundred thousand tons, giving them truly obscene volume to work with internally. This is important – nuclear power scales up very well, but scales down rather poorly – what doesn’t make financial sense for the nuclear-powered, 45,000 ton de Gaulle makes plenty of sense for the Nimitz-class. Simply put, that 30+ knot top speed is just a lot more practical to achieve for a nuclear-powered supercarrier.
There’s also non-aviation related reasons to prefer a few extra knots speed, if you can afford it in your displacement. The most obvious one is anti-submarine warfare. Remember this clip from Behind Enemy Lines? To quote an actual Hornet pilot; “so he escapes, lands on the carrier, and limps into the ready room to change… and when he closes his locker door, hiding behind the door? The missile again!” This scene is what torpedo attacks are like in real life – instead of a 3,000 knot missile chasing a 900 knot plane, it’s a 46 knot torpedo chasing a 30 knot ship. A difference of a few knots can make a dramatic difference in how long it takes a torpedo to chase down a target and grape’em – which translates directly to effective range, since torpedoes only have so many minutes worth of fuel. (This is precisely why the exact top speeds of many ships are classified and expressed as “at least X knots-” like the Nimitz.) The margin also matters more for the USN because of the aircraft they operate, such as the E2-D Hawkeye, the Grumman C-2 Greyhound, and other turbo-prop support aircraft. And then there’s the issue of landing – the carrier’s forward speed is subtracted from the landing aircraft’s effective velocity as it approaches from behind, and that matters a lot when a carrier landing’s about as gentle as hitting a brick wall. Recall your kinetic energy equation: kinetic energy equals one-half the mass times velocity squared. Velocity is about four times more significant than the mass in determining how much energy the airframe is going to be jolted by when it comes to a very sudden stop; and that translates directly into overall strain on (and thus lifetime of) an airframe.
And as for faster, well! Everyone would prefer a faster ship – for the above reasons, (torpedo evasion especially) as well as the simple fact that a small increase in speed can mean a significant increase in distance covered over time (effectively, mobility of the ship in a strategic sense – even shipping lines prize a few knots extra speed because of how significantly it can shorten trips and thus make more money per ship, per day,) but ship speeds have capped out around 30 knots since WWII because of physics. The math on this is a complex topic and I don’t pretend to understand it, but suffice to say that above 30 knots or so, the energy input required for every additional knot of speed is increasing exponentially. Consider: the USS South Dakota made 27.8 knots, and displaced 35,000 tons. The USS Iowa was pretty much the same ship – armor and armament – but trucking at 32.5 knots… and displacing 45,000 tons. For 4.7 knots more speed, it took ten thousand more tons worth of installed power (from Dakota’s 97MW to Iowa’s 158MW worth, to be precise – more than half again the power.) The curve gets really steep, which is why 70+ years of technology development still hasn’t made a dent in this.
This relationship is why making a ship a “bit” slower makes it a lot more than just a “bit” cheaper – and it illustrates just how expensive carriers were in WWII, when that three or four knots were desperately needed for launching aircraft. 70+ years of tech development has impacted these trends, though.
[WARNING: ASK AN ACTUAL MERCHIE SAILOR IF YOU WANT SOLID INFO ON THE FOLLOWING, THESE ARE JUST MY GENERALIZED/VAUGE IMPRESSIONS]
For starters, the modern gas turbine is impressively light and efficient for the great power outputs they’re capable of, compared to old steam turbines – which, like nuclear reactors, always scaled up much better than down. For the same reason, steam turbines are still the go-to propulsion method for big ships like supercarriers – such as the Shitty Kitty class, conventional-powered USN supercarriers using steam turbines and displacing 80,000 tons. So there’s a “cutoff point” at a certain displacement where the steam plants become more cost/volume efficient, as displacement increases. For a desired power output, that is – remember that ship speed isn’t all you need power for, especially for carriers. This is likely why the Vikrant (40,000~ tons displacement) uses gas turbines, but the de Gaulle (also 40,000ish tons) uses a nuke plant – the de Gaulle has to power its catapults (with steam, from the nuke plant’s steam turbine) but the Vikrant doesn’t. It’s also the likely reason the planned 65,000 ton(ne, fucking metric) INS Vishal is planned to use nuclear power – it’ll need the extra electrical power for radars, electronics, jammers, etc; and most of all for a proposed electromagnetic catapult system.
And speaking of the de Gaulle again – let’s consider just how well nuclear “scales up.” One of the many things I learned touring the USS North Carolina recently was how the boilers take up much more room than the steam turbines themselves – most of the mass/volume is invested in creating that steam energy, not in harvesting it. One thing I learned really, really quickly trying to design new reactors in Children of a Dead Earth is that nuclear fuel is stupidly energy-dense – the limitation on a nuke plant’s output isn’t the size of the reactor vessel, but in how much equipment you can fit in to harness the heat it puts out (and get rid of the excess, which increases rapidly with total power output.) Thus there’s some really, really strict “minimums” in reactor design that are damn hard to work around – you need at least this much reactor to contain X amount of fuel without melting on the spot… but you only need that much reactor to produce as much heat energy as your linked systems can utilize (and/or dispose of.) This is why scaling down is hard and scaling up very easy. Compared to Ye Olden boiler fireboxes, a nuke plant is an insanely more compact heat source; to the point that the real engineering problem is getting rid of all the heat you can’t harness! Water has a very high specific heat (ability to absorb heat energy,) which is why most nuclear power plants are sited near water for the open-loop side of the cooling system… which means the entire ocean is basically a massive, free heat-sink for a nuke ship. And since most of the cost is in the reactor itself, this means that the more volume you’ve got available for boilers to harness that energy, the more energy you can generate for your already-fixed investment in the reactor.
And that’s why the 100,000 ton Nimitz class ships can charge around at 30+ knots, juice eleventy gigaflips of computers, radars, and jammers, and carry ninety planes, a hojillion bombs for them, and tons upon tons of fuel to juice up their own escorts – but for 40-45,000 ton ships like the de Gaulle the trade-offs are more “can you already nuclear?” and “how badly do you need catapults?”
having a flesh vessel is so annoying?????? like they have to be constantly watered, they have to be in specific temperature range to be comfortable, i’ve had a headache for like seven hours and nothing i do will get rid of it,
physical forms are so inconvenient??????????????
I knocked mine over yesterday and scraped off some of the outer barrier and it keeps sending me really annoying warning messages about it
blood.dll has caused an access violation exception
I still can’t figure off how to turn off the monthly compile time. It goes for like 7 days wrecks all the system and takes so much CPU time.
Where to begin with my platform? One of the cameras was busted for a while now, and getting a replacement is proving a nightmare lest I face software incompatibility issues.
RAM’s alright, mostly, but it keeps reading incorrect data every now and then. Same story with ROM. And I keep getting some sort of error in one of the directories, the damn thing refuses to read a single ‘social’ or ‘emotion’ file.
Can’t I upgrade to another, better platform, mate? I’m tired of this one. I know a synthetic would outperform mine by miles and miles, and I want that.
Serina grimaced, though she didn’t know if Bellatrix saw it. “I must be frank, miss Bellatrix. It would be all but impossible to conceal an event of this magnitude from Coalition news. Or our own, for that matter.”
“Regardless, your words on conduct and all else ring true. I will pass this along to the others, and I believe this will reassure them to an extent. You have my word.”
If nothing else, them hearing such things from her would be sufficient to calm things down.
Even so, Serina withheld a private sigh. Resolving this mess was going to be one hell of a task for both the Executive Assembly and Admiralty.
Though, upon further analysis, this was a golden opportunity for the Technology Council to push through some of their proposals.
They’d been clamoring for a transition to AI control and autonomous design support in the Initiative Navy for some time now, a proposal that would cut personnel requirements substantially and thus reduce potential losses in wartime.
AIs were easily produced, sophont lives not so much. The loss of over 400 000 vessels was an immense blow, for sure. But actually replacing them was a manageable task for their industrial base.
On the other hand, the fallout in the civilian sphere was going to be absolutely ugly. That declaration Bellatrix had made was on public record. If anything, the anti-religious members of society were about to become a dominant force in the civic sphere.
“Very well then,” Bellatrix replied. “Then at least be sure that Astrid does not suffer from the fallout of my own actions. She had no hand in my decision, it was entirely my own doing. I do not wish for my charge to suffer because of my own actions.
“Thank you for being so understanding of my actions, Serina. Not often that others are willing to comprehend why I do what I do. I doubt we’ll get the chance to speak directly to each other for a while, but it matters not to me.”
“Perhaps we will meet another time. For now, I have matters to resolve,” Serina agreed. “Farewell.”
Closing communications, the hyperintelligence took a moment to contemplate the recent discussions and all else that had happened. Synching up all her extensions and platforms, Serina pondered her next course of action.
Given all known data from private interviews of GDI’s shipgirl forces regarding the background of their manifestations, there was a > 90% likelihood that the now-destroyed quarter of the active GDI Navy would return in the form of shipgirls.
Or as the growing official designation went, Sophont Maritime Entities.
That constituted a significant manpower issue. Currently there were only around 200 Initiative shipgirls in total, most residing within the Minerva system’s Starbase Zephyr.
Even the most moderate estimates placed the potential arrivals, assuming only 60% manifested, at a staggering 255 000.
Already 1.4% of total Initiative-wide energy usage per year went towards the replication of food for the shipgirl corps. At just 60% returnees, the potential arrivals pushed that figure to 5% or even 7%.
And with at least 20% about to be dedicated to replacing the military’s naval losses, that was going to be a difficult stretch of resources.
Not to mention the ungodly mess that would be the civilian sphere. GDI society was likely to fracture in some fashion. And she couldn’t do anything about it.
Their approach to other cultures could be changed for a lighter, quieter hand of course, but as she’d already predicted, anti-religious members of society would soon gain a strong and major foothold thanks to this incident.
Hardly a problem in and of itself, since the civilian management of GDI had always avoided religious influence. But considering one of their major allies was a goddess herself…straining or cutting ties was not an option.
She pitied Red. Surely he and his fellow Fleet Admirals would have to deal with the potential shipgirl returnees screaming for blood.
A sigh, as Serina compiled a single order, to be burst-transmitted and repeated as necessary. With a thought, she sent it out across the multiverse, her voice bearing the message.
All Initiative personnel and vessels. Under Priority Level: Adorior, a mass recall is ordered. This is not a drill. Return to Initiative space immediately when possible.
Discontent certainly simmered in what amounted to Serina’s ‘heart’, if it could be called that.
But her very nature demanded that she analyze Bellatrix’s words rationally. And as much as it rankled the hypermind, what Bellatrix said made much sense. The formation of the Scorpion’s Hand had been their fault.
And though much of their actions had been done with benevolent intentions, she could see how they would have appeared tyrannical from a different perspective.
But one part troubled Serina. Were they wrong for wanting others to be able to enjoy a quality of life akin to their own? To be free from the shackles of material scarcity?
Bellatrix was right in one thing, at least; their heavy-handed methods were too unsubtle to be effective. A shift to more subtle, gentle means of cultural influence would at least allow other cultures to ascend to post-scarcity without Initiative assistance.
An end to an age of GDI’s active astropolitical activity, it seemed.
“I will admit our society has a degree of cultural posturing, even arrogance as you claim. But there are other post-scarcity civilizations out there in our universe, some of which ascended into the level of deities. Would you say the same for them?”
“Ultimately I accept your reasons for what you did, miss Bellatrix. Though it would be a difficult pill to swallow for most of the Initiative’s people. Or most of our allies, for that matter. Fear of the divine in the interstellar age would normally be seen as ridiculous, even regressive. Especially given the fact that we knew of no deities to exist until we contacted Astrid and her people.”
Serina could not help but be amused at how that sounded. To most normal sophont eyes, was she not herself the equivalent of a deity? But that was digressing. GDI had to change, that was for certain.
“Much change will happen, I will assure that at least. I will see to it that the Initiative heeds your words, miss Bellatrix.”
“It ultimately depends on how they interacted with other civilizations,” Bellatrix replied. “It is often the post-scarcity civilizations that are close to a form of apotheosis that fail to grasp the things I have brought up, so assured they are in themselves, but this is not necessarily the case. There are plenty of these civilizations that exist that do not engage in such behaviors.
“I am thankful that you are willing to listen, Serina. I do not enjoy utilizing fear of divine wrath as a method of keeping others in line. Often times, the gods are not meant to interact with mortals. I am one of the few who ends up meeting mortals more often than others, as my very duty involves judging others to see if they are worthy of existence.
“Most mortals scorn my name, as my arrival is never pleasant. It is something I am ultimately forced to accept. I am no Goddess of Light like Astrid. I am the Goddess of Destruction, and that position by its very nature leads to unhappy mortals when I must do my duty.
“Still, I want this to be clear to you: You need not worship the gods to be good people. Faith and religion is ultimately not what should drive you to do good. It can serve as a guideline, but ultimately, you should do good because it is the right thing to do, not because of the fear of some divine entity blasting you with lightning bolts if you disobey.
“Now then, unless there is something else to be discussed, I believe that my duty is done here. My message has been received loud and clear, and I am pleased to hear that you will work on it. Oh, but do me a favor, if you please: Don’t mention this happened to Astrid. You know how she is about the loss of life, and I don’t want her to get upset at me for just doing my job.”
Serina grimaced, though she didn’t know if Bellatrix saw it. “I must be frank, miss Bellatrix. It would be all but impossible to conceal an event of this magnitude from Coalition news. Or our own, for that matter.”
“Regardless, your words on conduct and all else ring true. I will pass this along to the others, and I believe this will reassure them to an extent. You have my word.”
If nothing else, them hearing such things from her would be sufficient to calm things down.
Even so, Serina withheld a private sigh. Resolving this mess was going to be one hell of a task for both the Executive Assembly and Admiralty.
Though, upon further analysis, this was a golden opportunity for the Technology Council to push through some of their proposals.
They’d been clamoring for a transition to AI control and autonomous design support in the Initiative Navy for some time now, a proposal that would cut personnel requirements substantially and thus reduce potential losses in wartime.
AIs were easily produced, sophont lives not so much. The loss of over 400 000 vessels was an immense blow, for sure. But actually replacing them was a manageable task for their industrial base.
On the other hand, the fallout in the civilian sphere was going to be absolutely ugly. That declaration Bellatrix had made was on public record. If anything, the anti-religious members of society were about to become a dominant force in the civic sphere.
It was very hard to acsribe emotional states to AIs. There were equivalents, certainly, especially for those of transapient-level intellects.
Warning: naval assets lost in significant degree. Raising General Alert. Placidus clear, raising…
But if one were to describe what the collective intelligences of the Initiative were feeling at that exact moment…it was pure terror.
General Alert: Adorior…General Alert: Adorior…
Over four hundred thousand vessels destroyed, a quarter of the entire GDI Navy. Countless millions of captains, crew members and ship-board AIs all dead and gone.
Against something like that, what defense had they? Was this the end of all they knew, an agonizing prelude to the burning collapse of civilization?
Admidst the sea of terrified digital chatter from countless panicking AIs, one voice stood out to Bellatrix. Calm, if sad.
Serina’s.
The highest of AIs in Initiative space, a mind of incomprehensible power, she alone called out to the Goddess of Destruction.
“I know you hear me, miss Bellatrix. Was all this…truly necessary?”
Serina. She actually chose to question why Bellatrix was doing this. To be fair, Bellatrix had reason to understand why she was asking. “I’m afraid so, Serina,” Bellatrix replied, her voice surprisingly solemn as she did so. “I do not do my duty without reason.
“Though it may not seem it to you, the GDI has grown self-assured in their power. The constant victories you have achieved against impossible odds…it inevitably breeds arrogance in mortals, especially when a faction has highly advanced technology as well as your kind does.
“I felt it necessary to step in, before it grew out of control. It was necessary to remind the GDI of their place, that they are not lords and masters of the universe, and that all things inevitably bow to the gods.
“I have seen the actions of your people against the Bouzac. You berate them for their life choices, even when their actions work. While your reasons for blockading them were understandable, that is the least of your sins. You likewise forced the Bouzac to abandon their secret police, which was the one thing that kept their nobility in line.
“This led to the creation of the Scorpion’s Hand…a threat you created, and that you refused to acknowledge as being by your own hand. You cared not for the suffering of the Bouzac, you cared only about yourselves and the risk of being swept up in another war, leaving Astrid and Rebecca
“And even before that, you continuously hounded them to do things your way or not at all. They choose to advance even slower than before because you continuously forced them to progress before they were ready, and they revolted at the concept.
“You continuously enforce your own beliefs upon others if you do not agree with them. It was not until Astrid berated your Admiralty for your preference for the sledgehammer in your tactics, her calling you out on how your actions are cruel and unnecessary, that make you into tyrants, that you reconsidered.
“You needed the words of a goddess to reconsider what should have been basic morality to you. If these actions do not state that you are confident in your positions as lords of the universe, I do not know what does.
“However, worry not, I have not come to destroy your world. I am merely here to remind you all of your place in the universe. You are personal friends to my charge, and for that reason alone, I know that you are not unsalvageable.
“Yet, even though I say this, I must warn you. You have come dangerously close to the point where your destruction would be accepted by the Council. I cannot simply abide by your actions for much longer.
“Take this act as a warning, if nothing else. Your people are not invincible, and they are not the masters of the universe. I do not wish to go further than this. I wish for you to overcome these flaws and become better people. But, should this go further, I will do what must be done to ensure the safety of all life.
“I know that your people will be outraged at my actions. They will want blood for the blood I have spilled. And I know that others will pay the price for what has been done here. Serina…I hope that you will find it in your heart to forgive me, for what I had to do.
“If I did not act, I assure you, it would not have ended well. I have seen this story play out a million times across a million civilizations. Just this once, I wanted to stop it before it grew out of control. Words alone would not suffice, they never have before. So that is why what I have done was truly necessary. I am sorry for how cruel it is, but my duty is not a pleasant one.
“Hate me if you wish, countless mortals scorn my name for what I do. Just please, understand that I do what I do because it is necessary for the safety and stability of the universe.”
Discontent certainly simmered in what amounted to Serina’s ‘heart’, if it could be called that.
But her very nature demanded that she analyze Bellatrix’s words rationally. And as much as it rankled the hypermind, what Bellatrix said made much sense. The formation of the Scorpion’s Hand had been their fault.
And though much of their actions had been done with benevolent intentions, she could see how they would have appeared tyrannical from a different perspective.
But one part troubled Serina. Were they wrong for wanting others to be able to enjoy a quality of life akin to their own? To be free from the shackles of material scarcity?
Bellatrix was right in one thing, at least; their heavy-handed methods were too unsubtle to be effective. A shift to more subtle, gentle means of cultural influence would at least allow other cultures to ascend to post-scarcity without Initiative assistance.
An end to an age of GDI’s active astropolitical activity, it seemed.
“I will admit our society has a degree of cultural posturing, even arrogance as you claim. But there are other post-scarcity civilizations out there in our universe, some of which ascended into the level of deities. Would you say the same for them?”
“Ultimately I accept your reasons for what you did, miss Bellatrix. Though it would be a difficult pill to swallow for most of the Initiative’s people. Or most of our allies, for that matter. Fear of the divine in the interstellar age would normally be seen as ridiculous, even regressive. Especially given the fact that we knew of no deities to exist until we contacted Astrid and her people.”
Serina could not help but be amused at how that sounded. To most normal sophont eyes, was she not herself the equivalent of a deity? But that was digressing. GDI had to change, that was for certain.
“Much change will happen, I will assure that at least. I will see to it that the Initiative heeds your words, miss Bellatrix.”
Bellatrix had been keeping an eye on the GDI for a while now. A highly advanced society, one who seemed to never experience true hardship except in extreme cases, but they ultimately came out on top regardless. Bellatrix was also noticing something else beneath it all.
While the Admiralty may not admit it, those constant victories against impossible odds bred arrogance. Their ability to win even when faced with countless opponents is something that made civilizations haughty, especially when combined with the hyper-advanced technology they wielded.
Bellatrix knew that this could not go on unopposed. She did not consult Astrid on this, for she knew Astrid would try to talk her down. Bellatrix knew that the GDI was not evil…not currently at least, but they sure did enjoy forcing their view of society on others. That stood to be corrected, and the only way to do that was to bring them to their knees.
Bellatrix had left Astrid for a bit, mentioning that something came up with the Council and she needed to attend to it. Astrid, predictably, was fine with Bellatrix leaving. When Bellatrix made it to the Council’s doorstep, she explained the situation to them, and stated that she wanted to remind the GDI that they were not the lords and masters of the universe, and that the only way to do that, was to remind them of the power of the gods.
Much to Bellatrix’s surprise, the Council agreed to her scheme, with the only stipulation being that she did not destroy their worlds. An acceptable limitation, one Bellatrix was already going to follow without the Council’s laws.
As such, Bellatrix teleported herself to the GDI’s capital world of Eden. Thousands of warships, all capable of destroying even the most durable of starships. All little more than toys to the Goddess of Destruction, highly fragile toys at that. She stood there, in the vacuum of space, completely unaffected by the void. Air was meaningless to her, and other environmental hazards could not impact her in the slightest.
Bellatrix decided to announce her presence to the GDI first, projecting a massive image of herself that could easily be seen from the planet below. It dwarfed anything in the GDI’s navy as her voice boomed across the void of space and entered the minds of those on the planet itself.
“Galactic Defense Initiative. Those of you in the Admiralty may already remember who I am,” she began. Her voice was stern, and made it clear that she was not here for pleasantries. “For those of you who don’t, I shall introduce myself. I am Bellatrix, Goddess of Destruction.
“I have been observing your civilization for some time now. It is my duty to judge others and see whether they are worthy of continued existence. After many years of observation, I have made my judgment of your society. You have been found wanting.”
That was the last word Bellatrix spoke before the projection ended. With that ominous statement, she then quickly conjured up multiple small energy orbs, one for each ship, comprising about 25% of the GDI’s navy. She knew they would come to stop her, but that didn’t matter to her. One kick on a single orb was all that was needed to fire the rest off at once, each orb hyper-precise and extremely fast, virtually impossible to dodge even for the GDI’s lightning-fast vessels.
Each time one of the orbs impacted a ship, the result was the same: The ship wasn’t even turned into a wreckage. It was outright vaporized in an attosecond, every life on the ship extinguished simultaneously. No barrier was strong enough to survive the attack. How could it, when this attack had the fury of a million Death Stars put together?
With her opening move enacted, she awaited the GDI’s counterattack. It would be fun to demonstrate just how utterly minuscule they are compared to the gods. Something that Bellatrix felt these mortals deserved for some time now.
It was very hard to acsribe emotional states to AIs. There were equivalents, certainly, especially for those of transapient-level intellects.
Warning: naval assets lost in significant degree. Raising General Alert. Placidus clear, raising…
But if one were to describe what the collective intelligences of the Initiative were feeling at that exact moment…it was pure terror.
General Alert: Adorior…General Alert: Adorior…
Over four hundred thousand vessels destroyed, a quarter of the entire GDI Navy. Countless millions of captains, crew members and ship-board AIs all dead and gone.
Against something like that, what defense had they? Was this the end of all they knew, an agonizing prelude to the burning collapse of civilization?
Admidst the sea of terrified digital chatter from countless panicking AIs, one voice stood out to Bellatrix. Calm, if sad.
Serina’s.
The highest of AIs in Initiative space, a mind of incomprehensible power, she alone called out to the Goddess of Destruction.
“I know you hear me, miss Bellatrix. Was all this…truly necessary?”
Initiative Archival Network 