M.J. Markgraf
patreon
BSE Chapter 3-7
🕑 Added 2024-11-22 13:00:18 +0000 UTCAlexander looked over the three people standing in front of him. Damien had just finished filling him in on the new Council changes.
“When I first asked the Council to look into the growing discontent issue I thought you would try and find a solution to the problem. That’s kind of the whole point of the Council, you focus on the people’s issues so I can focus on my work. Instead, you went ahead and invited someone who you know is antagonistic toward me and my goals onto the Council along with three of his lackeys. You can’t have possibly thought that was a good idea or that I would simply allow it to happen. Kick them out of the Council.”
“We can’t do that,” Damien ground his teeth.
“If you can’t then I will,” Alexander stated.
“They were legally accepted based on the rules you established for us, Alex. If you decide to change that because you don’t like it, you will show the drifters that you are no different than any other government and will lose any support you might have earned from the drifer populace. There is nothing that unifies us more than someone in power overreaching,” Gabriella responded before the conversation could go any further.
Alexander gave the woman a scathing look. “So what, just leave him be and hope for the best? You three wouldn’t have come to speak with me unless Sorin’s inclusion to the Council was a problem. A problem that you knowingly let have equal control.”
He turned to face his Head of Security. “How much of a concern is he?”
The entire Council, minus Nancy – or who he had assumed to be the entire Council as of only a few minutes ago – had barged into his workshop to drop a steaming pile of shit right at his feet. To say he was upset would be an understatement and that was impressive considering his issues feeling emotions.
“I don’t know,” the man admitted. “Most of his followers are people who haven’t taken you up on your work offers. My concern is that their new positions will legitimize them and others will flock toward their cause.”
“And you all voted for this? Why? Help me understand the reasoning behind that. I can’t fathom why you would do something so ridiculous; I know you three aren’t stupid.”
Damien bristled at the accusation. “I was opposed from the beginning.”
“Sheila and I had our reasons for voting the way we did and we didn’t tell Damien what we were planning to do,” Gabriella cut in.
“What reasons?” Damien demanded to know.
Gabriella sighed. “I didn’t want to bring this up because I knew it would upset you and cause you to do something rash. I got a visit from one of Sorin’s people. Apparently, the man thinks he knows why I left the STO.”
“He was blackmailing you?!” the Head of Security looked outraged. “About that thing with your ex-fiance? That was all self-defense though.”
She sighed. “Yes, but just because you know about that, doesn’t mean I want the story to spread to every person here. I left the STO to leave my past behind.”
Damien looked hurt that Gabriella had kept anything from him.
The woman patted her boyfriend's arm in consolation. “If we told you, you would have only gotten upset and it would have alerted Sorin that we were playing him.”
The words didn’t seem to do much as the man silently stewed.
“I would ask what you’re referring to but I already looked into all three of your backgrounds, so I am aware of your circumstances. Before you look too shocked, I did it to ensure the people who were voted to be in charge weren’t terrible people. Something I wish you three would have considered before voting Sorin in. Look, I can understand wanting to keep a secret, but your choice not to reach out to me or Damien is going to cause far more issues than people finding out about what you did, but I don’t think you’re that shallow of a person, so help me understand your reasoning?” Alexander asked his Head of Medical Services.
“Sorin’s person visited me shortly after you first came to us with your concerns to try and blackmail me. After the man left, I spoke with a few people about Sorin before finding out he was one of the farmers. Once I did, I spoke with Sheila. It’s what she told me that convinced me that leaving Sorin to act behind the scenes was unwise. She can explain it better than I can.” Gabriella stated.
“The man is a snake,” Sheila added. “I- I had an issue with my seeds for the next round of planting. At the time I thought it was just a random accident, but I needed new seeds to go forward before we suffered shortages. I was going to ask you to purchase some new stocks from the STO, but I needed the new seeds now. The only other farmer with extra seed was Sorin, so I went to him to request some. The man gave me an ultimatum. Either I voted for his proposal or I wouldn’t get the seeds. I had no idea he would propose joining the Council until Gabriella spoke to me. By then I had already taken the deal. I now suspect Sorin or one of his people deliberately ruined my stock of seeds so I would be forced into choosing between allowing him onto the Council or not having any seeds to plant for this season. I chose what I thought was right.”
“So not only is Sorin opposed to me, but he is most likely the type of person who has no qualms about blackmailing people and destroying critical resources to get his way. This man sounds like someone who should be tossed outside without a breathing mask,” Alexander stated, making the group shift uncomfortably.
“Oh don’t pretend you three haven’t thought the same thing. Your decisions have really boxed me into a corner here. If I assume what you are telling me is true and I take the easy path out and remove him and his idiot compatriots, I risk losing the support of ninety percent of my current workforce planetside because I can’t prove he did any of that stuff. Obviously, I could replace the workers eventually, but losing them now would severely hamper efforts to prepare against Harlow or whatever he sends our way next. If I wait until Sorin does something dumb, I am forced to clean up the mess. How is this acceptable?”
“If we had left him to his own devices, the problems would have just continued to grow even worse. This way we can keep an eye on him,” Gabriella said defensively.
Alexander wasn’t sold on the woman’s logic there.
He sighed. “So, what? You gave them seats on the Council to pull him into the spotlight and give him enough rope to hang himself with. Can you even tell me what his end goal might be? I assume it’s nothing good if he went to this much trouble to try and get council seats.”
The silence from the trio was confirmation enough.
He shook his avatar in disgust. “Fine. I’ll go along with this idiotic plan for now, not because I want to but because you have left me little choice. I am extremely disappointed in all of you. Sorin’s actions and this blackmail should have been brought to my attention the moment it happened, not after the fact. I am holding the three of you responsible if anyone gets hurt. Even if nobody gets hurt in Sorin’s attempt at taking over, which seems like the only possibility given how much effort he seems to have put into his plans, I will be disbanding the Council once this is done. And depending on who gets involved, either sending people packing or making arrests.”
The group didn’t look all that surprised by his statement, meaning they already knew he was going to be angry when they told him what they had been up to, which meant they considered his anger before deciding that their actions were the best possible approach to the problem instead of coming to him first. He gave himself a mental shake of disgust before focusing on them again. “And where is Nancy? Is she not in on this nonsense?”
“I think we all know Nancy’s disposition,” Gabriella spat. “She voted for whatever option ensured a peaceful transition.”
“It seems like she is the only sensible one on the Council at the moment then,” he shot back. If Gabriella wanted to be angry or upset at someone, she should be upset at herself, not at Nancy for sticking to her ethics even if Alexander disagreed with them. “Alright, I’ve heard enough from you three, get out of my sight. For your sake, I hope nobody gets hurt by your choices.”
Gabriella stepped toward him and jabbed an angry finger into his avatar. “No, you don’t just get to dismiss us, Alex. You can be angry and upset, that’s understandable, but don’t you dare be dismissive. Perhaps we could have thought this plan through more or brought you in, but we aren’t politicians. I’m not even a licensed medical provider, I’m just a physical trainer doing her best to help everyone out. None of us ever wanted these positions, we took them because we thought it was best for the community and the decisions we made were always with that goal in mind. And before you take the high road here, you have made it pretty clear you wanted to be left out of our politics as much as possible, so don’t go blaming us when something happens that doesn’t align with whatever goals you have. Because you aren’t exactly ever open with anyone on what those are.”
With those words, the angry woman joined the rest of the group and stormed out.
After the group left, he didn’t immediately go back to work. He was a bit too angry to concentrate. It didn’t help that he thought their plan had some merit. Not much, mind you, but some. And if he thought about it, Gabriella’s parting words were mostly spot on. It left him with a lot to think about.
If Sorin had been as shady and self-serving as they said, then he could have really done some damage if he had been left to his own devices. If the man gained enough supporters, he could have disrupted food supply, repairs, or any number of other services that the entire population of Eden’s End relied on.
Alexander would have stepped in and dealt with the issue personally if that happened, but that would not garner him any favors. At worst, the people would see him as some heavy-handed dictator and simply leave at the earliest possible opportunity. Maybe that was Sorin’s goal if the man hadn’t gotten his way onto the Council.
Eden’s End would survive even if every drifter left, but it would put a serious wrench in his current plans.
Letting Sorin prove to the rest of the population that he was just a jackass who thought he deserved to be in charge made it much easier to get rid of the man and his sympathizers, but letting it play out irked him.
Alexander was not the type of person to beat around the bush and while he could play politics if he needed to, he preferred to avoid them. And maybe that was the problem. When he first arrived, he had given the Council a lot of power and he simply acted as a check on that power. It had worked so far so Alexander had focused on his work instead. It seems that decision had finally come to bite him in the ass and these were the repercussions of it.
And who the hell was this Sorin person? He didn’t sound like he understood politics any more than the other Councilors or Alexander, he was just more devious. This situation sounded like the start of a comedic movie villain’s attempt at politics more than actual politics. Like a man with a working understanding of something but no experience with it. It made Alexander wonder where the man could have gotten this information from. It’s not like political subterfuge was something you could purchase a learning module for.
Arresting Sorin after he did whatever nonsense he set out to do would still shake the drifter population, but the blame would fall squarely on Sorin in that case.
That was the only reason Alexander was allowing this stupid stunt to play out. Even then, he was only giving them two weeks to act. If Sorin and his goons hadn’t done something drastic in that time, it was likely that Damien, Gabriella, and Sheila had misread the man. He didn’t think that was the case, but he couldn’t simply go around removing people who were following the rules. Even if nothing happened, Alexander was going to remove any sort of political power the council currently held after this was all said and done.
It was obvious from Sorin’s maneuvering that the man had a better understanding of politics and the laws and rules of Eden’s End than the four original councilors. That wasn’t too much of a surprise since none of the four seemed all that enthusiastic about their positions, which is why Alexander had agreed to appoint them in the first place. The last thing he wanted was someone with delusions of leadership taking over during those early days. He should be glad that Sorin hadn’t been nominated back then.
The man’s timing was suspicious as well. Alexander had seen the growing resentment shortly after he had claimed the system. He found it hard to believe that was a coincidence.
There hadn’t been any announcement about his claim, but someone must have spilled the beans and it got back to Sorin. Did the man really think this power play would somehow put him in charge? Did he think he could appeal to the STO to make that happen? If so, the man was delusional.
The STO’s charter only specified what sort of civilian representatives he needed to have when they recognized his claim. The STO’s rules didn’t say he had to keep that government in place after that. Alexander wasn’t sure what he would replace the Council with, but he knew he needed to take a more active role in whatever came after, even if it cut into his work time.
Two weeks. If nothing happened, he was going to remove the Council’s authority anyway. They would still represent the people, but they would have no actual power. They would need to approach him or the representative he chose in their place. There would be no more of this jockeying for power on his watch.
Alexander had been considering this option for some time. He knew it would have to happen eventually when BSE grew larger, but he figured the problem was years off. Not right now when he was dealing with a much more critical issue.
Finally calming down enough to focus, he pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind so he could finish checking on the projects he had been working on when the three barged in.
The Talon’s new engines were ready, and his bots were already starting to remove the old ones from the massive ship. In a few days, Alexander would need to go up and personally attach the new thrusters. He could have relegated this work to the linked bots, but he didn’t have the time or patience to write the one-off program, especially now.
Jasper’s ship was also in the dock, getting a brand new set of Alexander’s Class 4 engines. These were the iterations after the ones he sold to the STO and were one step up on the model that Dr. Nova Lund had explained to him.
Alexander would have provided his friend the best of the best, but he wasn’t capable of producing anything beyond that iteration yet, and it would have been a bad decision to make his friend’s ship stand out too much. The engines he was getting would put him well above any competition for quite some time. It was the least he could do to thank Jasper and the crew of the Zephyr for all the work he had done for him.
The new printer was also coming together, looking like some weird unfinished gate ring in orbit.
He couldn’t wait for that to be completed so the fishbone ship could begin being constructed. Having the dedicated ship would make his work so much more efficient.
The new control ships were already in the belt along with the Destiny. Mingyu was keeping tabs on the ships, and adjusting their work as needed. The other three ships were also out there, taking on ore as the mining bots quickly tore into the asteroids.
The one complaint Mingyu had was that the mining bots weren’t durable enough. He was already seeing broken components on them. Alexander had provided a printer to replace these items as needed, but he was already designing more robust parts for the future.
Everything was on track with those projects and even Eden’s Might was scheduled to be completed in a month. It would have been three weeks, but Alexander pulled the construction bots off the ship to help retrofit the Talon and Zephyr.
He hadn’t received any response from Captain Krieger yet, even though he had read the news headline that clearly listed the man’s discharge from the Navy. That was a week ago. Either the man had no interest in responding to Alexander or something else was going on with him.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t sit by and wait for Krieger to respond, so his plans had to be changed to account for the former captain not being involved.
Alexander had a self-imposed deadline of three months to get the Hawks trained up and as many ships as possible ready to hit the pirate station to recover the five vessels. He hoped three frigates, an assault ship, and two gunships would be enough to take the station.
He knew all of the crews involved were already running drills and simulations. It wouldn’t be the most accurate simulation since they had no information on this hidden station but it was the best he could do.
There was a way Alexander could improve their odds, but it required him to slave one of the frigate’s supercomputers. If he decided to go down this route, whatever ship he chose would be very limited in its ability to run its more advanced systems while it was controlling the pod lasers. That meant it would need a larger crew if it was to be effective in combat.
It would provide the ship access to nearly sixty of the cheap laser weapons, giving it a hell of a lot more punch, but the trade-off was it would be much more vulnerable during a fight.
It was something he would need to think about and test before he decided if it was workable or not.
After finishing his checks, he tried to go into his design software and do some work, but it just wasn’t happening.
With a sigh, he secured his terminal and went for a walk. There were too many things on his mind for him to focus on improvements right now. Sometimes he felt like he was standing on top of a house of cards, and if any of them fell over, the entire thing would collapse.
While he knew that wasn’t true, he couldn’t help feeling that way sometimes. There were just so many moving parts right now, and he needed all of them to work smoothly or he wasn’t certain what the future would hold.
He couldn’t even predict what Harlow, or Katalynn Char might be up to or how it would affect him going forward. If either one of those people dropped by again, all of his carefully laid plans would go up in smoke.
That was why he was pushing so damn hard. The one thing Alexander had going for himself was his ability to scale and build much faster than others. He had been told this enough times by so many different people that he had to believe it was true even though he felt like he was still well behind the curve. It really boiled down to avoiding assembly as much as possible by wholly printing things like entire engines and ships. Connections had to be checked and tightened after the fact, but that was infinitely faster than building each component separately and assembling it.
The problem was, that he was starting from so far behind the STO and other interested parties that he couldn’t ease up. He needed to maximize all of his resources as much as possible or it felt like he was wasting his efforts. He also couldn’t spend every waking moment designing and building new things. As a father and the owner of BSE, he had other responsibilities. Ones that he hadn’t always done a good job of.
The Council’s little talk today was a reminder of another responsibility he had neglected. He was sure whatever Sorin chose to do, was going to disrupt his work. It would not harm Yulia though. He had already sent Dog an updated report and combat program to help keep her safe and he was preparing additional measures already.
If anyone on Eden’s End so much as laid a finger on Yulia, he wasn’t sure what he would do, but he could be certain that the responsible party would not enjoy the consequences of their actions.
Comments
IdolTrust
He should make dog have the ability to turn into a power armor for his daughter. Or a panic pod.
cm123
...As for the word "fascism", sure I'm not using it in a historically accurate way, sorry scholars. But if you look at the first paragraph of the wikipedia definition, the parallels are close enough for comparison. Of course the details are debatable, after all this is a sci fi setting not 1920s Italy, and they don't have the proper uniforms so can't be any fascistic tendencies I guess. But why am I getting into an internet argument... Overall point was, MC is not supposed to be an anti-hero, but if you zoom out form his point of view, what he's building is not a society a lot of people would enjoy living in, it's increasingly undemocratic, and the only reason it's not yet a fully fledged AI-driven surveillance dystopia is probably his lack of chips
cm123
Frankly, the fact he "bought" the place is a thin fig leaf for his behavior. The place was derelict and occupied by the "drifters" for 100 years if I read Chapter 28 correctly, hell even in the US they would probably be able to make a legal argument that they own it https://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/adverse-possession.asp To me "owning it" was more about protecting himself from legal challenge from STO corporations, not to lord it above the people who were already there as a lot of people seem to think, but I'm starting to think their interpretation is the right one unfortunately. So basically we have a guy who rolls up to your town, says I own it now, and literally turns it into a company town. But he's a Nice Guy so they can stay and be his workforce, as long as they behave and don't revendicate the right to govern themselves as they see fit. And of course the people should be properly thankful to their new master that brought such bounty to them (including some pirates in tow, that the people of the station had to fight, but let's not get lost in the details...) But at the first hint of confrontation, you see the Nice Guy mask fall fast, and the authoritarianism comes veeeery quickly: - "If nothing happened, he was going to remove the Council’s authority anyway. They would still represent the people, but they would have no actual power" - "“This man sounds like someone who should be tossed outside without a breathing mask,” I mean sure, the antagonist is written in the way that he's indefensible, but is this the kind of reflexes you want to have your leaders to have ? There's an undertone of dehumanization of the drifters lately that's quickly closing in on what I would expect of scorned colonialist rhetorics. "How dare they be unhappy with my rule, I made roads for them, I brought Culture to these barely human people, if they dare spit on my benevolence then I'm going to go 'back' to considering them as lesser beings and I can just get rid of them, by any means necessary"
Vanessa S.
So glad Alex is shaping up. Great chapter, though I do wish he would take action before the jerk can do anything serious. At the least Alex needs to find out the leak that let the guy know about the sovereign nation thing. This could be far more serious than he thinks.
Vanessa S.
Did you forget the part where Alex OWNS the darn place? That was a STO research station and it was sold to Alex. How is it wrong to want the squatters you so kindly let stay behave themselves? He has the right to kick the parasites who refuse to work, but want to be in charge out. They had almost NOTHING when he arrived but some food they were growing. He has fixed the station, provided education, supplies, a way of communicating and getting off the planet, protection from pirates who had come to the place before, etc. They are not entitled to anything unless they actually work for it. Not to mention this is a space sci-fi. Monarchies are kinda normal in them. Which is kinda where this one is heading IMO. One with a "king" who has a parliament to do the heavy lifting at some point I imagine.
Danielle Warvel
Fascist? Seriously?! You clearly lack even the most basic understanding of what the word means. Please, for the sake of your own sanity, try to learn some of the history in its proper context instead of regurgitating the establishment propaganda you hear on the big brother legacy media channels and indoctrination courses in the college activist factories. Here, I’ll even make it easy for you. https://youtu.be/maBLJUslLCM?si=AO4bIw2VzOwGlIPB https://youtu.be/_tiZVvE0S0E?si=HTz1KML7BeMmZj4K https://www.youtube.com/live/pGg63P8nmAc?si=i2Vu2DbR4KBalmJG Truth is not subjective. Hold the line.
mmarkgraf212
yes
Random
With the Q com online does that mean people will have access to their STO bank accounts and be able to start using STO money for transactions alongside barter and the contribution system?
mmarkgraf212
K. Bye
Danielle Warvel
Anyone who fucks around with Yulia is going to find out how many pieces a super intelligent homicidal alien robot can tear you into. I’m going to bet it’s a lot. Like, atomization levels. He’s been working with lasers, after all.
Aclys
I will say I am kind of curious why Alex is so upset with the council group, he left them to handle the politics and they are doing exactly that... Yeah they cannot handle everything without getting him involved at this point because that's how the system he set up works. He cant blame them for having difficulties with Harper any more than they can blame him for having trouble with Harlow and the like... That's just the consequence of the life they're all having.
Aclys
. . . Political overtones? What fascism? Nobody is stopping whomever wants to from setting up a business or working to learn the skills they need to start up some venture so they can go into business for themselves... No government oversight or intervention needed. That is the opposite of fascism. Alexander is only the sole source of resources because he literally came to that place After buying it and brought said resources with him, the only reason there's starting to be divergent levels of prosperity is because he made it possible for people to get more than the bare scraps people where stripping from the metal ruins of their living space. So again what authoritarianism? They live in a colony on a world with an atmosphere that isnt quite hospitable to human life. They Have to set up rules and live by them unless they want the systems, farms and other such infrastructure keeping them all Alive to stop working. As for his company, now a new nation, he made that with his own resources and paying the people helping him quite well for it as well as unlocking greater opportunities for everyone on the colony. So again, what are you talking about?
cm123
Thanks for the ride, I had a nice time but that's where I get off. The tech part was fun but I can no longer make myself ignore the political overtones of the story, which resonates a bit too closely for comfort with our own speedrun towards authoritarianism and fascism. (Not helped by all the comments to the tone of "yeah ! I want even more fascism" even if that's to be expected on the internet). But anyway, wish you the best.
Zachary Patterson
Thank you for the chapter!
Shmooggie
Wooo!
