I have a day or two until they catch up. But that's time to have a meal and leave another short paper for Golivka, as he tracks an apparently noteworthy captain assisting the Galatia Academy's scientists and technicians now that they've rejoined the sector at large.
The degree to which one can command an empty table in any crowded establishment, simply by writing in a paper book, continues to amaze me. One day, some very bored Persean sector scientist will subject one of our books to a micro-genetic scan in order to determine where we actually source the cellulose. When that day happens, we will have the ancient hells to pay, but I find consolation that the vaunted TriPads will become instantly and permanently obsolete in that moment.
Geopolitics: Term of Art, Intellectual, Deprecated, no functional replacement. The evolution of relationships between different political units as influenced by demography, planetside geography, and relative stellar position.
The Persean Sector Experiment remains politically unstable. A rough balance is found between the Persean League and the Sindrian Dictat, on the one hand, and the Hegemony and the Luddic Church on the other. As of now, this balance is ineffective because Tri-Tachyon has engaged in a more subtle version of power politics.
I won't bore Golivka with a base description of political powers we all know. But I'll ask some questions.
What does it mean that Tri-Tachyon's operatives can penetrate any other power's space more-or-less at will due to its mastery of phase technology, but that the corporation lacks the heft, depth, and most importantly, the population to become a true major power? Everyone waits for the next time Tri-Tachyon's combination of AI and human calculation considers hostilities profitable. But it seems that they have learned their lesson and are going for something else. Technological domination? Decapitation strikes with a credible success rate? Has over-reliance upon AI decision-making hindered Tri-Tachyon's ability to maintain strategic depth?
What does it mean that the so-called "pirates" all answer to a single leader, with settlements and bases spread throughout the Persean sector...yet their fleets are based almost exclusively on civilian-hulled vessels, relying on brute ferocity to hamstring development throughout the sector. "Warlord Kanta" is a far better name than "Pirate Chief" Kanta, given her functional similarity to Andrada as a Hegemony deserter. Yet Kanta wields no Diktat. With far-flung bases in many systems, many of which can be established in surprisingly little time, operatives and agents in every port, an argument can be made that the squabbling "pirate" tribes are the true power of the sector, in spite of lagging behind on so many of the usual metrics. And yet... what is Kanta's actual goal?
What does it mean that the Luddic Faith spreads throughout the sector, and that its Pather allies not only control vast swaths of territory with outdated, technically-appalling ships...yet are perhaps the best of all of the factions at settling systems with little to nothing in the way of planetary resources? Is the Path merely the deniable "enforcement arm" of the Church, effectively culling spacefarers like Kanta's so-called pirates, yet leaving even defenseless colonies alone so long as they are religiously inoffensive?
What does it mean that the Church is so unpopular with even its most-pious adherents that even the hint of a new farm world draws settlers by the hundred?
Berserker. Term of Art, Fictional, Deprecated/Antique. Artificial-intelligence war machines whose purpose is to wipe out humanity barring useful human servitors/worshippers, known as "goodlife."
What does it mean that that Tri-Tachyon wielded AI-powered forces.... yet no active Remnant AI has chosen to initiate a Berserker campaign, choosing instead simply to hold numerous systems and prevent their habitation by humans? Or can we consider Tri-Tachyon itself a Berserker Faction, given its willingness to turn a blind eye to saturation bombardment as a military tactic?
What does it mean that every port has hundreds, and often thousands, of space-trained personnel who will serve any captain willing to pick up their contract, and serve them faithfully regardless of the glory and/or ineptitude of said captain? That scores of highly-skilled marines will do same? That nanoforge production is almost purely centered around the production of ships and associated weaponry, resulting in a sector which is almost literally awash in barely-restrained (one cannot say "controlled") military power in dozens of different hands.... yet the majority of humanity remains planet-bound? Into what hands did the blueprints and technical knowledge required to terraform and create widespread stations and bases go?
I'll put this together in short-essay form for Golivka once I hit the next shuttle.
