Chapter 426 (2/2)

back off those ships out of the resonance zone or you're going to

raising the taxes again? come on

strike strike strike stike

and add on the gravity defying tits because i want them to look good for this skin

because the Confederacy is dead and gone we're on our own out here and

surrender or we land troops

go where no man has gone before

ring a ding ding baby the game was rigged from the start

i got a slippery wormhole for that dong if you know what I mean and I think you do

took out Terra and we're probably next

a military conscription draft are you crazy nobody's done one of those in six thousand years

aw man i just got this body how i like it and i have to reskin?

/////////

MANTID FREE WORLDS

I think I'm gonna hurl

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

WARNING! EXPOSURE TO UNFILTERED TERRAN DESCENT HUMANS DETECTED! WARNING!

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

PUBVIAN DOMINION

urk

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

LEEBAW CONTEMPLATION POOL

Holy crap! That was incredible! DO IT AGAIN!

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TELKAN FORGE WORLDS

MULIT-CHANNEL BROADCAST>IT'S COMING THROUGH UNFILTERED

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

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ADDING IN MARTIAL LAW PROTOCOLS

LOAD COMBINE MILITARY PROTOCOLS

LOAD IMPERIUM EMOTIONAL FILTERS

LOAD FIFTH REPUBLIC MATRIXES

soft dolly warm dolly yummy snack tasty juice good podling warm podling safe podling love and hugs and snuggles and love warm podling safe podling happy podling

COMPILING EMOTIONAL DATA - DONE

COMPILING OPINION DATA - DONE

COMPILING HEALTH AND WELFARE DATA - DONE

COMPILING LEADERSHIP MATRIX - DONE

>>>BOOTSTRAPPING HUMAN GESTALT

MANTID FREE WORLDS

Hold onto your panties.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

HUMAN GESTALT

Wow. This feels weird.

And totally illegal I didn't consent to this.

We're at war, dumbass, your right of consent stops about the line of my right not to get planet cracked

We wish to revoke consent.

How about I land troops and you can revoke consent to a 10mm MAW round?

CYBERNETIC ORGANISM COLLECTIVE HAS LOGGED ON

Did it work?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

We're at war, TerraSol is gone. The Confederacy is borderline gone. You can't stand on the sidelines and expect not to be involved.

I refuse to get involved. It's my right to withdraw consent. The Right of Consent is one of the foundations of the Confederacy.

THE CONFEDERACY IS AT WAR, YOU IDIOTS!

That doesn't mean my people are at war. Maybe if some diplomacy was tried instead of the Confederate standard of push a gun in people's faces we wouldn't be at war.

So you'll just wait for them to gentle you on the sidelines, I take it?

There's no reason for them to try to gentle us, we didn't do anything to them.

MANTID FREE WORLDS

Kind of.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

So you'd rather be like the Talmonous Cluster and just let the Lanks or the Dwellerspawn roll over us? No. You don't get to opt out of a fight for our very survival.

This fight violates my ethics, I refuse to take part or have it fought in my name.

IT DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT!

I'm sure if you explain very nicely to the Dwellerspawn about your ethics and you don't wish to be devoured in your name they'll listen very patiently before eating you.

You're one of those assholes who said we should just feed a couple billion more people to the Mar-gite, aren't you?

DIGITAL ARTIFICIAL SENTIENCE SYSTEMS

THAT'S ENOUGH!

Cyb, see if you can collapse the gestalt further.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

Once they're done there what makes you think they won't do to us what they did to Terra?

The Lanaktallan Gentling theory is just a conspiracy theory. Nobody's monstrous enough to do that.

OH MY GOD SHUT UP!

CYBERNETIC ORGANISM COLLECTIVE

Hang on.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

>

>>

>>>GESTALT CHANNEL MELDING COMPLETE

HUMAN GESTALT

Oh, woah. That was... weird. Why does it feel like there's two of me?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

CYBERNETIC ORGANISM COLLECTIVE

Technically, there is. There's something weird happening to Terran Descent Human brains. They're being reverted to pre-Glassing patterning and genetics.

Only a third of Terran Descent Humanity is unaffected and that's why you feel weird.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

HUMAN GESTALT

OK, what did I miss?

We're badly fragmented. We've got a dozen civil wars going on.

Everyone says the Confederacy has had it.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

GESTALT OF THE FREE HERD WHO WILL NOT BE TOLD WHERE TO GRAZE OR HOW TO SPEAK

Here am I.

Learning.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

MANTID FREE WORLDS

Yeah, that's what about a third of Terran worlds are saying.

It's weird. The Confederacy is ALL of us. Just the loss of you humans doesn't mean the Confederacy dissolves for the rest of us.

We kind of get a say.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

HUMAN GESTALT

There's been a lot of anti-Confederacy sentiment since the Mar-gite War.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

Yeah, well, human space took the majority of the Mar-gite attacks when

day is playtime sing with broodmommy dance with broodmommy play with broodmommy square is neat and circle is funny and triangle in happy one leewbaw two leebaw red leebaw blue leebaw swim and dance and run and play broodmommy will play with you all day

they hit the galactic stub and started.

Wow, that's back again.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

HUMAN GESTALT

What is it?

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TELKAN FORGE WORLD

Broodcarrier psychic signal got intertwined with the system. We hadn't heard it since...

since...

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

BIOLOGICAL ARTIFICIAL SENTIENCE SYSTEMS

Since TerraSol got locked up.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

TREANA'AD HIVE WORLDS

So the signal is being repeated by humans?

Weird.

---NOTHING FOLLOWS---

MANTID FREE WORLDS

Not too weird. You know, without the protections put down on the human mind after the Human/Mantid War, a lot of psychically sensitive species are going to be

ALERT! OMNIQUEEN PSYCHIC SIGNAL DETECTED! ALERT!

Uh-oh.