Humanity Endures

Part 1 - The Expeditionary Fleet | Chapter 3

With everyone present, and with an addition of one, the meeting soon began in earnest. With everyone interfacing with the digital desk, most of them doing so physically in order to ensure even faster rates of information transfer, communication became as easy as thinking; as all of the galaxy's least-classified intelligence became accessible with a mere thought, planning became similarly effortless. The entire room, engrossed in their scheming, fell into an uncharacteristic silence; talking was, compared with textcomms, inefficient.

From here, Yelazar initially advocated for an expedition to Kalithihar — a planet and system renowned for its advancements in computing, and, until it was outlawed across the Empire, Artificial Intelligence — because this planet's denizens generally harbored great resentment towards the rest of the Empire, and were often suspected of sheltering unlawful independence movements. The Kalithiharians' indignation and feelings of betrayal had somehow endured the long millennia, and had led to stark differences between Kalithiharian conduct and that of the rest of the Empire: Kalithiharian architecture was blocky and utilitarian, where the rest of the Empire's was smooth and gilded; Kalithiharian speech was heavily accented and contained words considered archaic even in Galactic Standard; the rest of the Empire frequently said "Humanity endures" as a general rallying cry, though Kalithihar, still obsessed with its age-old, AI-driven dream, said "Humanity ascends" instead. Kalithihar's history with the Empire was turbulent; to say that Kalithiharians were bitter about their perceived betrayal would be an understatement, and to say that this did not influence the world's policy would be a lie. Similarly, Yelazar argued, this lack of contentment could further Velan's own career if he uncovered and dealt with anything treasonous, for executive captains in peacetime had somewhat become a police force. Without a war on, with no shipping to raid or enemies to harass, the Executive Command's purpose, like that of the rest of the military, had changed.

Almost instantly, however, Yelazar's suggestion to investigate Kalithihar was forcefully put down by Terxah, who, being a native of Kalithihar herself, was unsurprisingly offended by the idea that her planet would willingly harbor rebels. She made this abundantly clear over the course of five whole minutes, as she flooded the minds of all present with a flurry of vehement, accusatory thoughts which sent Yelazar reeling; to emphasize her point, Terxah even took an empty bottle of 95%, and, holding it but a few inches from her quarry's face, violently crushed it into glass dust with her gloved fist as she lambasted his hurtful words. Velan simply watched the exchange, sipping part-contentedly, part-fearfully from his drink as he did so — he did not dare to speak, lest he end up like Terxah's bottle.

Naturally, not being involved in the conversation led to him becoming sidetracked. Rather than plotting his ship's destination, he, spurred on by Terxah's verbal onslaught, instead meandered into questioning whether Kalithiharian naming custom differed from that of the rest of the Empire because of the stated traditional reason, or because, by naming themselves like this, they forced the rest of the Empire to acknowledge their difference and importance. Perhaps, he thought, it was to achieve both of these.

The difference in names was obvious: Kalithiharian female names always ended in "ah," as in "Terxah," while the rest of the Empire's ended in "a" as in "Xandra"; Kalithiharian male names also almost always ended in "hn", whereas no such tradition existed across the rest of the Empire. The only exception could be seen with the Tekran, who often, if not always, left an "x" near the end of their male unadopted names, though the fact that the oft-separatist Kalithiharians had a naming system similar to that of the Empire's rulers seemed nothing less than some advanced insult. With so many minor differences in their culture and language, all of them seemingly intended to slight the very idea of the Empire, Velan had found talking or thinking about Kalithihar an intensely aggravating experience, and this opinion was shared by many. Clearly, the grand Kalithiharian conspiracy to annoy the galaxy at large was succeeding, decisively.