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Mortimer Balman      Deep within Winter are many mountains. Mort's signal is coming from one of these mountains. Tall, imposing, ancient, vast. Those who wished for his knowledge will find him up there, deep within the freezing cold. Under a waterfall no less, meditating in the below freezing temperatures as bitterly cold water and sheets of ice.. Fall around him, rather than on him, substantial amounts of steam waft upward as he maintains a temperature brutally high enough to evaporate the cold water and ice a good foot and a half before it can hit him.

     The great Thunderwolf Ulbrecht is watching for signs of people, while Switchbait is burrowed deep into his thick fur, grousing crankily about the cold. Reder is busy dragging a huge tuna up the side of the mountain toward the rest of the group so that they can eat, and so that guests can have a snack if need be. They're a thoughtful bunch like that.
Tomoe Tomoe is very glad she's one dressed for the weather and two that she can fly. It would be a royal pain to have got up here on foot. The towering woman comes in for a landing and banishes her wings shortly after as she spots some of Mort's companions. She'll wave and head towards them.

"Hey there didn't think you'd be out somewhere like this Mort?"

Tomoe has some experience with the horrors of the warp, given how long she's been around Karian. Though she tries to not think about it too much, seriously that universe was a nightmare. She'll go about finding a place to sit thinking something does need to be done but there are things she doesn't know and likely should.
Staren     High above Mort's chosen gathering place, the SSC Stranger Than Fiction drops out of FTL. Staren frowns as his sensors don't find any signs of a building or cave or something. He beams down a drone to check the environment, but that only /confirms/ the inhospitably cold temperatures. What kind of meeting place is this? Eventually, Staren beams down in a form-fitting spacesuit. He can fly if the wind's not too bad, fortunately.

    Once he finally gets close, Staren asks, "What the actual hell, man? This is no place to hold a meeting." He's already putting up concrete walls with the matter manipulator, trying to box an area out of the wind, make a level floor for gathering on, and dumping out some folding chairs for people to sit on. "...It's good to see you again, though."
Kirito     Kirito's used to handling some cold. The Winter zone, though, forces him to bundle up pretty heavily. He's equiupped a big, thick coat to go over his usual gear, one that leaves only his face somewhat exposed, save for the scarf tucked over his mouth and nose...

    When he finally finds the Thunderwolf and Pokemon, he squints. Not quite what he was expecting... isn't there some SHELTER around here?

    Well. Whatever.

    The Spriggan, who'd been flying his way here on glistening and delicate fairy wings, makes a dive and plows into the snow for an easy and dramatic landing. The wings cleanly vanish as he rises to stand straight again and dust himself off!

    "Of all the places... y-yo!"
Rean Schwarzer It gets pretty cold in Northern Erebonia, so Rean knows how to prepare for wintery conditions.  He wasn't expecting to have to bust out his winter coat in the middle of summer, though. He steps off of Staren's ship and follows him towards the waterfall. "Hey." He says, waving to everyone present. There's more people than he expected, but if they all wanted to help with this they all needed to understand what they were getting into.

He then looks over at the waterfall where Mort is sitting,. Something about what he's doing reminds Rean of something he read in a book once, or a story his master told him. "Are we interrupting your training, Mortimer?" Rean asks.
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer exhales a large cloud of smoke- which is odd, since he isn't smoking- and rises up, moving away from the waterfall toward the others. "Aye, grand t'see the lot of ye.. Ah, you must be Rean! Nah lad, no interruption. Focusing the mind more'n the body on this. Switch! S'time we got crackin'!" A purple Butterfree flutters down slowly, grumbling about the cold all the way, and hurriedly flapping to be near Mort's head where it is warm. "<There we are sah, all set and ready despite this abysmal environment.>"

     Mort looks at the assembled group. Missing a few people but no matter. "I have chosen this location because it is, A) safe. And B) because it is easier to focus and set up a network in a place people do not usually venture. To fully explain the breadth of the Imperium and its issues, we will be using a psychic network created by my dear butler, Switchbait." The butterfree nods, "<Won't hurt a bit, sirs and madams.>" "This will allow you to not only hear what the issues are, but I will be able to *show* you as well. This is important, because talking alone or writing is not enough. So.. Everyone take a seat- if the cold will bother you, curl up against Ulbrecht there, the wolf's thick fur will keep you warm. And we will begin. And when we are done, there will be food available."

     Mort himself sits a good bit away from where the giant thunderwolf is curling up. The butterfree's eyes begin to glow a bright blue, and he crackles with immense psychic energies..
Kirito     "... Psychic visions." Kirito exclaims, voice raising in tone with CLEAR apprehension about this prospect. He gives Mortimer a VERY focused stare while weighing whether he's willing to try anything so crazy. This is, after all, something he's only really seen in movies and games... personal experience? No. Not really.

    A deep, deep breath follows. "Not what I had in mind... never would've seen that coming. Guess I'll give it a shot, though!"
Staren     Staren adds a quick roof to the structure. It's a crude building but at least it keeps the wind and snow out, allowing Mort's warmth to spread inside. Staren's spacesuit... retracts from his body like it's a liquid, into an orange-sized lump which he puts in his bag. He's wearing a bodysuit underneath, but then... then he turns into a black-furred cat which is wearing a little sea green bandana around its neck, leaps on top of Ulbrecht and curls up atop him, slitted eyes watching Mort and Switchbait.
Tomoe Tomoe listens for a moment and stares, not heeding Kirito, Staren or Rean too much as Mort has said, using psychic vision? What has she got herself into here as she looks at him for a long moment thinking it over and she sighs.

"Right, in for a penny, in for a pound."
Rean Schwarzer Rean looks over and stares at Staren who is now literally a cat. Whaaaaaa....? There's a lot of different thoughts going through his head like 'Wait so was he just a cat the whole time,' and  'Is this just a thing he can do in general' and 'What is even going on here.'

Then Mortimer brings up psychic visions, and his attention returns to the man"...Right." Rean says, sitting down. The idea of poking around in someone else's memories is a bit strange, but if it would make explaining this complicated sounding situation easier, he'd just have to deal with it.
Mortimer Balman      Switchbait's eyes suddenly become blindingly white, and a flash washes over the assembled group.. And when they open their eyes next, they are.. Not on a mountain, anymore. They are on a vast, flat desert plain. No grass, no greenery, no nothing grows here. There is only the sand, and the sun. Standing there in the middle of that vast emptiness is Mortimer, casting a long shadow. "Greetings."

     The old badger casts a hand out, and the scene changes. They are now floating over a galactic view of the Imperium's Milky Way. "Now, let us begin.. The Imperium was built by the Emperor, the Master of Mankind, a little over 10,000 years ago. At one point Humanity had spread to a million worlds. But at some point before the Imperium's rise, there was an instance known as the Age of Strife.. I do not know the exact length of this dark age. I do know however, Humanity had incredible technological prowess. A technology known as the Standard Template Construct allowed any human colony to build basically anything it wanted or needed. Then.. The Men of Iron came. The artificial intelligences. These AI robots were far more powerful than men, and for reasons unknown turned upon them. This started the Age of Strife, as Humanity desperately battled the Men of Iron, somehow won, and fell into barbarism for.. At least 20,000 years, I think."

     the galaxy below everyone's vision burns with conflict. "Then came the Emperor, and the Machine Cult, and the Great Crusade. I know little of this period, save for the Emperor's efforts went out a great distance.. Before his son, the Primarch known as Horus Lupercal, betrayed him and started a colossal civil war that tore the Imperium in two, and got the Emperor put into his Golden Throne." Cut to Holy Terra. "This, I think, is the beginning of the Imperium's problems. This right here.. Where the Emperor cannot rule, because he has not designed the Empire to run without him. His surviving sons tried to keep it together but one by one, they were removed from the picture. The Machine Cult experimented more in this period, and suffered horrific disasters as they found just how corrupted the concepts of Science and Technology had become.."
Staren     In the mindscape, Staren's in his normal form and outfit -- Rean can make of that what he will. He frowns as he looks down at the galaxy. "So... these 'men of iron', alien AIs, put viruses in all of Mankind's technology, resulting in the barbarism and everything the Machine Cult has to do to keep things running?"

    Staren begins to pace. "I can see how this would be an incredibly different problem to overcome... were they limited by their world alone. But they're not. Maybe the viruses are /really good/, and I couldn't just give my own technology to humanity. But there are people better at this sort of thing than me. There are good AIs out there who might be able to keep up and fight back. Design technology the viruses can't get into. There are worlds with magitech that can attack the viruses with spells and keep them out with wards. There's a /multiverse/ of potential solutions out there. Why not use them?"
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer nods at Staren. "That would be ideal, were it not for everything else. First and foremost- Daemon Engines." Another wave of his hand.. And Staren can see machines twisting themselves around into horrific abominations of metal and flesh. "The Machine Spirit can be possessed by the infernal powers of Chaos just as readily as mortals. To protect the Machines and themselves, the Mechanicus has spent trillions of man hours trying to develop the rituals needed to keep the Machines safe from it. And even when they succeed.. A techpriestess once told me, that they found a fully intact STC factory, a long time ago. ...The Cult was ecstatic beyond articulation. And then they turned it on, and it began mass producing Chaos-posssessed Men of Iron. The entire world had to be destroyed before the cancer could spread, untold billions of lives were saved by that action. And that leads me to the threats that the Imperium faces.."

     Images of Orks appear. Eldar. Dark Eldar. Necrons. Tyranids. Tau. And the slaves to darkness- the Traitors and Heretics who have thrown their lot in with Chaos. "The Imperium is beset on all sides.."
Kirito     Okay this is much less disorienting than Kirito expected. The Black Swordsman folds his arms while watching, brow furroed as he tries to keep an open mind and reason out things that aren't being said, put these events in context.

    Oddly, the Kirito of the mindscape isn't quite the one that arrived here physically. His ears are round and perfectly human, and he's wearing a more open black coat across a black set of pants and shirt with a bit of metal reinforcement over his vital, with a black blade and a crystal-blue sheathed on his back.

    "So this Emperor, what state is he in? Nothing fit to lead, but it doesn't exactly sound like he's dead, either."
Tomoe Tomoe listens intently and also watches as she sees the whole thing before her. "So the cult used to do science back then and I think I get why they hate AI's so much if that's' the cause who could fault them? She watches and takes it all in.

"So where was the Emperor during the war with the AI's you think he'd have acted then? I think that's why they use servators now, Staren."

She knows some of the threats then pauses.

"Those metal men I have fought them before! They attacked a town out in the plains of the sector a few weeks ago! What the heck are they?!"
Staren     Staren rubs his chin. "I don't see how that's much more special than the virus, especially when we have so many kinds of magic in the Multiverse. Countless traditions, any of which may have found something that would ward the machines safely, just because they've been able to try things the machine cult didn't. Better machines will /help/ fight all these other threats."
Mortimer Balman      An image of a lonely Enginseer pushing a giant metal boulder up a hill appears, representative of Sisyphus. "The Machine Cult is fighting a losing battle to maintain what technology they do have. Innovation is dangerous, because it invites Heretics, it invites Daemons, it invites angering the Machine Spirit. ALL human technology, save for the most basic things like knives and stub-guns that are purely mechanical, possess the Machine Spirit- which might be an actual spirit, it might be broken strings of AI code, or it might be the spirits of the Dead haunting it. Appeasing it means your equipment *works*, period. They are spread thin and War is eternal, 99.9543- and yes, I have calculated it to that fine of a degree- of their efforts is simply to /maintenance/ and /production/ of the machinery needed for humanity's survival." Staren is given an equation showing Mort's math for that calculation. It's long. "As for the Emperor.. We do not know where he was during the Age of Strife, assumedly preparing to bring humanity back together for his Great Crusade. Currently, he is almost completely dead. His near-corpse rests on the Golden Throne upon Holy Terra, where I have not yet been, and he is supposedly maintained by the Throne and by the sacrifices made by the Chorus."

     Scene-cut to a great burning light above Earth. "This is the Astronomican. It is what allows navigation of the Warp- the only known method of FTL travel- by the Imperial Navy and various Navigator noble houses. The Warp is another name for Chaos. A parallel dimension made of emotions, thoughts, and so forth. It is so closely interwoven with realspace as to be inseparable. From the Warp, all psychic and magical power comes. The Warp is both the bane of all life, and the only way intergalactic travel as we know it is currently possible. By going through the Warp, one can go from one end of the galaxy to the other in months, or even days; depending on what currents are available. But this is only doable using the Astronomican as a sort of North Star for navigation, without it.." He waves his hand. The galactic map goes dark, bit by bit. Blood drips from tens of thousands of worlds, and evil laughter is heard at the back of the mind.

     "There is no Imperium without the Warp. There is no Astronomican without the continued sacrifice of psykers. Trillions of human lives depend on these sacrifices. This is the cruel reality. Methods have been sought to get around this. None have succeeded. But they continue on nonetheless. They will sell their lives without hesitation for a single drop of knowledge.."

     They are standing in a factory complex of impossibly enormous size. It would be a small country if this was on Earth. A man with a broken skull that leaks oil and sparking wires is crawling toward them, clinging desperately took a hand-written book. He crawls over a carpet of broken corpses, Skitarii cyborg-soldiers and Techpriests by the thousands. His mangled, torn hand reaches out and he desperately cries in an autotuned voice, "Mutant.. Please.. I beg you.. Don't let it die.." Tears of oil, blood, and salt leak out of his face as he holds the book out. "It must.. Get back.. To Mars..! Please! Don't.. Don't let it.. Die.." Mortimer's hand can be seen gently taking the book. "Omnissiah.. Preserve us.." The body crumples and deflates, shortly thereafter.

     Mortimer sighs and shakes his head. "...Four million people died for a single book. A book on botany. Better, safer ways to grow food on Death Worlds.."
Kirito     Kirito's grimacing with each new revealed fact, more and more. Anger. Frustration. And a strange as hell emotion he can't quite put words to.

    Nobody should have to live like this. It's just unfair that the whims of the Multiverse would lead to something like this even being possible. His world's issues feel comparatively minor stacked up against this...

    "There's a serious problem with this. The scale. It's HUGE.... we'll have to focus on single points of the equation to have real impact..."
Staren     Staren shrugs. "Let the machine cult keep doing what it's doing, but if we're to CHANGE things, we need to introduce something NEW. Innovation is dangerous for them, and it's dangerous for us too -- but we can HANDLE the danger, while we find something that works."

    He doesn't look happy about the sacrifices."Now THIS bit, has to stop. They can adopt FTL technology from other worlds once we've made it safe. They can use a new way to project this beacon. But we won't have truly saved the Imperium, if we allow this to continue."

    "If one book was so important, HOW can you be blind to the value of information from countless other universes?"
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer shrugs. "Trust, obviously, Staren. Just because someone *says* they have a better, safer way doesn't mean that it really is. And what happens if tomorrow, you give them all of your technology? They will spend centuries dissecting it. Because they have no way to know you from any other slob who's claiming to have a solution to all their woes. Literal *thousands of years*, Staren. Of betrayl, of political intrigue, of desperate efforts, mountains of failures, and molehills of successes. Trust is a precious commodity in this reality, and there is a saying on Earth- the Road to Hell is paved with Good Intentions."

     The old man jabs Staren in the chest with a finger. "Can you heal all wounds? Can you keep up production to feed, arm, and clothe hundreds of billions of soldiers without upsetting the balance? Can you swear to me here and now that your technology is just as safe and secure as their holy machinery? If you make a tank today, can you guarantee on your very soul that it will not be possessed or fail at a critical moment?"

     Now Mortimer is wearing the blood red robes of the Adepts of Mars. And he stares Staren right in the eye. "Why should we trust you?"
Tomoe Tomoe get even more information now it's like this world is the catch 22 incarnate she thinks for a moment as she tilts her head for a moment. The whole thing with the book just makes Tomoe have to sit down her head is in her hands she knows of the desperation, the fac the priest begged a mutant who seemed to have delivered the book. She takes some time to get it together and takes a deep breath when she does.

"Look at your own actions they often do not inspire trust in you. You can fall into the trap that your way is the only way from time to time."

It looks like Tomoe is holding back something and just seeme worn from the visons she's seen so far as a lot of it is now starting to fully sink in.
Kirito     Kirito interjects here, stepping forth here. "It's exactly because there's these thousands of years of paranoia, distrust, and stubbornness that I'm proposing we find key areas we can focus on to take the pressure off the Imperium. Just up and solving -EVERYTHING?- That's obviously impossible."
Staren     Staren is pushed back by the jab. "Of course not! But I'm sure we can get that testing done in less than /centuries/. As for whether the Imperium will accept it afterwards... it doesn't have a choice. /I/ mean well. /You/ mean well. A few others are willing to help. But how many more in the Multiverse would rather exploit? The Imperium has planets of billions of humans. It can't watch them all. And how many would see the Imperium as yet another enemy, perpetrators of crimes against humanity? You say they HAVE to mass murder innocent psychics to survive... but others might say if that's the only way humanity can survive, it would be better for it not to."

    "You said yourself that they're fighting a /losing/ battle. Time and time again, we say 'But we can help!' and you and Karian say 'No, don't, stay out, leave humanity to its awful fate.' We're their only shot. If we can't save the Imperium, it was doomed anyway."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer nods. "Yes. Karian is indoctrinated. It isn't his fault- he is literally brainwashed, because his culture says that brainwashing *keeps them safe.* But he IS wrong. We CAN help the Imperium. Kirito and Tomoe have the right of things. We pick and choose our battles *carefully*, Staren." He sweeps his hand, the galactic map reappears. "Technologies can be offered to them here and there, that look like their precious STC techs. Protocols can be offered and in time, implemented, to reduce the strain on the bureaucracy. The accounting methods I introduced to the Administratum alone will save them tremendous amounts of life and resources. But those offerings must look appropriate. They have to be dressed up properly. And you have to find the right people to offer it to. That means taking the time to learn about, and *understand*, these people. Their cultures, ideologies, religion, and so forth. Why do you think I allied myself to the Space Wolves?"

     Another sweep of the hand. "But even if you can get past the internal stresses, there are the *external* ones we must consider. May I explain those, now? Or do you wish to complain more about Karian's obvious brainwashing?"
Kirito     "Hrrnhh." Kirito doesn't have anything elaborate to say here. Mortimer's speaking wisdom on the matter of bringing this crazy tech to the Imperium. "External troubles... yeah, There's PLENTY of those."
Tomoe Tomoe listens to Staren for a moment she hears what he's saying. "You want to help I know, but we need to as Mort said to do this right. On the scale. For example? Say, we're working on a few small improvements to how fast they process data gets through could save a lot of lives. We have to be smart about this and not rush into it. We have some ideas already we need to plan look I'm a dumbass sword arm that most of the multiverse wouldn't even say hello to if not for the death game and I know it." She pauses to Mort "Right go on, I'm sorry."
Staren     Staren looks at Mortimer, and to the distant galaxy. After a long pause, he says, "Your vision isn't big enough. You give too much respect to people who settled for sacrificing thousands a day and condemning countless billions to squalor and suffering, to support a government that values them so little it would blow up a planet of its own people for fear of chaos."

    Staren turns to Mort, and holds a hand to his own chest. "We can find a /better/ way. Because we know better. We haven't lost hope and given up... at least /I/ haven't." He frowns at Mortimer. "Saying 'it has to be this way' is how you lose and let evil win. I am sure countless space marines fought for 'it has to be this way', and like all heroes who use that battle cry, they've maintained the status quo. And they've kept things from getting worse!"

    "But that's /not enough/. They've held off the obvious, dramatic evils facing them, of chaos and aliens. But for all their heroism, they've let the evil they DIDN'T see creep into their society. And now they just ACCEPT that horrible things 'must' be done, because..."

    Staren holds up his hands for air quotes. "It has to be this way."

    He drops one arm then makes a sweeping gesture with the other. "I reject 'it has to be this way.'" He clenches a fist, "I will fight it wherever I go, and if I'm not fighting it in one place, it's because I'm busy fighting somewhere else and I haven't achieved the ultimate power to rewrite the Multiverse /yet/."

    Staren shakes his head. "Karian's brainwashed, and you're too afraid. You're billions of years older than me, but nearly all that time has been spent in a single world. SO MANY heroes make the same mistake. They find themselves in the multiverse, say 'I can help these people!' and they go and help them, the same way they helped people on their own world. Fight bad guys who are making things worse -- fight to keep things the same. That was the Union's mistake. There's a MULTIVERSE of possibilities out there. New tools. People with abilities beyond what any one world could have conceived. When you buy into solving the puzzle set before you by the rules presented to you, you fall into the trap. You lose your chance to make a change for the BETTER. The Multiverse has NEW rules." Staren clenches a fist again. "We can USE them. If we don't, we'll be but pawns for those who WILL. And they will shape the future, instead of us. Do you want to reshape the future, Mort? Or just make whatever shape someone else chooses a little brighter?"
Rean Schwarzer Rean's looking at the 'floor,' turning over everything he'd seen so far in his head. The visions are horrifying, to say the least. It seemed like this empire was beset on all sides by all kinds of enemies, from their own creations gone wrong to other beings from across the stars. And it all seemed so /pointless,/ how wrong things were. But they had to do /something,/ they couldn't just leave this world to crumble. Luckily, most of the group seemed to be of the same mind.

"They're right." Rean said, nodding. "I can't even imagine what it'd take to truly fix all of this in one shot. And I wish I could. But we can change things bit by bit, and fix what we can, where we can. Even if it's just teaching them things without having to steal books."

He pauses to let everyone else talk, as Mort brings up 'external influences'. "The things that are actually from the Warp, right?"

And then Staren starts going on about being too scared to fix things properly. "Do you know a way to fix this, then? Maybe there is something out there we don't know about, but what are we going to do while we look for that possibility? " There's no annoyance or irritation in his voice. He's legitimately curious.
Karian Icefang     "I've known many who have thought like you, Staren. Do you know what happened to them?" A familiar voice growls out. KArian had somehow managed to find the time to arrive at the gathering, albeit fashionably late and with a LARGE polar bear at his side. "Despite their best intentions, despite having nothing but good intentions, the majority saw their actions as heresy, and they were given to the 'Holy' Inquisition." He says, shaking his head. "Unless things are done in a way to not scare the majority of people, such actions are doomed to fail thanks to the already set beliefs."
Mortimer Balman      Mort tilts his head. "You.. Do realize that my ultimate goal is to be canonized as a saint in their cult, right? And what an impossible task that should be. Of course I plan to reshape the future. I have no choice. They have a daemonic god of fate who exists to twist and warp destiny into putresence and corruption. But I am willing to have my legacy be *posthumous* if need be. And you.. Are making some very gross assumptions about me." He looks rather hurt, when he says that. "Assumptions I thought we had moved past, but.. I suppose not. I am just a stupid old man, and you know better because your philosophy is superior." He sighs and shakes his head. "So be it. Your philosophy is better than mine, I have no energy left to argue when people like Gilgamesh exist. Do you wish for further knowledge, or shall Switch disconnect you now so you can go act on your beliefs?"
Kirito     Kirito comes out of his deep thoughts to turn to glare at Staren. "Staren, think about the situation! You think I'm not pissed off at what this empire's up to?" He just glares at him, expression going grim in a way it rarely has in the years since he escaped the death game.

    "None of these people -want- to be making those hard choices. They're doing it because they don't know any other way that WORKS. In their mind any change is a risk they can't AFFORD. You're saying you should just ram it down their throats anyways. I'm saying we should change the situation so they'll see it as a risk they can afford to try! Who wouldn't want a better way? Whether your stuff works isn't the issue! Or are you seriously condemining an entire empire of people, with only meeting a few of them?"
Tomoe Tomoe says "You fail to understand something about human nature if you force something upon people they will fight back, it will take time care and effort to fix many of the Imperium's wider problems. No, you sound just like the Union, charing in there playing god-king and not even taking a moment to think about the long term effect hate will make new unexpected problems that could have a higher butcher bill than you think."

"Do you not recall where the union rushed in and didn't think to make things worse? Do you not think I care? If I did not care I would not be risking my life and soul to try and help them. Your attitude is the same as that which formed the Union was founded as they started knocking over everything they didn't like! My country has a bad habit of doing that. Where often make shit a hell of a lot worse when we're done. Look we came here for information and now we're in a damn pissing contest."
Staren     Staren turns to glare at Karian and Mortimer in turn (he looks hurt too, when Mortimer refers to himself as a stupid old man,) then look back at Rean. He shakes his head. "If I had a way to fix the Imperium right now, I'd have /done/ it. But I bet we can FIND one in far less time than thousands of years. This might be a dire enough situation to use a wish. Gather the Dragon Balls. Win a Grail War. The Multiverse is someplace that I can name two /artifacts of world-changing power/ /off the top of my head/."

    Staren takes a deep breath. "But of course you're right, Rean, that changes that can help people NOW should also be made. Do what we can, while we look for ways to do more."

    Staren turns to Karian. "In one ear and out the other. You're making more /excuses/. CHANGE. Change will win. Don't be stupid about it, but when this is all said and done, if we find a way to SAVE THE WORLD and some humans try to stop us? THEY are the Heresy. THEY are the ones helping Chaos. If they love sacrificing innocent people so much, then THEY can be the final, senseless, needless sacrifice, and the billions more human civilians on hundreds of worlds will enjoy the new future without them. And, you know, the thousands and thousands more psykers that don't have to die anymore will be there, too."

    Staren points at Karian. "You have to stop digging in your heels and going 'No, things won't change, it can't be stopped' like someone who's just discovered Nihilism! That's the PROBLEM! People come to help you and you tell them NO! That way of THINKING is why, despite your world being unified for YEARS, noone's done anything to make it BETTER. We's starting this LATE, that's over a decade of people who've died because people like you keep telling the heroes NO."

    Staren shrugs. "And so other worlds were saved, but not yours."

    Staren turns back to Mort. "I'm sorry. I get VERY SICK of hearing the 'nothing can be done, it has to be this way' mantra over and over and over and OVER AND OVER AGAIN, so maybe I was a bit short. Of course I want to work with you. You and Karian know more about the Imperium and the threats facing it than the rest of us could learn in /years/. And you're right -- if you want them to make a xeno a saint, you're already thinking outside the box. So lay it on me, your plan for a future where such a thing can happen, and the threats and obstacles in our way. I need to know what the problems /are/, even if I want to solve them unconventionally."
Kirito     Kirito just sort of STARES at Staren. "... Dude. Calm DOWN. We're here to put our heads together and do something. NOBODY's even TRIED to do anything, where are you getting this 'nothing can be done'... that's what KArian's people think." Kirito claps a hand to his forehead and rubs it slightly, as if he's getting a headache.

    Then the Black Swordsman turns to face Karian and his.. polar bear. The bear gets a brief blink. Because THAT's clearly new and unexpected. "... Yo, Wolf Lord. In your view of things, what are the best things that could possibly happen that would take the pressure off your cause? No matter how unlikely or hard. Like... this Emperor of yours becoming perfectly healthy again and returning to lead. I don't care if they sound like a miracle. Maybe we can find some way of making it happen."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer takes in a deep breath. "...Good. Then please, Staren, control your emotions for just a little bit. Just until we're done with this.." The galactic map reappears below them. "Here is one of the major problems."

     The visions zoom in on.. Colossal ships. Made of flesh, and bone, and carapace. They are so numerous, so vast, that they can blot out entire solar systems. "Behold. The Tyranid Hive Fleets.. A threat that came from beyond the Milky Way, a millennia or three back, I think? I'm not 100% certain of their arrival time. What I am certain of.. Is the path they are following." Mortimer draws a big line between the edge of the galaxy, and Terra. "They are heading directly, dead on for Terra. The Tyranid fleets pose a terrible threat-"

     They are on a planet. The planet is besieged by Tyranid bioforms of countless varieties. Guardsmen, Space Marines, Ecclesiarchy zealots, Inquisitors and their retinues- all battle against uncounted *billions* of the nightmarish creatures. And they are, slowly but surely.. Consumed, one and all. No survivors. No prisoners. The planet they stand upon is reduced to nothing but barren rock as the Tyranids devour ALL biomass and funnel it up to their vast ship-beasts. And worse still.. The psychic presence of the Warp, is blotted out. Somehow they generate a field that blots out the Immaterium, and everyone can feel that overwhelming darkness. The eternal, unending *hunger.*

     "When they find a world they like.. They often send out Genestealers, which infest and infect a planet with Tyranid-Human hybrids, that are loyal to the Hivemind, and weaken a world- or an entire system's- defenses before they begin their feast. They are vulnerable to many things.. But they are so numerous that the weight of the Imperium's war machines can at best slow them down."
Kirito     "Oh what the HELL, space bugs now?!" Is Kirito's disgusted exclamation at seeing the latest horrors. He flinches back, looking ready to puke at this display.
Tomoe Tomoe just drops it for now and looks at the Hive Fleets

"I have fought the Tyranids, it's sobering to know those were their scouts. Yes Kirito also I'm still wondering about those kill bots from the other week which showed up in the information tonight."
Karian Icefang     Freyja, the giant bear, takes up a stance and growls towards Staren, picking up on the slight annoyance of her 'father', but a quick hand settles down the ice bear. Kirito's question causes him to pause for a moment, thinking. "The first step would be for the Emperor to return. That was to be my wish in the grail war. Beyond that...there is alot to clean up. The Imperial Cult revering the Allfather as a god...but that is something we can discuss later." He says, turning to watch the briefing.
    "You've fought them before, Kirito. When the spilter fleet came...but that was a small fleet...barely 10 percent of what a true fleet can do. In addition, they are known as a 'shadow upon the warp', disabling warp travel and astronomicon connections."
Mortimer Balman      Another world, beset by Tyranids. "This is a Splinter Fleet that I assisted the Space Wolves in destroying some years ago." The world is an agri-world, terraformed for mass agriculture. Peasants can be seen screaming and fleeing in terror as the Sky Warriors descend in their drop pods. Machine Cult forces and Arbites can be seen fighting the monstrous creatures but slowly losing ground. And then Mortimer is seen, fighting with the Wolves, whose war-fleet fights the Tyranid bioship overhead. This vision of the past includes a scene of Mort assisting a Wulfen Marine grabbing a Lictor by the legs, and the two of them wishbone the beast in half quite messily. "MARVELOUS! COME ON YOU MUTTS, ARE WE GOING TO LET THE POLICE HAVE ALL THE FUN?!" Mort is egging on the Blood Claws and Grey Hunters, and the vision slowly fades away.. "We barely managed to save that world. Only by the skin of our teeth did we hold them back."
Staren     Staren quiets down and listens until there's another break. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that, about fighting the Imperium. I mean... If it comes down to everything else being solved but for a few rebels in our way, maybe. But it was insensitive to jump to such a dire contingency. We've fallen into another trap. Thinking about this in terms of 'do things that are acceptable to the Imperium' or 'Fix things and let them pick a side.' That's just another rule we need to break. We need to CHANGE their beliefs so that they'll accept us somehow. We need to CONTROL them..." Staren shakes his head. "Well, maybe not that far. Better not to make certain declarations this early in the planning phase. But it's something to consider."
Kirito     "Dude... what's gotten into you in the last few years? 'We need to control them?' I don't want any part in that. Won't they be grateful enough if we just do something big that gets their attention in a good way?"

    He makes an uncomfortable face at Karian. "... yeah, probably, but I didn't see it from space. All the weird bug monsters start looking alike after you've slain a few thousand of them." Because, for Kirito, killing a bunch of fantastic-looking monsters is tuesday. And wednesday. And probably thursday.
Tomoe Tomoe looks at Staren for a moment. "What have you been up to the last few years. We need to control them? What the hell are you doing you sound like some of the people we have /stopped/ together." She get her mind back on track and looks tpe Karian for a moment.
Staren     Staren looks at Kirito. "I just SAID maybe not that far! ...Oh. You think I meant like, mind control or something? No, I mean social manipulation. Get them to stop seeing the HELPFUL things as heresy, somehow. I'm not good at that, but others in the Multiverse are."

    He turns to face Kirito fully, hands on his hips. "And what's happened over the past few years is I don't have the Union holding me back. We could have caught Death Gun. But /multiversal heroes who save worlds/ were afraid of /a computer game company/. Oh no, what if the dudes in the server room catch us! We confiscate their shit, get Death Gun's address, and hand him over to whatever authorities you please. Oh no, Gun Gale Online might be offline for awhile. We were more worried about /disrupting a computer game/ than /saving lives/." Staren shakes his head. "What's changed is my priorities are no longer /horribly out of whack/."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer shrugs at the others.. Then moves on. Or tries. "....This stops now. I did not bring you people here to argue your damned perspectives and philosophies. If my briefing is too boring for you, then we can end this now and you can go argue in someone ELSE'S head."
Staren     Staren turns back to Mort. "Fair enough. And I've been paying attention, but I confess I don't have an immediate answer for the tyranids popping into my head. I figured I'd wait to hear the... whole thing before going off half-cocked and making terrible pronouncements of what we'd have to do again."
Mortimer Balman      "The answer with Tyranids is simple, Staren. We kill them all- there's no argument, no negotiation with these things. There is only violence, eat or be eaten. They're a very straightforward problem that way! Our enemy on that front is /math/." Mort sighs.
Karian Icefang     Karian nods at that. "aye...However, one main target is the synapse network. Cut that off, and the surviving nids will go feral. We can also target the Hive Mind. I know the Blood Ravens chapter utilized a poison strike on one. But please, continue Mort."
Kirito     "... Now with the topic of these Tyranids, if we could CONTROL /THOSE,/ we could send them straight into the nearest black hole." Kirito exclaims, after relaxing considerably from Staren explaining himself. As usual, it's a poor choice of words that had him getting on edge.
Tomoe Tomoe says "Seek out whatever controls all ofd them and kill it, they are a hive so there has to be a queen somewhere in there."
Staren     Staren looks intrigued at Karian's suggestions, and then points at Kirito after he speaks again. "Now there's an idea! Is Switchbait writing these down? I'd like to hear more about these 'synapse network' and 'hive mind' later."
Mortimer Balman      Switchbait's voice seems to be everywhere at once, "<Killing the synapse beasts is difficult but effective. Looking at the Hive Mind is like staring oblivion itself in the eye. It's actually quite painful for me just to *exist* around the beasts, so I shant be taking chances with their guiding intellect.>" The Tyranids slowly fade into the distance as Mort moves on. "A minor issue are these creatures.. The Eldar." Two distinctive-looking.. Well, /elves/ appear. "There are two apparent divisions. These Eldar here are called "Craftworld" Eldar, and these are their cousins, the "Dark" Eldar. You can tell the difference by A) dress, and B) intention. The Craftworld Eldar are ungodly arrogant, stubborn space elves who- as near as I can tell- endeavor to guide their species by way of psychic divination. Their leaders are called Farseers. They wield powerful psychic technology, and they are more than willing to sacrifice billions of humans- entire worlds- to save handfuls of their own, even their dead. I do not know why. However, these Eldar can be reasoned with."

     There is a scene where Mortimer can be seen negotiating with El'Dranil the Farseer. He is negotiating a truce wherein the Eldar assist him in recovering Karian, and he will in turn guarantee the safety of Eldar 'soul stones', which apparently contain the souls of their dead for some reason. "From what I have been led to understand, saving even one of these stones makes you a noble spirit in their eyes. I may or may not be considered a heroic savage for assisting in the security of thousands. All non-Eldar are, by the way, savages to them. Switchbait believes he understands why-" Switch's voice comes on again, "Their minds are /highly/ evolved compared to that of humans'. They are one and all psykers, but their evolution makes them /very/ intense creatures. They feel everything far more than most of you do. This, I suspect, is a hindrance as much as a help, which may explain their dark cousins. The Dark Eldar rabble I have witnessed psychically *feeding* on the suffering of others, almost like how Nettle used to but they inflict that suffering themselves. I am unsure why they do this, but it doesn't matter. If you see one of these Space Elf creatures, kill it. Kill it without hesitation. It is a torturous, sadistic, rapacious monster of the worst kind."
Karian Icefang     "I've heard rumors they do so to 'restore' their souls, so to speak. After all, it's their fault we have 4 chaos gods and not 3. They 'accidentally' created Slaneesh." He says coldly.
Staren     The Eldar! "I remember seeing these guys before. Been a long time." Staren comments. He simply nods at the description of the Dark Eldar. "Noted. Well, sounds like at least /some/ things in the galaxy don't HAVE to be humanity's enemies."
Tomoe Tomoe tmakle one of the Eldar duobly so about the Dark Eldar. "Got it, put sword a into Dark Eldar B."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer nods. "They're stubborn and arrogant to degrees that make the Imperium look downright /cosmopolitan/ at most times, and they love games of manipulation to make their enemies fight each other when possible. But, sometimes, reason sees the day through. The next big problem.. Are the Orks."

     Image of a huge green-skinned humanoid with a giant, crude cutting implement and a similarly crude gun.
Karian Icefang     Karian sneers angrily at the ork. "Greenskins..." He says, the SHEER disdain and poorly suppressed anger in his voice. "Savage monsters..."
Mortimer Balman      Mort's face tightens a bit. "Orks seem to live for nothing other than conflict. They love fighting. Killing. They crave it. Once, years ago, I pumped an Ork with enough anti-psychotics to kill a Tauros. In the half hour that it was calm and placid, it explained to me that they were born to do two things- Fight, and Win. And they are very good at this. Orks are some sort of *fungal* lifeform, they drop spores everywhere they go, that grow into new Orkoid bioforms. Squigs, gretchin, Orks of various sizes. Karian's people told me an interesting thing- the older Orks get.. The bigger they get. There's also some sort of... Strange latent psychic ability to them, but I've only seen it manifest around these weird Orks here-" An image of an Ork Weirdboy, with an exposed brain full of metal bits and wires, dancing around and chanting to Gork and Mork.

     "Orks love combat more than anything else. Give an Ork a fight and he's in Heaven. If I don't misunderstand it, they love the Imperium for this reason. "Humies" as they call Imperials, are individually weak, but they regularly put up good fights. Battles with "Hard Boyz" like Karian may be the closest thing these beasts can feel to love, if my understanding of their psychology is correct."

     A scene of a vast wave of Orks charging forward like a green tide on some nameless world. "Orks are dumb, but they can be clever. And they are, as you can see, numerous. Sometimes they will perform mercenary work, but most of them follow "warboss" Orks in big congregations they call Waaaaghs, which I can only describe as a drunken pub crawl mixed with a religious crusade.."
Staren     "Yeeeah..." Staren looks at the orks. "I've heard of them, but I haven't really interacted with them." Staren scratches his head. "It SOUNDS like it should be easy to manipulate them into fighting the other xenos, but I take it their preferred target is humanity for some reason?"
Mortimer Balman      "I just said, Staren. Humans frequently put up good fights. Good fights lure Orks like fresh vinegar lures flies."
Staren     Staren throws up his hands, "Yeah, but so do all the other things or they wouldn't be such a problem!" He sighs.
Mortimer Balman      Mort crooks a finger at Staren. "Exactly! Now you're gettin' it!"
Kirito     "Hmmmmmmm.... these guys sound more like a big messy nuisance than an apocalyptic threat." Kirito declares, although his voice warbles with some uncertainty. "Great if we can steer them at something that needs a sound beating. Probably best to stay far away from these Orks, though."
Mortimer Balman      The next image is a Tau. "These strange creatures are called Tau. They have highly advanced technology.. But as a civilization they're only about five thousand years old. They are new to the metaphorical scene in the Milky Way, and they are largely ignorant of the dangerous the galaxy possesses. They can be reasoned with, but they are extremely expansionist with their "Greater Good" leading their every move. There's a lot of information I have not been given about these creatures, but I have had succcess at negotiating with them to get out of Imperial space without shots being fired. I fear for these people and their little empire.. Not because the Imperium could wipe them out if they became so inclined, but because they have no psychic ability. They can't see the true depths of the Warp and the dangers it poses.."
Karian Icefang     "They also have surprising amounts of robotics and battlesuits." Karian adds, seemingly having nothing against the Tau.
Staren     Staren nods. "Well, glad to hear there's another species out there that can be reasoned with. And if they're concerned about the greater good, even if they can't see the Warp, mightn't they help humanity fight the other xenos? ...Oh wait, I remember them now! There was that 'Commander Farseer' guy working for the Union in its last days..."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer snorts. "Don't I wish. Like everyone else in this galaxy they're stubborn about their way of life being the besst, and refuse the idea that anyone shouldn't do things their way. However, I believe that with effort we might turn them into a useful bulwark against the Tyranids.."
Kirito     "SO our worst enemies so far are the Tyranids and obviously Chaos." Kirito states his current view of things. "With some other things throwing monkey wrenches into the works. These Tau don't sound too bad so far."
Karian Icefang     "I've heard the Ultramarines occasionally working with the Tau, so it's not impossible." Karian says, also nodding towards Staren. "Farsight, aye."
Tomoe Tomoe says "Sounds like we can talk to them and should deal with the two primary threats first."
Staren     "Three or four or more primary threats. There's also those robots we saw, remember?"
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer nods, and brings up images of the Necron legions. Vast armies of them.. Marching inexorably across worlds. Like the Tyranids they annihilate all biomatter, down to the bacterial level. But they don't eat it. They just *destroy* it. "I don't know what the deal with these things is, but the Necrons are a vicious and implacable foe the likes of which are.. Frustrating to deal with. They teleport away when they suffer too much damage. They get back up when defeated unless they are completely and utterly incinerated down to nothing. They teleport in fresh troops from seemingly nowhere at all. I have heard rumors from Imperial Guardsmen that some of the Necrons are.. Changing, however. They're not *just* annihilating entire worlds, that some are working as *conquerors.* I have no substantiation of this yet though. The worlds they might be conquering are well beyond Imperial reach. Frustrating creatures but, they can- with effort- be defeated."
Staren     Staren nods. "We need to find a way to shut off that teleportation and self-destruction. Maybe someone with timestop powers could help. Then we can learn how they work, and create a scalable solution for stopping them. Imagine if you could stop them from teleporting away, right?"
Karian Icefang     "There are rumors....Some of them are...talking. They might be converting...somehow." Karian says.
Tomoe Tomoe gets her answer about the robot skeletons and takes good note of it. "SO what else do we got to deal with?"
Kirito     "So we've got arrogant psychic space elves who are POSSIBLE allies. Crude, wild, unpredictable mushroom brutes that just want to fight. A relentless horde of ravenous bugs that are NOBODY's friends. Enigmatic blue people who probably don't HATE us... and super hostile exterminate-all-life robot things that just don't die. And then the Chaos Gods, who I think EVERYONE hates?" Kirito can't help but sound a bit strained and distanced from the issue when all of it's piled up like this.
Mortimer Balman      The galactic map fades away. They are not in a room of any sort. But a swirling vortex of emotions and thoughts. They stand upon an 'ocean' made of hopes, dreams, hatreds, loves, desires, and pains. "Now the final problem.." Mortimer's face darkens as the strange space around then begins to violently shudder and contort, twisting. Faces of horrors beyond mortal ken can be seen appearing and disappearing at random. Wailing is heard in the distance, a thousand starving crows all singing at once. "For more than ten thousand years, the whole of Humanity has waged war both open and covert against this. The twisting nethers of the Immaterium.. The Warp, Chaos, home of the Ruinous Powers. This place is why the Inquisition exists. This horrible, hateful place.."

     Mortimer throws a cloak around himself and begins walking across the ocean.

     "With but a moment of laxity in their duties, entire worlds- whole sectors- can burn in the fires of daemonic possession; for this is a war against Heretics-" They can see images of men and women cavorting around grisly maypoles of stripped human flesh and bones, laughing and crying out for the favor of the Dark Gods. "Traitors-" They are witness to a great arena, where tens of thousands of chained humans of all ages, all races, are forced to their knees and made to pray to the Ruinous Powers, by Space Marines who bear visible signs of corruption of both flesh and mind. Men in powered armor who foam blood at the mouth, twisted mockeries of flesh that have broken forth from their own armored shells and have become integrated to it in an ugly marriage of corrupted flesh and metal, and so forth. "And the very physical manifestations of Chaos itself.." They are shown visions of Daemons now. Bloodletters that look like classical Biblical demons carrying wicked swords and riding massive bull-like monstrosities. Warp Spawn that are nothing if not a mass of undulating flesh, tentacles, eyes, teeth, and screaming mouths. And tiny Nurglings- impish creatures that seem to be MADE out of pure filth and disgust.

     "It is a perilous struggle, and only the strongest wills may attempt such fate. This is where the Faith of the Imperial Cult comes into play, because Faith does not tire. The Inquisitor, the Space Marine Captain, and the Militarum General have at their disposal a host of the finest that the Imperium can provide against such horrors."
Tomoe Tomoe admits a weaknes "I may not be suited to fighting this enemy. The others, yes this one I'm not sure. Still it has to be stopped." She looks at to the rest but says nothing else at this point but her gaze lingers on Staren for a moment.
Staren     Staren hmms. "So there MUST be some rules to all this. The Warp doesn't just break through anywhere, and it hasn't been attacking other parts of the Multiverse. People without the protection of inquisitors... if it were REALLY that easy for the warp to corrupt just anybody, they'd have legions of new troops the moment your galaxy unified. Are people giving in because of how terrible life is? Why do only humans follow them, and no orks or eldar? If we start making a dent and improving things, won't the forces of Chaos /lose/ support?"
Karian Icefang     "Chaos wars with itself. The Ruinous powers are at war with themselves. That is why they do not invade other worlds...Save for one even." Karian says, turning away. "A Black Crusade....an event where the whole of Chaos unites for one goal. There have been 12 Black Crusades...We have stood so far, but I do not know how much damage would be done if there was a 13th."
Tomoe Tomoe says "They play with their food. They like to savour it like you do a good meal the same deal. Also I don't think they want it to end."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer looks at Staren. "Oh no, my boy. It's not that simple.. It's never that simple. The Dark Gods use anything- *everything*- they can to worm itself into the soul. They make offers. They make promises. They look for the bored, the desperate, the broken." He walks Staren, looming impossibly high over the young scientist. Blood begins to run from under the cloak in rivers. "The Blood God offers you freedom. I have heard the Whispers many times. The promise he brings.. Is one where you are no longer bound by society, by rules. By anything.. Except the need to destroy. To kill. To burn it all to the ground." Skulls begin to float up from the rivers. "All mighty Khorne asks in exchange for freedom... Is blood. Blood, for the Blood God. And skulls.. For his skull throne. He cares not from whence they come. Only that they do."

     They are on a world that looks not unlike 21st century Earth. But it is a scene from Hell. People are butchering each other in a mad frenzy. Dragged from cars and apartments, there is no discrimination. Men, women, the elderly and the child, none of them are spared. There is nothing but a constant and endless carnival of butchery and slaughter. Screaming that never stops. The screams of elation from the killers, fear from the victims, the rattles of the dying.

     And everywhere, towers of brass that bleed slowly rise from the ground as it burns. It would almost be comical, were it not so *real.* Were it not something that *happened.*
Staren     Staren listens, and nods. He doesn't seem swayed by the psychic imagery of a giant, bleeding Mort, but does wince and sigh and look away from the people murdering eachother, ears splayed and tail drooping. "I can see why some humans would choose that over life in the Imperium. And of course, the sociopaths who were gonna be serial killers /anyway/, may as well get divine credit for it, right?"

    Staren stares off into the distance. "There's a new one now. The ghost who tried to grant the wish of those psykers in the stupidest way. I'm hoping she can yet be reasoned with. She didn't demand anything of them, after all. She just gave them the power to cause trouble."

    He turns to Mort and looks at him for a moment. "So, what do you think they'd offer /me/?" He asks, plainly. Hopefully the reason why is obvious.
Kirito     All that butchery on display is in fact too much for Kirito. He turns away and violently heaves in a rather dangerous-sounding fashion. Just barely doesn't actually throw up...
Mortimer Balman      The world fades away, and Mortimer is there again. "What do you want? They'll offer it to you. Anything to get their hooks in. There's literally nothing they won't offer." Something.. Strange is beginning to happen. "Do you want knowledge? They have that. The Dark God of Fate has it in spades." The universe around them begins to crack into fractal patterns. "Would you like to be able to perfectly predict every possible outcome of predermination? He'll offer it. Infinite knowledge! Infinite mystery! Infinite potential to rewrite the universe as you see fit! I've heard him too, yes. But you could have it, Staren. All the know-how you could ever need, and then some.." The shattering continues until they're in a massive spiral of broken mirrors, each one showing off a different potentiality. A thousand Staren faces, each one reacting differently. A thousand Mort faces, Kirito faces, Karian faces. "But.. What if that's not what you want?"

     They're in a luxurious compound. "What if in the heart of Staren, there's something.. Else he wants? Maybe you're tired of being the egghead once in a while, and just want someone who *understands.*" Wait, why does Mort look androgynous and alluring. Why does he sound like David Bowie and Tim Curry had a fantabulous baby. Why is there a rock stage for that matter. "Slaanesh will give that to you, I've seen them.. In my nightmares. I still do, in fact. Anything you want.. Anytime you want it.. Anyone, for that matter. It can all be yours.." He leans over Staren's shoulder. "And wouldn't that be grand? Imagine it, Staren." He grips the scientist by the shoulder, and holds a hand out, doing that Buzz Lightyear 'everywhere' gesture. "Imagine a world.. Where everyone understood you first time you spoke. Where you got everything you wanted. Where everything went your way.. Where you got *everything* you could ever, possibly, want. And then.." The lighting darkens a bit. "And then.. When you have it all, Staren. You can have MORE! More and more and MORE AND MORE AND MORE, THERE ARE NO LIMITS! NOTHING WE CANNOT INDULGE!"
Kirito     Kirito's okay, the bear will find out. He has to clench hiss teeth, work on breathing, and burning willpower to bleach his brain of some of the things he just saw... but he's okay. He gets back up and keeps his attention focused...

    Despite his better judgements.

    "There's always going to be some freaks who'll take these paths... not because it's better than living in in harsh conditions... but just because they're sick to the core." A shudder runs right down his spine as he exclaims this.
Staren     Staren sighs. His look at the fractal patterns and the infinite reflections is the exact same expression as a teenager whose parent doesn't 'get it'. Nothing that can be done to Mort's appearance -- to anyone's appearance -- draws Staren's interest, although he looks annoyed at the attempt, ears flattening back against his head. Then it's back to the teenager-whose-parent-doesn't-get-it expression as Mort describes some sort of shallow narcicist heaven. "But it's all fake. What I want is to help people. Not the /experience/ of helping people, but to actually make a change in the world. I could have locked myself in a paradise as soon as I had both immortality and the World Seed, if that's what I'd wanted."

    "And if the gods of chaos could offer this for REAL... we wouldn't be having this discussion. They'd have given a desperate hero everything he wanted and wiped themselves and the other problems facing humanity out."

    Staren waves a hand dismissively and lashes his tail. "So I already know everything they offer is fake, or they wouldn't be a problem, unless there's something you're not telling me?"
Mortimer Balman      "Well for starters, none of it is fake. Just.. There's *caveats* they don't tell you about. You can only see it in the background, if you aren't blinded by the flash. It's all very real, what they offer.. The Plaguefather perhaps is the most real out of them all. He offers.. A sick and twisted sort of 'hope'. Comfort, happiness. Bathed in pure filth and corruption but you won't care about that once you have the disease. That's what Chaos is. It's a disease, a cancer. Metaphorically AND literally."

     Mortimer is back to normal, waving his arm at a world that is in the process of being struck by Exterminatus. "The threat that Chaos poses far outweighs that of the most malevolent alien race. The daemonic are without number, and their legions scatter throughout the galaxy fulfilling the whims of their dark gods like gleeful children. The Faith of the Imperial Cult is one of the few things that can actually provide some sort of shield. And here's the part you're going to really hate, Staren- ignorance is one of the most powerful shields. Simply not being aware of their existence has kept hundreds of thousands of worlds safe for countless millennia."

     Mort grabs Staren by the mouth, "And before you start throwing a temper tantrum over that, keep in mind that such ignorance is a weakness as much as a strength, and I do not like it any more than you do. I'm still working out means of killing the cancer, but it is a cancer that infects the soul AND the body."
Kirito     "The thing he's not telling you is that you're not everyone else. Maybe you don't have any interest in that but it's not about YOU, it's about the threat and everyone dealing with it." Kirito's starting to sound very irritated with Staren overall, and it's pretty rare for him to actually sound snappy. "You're also looking at it now when it's just being explained. Let me tell you, Staren. You ouight to know this deep down. There's -always- those voices urging you to make some dumb choices thinking it's the right move, or that it'll all work out in the end.... if you haven't heard them then I'd have to wonder how much of you has anything in common with the people you want to help."
Staren     At the comment about ignorance, Staren shrugs -- he looks annoyed at being grabbed, but waits for Mort to finish before stepping back and speaking: "Eh. A /little/ bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Imagine a universe where a single lecture about magic is enough for you to blow yourself up, and eight years of training is enough to /not/ blow yourself up. Probably need to start some mystic order, though perhaps there's some kind of societal thing that could be done to make people not... THINK of misusing it." Staren scratches his head. "Septette and the Captains might have some ideas, actually. We should get them in for consulting on this business."

    Staren sighs and closes his eyes for a moment and turns to Kirito. "It doesn't seem like voices to me. It's fear. Fear that I'll be made a fool of, and noone will listen to me, and then I'll barely be able to help anyone. Fear that because of a choice I won't be prepared for something later. Fear that despite everything, it all won't be enough and some greater chaos god mightier than anything will show up one day and eat the Multiverse before we even realize it's happening. But... there's also fear of making a decision that might turn out badly. Fear of standing apart from everyone else. I'm not perfect. I make mistakes. But that..." Staren shakes his head. "Sorry. This is a talk for another time. There's fears on both sides, and there's reasons I'm trying to be more confident now. Part of it's a front though. Fake it 'till you make it."

    Staren takes a deep breath. "...I just felt it was an obvious question. It felt like where this conversation was going. How chaos would tempt us. I didn't think that maybe the problem isn't people like us, it's the billions of others. Sorry. Please continue."
Mortimer Balman      "Good. You get it, then." Mortimer lets out a sigh and suddenly it's all back to the desert, only Mort has collapsed into a very comfy-looking chair. He looks.. Old. Impossibly ancient, withered and frail. A tired old man who's looking at a million math problems all at once, trying to find answers that don't end in casualty ratios numbering more than eight digits. "These are the problems the Imperium faces. And has faced, for ages. There's other events- the Ecclesiarchy rose because of something called the Age of Apostasy, but I haven't studied that too much yet. More have I focused on the here and now when possible unless it was necessary to look at the past. There are as many reasonable and clever Imperials as there are ignorantly violent ones. Radical change is a dangerous game when quintillions of innocent souls are on the line.."

     Mortimer sits there, hands folding in front of his face. "We had a saying in Grouda. Seldom do the dunes shift themselves overnight.. But they do shift. And, sometimes, overnight. The Imperium is not an insurmountable problem. But it will require careful planning, and, perhaps, patience. Even if the Emperor awoke tomorrow, the full effect of His return would not be felt for decades. Simple matter of scale. We need both internal *and* Multiversal resources to solve these equations. And, perhaps, some aces up our sleeves so we can cheat.."
Staren     Staren nods again at Mort's appraisal of the situation. "Yes. I..." He holds a hand to his head. "Internal change will be too slow, if it works at all. I don't think it's going to come down to waving a magic wand from another universe and fixing it all, although hey, if we DO find that wand, great. It's just that treating the Imperium like a lost cause from the Multiverse's perspective... has not helped. And the way people were warned off before encouraged lost-cause thinking, not constructive solutions."

    Staren turns and holds out his hand to Mort. "Thank you for having this talk. And making this effort. And putting up with... me. I don't know how we'll fix this... but I think as we get more people in on it, we'll have more knowledge and ideas."
Mortimer Balman      Mortimer shakes Staren's hand. "No problem, son.. I've been working on it for years for a reason, after all. I just don't want someone to charge in screaming all half-cocked and fuck things up so bad that billions die. That only feeds the problem. Sorry if I've come on too strongly at some points, but I won't deny that fear reactions played a part in my behavior."

     They're all o utside again, in the freezing cold. Ulbrecht is still keeping them warm. Reder is sitting there around a fire with chunks of fried fish filets, "<Sup, thickos! Want some fish?>" it smells pretty good...