Okay, so we have been getting a ship ready to head up there already, and it will be finished in just a year or two, but I feel kind of funny building it. That Farlander 1.0 is kind of ... big....
2364: My engineers found a way to shave a year off the Farlander's build time - I think we temporarily cut down on empire-wide Friendly Cooperation with the Mrrshans spending or something, and the Secretary of Defense submitted a long-range laser fighter design too, thanks to our NPGs, so a fleet of the new Gunscouts will be following the Farlander out toward Vox, and we'll keep producing more of them every year! I'm not sure why we want to do this, since I'd really rather just be friendly, but after all, Mirana had a bunch of armed ships when she made her Paranar colony, and she must have had a good reason. My advisors explained it to me too. It had something to do with quantitative equalization, but I don't remember exactly.
2365: Old Black Cloak's at Paranar again. I don't suppose there could be two of him, could there? Anyway, he's a planetologist this time. He sent the plans for Controlled Barren Environment in Mrrshan handwriting again, and said the cats just developed it! Brand-new technology! I guess he must mean he's been collaborating with them, which is obviously good news. It'll be great for future peace.
2368: It seems we're not the only ones making discoveries! Ariel the Xenophobic Diplomat and his Airborn Alkari Acrobats just came up with advanced fuel cells or something, and greeted me ... errrr ... kind of icily. They wouldn't agree to a trade agreement or anything. Well, we'll just have to overcome these little obstacles. I turn up massive Friendly Cooperation spending on them. Anyway, it's not all bad news!
Ariel pointed out the location of Altair - that's his homeworld - and admitted he only has two planets in his empire. It looks so cute! Plus, the Farlander finally reached Beta Ceti, where we built another Gunscout to support it just this year, and they're making the looooong journey up to Vox together. I still can't quite believe I built a colony ship in a dreadnought hull. If only my construction engineers would get back in touch with me!
2373: Black Cloak's kitty collaborations are going great; he just presented me with Improved Terraforming +10 from a Paranar lab this year. For some reason though, in spite of all this cooperation, my paranoid Sec. o' Def. still isn't happy with our Gunscout fleets. I asked if he wanted NPGs on something, but that wasn't it; in fact, he said he wanted a ship with more lasers - gatling lasers, actually - plus our best computers and a battle scanner to aim them. He said otherwise, we'll never actually hit the Alkari. I didn't understand why we'd want to hit them, but I had production to spare in the empire, so I went ahead and finished a Turret 1.0 cruiser this year to his specifications just to humor him ... and wouldn't you know it? This is the year Ariel picked to declare war on me! Maybe I should pay closer attention to my SoD.
2376: Really great news, everybody!
Our giant colony ship finally made it to Vox, and I've got six stars in my empire now! It even gave me contact with Meson, the Honorable Diplomat in charge of the Psilon imperium! He's willing to trade 25 BC per year with me, and to give me a look at the stars in his empire! It turns out that, just like Ariel, he's got a cute little 2PE. Oh, and speaking of Ariel, it's a good thing Beta Ceti's all done with its terraforming!
The Turret is making the slow trek up to Vox - it's the trailing fleet on the way up from Beta Ceti - which is a good thing, as you can see from the two Alkari fleets already heading there from Keeta! - and the biggest birdy fleet of all is bound straight for my fertile terran colony! Luckily, I'll be able to send transports up to Vox and still get some defenses into place, since Beta is so well-developed already ... uh ... and because apparently the SoD had it pre-build most of a missile base in anticipation of something like this. Who is he, Nostradarlok or somebody?
2377: The 'Lok in Black is at it again, collaborating with the kitties! He just sent in the designs for Irridium Fuel Cells (Range 6) in the usual Mrrshanese. Oh, and he says one of his colleagues is operating in Psilon space! This is great news, since we could definitely use more collaboration with other species.
2378: Wow ... the Psilons have made a couple new discoveries even since just last year! Is it a bad thing that even with just two worlds, they're better than everybody else at everything?
Also, my SoD is having a fit. For some reason, he thinks their alliance with the Alkari is a bad thing. We're building Birdshot 1 NPG fighters with battle computers and everything, but my SoD is babbling about splitting up our defenses between helpless Vox and vital Beta Ceti and rich Rayden. He must be confused; Rayden doesn't even have a colony. I guess the Psilons have good enough technology to build a colony there now, but isn't that a good thing? The world is so lifeless as it is. And really, there are only four or five different Alkari fleets headed our way, as far as I can see. How bad can that possibly be?
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Next: How Bad Indeed?
