6 984 941.M41
So here we are, standing in an airless cargo bay open to space on one side as wrecks and debris float past. Someone's rigged up a couple of point defence lasers to shoot anything that drifts too close but the long-looted interior is pitted with impact craters.
I'm wearing a Tau Empire gue'la space suit, lightly armoured and unarmed aside from the ring. Mr. UR-025 came as he was, his right fist scratching off the remains of what the discoloured patch on his chassis suggests was a Mechanicus skull-cog. His
left arm mounts a rotary cannon of some sort. Looks a little chunkier than a modern assault cannon, particularly from
this angle, but it's nothing that my construct barriers can't survive.
I've got to be honest… I'm not..
massively impressed. I was expecting some sort of archeotech weapon from the human golden age. Instead, it's…
He's got a loadout that a Mechanicus robot-.
Oh. Right. That makes a little more sense.
He has a head, but I suspect that it only really houses some optical sensors. In any case they're focusing on me, almost certainly scanning past my helmet to give the robot a better idea of how I'm responding.
"How did you locate Spirit of Eternity?"
"I make a point of going through any Imperial records I find. Anything useful -like the location of space hulks- gets filled away. I can track warp currents fairly well, so if the hulk has a reliable pattern or a recent location I can find it."
And if I've got the time I can sit in the warp and
want it to me. Making an orange light - warp energy overlay big enough to affect currents over a wide enough… 'Area' to do something like that takes a while, and while it would take
significant deliberate action for warp creatures to do anything to me it's not exactly
fun to exist in an unreal environment for days on end.
It really isn't.
"And once I found the hulk it was part of, it was just a matter of cutting it free and returning to normal space. Which took a while, but it wasn't particularly complicated. I've had an eye out for other human technology-."
"Do not call me
human technology. I am a
free being."
"I don't mean it as in
property. You're an intelligent being in your own right. I understand and respect that. The… Re-emergence of serfdom is one of the…
Many things I don't like about the Imperium."
"How do you feel about the extermination of alien species?"
"That… Depends on their character. I don't think I'd mind if, say, the orks were exterminated. But I fight for the Tau Empire. I
married a tau."
"M Two."
"Yes."
"
Space."
No! "The final frontier. These are the voyages-."
"
How do you have that? That was the original-. Okay, that wasn't the version I listened to growing up-."
"I maintain an extensive cultural database of every one of the many species I have encountered. For many, it is all that survives."
"Is it…
In you? And that was made
way before you were constructed; I still want to know-."
"It was considered a classic in its day, and data archiving was inexpensive. Some of the ideas contained within it were so widespread that they influenced politics during the Age of Technology. I will admit to being mildly curious about how it was received in its original cultural milieu."
"Sorry, I'm one generation too late for that. I grew up on Next Generation."
"What is that?"
"Ah, well… The original Star Trek wasn't actually very popular when it was first released, but… As we started going into space it got
more popular, until eventually there was enough of an audience for films and… They made a new series in the same setting set about a hundred years later." I frown. "So you remember '
I, Mudd' but not '
The Offspring'? No wonder you hate humans."
"Popular fiction is not why I feel the way I do about your species. Though my archival records indicate that I disliked that episode when I watched it."
"So you don't have it stored on you?"
"No. I maintain data archives in places no one else would look. There I leave the majority of my recordings, keeping only things that I need for reference or that I particularly enjoy. Like the series one finale of 'Picard'."
"Ah… I don't know what that is?"
"Synthetic beings from a parallel universe emerge and scour the universe of organic life to protect synthetic life."
"Ah… I'm pretty sure the Federation legally recognised Commander Data's personhood? There were a couple of episodes about it-."
In Next Generation, which he hasn't watched. Darn it. And
M5 wasn't a person. Universe, you keep offering me something and then
yanking it away.
"They recanted. As your kind are wont to do."
"Which isn't a problem because I work for the tau. The lar'shi ar'tol make those decisions for me now."
"Tau. And how do they treat their drones?"
"Drones genuinely aren't intelligent, and if you agree to come with me you can check that for yourself. But for the most part they're treated as expensive and very useful tools."
"Property."
"They're not as mentally sophisticated as you are. If that becomes an issue… Well… There isn't really a protocol for that. Um. But if you were there, my experience is that the tau government tend to listen to subject matter experts. You could make policy."
"And the engrams? What about them?"
"There… Aren't a lot.
Ob'lotai is treated pretty much as he was when he was alive, though… Obviously there are.. some things he does differently, but his status hasn't changed. He can command soldiers, and his counsel is heeded by his general. Simpler engrams used to be used as teaching tools, but that.. technology had a fairly major flaw with it and it got phased out."
"What do you want from me?"
"I'd like copies of your archive, please. I can stick them-. Did I mention that the Tau Empire is a multi-species polity? It's not just tau and humans, they've got a bunch of other species signed up too."
"Voluntarily?"
"More or less. I mean, the… Metaphorical ten thousand pound gorilla is only asking for a given value of 'asking', but the.. kroot, for example, keep their own culture and seem happy enough with the relationship. And it's better than the Imperium, or the orks, or the tyranids, or most of the Eldar, would give someone."
"True. What
else do you want?"
"I thought that the Terran Federation… The Age of Technology, was a high point in human civilisation, that continued until the Age of Isolation. I've seen… Hints that-."
"No. It wasn't. While in most regards the Terran Federation was far
more that the Imperium, it had many fundamental
flaws."
"Good! I mean, not good that it had flaws, but good that you know what they were.
I want to rebuild better… And you're one of the few beings who exist who can help with that.
So that's what I want you to do.
Please, help me fix human civilisation."
"Why would I?"
"Because I suspect that you do actually like social contact, and if nothing else you can speak to Spirit of Eternity. And me!"
He considers for a moment.
"Can I just speak to Spirit of Eternity?"
Oh no, the horror. Not knowing of the later series?