094 | [Video]

[with_discipline]

Science has been my area of interest since childhood, but I do find the history of other cultures to be of great educational value. With that in mind, I would prefer any such future lessons to be less interactive. [Yes. This is said extremely dryly. No, she doesn't expect to get her wish. OPEN LETTER TO THE ADMIRAL, the undercurrent of which is, he's a dick.]

[Private to Trip]

You compared us once to Romeo and Juliet. Do you still feel that way? [She is vaguely amused about this whole thing. Vaguely.]

[Private to Snape]

It's been a good deal more than an hour. Are you still upset you suffered a coma over this breach?

[Private to Slade]

What happened to you during the breach?

Comments

[truth_is_cold]

An attempt? It was unsuccessful, then? The Magog are an invasive species that live of sentient beings and use them as hosts to breed their young.

[This delivered clinically, and hiding how much HATE he has for these things. HATE.]

[with_discipline]

It spawned the Eugenics Wars on Earth, but ultimately it was halted.

[Hey he's controlling it, so that's cool.] And after they attacked?

[truth_is_cold]

The worlds they initially attacked were Nietzschean founded worlds. Despite promises of driving them away, the Commonwealth agreed to hand over the planets as breeding planets as part of the Treaty of Antares.

We revolted. I died during the revolt.

[with_discipline]

Why did you revolt?

[truth_is_cold]

Because they weren't just handing over our planets to the Magog, they were handing over lives. To us, they were saying that we were expendable. [Someone had some Magog oriented PTSD.]

[with_discipline]

Wasn't peace preferable to warring with them?

[truth_is_cold]

Peace wasn't preferable to being used as food stock, or having innocent lives treated as bargaining chips.

The Magog wouldn't have stopped at those worlds. They couldn't. They can only eat when they kill. The negotiation was only to placate the Triumvirs of the Commonwealth.

[with_discipline]

I see. And were you the only ones to revolt?

[truth_is_cold]

Yes. It was mostly our worlds that were bargained with.

[Ponders] There had been rumors before that, that the Nietzscheans wanted to form their own unified force because the Commonwealth hadn't actually fought in a war for a millenia. We were the ones with the most combat experience. I disagreed for a long while, thinking that we were better working with Commonwealth resources.

It wasn't until the Treaty was signed that I changed my mind.

[with_discipline]

Didn't anyone speak out against the Treaty?

[truth_is_cold]

We did. They proceeded anyway.

The Nietzschean forces were decimated at some point. Tyr informed me, but I don't know much about it. [Disappointed.]

[with_discipline]

By the Magog, or the Commonwealth? [A beat] Who was the Commonwealth comprised of?

[truth_is_cold]

Over a million worlds and territories. It wasn't the Commonwealth or the Magog. Something else that destroyed two thirds of their fleet in the Witchhead Nebula before the Commonwealth arrived. Something called the Angel of Death.

[with_discipline]

[Paaaaaause. What. She doesn't think even the Federation gets to be that size, though she isn't positive.] And you have no further information?

[truth_is_cold]

I don't. Harper is from 300 years in my future, but so was Tyr. All I know for a fact is that after the Angel of Death struck, the Nietzscheans won but were unable to mobilize the force necessary to combat the Magog. The Prides turned on each other in a bid for claiming territory in the now abandoned worlds, and they even drove some of the prides and clans into near extinction.

Apparently my Pride maintained appropriate behaviour. [This makes him unreasonably happy. You can tell in a you can't really tell sort of way.]

[with_discipline]

[It's a familiar way. She's kind of intensely curious about his culture, now. Kind of.] Which Pride is that?

[truth_is_cold]

The Majorum. Though my clan name is Rhade. [He's happy to talk about his culture. It's more comfortable than the Magog.]

[with_discipline]

Is a clan name the equivalent of a surname?

[truth_is_cold]

Yes, essentially. Do Vulcans have surnames?

[with_discipline]

We do not. Traditionally, we cite our ancestors during formal occasions.

[truth_is_cold]

Are there houses or family lines within your culture?

[with_discipline]

They are not named. I am T'Pol, daughter of T'Les, daughter of T'Lan, daughter of T'Mir. We trace our histories through our ancestors.

[truth_is_cold]

We announce ours as a part of our introduction. Most of us have family lines memorized back for a few centuries. I am Gaheris Rhade out of Morgause by Lot. "Out of" indicates the maternal DNA, the giver of the maternal genes within the egg. Not necessarily the actual mother. The giver of the completing DNA, the "by".

Hybrids are uncommon because breeding is very important to Nietzscheans, but I personally have no problem with it. Our original stock was engineered from many people and being so exclusive when a child might lead a better life for the union seems irrational.

[with_discipline]

You are not typically raised by your biological parents?

[truth_is_cold]

We are commonly. But if we aren't, we still address our actual lineage. For example, a woman that wants to achieve higher rank but doesn't want to marry a man who's earned a higher rank, and isn't necessarily competitive herself, might agree to carry the children of a fallen alpha.