Tycho Brahe#Artemis — 2346

Convergence T-minus 22 days, 5 hours, 2 minutes

Despite the exhaustion that had come down on him like a hammer, Tycho found it difficult to get to sleep. It weighed him down like stones on his chest, even as he lay in bed in the room that True Name led him to. It was a comfortable bed in a nice enough room, and still he lay there in the dark, staring up at the ceiling with eyes that burned.

He did not know how long it took him to actually fall asleep, but when next he woke, ten hours had passed, and dreams of Artemisians clung to him still. They were always just out of sight, and their conversations were just slightly below the level that he could hear them, and yet, he knew it to be them. Knew they were there, just around the corner. Knew that, above all else, he wanted to meet them.

When laying in bed gained him no further insight from the dream, he climbed out, showered in the en suite, and, when he was dressed, opened the door to find True Name waiting across the hall, two coffees in hand.

“Do you feel more well-rested, Tycho?”

“I guess, yeah,” he said, accepting the offered coffee. “I hope I didn’t sleep through too much.”

True Name began walking, letting him fall in step behind her. She laughed. “Of course not, my dear. Nothing much that you need to worry about has happened in the last few hours. We have been working on information control and hunting down those willing to help with the effort for setting up the Ansible system to upload to Artemis. That is what you will be working on today, you and a passel of nerds. I think that is the collective term, at least.”

So out of place was the humor that it took him several silent steps and a sip of his coffee to relax from the adrenal rush of the statement. “Well, if you say so. No further communications from them?”

“One, but I will not ungate it on you yet, as it is quite large. It is instructions for one of their languages. Secondrace’s, apparently. I will ask you to learn some of it, enough to be polite, but both Why Ask Questions and Answers Will Not Help are working on that with more forks.”

Tycho quickstepped enough to fall in beside True Name as they made their way back to the central hub of the complex. “That feels somewhat out of place to me.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, if firstrace is there in a leadership capacity, why not send that language?”

The skunk shrugged. “We do not know. They did not include any of that information in the message. It will be something that we can ask, whether prior to or at the conference.”

He nodded and looked out at the bustle of the room, as active as it was when he had arrived and when he had gone to sleep. He wondered if the various forks shifted their sleep schedule such that there were always True Names and Jonases at work.

“So, uh…what’s on the schedule for today?”

True Name tilted her head momentarily, then nodded. “You will be working with Answers Will Not Help and two others to help spin up the effort to work on getting the upload side of the Ansible working to their specifications.”

As if on command, Answers Will Not Help appeared before them, followed shortly by two others. Tycho supposed that the skunk must’ve sent each a sensorium ping.

Answers Will Not Help grinned to him, then gestured to each of the new guests in turn. “Sovanna Soun is a sys-side Ansible tech, who will be working on that part, and–”

Tycho was already leaning forward to shake the hand of the other guest, a slight gentleman who looked every one of the seventy years he had been prior to uploading. “Dr. Verda, wonderful to see you again.”

“Likewise, likewise.”

“You two know each other, then?”

Tycho nodded. “Paolo was one of my professors, yes.”

“Well, what do you know,” Answers Will Not Help said, laughing. “Right, then. If the three of you will follow me?”

They made their way to a conference room where they sat around a long table, both True Name and Tycho still nursing their coffees. Answers Will Not Help pulled a wheeled whiteboard over and uncapped a marker, beginning to diagram on the board.

“I will be managing the effort,” she said, writing ‘AWNH’ and circling it at the top. Two lines were drawn diagonally down from that. “As mentioned, Ms. Soun will be working on the Ansible software modifications. Dr. Verda will be working on the math side required to have the Ansible track the ship as it moves. It was built to be mobile in case we did need to send or receive anyone from Lagrange in an emergency, but I am told that it was meant to require manual intervention.”

Tycho frowned. “Two people working on all of that?”

“Two clades, yes.” She continued to diagram on the board. “As discussed, Ms. Soun will begin with a clade of ten to work on the software, and Dr. Verda will begin with a clade of two. Both can expand as needed. We need to ramp this up and complete the changes required within two weeks, so it is important that we be able to move quite quickly.”

“And what about me?”

Answers Will Not Help wrote his name next to hers, then drew connecting lines to all three names already on the board. “You will be acting as Artemis consultant and manager. We will deliver all messages through you and you will pass on any information required bidirectionally. Due to your relative inexperience with forking, your specialized knowledge of our visitors, and a certain bold je ne sais quoi, we will be keeping you at one fork for the time being.”

Dr. Verda laughed. “Bold? Our Jo– er, Tycho?”

He felt a heat rise to his cheeks as Answers Will Not Help replied, “He is the one who said yes to the Artemisians before we had the chance to do anything about it.”

Everyone looked at him.

“Uh, sorry.”

“What the fuck, man?” Sovanna said, laughing. “So all this is your fault?”

Answers Will Not Help laughed as well, waving her hand. “Do not be too mad at him. Or do, but do not tear into him too much. He has already received the Odist third degree.”

“I have?”

“True Name threatened you with death, did she not?”

Tycho froze. “I…what?”

The skunk grinned over the rim of her coffee cup.

“Even the smart and bold may be denser than lead, I suppose.”

Sovanna laughed and patted him on the arm. “Don’t worry, Tycho. I was just giving you shit. No idea what Answers is talking about.”

Answers Will Not Help capped the pen and, with startling speed, threw it at Sovanna. It struck her in the shoulder, getting a yelp from the Ansible tech and making both Tycho and Dr. Verda jump. The grin never left her face as she spoke, but her voice was frigid. “You are not permitted to call me ‘Answers’, Ms. Soun. Understood?”

Eyes wide and hand holding onto her shoulder where the pen had struck, Sovanna sat, wide-eyed, and nodded.

“Now, if there is no further need for third degrees, shall we begin?” Her voice was back to its normal, joyous self with a surprising adroitness. Something about her seemed decidedly ungrounded.

The three nodded together, silent.

“Excellent. One moment, then.”

The three walls of the room that did not contain the door quickly expanded outward, leaving a broad, open room. Fourteen desks sprouted from the floor, divided into a group of ten and two groups of two.

“Cubicle walls?”

When Sovanna shook her head and Dr. Verda nodded, both pods of two sprouted cubicle walls around them, the pod of ten melding into shapely desks. With a final flourish of a bow, Answers Will Not Help welcomed them into the room. Above the pod of ten hung a sign that read ‘Ansible’, and the two pods were labeled ‘Astro’ and ‘Admin’ in turn.

It was all quite skillfully done, but Tycho still felt a slight pang in his chest. It was generally considered a violation of social norms for public sims to violate Euclidean space without warning, but private sims were beholden only to the holders of the ACLs. This room would occupy at least one office on either side, if not more.

Quite unnerving.

Answers Will Not Help spoke as she walked. “Begin by estimating your work. We will meet in one hour. After that, we will meet twice a day; more often as needed. Please feel free to ping me if you need anything. I have granted you all access to cones of silence and music, which you may use at your discretion or when requested. Tycho, dear, with me.”

Sovanna forked as she walked, further instances of her blipping into existence beside her, each one walking up to claim a seat. It took Dr. Verda longer to fork, but soon, there were two of him.

Tycho simply followed his new boss to the admin pod. She gestured him to one of the cubicles while she took the other. Once they sat, the wall between the cubicles lowered itself and he found that their two desks faced each other. At a gesture, a cone of silence fell over them both.

“Alright, Dr. Brahe. I am going to grant you access to the language dump that they sent our way. I would like you to take a look at it over the next hour and see how easily you might be able to pick it up. From what it sounds like, they already have a good grasp on our lingua franca, but in order to be polite, we ought to also work on learning one of theirs.”

He nodded. He could already feel the presence of that information lingering on the periphery of his memory. “I’ll give it a go. I’ve never learned another language but I guess there’s a first time for everything.”

“Excellent, thank you. Again, you do not need to gain mastery over it. That will be my job. Why Ask Questions and I have several instances working on it already. If you find yourself in need of assistance, let me know and I will request a merger from them so that I can pick up what they have learned.” She waved a hand and a few notepads spooled out of the air between them, along with several pens. “I do not know your preference, but here are some materials for you. You are also welcome to create further copies if you need, and should you require anything more advanced, ping me and I will make it happen.”

He collected the notepads into a pile on his desk, setting the pile of pens next to them. Each was unique, probably to give him a variety to choose from.

“Please also be prepared to set aside your work should the others request any further information from you. I believe Dr. Verda would be the most likely, as you are not an Ansible tech, but one never knows, yes?”

“Alright,” he said, jotting down on one of the nicer pads with one of the nicer pens a list of what he was to do. “Language, be available. Anything else?”

“Nope, that is it. Your #Tasker instance will be working on separate items.” She waved a hand again and the cone of silence dropped as the cube wall once more raised up between them. Muffled on the other side, he heard, “See you in an hour.”