Chapter 609: Interlude

>LEEBAW.SUPERUSER HAD LOGGED ON

>LEEBAW.SUPERUSER TITLED LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

>LEEBAW.SUPERUSER HAS ENTERED 'GESTALT GENERAL CHAT'

>

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LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Hello! Where is everyone?

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LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

HELLO!

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>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS HAS ENTERED THE CHAT ROOM

AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

Hey!

>looks around

Uh, where is everyone?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

I don't...

!!RAWR I'M A TERRAN HIDING UNDER A BEDSHEET WITH TOO MANY HOLES CUT IN IT RAWR!!

Hey, guys!

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AAAAAAHHHH!

What the hell, Trea?

Why are you wearing a sheet covered in holes?

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!!OOOOH! SPOOKY ZOMBIE SECOND EATMU WAR SOLDIER OOOOH!!

Hey! Are they out there.

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LEEBAW> SCREAMS

AKLTAK> SCREAMS

!!CYBERNETIC MAR-GITE WITH GOOGLY-EYES EATING A DONUT!!

Hey, there they are!

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

LEEBAW> SCREAMS

AKLTAK> SCREAMS

LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

WHAT IS GOING ON? WHO ARE ALL OF YOU?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

!!RAWR I'M A TERRAN HIDING UNDER A BEDSHEET WITH HOLES CUT IN IT RAWR!!

Oh, sorry. We're in costume. Hang on.

>!!RAWR I'M A TERRAN HIDING UNDER A BEDSHEET WITH TOO MANY HOLES CUT IN IT RAWR!! has been renamed TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

>!!OOOOH! SPOOKY ZOMBIE SECOND EATMU WAR SOLDIER OOOOH!! has been renamed CONFEDMIL

>!!CYBERNETIC MAR-GITE WITH GOOGLY-EYES EATING A DONUT!! has been renamed RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

There, that better?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

But... but... why?

Why use those headers and those horrible avatar skins to

!!VIOLENT SPORTS FACIAL ARMOR WEARING BACKWOODS MASS MURDERER WITH MOMMY ISSUES!!

It's almost back on!

LEEBAW> SCREAMS

AKLTAK> SCREAMS

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WHY? WHY? OH, THIS IS TERRIBLE!

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TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Look, come on. Follow us. Confed, can you hold the door open?

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CONFEDMIL

Sure.

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AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

Um, where are we going?

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CONFEDMIL

Somewhere frightening, children.

Very frightening.

CONFEDMIL> Laughs spookily

AKLTAK shivers

All right, go up and touch the little festive holiday gourd.

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LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Wow, how did I miss a big door surrounded by flashing lights with a festive gourd painted on it.

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AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

I don't know... it looks kind of suspicious to me.

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TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Quit being a sissy and come on.

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TREA has left the chat room

RIGEL has left the chat room

AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

All right...

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

AKL has left the chat room

LEE has left the chat room

CONFEDMIL has left the chat room

WELCOME TO THE SPOOKY ROOM!

DON'T TOUCH THE FESTIVE HOLIDAY GOURD, TREA CARVED IT!

>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Why is everyone wearing those terrible costumes?

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

>>VIOLENT SPORTS FACIAL ARMOR WEARING BACKWOODS MASS MURDERER WITH MOMMY ISSUES

It's Free Candy & Scary Costumes time!

Come sit with me next to this festive holiday gourd I carved!

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

>>MAGICAL GIRL IN A SPARKLING DRESS WITH A SNOWMAN SIDEKICK WHO DOESN'T GET COLD

Don't step on the gourd guts. We're picking out the seeds to dry them out.

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>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Ewwww...

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>>HESSTLA CYBERBURROW

>>WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW I AM THE HAMBURGER KING!

Oh! Oh! It's almost back!

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>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

>>RAWR I'M A TERRAN HIDING UNDER A BEDSHEET WITH TOO MANY HOLES CUT IN IT RAWR

>munches popcorn

Here some the scary part!

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WE NOW RETURN TO OUR HOLIDAY SPECIAL

"Engines nominal, Control," Colonel John Padwicken said, feeling sweat bead up on his face. He could see a slight color shift on the stars outside the heavy crysteel windows. He glanced to the side at Major Nupta, who nodded slightly, sweat gleaming on her brown skin.

"Engage primary engine linkage," the order took nearly twenty seconds to reach the UESPV (United Earth Space Program Vessel) John Hamilton from Buenos Aires UN Space Control.

Col Padwicken reached forward, flipping up the macroplas shield. He flipped each toggle, calling it out.

On Toggle Five a low, steady vibration could be felt. Not on the seat, not vibrating the ship itself, but making his bone marrow vibrate.

>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

I can't watch this part!

>>MANTID hides her face

"Primary Engine Linkage engaged," Col Padwicken said. He reached out and grabbed the handle, a simple grip connected to two bars with only two settings. Forward, for on, back for off. It was currently in the back setting.

"Active Primary Engine," came the order after nearly twenty seconds.

Colonel Padwicken pushed the lever forward.

Everything tunneled down, the hull seeming to crinkle inwards in geometric patterns even as the crysteel windows flexed and bent along right angle with impossible geometry such as twelve perpendicular red lines of flexing glass done in blue glitter ink. The stars shattered into pinwheels of sparkling lights.

>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

>>NO COSTUME ASSIGNED

Is that... is that...

UNSHIELDED JUMP SPACE?

>>screams and hides under chair

Major Nupta screamed/giggled/laughed/cried/sang the Nipwicken Cartoon themesong/played a guitar/jumped up and down on an accordion played by a screaming mime. Colonel Padwicken heard Captain Barvettiel howl like a dog from the engineering station.

>>TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

>>I AM HERE TO AUDIT YOUR INCOME AND EXPENSES DO NOT BOTHER TO RUN

>>Screams in terror

>>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

>>NO COSTUME ASSIGNED

>>shrieks in fear

>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

>>PSYCHOTIC MURDERING LEMUR WITH A HOOK FOR A HAND

>>hides under couch

Everything came back in a sudden jerk.

Neptune sat silently off to the right of the crysteel windows, the banding silent and holding its secrets as it had for millions of years.

Colonel Padwicken blinked the frozen amber off his eyelashes and looked at the instruments.

"Control, this is John Hamilton," Colonel Padwicken said. "Jump successful."

Neptune sat, encircled by its rings, undisturbed by industry or technology, as pure and simple as it had been for millions of years. The bands slowly shifted and turned as the credits began to flow up.

>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

OK, that was the most horrifying movie we've watched.

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

Is it over?

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>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Yeah, it's over, sis. You can look.

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

>breathes a sigh of relief

That part terrifies me.

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>>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

Did... did they do a jumpspace translation, in-system, exiting inside the resonance zone, without jumpspace shielding?

But... but...

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ALL> That's impossible!

ALL> Laughs

>>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

That's... that's terrifying to even think about.

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

It was their first superluminal test flight that was a success.

Wanna hear the real scary part?

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>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Brrr... OK

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

They did it with standard programming. No AI's, no VI's, just straight programming on computers less powerful that a pocket vidphone has now. Metal over silicon circuitry on the ship, no a bit of quantum computing or molecular circuitry to be found.

>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

AND A NUCLEAR FISSION REACTOR!

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And a nuclear fission reactor.

Thanks for stealing the punchline.

Jerk.

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>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Wait, that was their first superluminal flight?

But I thought they'd been to two nearby stellar systems.

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

They had been. They'd used slow-ships. Max speed they got up to was like .22C.

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>>TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

The Madness of the Lemurs.

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>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

OK, enough. Enough.

What scary movie do you want to watch next?

You all know what I want to watch.

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>>TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

What do you want to watch?

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>>DIGITAL ARTIFICIAL SENTIENCE SYSTEMS

>>BEHOLD MY MIGHTY SYSTEM OF ORGANS

What he always wants to watch.

One of the P'Thok specials.

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>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

How many P'Thok specials are there?

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

A lot. Like, two dozen or so per holiday, including P'Thok and Charlie Moomoo Save Singing Duck Day that came out last year.

To say the Treana'ad got culture cracked is an understatement.

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>>LANAKTALLAN FREE HERD

>>QUAKE IN FEAR AT MY MASK OF A MAGIC USING DISFIGURED GREEN SKINNED TERRAN FEMALE LEMUR

As bad as us?

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

We all got culture cracked as bad as you did.

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

Pfft, not us.

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

One word.

Tits.

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

LOL Ok, you got us there.

Why is it that many of those illustrations where our females have mammalian mammaries so aesthetically pleasing?

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>>DIGITAL ARTIFICIAL SENTIENCE SYSTEMS

It's hard to explain, but... um... boobs?

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ALL> LOL

>>PUBVIAN DOMINION

>>BEHOLD! I AM DRESSED AS A DECAPITATED MANTID OMNIQUEEN WITH A MISSING EYE

Seriously, what should we watch now?

Are we really going to watch a P'Thok special again?

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>>MANTID FREE WOLDS

WAIT!

Two of us aren't in costume.

If we don't want the giant malevolent carved festive holiday gourd to visit us and devour us all, they have to put on costumes.

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>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATIVE POOL

Fine.

Wow, there's a lot of them.

How do we know which one we want to wear?

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>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Just grab something you like.

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>>LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL HAS MADE >>NINE HUNDRED FOOT TALL LANAKTALLAN EXECUTOR WITH BLOODY JAWS POINTING AND MOCKING

>>LANAKTALLAN FREE HERD

>>Screams

Wow, good one. That's scary!

---NOTHING FOLLOWS--

>>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS HAS MADE >>BLOODY EYE SOCKET ZOMBIE NAMTOTUN PLANETARY DIRECTOR FOR LIFE

>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Oh, nice one. That's chilling.

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>>AKLTAK SOARING WORLDS

Come on, pick something.

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>>TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

P'Thok! P'Thok! P'THOK! P'THOK!

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>>RIGELLIAN SAURIAN COMPACT

We know. We get it. We get the picture.

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>>LANAKTALLAN FREE HERD

This is actually fun. I had thought it was some kind of mental aberration to watch media designed to frighten, horrify, and gross out the viewer, but lemur scary movies are actually exciting.

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>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Yeah, weirdly enough, it is really fun.

Hey, let's watch Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat-Girl XXII!

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

Ugh. Really? Why do you like those so much?

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>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Oh, come one, that one has Lanaktallan scouts landing on Derkin-6 and running face first into Hobby and Susie and Cavvy.

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>>LANAKTALLAN FREE HERD

Oh, I vote for that one.

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>>TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

I vote for Daxin VS Kris the Krusher Kringle

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>>TNVARU GRIPPING HANDS

Wait, I change my vote to that one!

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>>MANTID FREE WORLDS

Oh, come on, you know how that one will end.

Besides, that one's a Winter Wonderland Holiday Special.

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>>CONFEDMIL

All right, everyone do a silent vote. We'll do whichever one gets the most votes, even if it's just two votes.

If it's all one vote for each movie, then we'll just do random number selection.

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>>TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

Heh, I'm going to ruin almost everyone's day.

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>>CONFEDMIL

OK, we've got the movie!

Everyone ready?

ALL>Ready!

And... here... we... go!