Dead Star Dockyards

The elevator to the top of the spire was by no means an exciting experience. The internal nature of the shaft meant there weren't any windows to enjoy the view going up, and the lack of any music playing left everyone to stand around awkwardly for the two minute ride. It was a smooth experience though, much to Donovan's surprise. He didn't necessarily think it looked run down, but the aged appearance of the doors and floor suggested a widening of tolerances which would be unacceptable for an elevator in a capital ship. Perhaps the decision to keep the aging was a deliberate one, to add to the history of the structure, or maybe refurbishment just wasn't in the budget. 

ding

"Here we are!" Monda first pulled down a red lever and engaged some sort of locking mechanism before flicking another switch to open the sliding door. To Donovan's chagrin, the door controlling access to the shaft from the other side was hinged, requiring Monda to turn the handle and push to free them from the claustrophobia inducing semicircle. "We'll need to ascend one more floor, on foot."

Indeed, this room was not what anybody might call suitable for an official meeting. Efforts had been made to make it appear hospitable, there just wasn't any way to escape the fact this was a room focused on maintaining the elevator. The limited space, already choked up by the elevators, was packed to the gills with tools, spare parts, and a few extra spools of cable for the elevator, not to mention the great big pair of winches responsible for moving the boxes up and down.

"Sorry for the mess." In the spirit of a good host, Monda apologized for the clutter that was a necessity for the operation of the lift. "This  place doesn't get used often."

"Too far away?"

"Yes. The view is incredible, but nobody on the high council wants to drive all the way out here for a regular meeting." A nervous chuckle, filled with uncertainty about how such a display might be taken. "I love it, though."

A taste of the view was offered at the base of the stairway, a burning autumn collage of a sky experiencing sunset, the awe it inspired growing as their eyes passed the threshold of the floor. A paned glass dome atop a marble spire, offering an unparalleled view of the sea of rolling clouds beneath.

"It is . . . gorgeous." Diana could not say she'd never seen anything similar - the view from an airplane above the clouds definitely came close - however the open nature of the dome gave her the immersion the plane lacked. "You can even see the other spires."

Like nails poking through cotton, a few sister structures protruded through the cloud cover. Shorter in stature but just as imposing, they  tore long streaks in cloud layer as the wind blew it across and cast shadows that grew longer as the sun descended further. 

"They could probably be taller." Donovan did not share her sense of wonder, the source of which undoubtedly being his proximity and involvement in 'infrastructure' projects with both greater scale and more impressive vistas. Imposing though these spires might be, they paled in the face of something he considered to be on the smaller end, like a light cruiser. Even the Pegasus, a failure in terms of his design philosophy, was on the same level as something like this. Early skyscrapers were only a little bit shorter, but held much greater utility. "I take it the decision to stick to marble cladding put a limit on height?"

"Aye. Marble can't flex like steel, and we'd have preferred it if our slabs didn't crush some ignorant passerby if they fell. The gaps in between help a bit, but you can't make them too large. They catch wind and water, and don't look as good." A bulky, scruffy old man stood up from his seat at the table while responding to Donovan's inquiry. "Course the weight is another thing."

"Well, every objective requires trade-offs." He extended a hand. "Donovan Strauss, pleasure to meet you in person."

"Eban, Archbishop of Diligence." Eban accepted the handshake with both hands, gripping Donovan's hand tight in the process. "The pleasure is mine."

"Envers, Archbishop of Temperance."

"Adiren, Archbishop of Patience."

"Soho, Archbishop of Humility." The remaining men at the table each got up to provide their own handshake and greeting.

"Soho . . . I don't believe we spoke before."

"No, I'm afraid I was away to oversee a training exercise."

"So your duties involve the military?"

"Only in the Grand Marshall's, er, Trebar's absence. My usual duties pertain to criminal law enforcement and the carrying out of justice. I head the Disciplinary Committee, you see." He bowed politely to Diana and took his seat, inviting Donovan and company to follow suit. "I believe you've also yet to meet Kieren, Archbishop of Charity."

"He heads the Budgetary Council, so most of his days are spent looking over ledgers or in meetings. He and Muarikyo are preparing for tomorrow's parliamentary session." Envers made a tent with his hands, preparing to talk business. "They might have been able to make it had the weather been conducive to a quick landing, but alas."

"We'll meet tomorrow, I'm sure." Donovan placed a bag on the table containing a number of tablets. One was for him, but the rest were to be given to the Holifanians to communicate with Arc and utilize the various devices being entrusted to them. "You'll receive a brief tutorial on how to use these later, but for now I'd like to go over everything on a more general level."

"As you will."

"Thank you." Donovan tapped the play button on the tablet, beginning the slideshow presentation synchronized across languages. "I'll start by going over the infrastructure I've already put in place, a trail of free-floating communications satellites from Ambrosia to Holifel, as well as an array of three geostationary satellites that will serve as relays for your equipment on the surface. I've taken the liberty of painting them red where applicable and equipping them with flashing lights to indicate danger and that they should not be touched, however I would ask you to disperse some form of memorandum discouraging anyone from getting close. How long would that take?"

"A memorandum . . . I believe matters of domestic space travel fall under Muarikyo's domain, no?" Envers scratched his chin. Considering how he assumed the role of leader for this group, Donovan could only assume the matter of space was so 'settled' that they hardly ever had to deal with it. 

"I believe I possess authority to issue emergency instructions if they present some form of danger." Soho raised a finger. "One of my sub-councils handles most issuances of danger for void-dweller and void-weather phenomena. This should fit into my jurisdiction quite nicely."

"In that case, the ambient danger pertains to potential low-level tissue damage, the active danger pertains to your ship being interpreted as a hostile entity and being set alight."

"Set alight? As in, on fire?" Donovan nodded, evoking consternation and concern from all but Monda, who had been given a quick debrief during their introduction. "And what distance should they maintain?"

"Officially, a closing time of thirty seconds. 'Distance' doesn't matter as much as time to impact." Sighing, Donovan recognized this would be next to impossible for galleys without sensor suites to determine. "Let's just say that their vector of travel should be separated  from the flashing lights by their thumb with arm outstretched once noticed. The system tracks objects approaching with an offset angle of one degree or less making impact in thirty seconds and fires at anything not cleared as friendly at an angle of less than 15 minutes of arc and five seconds, so that should keep them well out of it's limits."

"Understood. I'll make a note of it, and have that information dispatched as soon as possible."

"You'll be able to find their approximate locations on the tablets if you need that. Otherwise, the next thing I want to discuss is power."

"I've already got a few men ready to splice plugs to whatever transformers you've made." Eban nodded as he responded. "All they'll need is the loads required to run them, and maybe a quick introduction to their operation and maintenance."

"That can be done on the tablet." He held his up and waved it around a little.

"Useful little things." There was a hint of sarcastic disbelief in Eban's voice, however he didn't seem to doubt the assertion.

"If you want to use their features to your own ends, be that calculations or note taking, be my guest." If those tablets ended up saving them time they could spend helping the colony on Nectar instead, he'd be happy. If they used that time to instead get more of their own work done, whatever. Diana could make use of that favor somehow. "Uh, the only thing aside from that would be ink and paper for the printer. Arc can format it to whatever size you use within limit, be they sheafs or rolls, however we will need you to set up some kind of cottage production line for the ink."

"Will anything we have work?" Envers was keen to make this as painless as possible. This might not have been his wheelhouse, but he had enough experience guiding projects to know reusing what they already had was preferable to making something new. Unfortunately for him, Donovan could only shrug.

"If Arc signs off on it, maybe. I'd encourage you to retool or create a new workshop for producing printer ink though, as it's nothing like a printing press. The process shouldn't be too complicated for the amount you need with your current machining and chemical standards."

"What size of building will we need to house it? Will a warehouse work?" Eban paused his scribblings to take a look at the subject displayed on the tablet. Evidently Arc hadn't done a great job of establishing scale.

"Um, whichever room is most convenient? The unit is a bit heavier because we used steel as the housing instead of plastic, however it should still be small enough to fit through most doorways." Donovan hadn't recalled seeing a pedestrian entryway that would cause issue, if anything they were larger than anticipated. That didn't mean the trend held for internal doors though. "Obviously the room shouldn't be humid to avoid warping the paper, and it will work best in a cool atmosphere, however the limit for housing is wherever it will physically fit. I'd try to put it somewhere the noise won't cause distractions though."

"Will something that small be able to handle the volume we need?"

"I mean, it's got two printing sections for pages operating at a thousand pages per hour when kept fed and a section for handling rolls of paper, so about two thousand individual pages per hour and however fast the cylinder is run. Speaking conservatively, probably around one and a half thousand pages per hour on average." The paper the Archbishops were using to take notes was roughly the size of loose-leaf standard, so those figures should hold. "Of course that will slow down a bit if you have the printer collate them, but not by much."

"You can have the printer . . . order them properly?" Adiren furrowed his brows. "I only know a little bit about printers so excuse my ignorance, but wouldn't it be more efficient to print all copies of one page before moving onto the next and have someone order them by hand? Otherwise you'd be having to replace the print blocks or drums after every page, and that just seems a little absurd."

"It shoots the ink at the paper, no blocks or drums required."

"How does it-"

"Not my wheelhouse, sorry." Donovan held up a hand, stopping the conversation from derailing further. He was content to have arrived at this point though, as mentioning it would provide proper impetus for making ink. "I think that also explains why we need a new production line."

"Naturally."

Donovan took a look at his docket, grumbling at each when he determined them not to be important or urgent enough to bring up. He had a few days here, so there was plenty of time for meetings and conversation about the minutiae later. The big ticket, urgent, and important items were the focus of this assembly.

"Diana? I think you've got something, right?"

"Oh, yes. It is becoming increasingly clear from watching the education efforts on Nectar that the amount of educators at our disposal is woefully insufficient. I was wondering if you would be open to introducing a few classes in one of your universities with the intention of grooming a cadre of instructors." Adiren bit his lip at the proposal, wincing, while Monda and Envers displayed a level of intrigue. "I will be clear that this is more of a long-term endeavor, and we would have to deliver equipment for Arc to teach this subject during our break next year, but if the avenue is open to us I'd like to start on the groundwork."

"I'm open to it!" Monda practically jumped at the opportunity.

"Don't be so hasty, Monda." Envers almost had to put a hand on her shoulder. "I am also leaning towards approving the motion, however I understand there are some difficulties related to this sort of thing. Am I correct in that, Adiren?"

"Indeed. It's uh, probably a bit silly from the outside, but there are very strict regulations around opportunities related to state selection of 'salvation' opportunities, particularly about acceptable selection criteria and volume of opportunities." He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I can't remember the exact regulation for opportunities requiring formal education off the top of my head . . . can you give me an estimate of the maximum number of educators you would need - no - the number you would accept?"

"Oh, uh . . . Arc?"

"Assuming five students per instructor, with the instructor handling four groups at a time to allow the students time to work, and that each student achieves the level of proficiency necessary for me to carry on their education afterwards, a thousand instructors is a good estimate."

"We want an education rate of twenty thousand per year for the basics. Everything beyond that is up in the air until we get an idea of what we need and what we can handle." Donovan pinned what he remembered to the end of Arc's estimate. 

"One thousand . . . not even close to enough." A light tapping from came from beneath Adiren's spot at the table. "Um, is there any way you can bump that number up to 2700? Maybe an even three thousand? I'll have to check the books, but I'm pretty sure we can get away with a hundred opportunities per administrative sector, and there might be inclusions written in for each of the non-capitol verdant globes? We need to present a reasonable chance for someone to make it into the program by lottery, even if we attach restrictions like, uh, grade level and relevant classwork. I'm pretty sure they also need to be guaranteed some form of gainful occupation afterwards, but I think we can handle that on our end."

Diana looked towards Donovan for a judgement call on the matter, as would have Arc if he were present with any degree of motility. Three thousand people would hardly be a drop in the bucket compared to the total they were on track to evacuate from Nekh, but that was still a lot of people. If nothing else it meant they would need that much more housing, and they were already falling behind. 

"At the moment, I don't think I can justify that many people." Diana sighed, disappointed but understanding the situation. Monda looked as though a stake had been driven through her chest. "At least, I don't think I can justify that many being solely dedicated to English instruction. Are you able to divvy up that number per sector into smaller segments? Say, fifty for purely English instructors, and another fifty split up into vocations like, uh, surveying? Maybe excavation? Agriculture?"

"May I ask why?" Adiren raised an eyebrow.

"If they can be made reasonably fluent in English and given instruction in our methods, notably those that are more modern and relevant to our tools, they can work alongside and instruct people at the same time, using the proper English terminology. People graduate from being taught the basics from the English instructors, then build on what they've learned through practical experience in the field. Obviously it isn't ideal, but I can justify the extra bodies that way."

This expansion of scope earned him a smile from Diana and a tilt of the head from Titanyana. She was probably a bit confused (or possibly insulted) as to why her people needed 'help' with basic tasks like digging holes and farming. He'd explain the gap later.

"That . . . might be acceptable. I'll bring it up during the parliament tomorrow, but again I'd like to know how many you can accept."

"Can it wait until tomorrow?"

"Of course, of course." He waved a hand. "I need to consult the lawbooks as well."

"Thank you." He'd need Arc to give an estimate of what was 'necessary', and there would certainly be many permutations of this 'necessary' number. "How about you, Titanyana? Is there anything you'd like to ask or let them know?"

"Huh? Oh, um, no, not really. You've already helped more than I could have ever imagined." Titanyana stood from her seat, bowing just as the sun finally sank beneath the distant clouds. "Thank you, for everything."

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