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What mandate? We have no mandate here. We were dragged to this universe by accident. There was no plan of action, no orders, no outline of our objective or position in this universe. What we DO have is our oath to the TSN – our TSN.
I will never turn from the right path, never follow fear, never enable an injustice.
I will stand in truth, serve with honour and fight with courage.We’ve taken part in operations that have aimed to kill innocent people. When the Fleet Captain was here, he did everything possible to stop that from occuring. He knew the consequences of his actions, and so did all the Senior Officers who are being detained now.
To sit by an allow the ISN to continue exploiting the Caltrons and supressing their own people, we are breaking our own oath. Its not a question of one weapon or another, but a question of its use… in our own universe or in this.
We cannot hide behind politics, legalities, or our desire to return home and use them as an excuse not to do what is right. Our oath doesn’t just make us swear to protect ourselves, but protect anyone from an injustice. The TSN exists because our officers first laid down their lives to protect others who were under threat and unable to protect themselves.
Turning to address Quinn
Look at the evidence we have before us and the facts. The TSN we have met in this universe… look at what they have done so far – attacked us when we have threatened innocent civilians, rescued our officers when they’ve been in need, cooperated with us when we’ve needed to cover our tracks. We don’t have to join them, but we can seek their help.
And if you are worried about choosing a side, we cannot sit neatly on the fence in the middle. We cannot make it home on our own. By staying in the ISN we ARE choosing a side and making it hard to achieve virtually anything. We are also allow an injustice to continue.
I, for one, don’t give a damn about the politics of this universe. What I do care about is getting our people back, getting back home to our own universe, and protecting people as much as we can along the way.
Intendant Nhaima, I believe it is inevitable that the ISN will find out about the possibility of transferring to another universe, especially if our return to our universe also returns them to theirs. Surely they will report their own journey to the ISN. I believe a better course of action in that case is to do everything we can to prevent the ISN from learning how this transfer occurred.
Regardless of picking sides, or which side to pick, I believe the purpose of this meeting was to determine ways to find our Senior Officers, and the Midshipman if possible.
Someone mentioned Admiral Mundy. There are probably other officers who have connections elsewhere that we might be able to take advantage of. I suggest we all start to reach out to potential assets each of us may have in this universe.
When considering the danger of left-behind personnel, we should also consider that our mirror selves will presumably be in an equal position to help the ISN understand our origin.
As for whether we should any ourselves or try to remain neutral, I would worry how long we would survive on our own. We didn’t last long then we first entered this universe.
So we’re clear: if the best play for rescuing the senior officers requires defection then that’s what we’ll do. If it requires shining our boots and saluting the ISN, then that’s what we’ll do. But if it requires the murder of innocents or otherwise compromising our TSN oath, however, then we’ll be using the next best play. Abandoning our oath is no more an option than abandoning our senior officers.
Quinn sighs
But Iroh is correct, we’ve got to focus on the task at hand.
Subaltern Tam, I want you to come up with a way to get a message to the TSN while we’re here on station. Collaborate with any of our officers you have to but we need to send the message asking for specific intel on the location of our senior officers.
Intendant Nhaima, you’ll be working the same angle but from inside the ISN. You’re to identify potential Azure Legion targets for your proposed operation, but I also want you to pursue less invasive means as well. Perhaps we can bug the INI officers and they’ll drop clues that we can follow up.
I cannot stress enough to both of you: Don’t get caught. The senior officers are counting on us and we can’t save them if we’re locked down. Contact me immediately if you believe you may be compromised so we can scramble ships and leave.
He looks at the cadet who spoke up earlier
Midshipman, that was a good idea about alerting Admiral Mundy. Having an admiral hassling the Azure Legion can only help our potential operation, and she may even point us in the right direction. I’ll send her a message right away.
Other ideas? The more options we have, the better chance we stand of a successful rescue.
Aye, aye, sir. If any other officer has ideas I’ll gladly accept the help.
Long term, sir, from reading the logs and sensor analyses, it seems pretty clear that the Forerunner Artifacts were involved in the accident that brought us here. Principally some interaction of the jumpspace manipulator, which is what the ISN seemed to use in a very limited fashion in our last action against the Hegemony, and the artifact psionic interlink device that the Kraliens originally found in Hjorden, seem to have been responsible for migrating our mental essences across er… universes. That second artifact is what Prefect Romanova seems to be accusing Moritani of abusing.
Assuming we can somehow reverse engineer the circumstances, could we close off the possibility of further use within human timescales by destroying the artifacts?
Have we got anyone on identifying safe harbours for when we break away? It’s one thing stockpiling what we can and then running, but we need to be able to find somewhere safe enough from the ISN to make use of it. We’ll never be able to focus our resources on getting home if we’re constantly on the run.
There are some urgent whispers among the cadets. The cadet who spoke up earler — her name tag reads Felicity Song— says
Sir, the smugglers and pirates must have safe harbours, we might be able to take one over, or, I don’t know, come to some agreement with people who are just smuggling, rather than actually attacking ships?
She adds,
Didn’t Mr. Rakaydos mention something about some incidents with pirates in his past?
Looks around for confirmation
“Thinking that there is only ISN and TSN is a false choice, and I maintain my oath by refusing to aid the ISN in immoral actions. That oath does not require me to intervene in every situation I think is wrong with lethal force, because that also means that another who had sworn a similar oath with different values – the Arvonians for example probably regard everyone on the Horizon as immoral beings because we make casual use of guided ordnance and they regard any artificial intelligence as worthy of moral consideration.
To shift our imperative from defending those around us who cannot defend themselves (as needed and on a case-by-base basis) to stopping an organization we have extra-judiciously and without authorization of war from the USFP decided is evil and must be destroyed is the pivot from defense to offense, and the concession of our agency and worthiness of moral consideration.”
Nhaima sighed and rubbed at her temple for a second before placing her hand palm up on the conference table.
“Look, I’ve never admitted this to anyone here before but…. I mean, I was arrested once by our TSN. For carrying out my,” she said, scoffing slightly at herself, “private little war… against the Kraliens. And I was given a choice, to either join the TSN or cool my heels in a brig for quite a few months. So I’m here. But if choosing to fight against a government we were already in conflict with in our universe wasn’t alright, then why is fighting against one we’re not in a universe that isn’t ours suddenly justifiable? Seems an awful lot like wanting to have our cake and eat it to. To be heroes? Rather than doing our duty and getting our people home safely.”
Intendant, I hear your concerns, but this is not a meeting to discuss the philosophical nature of objective morality, nor is it a meeting to discuss the pros and cons of joining the TSN. This meeting is about getting the senior officers back.
If we can get the intelligence we need from the ISN, I want you to find a way. Is that clear? If you would prefer not to carry out the assignment I’ve given you for moral reasons then I can assign it to another officer, but I will not let any stone go unturned in our search.
Meanwhile, if we can get the intelligence from the TSN, I want Subaltern Tam to find a way.
As for the underworld elements- Midshipman Song is it? It’s a good suggestion- I would like you to review stellar cartography and consult with the science officers to identify any such independent bases who might offer us safe harbor for a fee. Mr. Rakaydos’ experience may come in handy identifying exactly what that fee might be, so please consult with him as well.
“Yes sir,” Alia replied evenly, “I’ll program a search routine for ships matching a similar configuration to the known type, as well as ship records which don’t match a sensible transit pattern, and make a few discrete requests on pirate radio if anyone knows anything and indicate that sources would be compensated for their intelligence. Once we have a lead, we can plan the interception. In the mean time, Relentless‘s magazines were looking a little low. I’ll be filing additional requisitions for everything needed to bring us up to full strength. Is there anything else I may do for you?”
Crackling and hissing over the comms system interrupt the conference. A pixellated outline appears on screen. An urgent voice, distorted by static, says
…lton reporting. Sir, I’ve found them. They got your black…Shrieks of static … info in exchange… Static
… Os being held in Atl… Static Do you read? Static …mmand. Imminent transfer… Static …peat, imminent… Static …ess Fenr…
Long protracted static burst
Sir! I hid a covert scan in systems background tasks watching for the TSN secure comm protocol. I just got a bite, but the connection is extremely tenuous. It seems to be relayed through a mining scow’s prospecting shuttle high off the ecliptic. Very unlikely to intersect another antenna. I’ll try to keep refining…
Subintendant Ironclad, who’s been standing in the corner pensively up to this point, perks up noticeably and looks excitedly / intensely at Overintendant Quinn at Hamilton’s comm
Seems both our defector and our information drop came through. How many systems can you think of in our vicinity that start with “Atl”?
Looks over to Nhaima.
I bet you a month’s pay that Atlantis command is showing unusual ISN traffic right this moment. Is there anything specific we can requisition from Atlantis Command necessitating a 4HG pit stop?
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