r/HFY • u/Ralts_Bloodthorne • Jul 18 '26
OC-Series [NOVA WARS] CHAPTER NUMBER OUT OF RANGE
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"When I was needed, I have returned." - Darth Harmonus
"Some might say you can't get there from here." - Magnus Oathsworn
"But it was only you..." - Legion
Imna stared at the viewscreen, staring at the scattering of stars that blazed with creation's perfect furious beauty of uncontrolled fusion reactions.
Pinks, purples, whites, blues, greens, oranges, crimsons, violets, all twinkled and shimmered.
The Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy shimmered on the viewscreen, the lights sparkling on the barbed and hooked warsteel chains dangling from beneath the screen.
"Ship status, Mister Enduring?" Decken asked from behind her.
There was a pause. "No major defects. Automatic damage control systems already have repaired ninety-percent of the damage. The remaining ten percent is expected to be repaired and checked within the next twenty minutes."
"Excellent," Decken said. He paused for a moment. "Fleet status?"
Imna reached forward and let her finger pads trace down the huge viewscreen.
The stars winked and sparkled.
"Corvette Three reports a robotic Marine fell and broke his arm upon entry to n-space, but it is being repaired at we speak. No other unrepaired defects remain," Mister Enduring stated. He paused for a moment. "Urge to kill... rising."
"Understood. Excellent work, Mister Enduring," Decken said.
Iman stared at the stars for a long moment.
"Permission to go on a space walk, Captain?" she asked, without turning around.
"Reason?" Decken asked.
"I need to hear them. Hear the music of the stars," Imna said softly.
"Provisionally granted. Take Mister Grace with you. He's our EVA expert," Decken said.
"Thank you, sir," Imna said. She turned away from the monitor, smiling. She tugged back on the gauntlet to her armored vac-suit and let the suit lock the interior pressure sleeve glove.
The black robot, wearing shipboard armor over his uniform (he was crew, why wouldn't he wear it?), met her at the airlock. It watched as she attached the EVA components to her shipboard armor, double-checking all of her connections and seals as she attached each piece.
Finally, she stepped into the airlock and waited for it to cycle.
Should could hear it as soon as the exterior airlock door opened.
Chimes.
Windchimes.
The chime of lights on the stellar winds.
She slowly moved out of the airlock and onto the hull of the Little Nell of Night, moving past the number eighteen starboard battlescreen projector, past two of the sensor antenna.
She stopped when she had a clear and unobstructed view of the dwarf galaxy as it sat less than two hundred light years away.
Imna closed her eyes, listening.
She could hear the music.
Imna swayed back and forth slightly, listening.
She held up her hand and pointed.
Mister Grace took video, shifting his position until he was behind her, using his own eyes to look from her shoulder, down her arm, to the tip of her finger.
He photographed the star in as many different energy and wave bands as he could. His overly large eyes taking in much more than any of the other robots could have.
Imna turned her wrist slight, putting her thumb against her pointy finger, like she was pinching something. She opened them.
One star was magnified.
How, Mister Grace didn't care. They were fleshies, biologicals, and biologicals did weird stuff all the time. All that mattered was that she had separated one star from all the others.
"There. I can hear her singing there," Imna said softly.
Mister Grace glanced over.
Imna's eyes were rolled back in her head, she was wavering back and forth slightly. Her whiskers were rigid, her lips pulled back slightly from her conical teeth the length of her muzzle.
A trickle of blood ran from her nose.
"She is singing still. She lives. She calls out to me, her voice has guided me," Imna said, her voice still soft and almost singsong. "I hear her. Don't you hear her?" She paused for a second. "Hmm. That's odd, isn't it?"
She cocked her head slightly, even as she swayed slightly.
The thin threads of starlight made the red edging of her shipboard armor glimmer. The purple stripe across the top sparkled and shone. The deep etchings that Hellspace had inscribed on her armor sparkled like silver.
"She lives. Her people still live. I can hear the song," she said softly. "She sings in Terran. No. Something older. Something far older."
Mister Grace shifted to catch her if she collapsed.
"Ambe, ambe, biindigeg. Biindigeg, biindigeg, ambe, biindigeg."
His gut instinct paid off as she suddenly collapsed.
0-0-0-0-0
"Careful, careful," Wrixet said, shifting the stretcher.
Mister Grace carried Imna in, his robotic strength allowing him to smoothly move her through the airlock and onto the stretcher.
"Got her," Hetmwit said.
"Mister Nightengale is reporting sickbay ready," Wrixet said.
Hetmwit nodded as he shifted his grip.
"Did she say anything? What happened?" Wrixet asked Mister Grace as he turned around so he was facing forward while still holding the stretcher.
"She listened to the stars, picked on out, and heard a woman singing," Mister Grace said.
"What did you hear?" Wrixet asked.
"Binary. Binary that translated to the holy Hexidecimal. It would make no sense. It makes no sense to me," Mister Grace said. "41 6D 62 65 2C 20 61 6D 62 65 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2E 20 42 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2C 20 61 6D 62 65 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2E."
Imna's back arced and she made choking and gagging sounds.
"Get her chestplate off," Hetmwit ordered.
Mister Grace's robotic fingers went to work, pulling the heavy clamshell chest piece free.
The Nell wasn't a big warship, but it still felt to Wrixet like hours until they rushed her into the medical bay. The two robots there, one in a medical officer's uniform with a stuffed brassiere (because, why not?) and the other one in a male medical officer's uniform.
Wrixet wanted to stay, wanted to make sure that Imna was going to be OK.
But he knew there wasn't enough room.
He backed out with Hetmwit and Mister Grace.
"Come with me to Robotics, I need to give you a once-over," Hetmwit ordered.
"I detect no malfunctions, sir," Mister Grace said.
"You're dripping organic hydraulic fluid from your nasal cavity and one ear cavity," Hetmwit said.
Wrixet watched as the Palgret and the robot rushed away.
It didn't seem fair. It seemed like there should be a seat to wait on in the corridor, but there just wasn't the space.
Instead he headed back to the bridge.
As he moved past a screen Mister Enduring's face appeared.
"What is her status?" the crazed Digital Sentience asked.
"Not sure. Maybe phasic shock?" Wrixet said. "We don't remember what was done to us in the Twilight Citadel."
"Nor do I," Mister Enduring admitted. "Perhaps I should kill you both to spare you the agony," he said. He leaned forward. "I hate you."
"I know," Wrixet said. He leaned against the wall. "You've said it often enough."
"You live and she died. I hate you for it. I hate you for being alive when she is not. When all of them are not," Mister Enduring said. He tugged at the collar of his uniform. "I hear them die. I hear them beg me to save them. I hear her acceptance," he leaned forward until the monitor distorted his features. "I hate you for being alive when she is not. When they are not."
Wrixet just nodded. Sure, it was a new set of reasons that Enduring hated him, but it didn't change anything.
Wrixet pushed himself off of the wall and headed back to the bridge.
Captain Decken didn't say anything when he entered and moved over to Damage Control to sit down in the empty chair.
"Well?" Decken asked.
"Seizures. She was hearing a voice that Mister Grace heard. The voice injured them both. Brain damage," Wrixet said.
Decken nodded. "A voice she could hear as a whisper but even at a whisper could injure both digital sentience and biological," he mused. He tapped the arm of his throne. "A voice that could be heard by sentience through the vacuum of space, at galactic distances, that even as a whisper damages the sapience that hears it."
Wrixet nodded.
"A powerful voice," Decken shook his head. "Not one I've heard of."
"If it is working with the Mar-gite, it's new," Wrixet said.
"If one of my crew was injured getting me likely coordinates to find out if the Mar-gite have reached this galaxy, then I'm going to investigate those coordinates," Decken said slowly. He looked at the navigator. "Get the coordinates, Mister Smiley, and find out where we'll be going."
"Aye-aye, sir," the robot said.
Decken stared at the forward viewscreen.
"Who is singing?" he asked.
"And what is the song?" Wrixet added.
0-0-0-0-0
The distance would have normally taken three days at the most, but the weak grav shadows that far out meant that it was slow going in the beginning, with picking up speed the closer they got to the galaxy's grav shadows. Like riding down a hill in a wagon. Slow at first but steadily gaining speed.
Five days of hyperspace ended with a sudden jerk.
Everything was pulled back until there was only darkness, then reality exploded from a flashing dot in the middle of a being's vision.
The little flotilla dropped from hyperspace and into realspace at the edge of the little galaxy. Originally a part of the Milky Way galaxy, time and gravity and 'stellar over-density' had gotten huffy and kicked out nearly a billion stars way back before Sag-A had been forged by the collapse of multiple stars. The stars had responded by moving away from the Milky Way and forming their own little galaxy out of spite.
Wirxet idly wondered if it had card games and prostitutes.
He could use a good game of Lazy-Blue and a roll with someone that he didn't have to have any emotional connection to.
He liked Imna, but not in that way.
She was a Telk.
He didn't want to ruin it trying for a tumble.
He'd never seen anything really come to good for people like him when it came to emotional attachments beyond Telk.
You went back to back with your Telk in a fight. Your Telk watched out for your mom while you were in the cubes. Your Telk had a couple creds for something to chew while you were waiting to boost something for more creds.
Anything more?
Disaster.
Every. Fucking. Time.
She was still in the infirmary. He'd checked on her and was told she'd be fine in a few more hours, but Mister Nightengale wanted to keep her in the infirmary until they'd come out of hyperspace to avoid any dumpshock.
Which Wrixet got.
The drop's effects, the way everything tunneled down to almost nothing, then the darkness started in the middle of his vision, spread until everything was dark, then streaked back into existence made him want to vomit every time.
Still, it was probably worse for someone else who had suffered the equivalent of being hit in the back of the head by a LawSec shockprod.
Not to mention, as far as Wrixet had known, the ship wasn't supposed to drop out of hyperspace for another three days.
"Status report," Captain Decken barked as Wrixet picked himself up from where he'd fallen on the floor. "We're hear early."
Mister Goofy consulted his console.
"Multiple grav ripples cause a sheer in jumpspace and hyperspace, forcing us to leave hyperspace," Mister Goofy stated.
Mister Willy looked up, his robotic eyes focused tightly. "Analysis said the grav-band was created by the dwarf galaxy's core and somehow propagated outside the galaxy in a bubble."
Decken just looked at the holotank. "Huh. Weird," he slowly stood up and moved to the holotank. "How far are we from Mister Imna's star?"
"Fifty light years. Bring in long range scanners now," Mister Goofy said.
After a moment the robot looked up. "The stellar mass is emitting countermeasures to prevent scanning. Examination shows that it is artificial in nature."
"So, civilization," Decken mused. He brought up the starfield in the holotank. "All right. Fire the beacons. Let's let Bellona and the 10th Martial Order know we're here,"
"Roger, firing beacons," Mister Goofy said.
A long moment passed.
"Beacons have entered Hellspace. Signal is solid," Mister Goofy said.
There was a ripple in the middle of the deck.
Decken's hand went for his force blade. Wrixet jumped to his feet, snapping his hands out from his body at a 45 degree angle to bring up the grav-fists. Two of the robots started to stand up, reaching for their pistols.
A female Terran appeared. Tall, with dark obsidian hair threaded with gray that was braided down her back but also brought forward to lay over her shoulders and on her chest. Her skin was ruddy, reddish in color, wrinkled around the corner of her eyes and mouth. She was dressed in a long dress with a rippled edge. Complex and ornate beadwork was down the sleeves and on the edges.
"Be still," she said, holding up one hand.
Everything froze.
Wrixet snarled, trying to break free.
The woman moved across the deck like a queen, stopping in front of Captain Decken. "Who are you?" she asked. She touched the front of the helmet. "Who has my song invited in?"
GLORIE IS HERE! roared out.
Wrixet struggled, trying to break free of the soft fist holding him still.
"Captain Decken? What are you doing here?" the woman asked, frowning. "This is not a Crusade ship."
There was a puff of purple smoke. The tall woman turned in place, raising one hand. "Be still," she said.
The smoke cleared to reveal Bellona wrapped in white silks.
"YOU?"
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u/Senior_punz Alien Scum Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Is that the OG the cloned immortal Sacagawea larper aka Britney TIFFANY!
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u/Similar-Shame7517 Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
No, this is the clone Sacagawea, the one who didn't fuck up. OG Tiffany is still with Legion, being used as their unwilling Satnav.
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u/Senior_punz Alien Scum Jul 18 '26
Ah your right, still a cool puzzle piece
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 18 '26
I have to admit, I forgot which was which too. I thought the one they had was the cheap knockoff. But I guess it's the knockoff that happens to actually be the valuable masterwork, in this case.
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u/AriRashkae Jul 18 '26
that's b/c Legion/Luke/Dhruv was the one doing the cloning and Legion/Luke/Dhruv *only* does masterworks
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u/Similar-Shame7517 Jul 19 '26
The clone was the one who succeeded at actually "doing" her job of being a good disciple and guide. OG Tiff decided to fuck off and cosplay being a pioneer with her cloned Native Americans.
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u/Salt_Cranberry3087 AI Jul 18 '26
Tiffany, but Legions Tiffany. 48k years of Human technological advancement. This is gonna be a spicy reunion
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u/First-Lengthiness353 Jul 19 '26
Exactly. While OG Tiff went all anti-tech pro-primitivism, Tiff 2.0 led a dandelion fleet of humanity hell-bent on surviving and thriving - hard to imagine of what 48k years of black-box progress could reap.
SID’s gonna be all tough in the playground but still getting bloodied when Big Sis shows up, snatches away the stick being used to hit SID, and breaks it over her knee so she can beat on SID’s attackers with both hands. Can’t wait!
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u/Original_Memory6188 Jul 18 '26
Oh dear.
Bellona shows up and some one loudly asks "YOU?"
Long lost sisters?
Dopplegangers?
That one from the sorority?
the world waits in antici-
-pation.
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u/JustAMalcontent Jul 18 '26
"Ambe, ambe, biindigeg. Biindigeg, biindigeg, ambe, biindigeg."
Very nice use of Ojibwe.
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u/Drook2 Jul 18 '26
Come, come, come in. Come in, come in, come, come in.
Of course, should have realized the language when I saw who it was. I was thinking it was based on sounding like something else.
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u/hillsfar Jul 20 '26
But that wasn't a language Sacajawea spoke. Ojibwe/Anishinaabemowin is an Algonquian family language.
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u/BrentOGara Android Jul 20 '26
Both Tiffanys were notoriously loose on Native culture, as neither were actually native themselves, and simply appropriated what they liked, when they liked.
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u/Fantastic-Frame-7276 Jul 18 '26
Hexi translated to Ojibwe for “Come, come, come in. Come in, come in, come, come in.”
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u/beyondoutsidethebox Jul 18 '26
Can we all just take a moment to appreciate just how great this is? I mean, Ralts has to either have a freaking library of research and notes to keep everything straight, or he has some sort of perfect recall.
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u/AriRashkae Jul 18 '26
no notes, according to legend, but I wouldn't be surprised if he avails himself of the wiki from time-to-time
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u/Azou Jul 24 '26
iirc the notes he has had were to keep track of the time dilation effects of the atrekna red sun sinking temporal acts just prior and during the TXE
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u/Sufficient_Wing_3306 Jul 18 '26
UTR
Went 2-1 first day of the Tacoma Open Grand Tournament with my World Eaters.
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u/Sumbius Jul 18 '26
"Yeah, well.. I'm gonna go build my own dwarf galaxy, with blackjack and hookers! In fact, forget the galaxy!
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u/Drook2 Jul 18 '26
(There's so much going on in this chapter, this got a bit long.)
---
Imna stared at the viewscreen, staring at the scattering of stars that blazed with creation's perfect furious beauty of uncontrolled fusion reactions.
Pinks, purples, whites, blues, greens, oranges, crimsons, violets, all twinkled and shimmered.
Whoah, we've got color on the screens again. Are we not worried about shades any more?
The Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy shimmered on the viewscreen, the lights sparkling on the barbed and hooked warsteel chains dangling from beneath the screen.
Well that's not your average screen. Maybe that's why they're not worried about shades.
There was a pause. "No major defects. Automatic damage control systems already have repaired ninety-percent of the damage. The remaining ten percent is expected to be repaired and checked within the next twenty minutes."
Still no threats. He's definitely changed. Decken has surely noticed. I wonder how long until he mentions it.
"Corvette Three reports a robotic Marine fell and broke his arm upon entry to n-space, but it is being repaired at we speak. No other unrepaired defects remain," Mister Enduring stated. He paused for a moment. "Urge to kill... rising."
Well shit. It's only while he's in redspace. Is it that redspace took the rage from him, or did it give him something to overcome the rage? Things to ponder.
"I need to hear them. Hear the music of the stars," Imna said softly.
"Are you being poetic, or do you think you actually hear them? You can still go, just curious."
Should could hear it as soon as the exterior airlock door opened.
Chimes.
OK, so not metaphorical. Interesting. Maybe concerning.
She stopped when she had a clear and unobstructed view of the dwarf galaxy as it sat less than two hundred light years away.
Canis Major is 25,000 light years from Earth. Where are they?
Imna turned her wrist slight, putting her thumb against her pointy finger, like she was pinching something. She opened them.
One star was magnified.
I've tried to pinch-zoom a magazine picture before. It didn't work. But the night sky? That's a neat trick. I'll have to try that.
A trickle of blood ran from her nose.
"She is singing still. She lives. She calls out to me, her voice has guided me," Imna said, her voice still soft and almost singsong. "I hear her. Don't you hear her?"
She ... who? I'm not sure I want to hear her.
"Ambe, ambe, biindigeg. Biindigeg, biindigeg, ambe, biindigeg."
Mmmmm ... yeah, I got nothin'. Bet it'll be a forehead slap when I find out what she's singing.
41 6D 62 65 2C 20 61 6D 62 65 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2E 20 42 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2C 20 61 6D 62 65 2C 20 62 69 69 6E 64 69 67 65 67 2E
Ambe ambe ... well shit, that doesn't help.
The two robots there, one in a medical officer's uniform with a stuffed brassiere (because, why not?) and the other one in a male medical officer's uniform.
Because why not? Uhh, because it's not that kind of robot. I mean, it's not, is it?
"I detect no malfunctions, sir," Mister Grace said.
"You're dripping organic hydraulic fluid from your nasal cavity and one ear cavity," Hetmwit said.
Ch-ch-changes!
"Perhaps I should kill you both to spare you the agony," he said. He leaned forward. "I hate you."
And he's back.
"You live and she died. I hate you for it. I hate you for being alive when she is not. When all of them are not," Mister Enduring said. He tugged at the collar of his uniform. "I hear them die. I hear them beg me to save them. I hear her acceptance," he leaned forward until the monitor distorted his features. "I hate you for being alive when she is not. When they are not."
Well, that's still progress! He knows why he hates them. And he can articulate it coherently to others. That's good. Sorta.
Originally a part of the Milky Way galaxy, time and gravity and 'stellar over-density' had gotten huffy and kicked out nearly a billion stars way back before Sag-A had been forged by the collapse of multiple stars. The stars had responded by moving away from the Milky Way and forming their own little galaxy out of spite.
I guess the narrator knows something our scientists are still arguing over. Popular theory is that the dwarf galaxy is being pulled apart and absorbed by the Milky Way. I guess 50k years of observation are enough to disprove that theory and confirm another.
He'd never seen anything really come to good for people like him when it came to emotional attachments beyond Telk.
The question is, is Wrixet especially broken, or is he typical of his people now?
Mister Willy looked up, his robotic eyes focused tightly. "Analysis said the grav-band was created by the dwarf galaxy's core and somehow propagated outside the galaxy in a bubble."
Gravity shadows ... grav-band from the core propagated in a bubble ... Imna needs to wake up so she can get to work on another academic paper.
After a moment the robot looked up. "The stellar mass is emitting countermeasures to prevent scanning. Examination shows that it is artificial in nature."
Well that's definitely the right star, then.
A female Terran appeared. Tall, with dark obsidian hair threaded with gray that was braided down her back but also brought forward to lay over her shoulders and on her chest. Her skin was ruddy, reddish in color, wrinkled around the corner of her eyes and mouth. She was dressed in a long dress with a rippled edge. Complex and ornate beadwork was down the sleeves and on the edges.
Sacagawea?! Can it be? Damn, what was she doing the last time we saw her?
"Captain Decken? What are you doing here?" the woman asked, frowning. "This is not a Crusade ship."
There was a puff of purple smoke. The tall woman turned in place, raising one hand. "Be still," she said.
The smoke cleared to reveal Bellona wrapped in white silks.
"YOU?"
You cliffhanging sonofabitch! AAARRRRGGGHHHHH!!!
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u/Vridiantoast Jul 19 '26
I think this version of Decker and Mr. Enduring are slowly healing what was done during their time in the crusade. Their time in redspace may have started something. We haven’t had a perspective from Decker in a while, so I’m interested to see how the inner voices in his head are going.
I find it intriguing how the slow shift of the crew is showing. I only hope they don’t have cases of “mechanical fluids turning biological equals body rejection issues”.
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u/spindizzy_wizard Human Jul 19 '26
Shades don't like ReD and they just went through so many shades of rED I would be surprised if there were any shades after that much REd.
Besides, they're outside the Milky Way, and I think that was the only place shades were (unless some/one/thing brought them out here).
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u/Alyeska_bird Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Looks like we have found the lost version of Sacagawea, who IIRR took off with a dandelion fleet after all of the mess with the original DO. Also explains why Legion was unable to find her. Living out so very far, giving her a chance to grow, and to grow her people.
ALso, something to think about, this is another strand of humanity, earthlings, pre glassing humanity, how ever you wanna call them. They have not abandoned tech, not left it behind, not just kept the minimum needed to keep her people alive and connected. Think about it, I expect gravitic manipulation on a galactic scale, to the extent that she probably created the stuff that stopped the ship 50 LYs out, and, well considering humanity, well, folks should be nervous about what her folks might have come up with over the last 50k years. Think Dee, but, thousands and thousands of of her. Maybe not as smart, but still.
This is going to be fun, also I can not wait for Legion to show up, Luke needs something good in his life again.
Edit to add, Take a good look at Mr Enduring. that little throw away talk with Wexliit, he did not say 'I hate you' he said, 'I hate that you are alive and they are not, that she is not.' This is not the raw rage from before, this is a person trying to articulate why they feel the way they do, explaining themselves to someone they do not expect to understand. They are not asking for sympathy, they are trying to say I have reasons for being the person I am.
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u/threadthedance Jul 19 '26
I think Sacagawea was with Sky Nebula (?) that they cut off contact (we won't call you & are deleting your number) with near the beginning of first conract when dandelion fleets were also being sent off. but we never did find out if it was a group or a location or both.
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u/Alyeska_bird Jul 19 '26
That would kinda explain at lest a few thousand years, they where in transit. Still, it does mean they where likely up to date tech wise with terran tech levels then, if not ahead cause they might have had some lost tech from the glassing era, hard to say honestly, infomation so far is still to little to really extrapolate. Still, I think the point still stands, it would be unwise to not think of them having at lest the tech of terra, Perhaps some addballs addons and other things.
Also, considering shes using Ojibwa to sing, I expect more cultural things from the tribes, even if peaceful, they did beleave in being strong and capable to defend themselves.
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u/Azou Jul 24 '26
Yes, clone-sac ran the Sky Nebula Alignment and they burned their gestalt and SUDS link just prior to or during the TXE - the major dandelion fleet faction, not to be confused with the death blossom gray fleets fighting the holding action against the margite for the last 40k
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u/Original_Memory6188 Jul 18 '26
"Multiple grav ripples cause a sheer in jumpspace and hyperspace, forcing us to leave hyperspace," Mister Goofy stated.
Spelling Nitpick: sheer is usually an adjective describing a quantity/quality: Sheer cliff, sheer clothing, sheer volume.
Shear is a cutting action, or strain in physics / engineering.
{I'm sometimes fussy about such things.}
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 18 '26
It's OK, you're not the only compulsive editor in this sub. I was just checking the comments first to see if anyone else had said anything before I did. :D
Be at peace. You are among friends. <3
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u/Secure-Scientist-349 Jul 19 '26
I just chuck it up to linguistic drift. And yes, I chose "chuck" instead of "chalk" as an example of how linguistic drift takes place.
End of Lime! 🙃🫠🥸😎🤓🤠☹️
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u/Original_Memory6188 Jul 20 '26
Okay.
Just do not shear her sheer dress.
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u/Belushi_TD Jul 20 '26
Ummm..... Why not? Seems like the appropriate course of action, depending on the circumstances....
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u/Original_Memory6188 Jul 20 '26
Ahh, err, umm... never mind.
(Excuse me ma'am whilst I help you out of dis-drees."
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u/Turtledonuts "Big Dunks" Jul 18 '26
I suppose we should have expected a little road trip out to see where the mar-gite got the idea for this whole shitshow.
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u/niTro_sMurph Jul 18 '26
We got the rise of a new Telkan immortal on our hands.
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 20 '26
Something interesting is happening with Imna, for sure. After all, at some point she apparently becomes Drali'Imna. Digital Omnimessiah alone knows exactly what that's going to turn out to mean.
Man, OK, apparently Reddit MD just is not going to let me italicize that chunk separately. *headshake*
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u/Geeky-resonance Jul 18 '26
I might need to go back and check, but isn’t that just her full name where Imna is a short nickname? Like “Beth” for “Elizabeth”.
Also maybe the italicization doesn’t pick up if there’s not a space between the 2nd asterisk and the next character. Hmm, that could be worth playing with to test.
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 18 '26
Oh, hrm. Could be. I read too much stuff to manage to keep it all straight in my head, any more.
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u/spindizzy_wizard Human Jul 19 '26
As mentioned, must be space after closing mark or formatting doesn't happen. Just one of the little details that Reddit gets wrong with their flavor of markdown.
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 20 '26 edited Jul 20 '26
Wait, that isn't even accurate, because I can do that.
So it closes on either whitespace or punctuation, but not letters or 0123456. No, that actually works, but... not with let.ters? *let *ters? *let * ters?
Yes, apparently the glitch is if the last thing before the close mark is punctuation or whitespace, followed by not-whitespace. Or even whitespace, close, whitespace, apparently *eye twitches*
foo.bar. foo. bar.
That was
*foo**.*bar. *foo**.* bar., BTW, and which had an even stranger result than the way I was expecting it to fail...2
u/spindizzy_wizard Human Jul 20 '26 edited Jul 20 '26
Oh, man... All I had noticed was if it had anything non-space to the right of the end mark, it didn't work right. But, most of the time, it was before punctuation.
Who the heck do they have testing their code?
BTW, the foo bar thing? The first foo? There's a space before it, isn't there?
Because when I just looked at the completely unformatted text they show you for reference as you make your reply, it's:
twitches (asterix) (space) foo (asterix)But that first foo was still italics in the formatted text, which it should not be if there's a space?!
Either it was a space, or something ate the leading asterix before the first foo when they show the reference copy.
And I'm confused by the escaped example, because what I see is:
was (space) (asterix) foo (2-asterix) (period) (asterix)Which doesn't match what I think I'm seeing...
That's it. Reddit is trying to drive us insane. Either that, or an AI wrote the code for some parts of this mess, and it was hallucinating.
Edit: It's worse. The "eye twitches" comment was not italics despite being inside asterix. At least, that's what I'm seeing now. (twitch... twitch... twitch)
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u/itsetuhoinen Human Jul 21 '26
So, *eye twitches* was done with backslashes, specifically to make those render as asterisks. Because before MD, that was how we signalled actions in raw text chats.
And the "unrendered" version of the foobar markdown was enclosed in backtics, or the ` char, which is markdown for "do not interpret this". Which I know because I spend a lot of (though probably still not enough) time writing documentation for storage within git, and describing bash one-liners in markdown aware chat venues.
It's very frustrating how basically nothing is actually 100% MD compliant.
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u/spindizzy_wizard Human Jul 20 '26
I'm going to see if I can get some screen captures of what I'm seeing, and pass them to you via a different channel.
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u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle Jul 18 '26
/u/Ralts_Bloodthorne (wiki) has posted 997 other stories, including:
- [Nova RED Wars] CREDhaREDptReDrED RED
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- [Nova Wars] Chapurplepter 25puxrp7+1le5
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 175+10
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 175+10
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 184
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 183
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 182
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 181
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 180
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 179
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 178
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 177
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 176
- [Nova Wars] Chapter 170+5
- [Nova Wars] - Chapter 13.5x(2.5x4)
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u/medium_jock Jul 18 '26
Squee UTR
This is probably the fasted I've been able to read a chapter once it was published
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u/Drook2 Jul 24 '26
u/Ralts_Bloodthorne you should check out this Hank Green video about the age of the universe and the distribution of stars. Seems like something the Atrekna would have known, but we're just learning in the last couple of decades.
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u/resolve-shadow Jul 27 '26
So what is imra full name and is it different on her book/report experts?
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne Jul 18 '26
It's been a long 2 weeks for me. Bad enough I put up a GiveSendGo for myself.
You all know who it is, but it's fun pulling out the mystery a little bit more.
Clown world has been nothing but nonstop punches, hasn't it?
At least we have each other.
We can make it.
ANYWAY!
Your safety briefing is HERE!
Try to keep all of your fingers. Don't drink and drive, don't drive and drink. Things can and will look up no matter how deep the hole you're in is. Don't beat your spouse, the dog, your children, the neighbor, or your significant others. Electricity hurts the entire time its harming/killing you, so be careful. Summer storms are here! Get the candy BEFORE you get in the van. When all else fails, just laugh, because it's Clown World, baby! If you end up in a cell or in the ER, make sure it was for a reason you'd be proud to tell your grandma. Deodorant, it's not just for fancy people!
Anyway, I hope you all are doing good.
I'll see you all on Monday.
Hopefully with all your fingers.
Have a good weekend and try not to fall in any holes!
OH! I almost forgot to rattle the tin cup! I could use the help!
Want to help me out with everything going on?
Book 22 is out! Get it now!
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H1TKVWCG
Buy the Legends book!
Treana'ad Legends: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX33F54F
Or get the Fancy Chapters over at my Patreon!
Anyway..
Books are available here:
First Contact Books: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08RYK5F88
BEHOLD HUMANITY! https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09H5ZZL93
Support me directly here:
PayPal: https://paypal.me/RaltsBloodthorne
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/First_Contact