It allowed itself to be gently buffeted by the impact, using its engine fields to adjust its apparent mass and so increasing its inertia so that the effect would fall within acceptable parameters, while observing the outermost elements of its field structure deform inwards by a few micrometres under the weight of the blast. The effect of the colliding gust of plasma was to send it drifting very slightly across the face of the sunspot, spinning slowly. Finally it sent,
Why do we bother with this sort of bio-tangling stuff in the first place? We could live lives of such uncomplicated joy if we left them to their own sordid, murderous devices.
∞
Because it pleases us. It’s a challenge. We could Sublime, too, but we don’t do that either. Come on; we have a reputation for enlightened interference to protect here.
∞
Yeah, that’s us: first amongst the Altruists; the emperors of nice. We’re not competitive about it, but — if we were — by fuck we’d be the best.
∞
Most amusing.
∞
Yes, my fields expand at the mirth of it all. Very well. I may regret this, but; all right. I’ll take part.
∞
And use those contacts with the Sublimed?
∞
If I have to, even more reluctantly, yes.
∞
Hurrah! Welcome aboard. Here’s a diaglyph with the situation. Any thoughts?
∞
The data was lush with detail, a fact-crammed welter of information leavened with analysis and speculation. There were pointers towards standard concise histories of all species/civs involved for those who hadn’t been paying attention earlier, more incisive, less polite, Contact-produced essays on the societies and personalities involved, plus a comprehensive summary of all recent developments, their possible explanations, a statistical breakdown of multiple already-simmed likely futures and an exhaustive, minutely annotated multi-dimensional comparison of this situation with those of any pressing similarity in the past, with another spread of likely outcomes relating thereto, plus the positions and specifications of all known capital and other major ships in the volume or inbound.
This did have the look of something blowing up alarmingly quickly, the Caconym thought. The Mistake Not… had been the first to flag up something amiss when it had spotted the weapon-blink from Ablate, communicating this to its home GSV, the Kakistocrat, which had been cautious enough to pass this on to a select few of its peers including the Pressure Drop rather than broadcast the news.
The message from the Zihdren-Remnanters had gone straight to the Pressure Drop less than an hour later. No hint of who or what had been responsible for the destruction of the Remnanter ship. Two principal Scavenger species present: the Liseiden and the Ronte. It would be tidiest and least alarming for all concerned if one of those had been responsible for the attack on the Remnanter ship, but that looked impossible; even if the Remnanter ship had been unarmed, the tech levels were just too far apart.
The Caconym didn’t pretend to take any appreciable time to review the totality of what it had been sent.
The old Desert class currently hanging around Zyse, it sent.
∞
Yes, the venerable MSV Passing By And Thought I’d Drop In. There to represent us guys until the cultural big guns get there in the humungous shape of the System-class Empiricist, currently Zyse-bound, though delayed by a smatter outbreak en route. The Passing By… has been informed there might be a minor situation developing, though no action yet required; the Empiricist is still in a state of blissful ignorance.
∞
The Passing By… has two Thugs with it as escorts, DMVs.
∞
DeMilitarised Vessels is such old terminology, dear thing. They’ve been called Fast Pickets or Very Fast Pickets for a long time now. But, yes: the ex-Thug-class Rapid Offensive Units Refreshingly Unconcerned With The Vulgar Exigencies Of Veracity and Value Judgement. If you’re thinking about those as immediately available military assets, though, I must disappoint you. They both really have been fully de-fanged. They’re not that just-pretend kind of OU described as weapon-free to keep the locals happy while actually toting gear of serious cloutage, sadly.
∞
Still, have a word. Those three ships have a long association, a lot of the Desert class were discomfited at being demoted from General to Medium and — like myself — the Mind in the Passing By… is old. Also, the Thug de-weaponing was done aboard it.
∞
Keep going.
∞
Old equals sneaky. And prideful, sometimes. Tell the Passing By… what has happened. Suggest to it that if it did just happen to have the weapon clusters taken out of its escorting Thugs to hand, it should get both ships back aboard and fully re-tooled immediately.
∞
Just checked. That stuff’s not aboard the Desert; absent from both the relevant cargo manifests and registered materiel declarations.
∞
Ask it all the same. It might be hiding the gear.
∞
That’d be a bit cheeky. And anyway, on a Desert class? They’re tiny! That’s why they got demoted.
∞
They’re over three klicks long and boxy, and the principal weapon cluster on a Thug is less than thirty metres in diameter. Also, there isn’t a Desert class extant that hasn’t altered its internal layout umpteen times, over the millennia, just to suit operational happenstance or to amuse itself. I bet most of them could find places aboard themselves to hide sufficient ordnance to equip a fleet, if they looked hard enough or could be bothered.
∞
Signal duly sent.
∞
The Beats Working, with the Ronte; genuinely civilian?
∞
Completely. And genuinely tiny. Eighty metres. We had missiles bigger, back in ye olden days.
∞
And this Eccentric-erratic, the Mistake Not…; is there any data on its throw-weight? I can’t find anything official.
∞
Seemingly not. That’s sort of the idea, apparently.
∞
Estimates of its puissance by enthusiastic amateurs vary wildly, but indicate something close to my own disclosed capabilities. (The Caconym had resorted to consulting documentation drawn up by the sort of people who took an informed interest in Culture ships.)
∞
I’m sure one of you ought to be flattered.
∞
Hmm. I think even by our relaxed standards it is a little absurd that one warship needs to look up what are essentially fan-sites for an estimate of a comrade vessel’s clobbering capacity. Think it could be SC?
∞
Possibly Special Circumstances, possibly just congenitally inscrutable. SC’s ongoing attempts to corner the market in deviousness have yet to come to fruition.
∞
Let’s try to find out how on board it is, and ask what it’s toting.
∞
Agreed. Its contact is the GSV Kakistocrat, which certainly used to be SC, though it claims it long since settled for a quieter and more contemplative life. Signal sent.