It's another message from the Lieutenant Colonel.\n\n//Doc,\n\nHaven't seen much from you lately. Got writer's block? I have a surprise for you. Maybe it'll put an edge on that sword we talked about. Here's the address. Happy forging. \n\nCLARIOT//\n\nYou'd better [[go|Surprise]].

"Well, uh, she's pretty busy. Do you want a drink?"\n\n[[I probably shouldn't.|Kindness]]\n\n[[It is still pretty early in the day.|Kindness]]\n\n[[Dear god, yes.|Kindness]]

[["Meditations on a Hostile Hivemind"\n\nby Vantis C. Albine|Fullpaper]]

Caeth comes over the next day. He has a gym bag on his shoulder. You hold each other for the first time in years. You hold him like you used to when he was a child. You suppose he does the same for you.\n\n"Dad,"\n\n[[I know.|With Caeth]]\n\n\n\n\n

[[...|Day3]]

It's gotten late. You're exhausted.\n\n[[Go to bed|Sleep]]\n<<if $usescreen1 is "no">>\n[[Use your screen|Mars]]\n<<endif>>\n

If we were connected, mind to mind, each of us would be absolutely known. No longer would we have to leap across the impossible gaps that stretch between people. There would be no need for <<cyclinglink $word26 "language" "lonesomeness" "love">>. \n\n[[Back|Undone2]]\n[[Continue|Undone4]]\n

When you go downstairs to make coffee, there's a message on your screen. It's from someone with "Lieutenant Colonel" in front of their name. He wants to meet you at your neighborhood coffee shop. How obliging.\n\nThere's work to do, but you should probably hear out the g-man first.\n\n[[Meet with the colonel|Coffee]]\n<<if $usescreen2 is "no">>\n[[Use your screen|Cats]]\n<<endif>>\n\n

Chirp, chirp. A family of robins have made a nest outside your bedroom window. You can hear them in the mornings.\n\nThere is work to be done. Then again, you feel like you need some fresh air and better company.<<if $clariotmessage is "no">>\n\nA light is blinking on your screen across the room. You have a message.<<endif>>\n\n[[Go out.|Telegraph]]\n\n[[Use your screen.|Clariot's message]]

"Now, with that approval you received, you should have no trouble at all. You need funding? You got it. Special access? Sure. Your wish is our command, get it?"\n\nYou get it. But you don't like all this buttering up.\n\n"Since we're placing all these resources at your command, though, we're hoping you'll oblige some curiosity on our part. We don't want to tell you what to write, of course, but were hoping you might focus the paper on a couple areas."\n\nHere it is.\n\n[[>|Sword of Understanding]]

"Anything. Our knowledge of them is so limited, we're like children. Of course, the military would prefer we focus on new ways to kill them, but I'd like to know how they reproduce. I mean, what's their home system like? How did they evolve? Sorry, I get worked up about this stuff."\n\n[[It's fine.|Goal Oriented]]\n\n[[The apocalypse is approaching faster each and every day so it makes perfect sense to get worked up.|Goal Oriented]]\n

[[Meditations on a Hostile Hivemind\n\nby Vantis C. Albine|Approval]]\n\n<<set $usescreen1 = "no">>\n<<set $usescreen2 = "no">>\n<<set $usescreen3 = "no">>\n<<set $usescreen4 = "no">>\n<<set $stilltalking = "no">>\n<<set $catchit = "no">>\n<<set $squidie = "no">>\n<<set $clariotmessage = "no">>\n<<set $shower = "no">>

Cat vids distract you for a while.\n\n<<set $usescreen2 = "yes">>\n\n[[Back|Day2]]

The bar is called the Telegraph. You've always hated the name.\n\nIt's too early to start drinking, but that doesn't stop some seasoned professionals. You find a seat at the bar. The bartender, unable to distract himself with other customers, comes over.\n\n"Hi, dad."\n\n[[Hello, Caeth. How's work?|Caeth]]

Clips of the Mars evacuation. Long lines of refugees, all their lives packed into what they can carry. \n<<set $usescreen1 = "yes">>\n\n[[Back|FirstNight]]

White coats carrying clipboards and maintenance men pushing unfathomable machinery populate the halls of the old public school. It's clearly been repurposed--no middle schooler has been within a mile of here in months.\n\nYou give your pocket screen to a guard. She shoulders a rifle leaking purple light and makes a phone call. You're ushered inside a moment later.\n\n[[>|Lab]]

He stays the night, sleeping in his old room. You try to sleep, too, but there's nothing to be done.\n\nDownstairs, the last draft of your paper sits on your [[desk|Title]].

There is a prevalent idea in <<$word1>> that the <<$word2>> of our alien foes, dubbed <<$word3>>, is so foreign that it is incomporable to any human point of reference. Perhaps admitting <<$word4>> comes with <<$word5>>, so I do not fault my peers for this. There can be no progress, however, from such a surrender. We must <<$word6>> the force which now theatens to destroy us.\n\n<<$word7>> from pre-evacuation Mars clearly demonstrate the willingness with which whole <<$word8>> legions will readily die if it benefits a strategic ploy on the far side of the planet. Similar suicidal defenses have been observed in the Brazilian ant //Forelius Pusillus//, where a small group of ants leave the security of the nest after sealing the entrance from the outside each evening.\n\nAn ant colony seems an <<$word9>> way to begin thinking about the organizational structure of the <<$word10>>. The key term "superorganism"--a collection of agents which can act in concert to produce phenomena governed by the collective--was originally coined by James Hutton, an 18th century geologist, to describe the biosphere of Earth. Of course, compared to the approaching <<$word11>>, the Earth is a poorly regulated superorganism indeed.\n\n--\n\nOur enemy has enacted a policy of total war so <<$word13>> that there are scant few historical comparisons we can point to. <<if $word13 eq "merciless">><<$word14>>, yet all sources say that Retevenators leave no survivors. There are no prison camps. There aren't even graves for our dead--the bodies are converted to organic fuel, the corpses of our soldiers bringing their ships ever closer.<<endif>><<if $word13 eq "grimly efficient">> <<$word15>>, pales in comparison to the factories of war the Retevenators assemble on conquered worlds in mere days. Oil, steel, stone, bone--the energy in all of it is extracted down to the last atom.<<endif>> When faced with the <<if $word13 eq "merciless">><<$word16>><<endif>><<if $word13 eq "grimly efficient">><<$word17 >><<endif>> of this hostile hive mind, one must ask: <<$word18>>\n\n<<if $word18 eq "how have we earned the wrath of this alien god?">> There were never any diplomatic negotiations with the Squidies, so there were few possibilities for offense as we understand it. First contact was also the first battles of this war. Perhaps it is a deeply impersonal genocide--it is possible that we are being <<$word19>>. Ants, our previous example, identify nestmates by their pheromone secretions, and any ant without a matching scent is attacked. Maybe we smell wrong.<<endif>>\n<<if $word18 eq "is there a metaphorical chink in their chitinous armor?">>Yes, the <<$wordsquidies2>> act with a unity of purpose unseen in human culture, but without internal <<$word20>> they are deprived of <<$word21>>. While the collective consciousness of our alien foes are their greatest strength, it may also be their most dire weakness.<<endif>>\n\n--\n\nThere is <<$word22>> in their absolute unity of purpose. Their treatment of us is barbaric, yes, but regarding treatment of their own kind, there has never been a more just society on Earth. Think of all the <<$word23>> that is born from misunderstanding. Surely the <<$wordsquidies>>, with their shared intelligence, do not suffer from the pathogen of <<$word24>>. They do not wage war on their own kind. None are killed by abstractions such as <<$word25>>.\n\nIf we were connected, mind to mind, each of us would be absolutely known. No longer would we have to leap across the impossible gaps that stretch between people. There would be no need for <<$word26>>. <<if $word26 eq "language">>Like shouting between tin cans connected by string.<<endif>> <<if $word26 eq "lonesomeness">>How could someone feel alone in a solar system with 15 billion people?<<endif>>\n\n--\nCitations\nQuiroga, Guilherme. //Cooperation and Communication Among South American Ant Species// Rio de Janeiro: Los Libros, 2021.\n<<if $word7 eq "Military field reports">>Lartessen, Marco //Military Action: Jupiter/Mars//. El Paso: OFFICIAL DOCUMENTATION 2141. <<endif>><<if $word7 eq "Journalistic dispatches">>Brale, Valter //The Apocalypse War//. New York: TimeCap, 2142.<<endif>>\nHutton, James. //Theory of the Earth//. with proofs and illustrations. Edinburgh: Creech. 2 vols. 1795.\nObdala, Kirin. //Organic Propulsion: The Coffin Ships.// Cape Town: Biologism, 2139.\n<<if $word14 eq "The mongols occasionally absorbed conquered peoples into their nomadic empire.">>Bulag, Uradyn. //The Mongols at China's Edge: History and the Politics of National Unity//. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.<<endif>><<if $word14 eq "Even the Third Reich took prisoners of war on occasion">> Rummel, Rudolph. //Death by Government.// New Brunswick: Transaction, 1994.<<endif>><<if $word15 eq "Ford's assembly-line, one of the greatest triumphs of American high capitalism">>Batchelor, Ray. //Henry Ford: Mass Production, Modernism and Design//. Manchester: Manchester U. Press, 1994.<<endif>><<if $word15 eq "Soviet Russia's titanic industry, resulting from a top-down command economy">>Allen, Robert C. //Farm to Factory: A Reinterpretation of the Soviet Industrial Revolution.// Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2003.<<endif>>Marqien, Renda. //Collectivist Industry and the Retevenator Hive Factories//. Shanghai: The Economic Observer, 2137.

Beautiful dark oranges and chartreuse greens.\n\n[[Back|Squidie]]

It's not hard to tell which of the coffee shoppers you're meeting. You pick him out by his immaculate haircut and his espresso cup.\n\nHe stands up to shake your hand. "Professor Albine. It's an honor. My name's Clariot. This is, as I'm certain you've guessed, about your paper. We're very excited about it back at HQ. I've read all your stuff."\n\nYou find that unlikely, but maybe that's uncharitable.\n\n[[>|Focus]]

<<if $word13 eq "merciless">><<cyclinglink $word14 "The mongols occasionally absorbed conquered peoples into their nomadic empire" "Even the Third Reich took prisoners of war on occasion">>, yet all sources say that Retevenators leave no survivors. There are no prison camps. There aren't even graves for our dead--the bodies are converted to organic fuel, the corpses of our soldiers bringing their ships ever closer.<<endif>><<if $word13 eq "grimly efficient">> <<cyclinglink $word15 "Ford's assembly-line, one of the greatest triumphs of American high capitalism" "Soviet Russia's titanic industry, resulting from a top-down command economy">>, pales in comparison to the factories of war the Retevenators assemble on conquered worlds in mere days. Oil, steel, stone, bone--the energy in all of it is extracted down to the last atom.<<endif>>\n\n[[Back|Body1]]\n[[Continue|Body3]]\n

Oddly delicate.\n\n[[Back|Squidie]]

It's a message from the colonel.\n\n<<if $word18 eq "is there a metaphorical chink in their chitinous armor?">>//Doc,\n\nRead the draft on your machine. Don't ask me how. Keep up the good work. Brass is eating it up.\n\nCLARIOT//<<endif>><<if $word18 eq "how have we earned the wrath of this alien god?">>//Doc,\n\nI'm not sure we were on the same page after all. Your draft is looking a little too abstract right now. Remember that we're fighting a war here. Let's not have to meet again.\n\nCLARIOT//<<endif>>\n\nLooks like you better get comfortable with a pen and notebook again.\n<<set $clariotmessage = "yes">>\n[[Back|Day3]]

[[...|Day4]]

Fireflies rise up out of your unmowed grass.\n\n[[Go to bed|Sleep2]]

"Sure. Do you know a place?"\n\n[[You definitely don't.|Afterwards]]

It's dark out.\n\n[[Go to bed.|Sleep2]]\n\n[[Sit on the porch.|Porch]]

The lab they bring you to still has a colored post of the periodic table taped up to the wall. In a tank of blue goo a disturbing form floats weightlessly.\n\n[[Did it just move?|Yara]]

There is <<cyclinglink $word22 "something to be admired" "a purity">> in their absolute unity of purpose. Their treatment of us is barbaric, yes, but regarding treatment of their own kind, there has never been a more just society on Earth.\n\n[[Continue|Undone2]]

"That's tough to say with total certainty, but it's relay center--that's the closest analogue to a "brain"--is non-operational." She paused. "Also, it's dead."\n<<set $stilltalking = "yes">>\n[[Back|Questions]]

A light is blinking on your screen across the room. You have a message.\n\n[[Go out.|Telegraph]]\n\n[[Use your screen.|Clariot's message]]

The Sword of Understanding\n

In a gesture of infinite kindness, Caeth lets you stay there as long as you like.\n\n[[>|ThirdNight]]

An ant colony seems <<cyclinglink $word9 "an apt" "a tremendously insufficient">> way to begin thinking about the organizational structure of the <<cyclinglink $word10 "Retevenators" "squidies">>. \n\nThe key term "superorganism"--a collection of agents which can act in concert to produce phenomena governed by the collective--was originally coined by James Hutton, an 18th century geologist, to describe the biosphere of Earth. \n\nOf course, compared to the approaching <<cyclinglink $word11 "hive fleet" "void colony" "monsters">>, the Earth is a poorly regulated superorganism indeed.\n\nYour citations so far:\nQuiroga, Guilherme. //Cooperation and Communication Among South American Ant Species// Rio de Janeiro: Los Libros, 2021.\n<<if $word7 eq "Military field reports">>Lartessen, Marco //Military Action: Jupiter/Mars//. El Paso: OFFICIAL DOCUMENTATION 2141. <<endif>><<if $word7 eq "Journalistic dispatches">>Brale, Valter //The Apocalypse War//. New York: TimeCap, 2142.<<endif>>\nHutton, James. //Theory of the Earth//. with proofs and illustrations. Edinburgh: Creech. 2 vols. 1795.\n\n[[Back|Intro Cont.]]\n[[Finish|FirstNight]]\n\n

"Thanks. Though I guess the rest of it won't matter much if we don't figure out the military stuff, right?" She looks at the specter in the tank. "I guess they never have that particular problem. They're pretty goal oriented. Anyway, hope this helped with the paper."\n\n[[Our human curiosity is worth dying for and you have reminded me of that.|Drink]]\n\n[[Do you want to grab a drink?|Drink]]

<<cyclinglink $word7 "Military field reports" "Journalistic dispatches">> from pre-evacuation Mars clearly demonstrate the willingness with which whole <<cyclinglink $word8 "Retevenator" "squidie">> legions will readily die if it benefits a strategic ploy on the far side of the planet. \n\nSimilar suicidal defenses have been observed in the Brazilian ant //Forelius Pusillus//, where a small group of ants leave the security of the nest after sealing the entrance from the outside each evening.\n\n\n[[Back|Intro]]\n[[Continue|Intro Final]]

It's supposed to be a joke, but Caeth doesn't laugh.\n\n"Yeah. Did you want to tell me anything in particular, dad?"\n\n[[I know you're worried about disappointing me, but you could never disappoint me, and I love you.|New Paper]]\n\n[[You don't want to see me right now and these few moments together will be painfully awkward, but I needed to see your face. You have your mother's eyebrows, my watery eyes.|New Paper]]\n\n[[I'm working on a new paper.|New Paper]]

"No, no, that's just a reflex action. We're running some tests. Professor Albine, right?" She shakes your hand. "I'm Yara, head of research here. I can answer any [[questions|Questions]] you have."\n<<if $squidie is "no">>\n[[So this is a Squidie?|Squidie]]<<endif>>\n<<if $stilltalking is "no">>\n[[Is it still talking to the others|Still Talking]]\n<<endif>> <<if $catchit is "no">>\n[[How did you catch it?|Catch it]]\n<<endif>>\n\n[[What are you looking for, here?|Looking]]\n

The next morning there's a letter in front of your door. You didn't know that mail slot actually opened.\n\nIt's got the United Earth seal on it. Something from Clariot?\n\n[[Open it|Letter]]

"Oh, busy. It's been crazy every night this week."\n\n[[I guess it's last call.|Last Call]]

//Dear Mr. Albine,\n\nI am personally writing to offer my condolences for the loss of [[Sergeant Tera Albine|Blackout]]--//

Think of all the <<cyclinglink $word23 "hatred" "violence" "death" "destruction" "misery" "inequality">> that is born from misunderstanding. Surely the <<cyclinglink $wordsquidie "squidies" "Retevenators">>, with their shared intelligence, do not suffer from the pathogen of <<cyclinglink $word24 "racism" "sexism" "classism" "homophobia" "transphobia">>. They do not wage war on their own kind. None are killed by abstractions such as <<cyclinglink $word25 "money" "politics" "fear" "faith" "love" "pride" "patriotism" "justice">>.\n\n[[Back|Coming Undone]]\n[[Continue|Undone3]]\n

<<if $word26 eq "language">>\nLike shouting between tin cans connected by string.<<endif>><<if $word26 eq "lonesomeness">>How could someone feel alone in a solar system with 15 billion people?<<endif>><<if $word26 eq "love">>Such a blind charge into peril and doubt. <<endif>>\n\n[[Finish|Why]]

"It is. One of the most complete specimens we've ever brought back, actually. You can take a closer look, if you want."\n<<set $squidie = "yes">>\n[[Look at its war tendrils.|War Tendrils]]\n\n[[Look at its sensory webbings.|Sensory Webbing]]\n\n[[Look at its exoskeletal patterning.|Exoskeletal Patterning]]\n\n[[Back|Questions]]

"Oh yeah? What's it about?"\n\n[[The philosophical implications of being destroyed by a hostile hivemind.|Tera]]\n\n[[Everything that will be taken from us when the world ends.|Tera]]\n\n[[Squidies.|Tera]]

"Sounds light years beyond me. Hey, did Tera tell you? She was reassigned. She's on board the Black Arrow now. You know, that new destroyer-class cruiser they launched last week? It's been all over the news."\n\n[[I hadn't heard, actually.|Busy]]

You're home, and a little drunk. You still have work to do, though.\n\n[[Go to notebook.|Coming Undone]]\n<<if $usescreen4 is "no">>\n[[Use your screen.|Message]]\n<<endif>>\n

Probably a good idea.\n<<set $shower = "yes">>\n[[Back|Day4]]\n\n

<<if $squidie is "no">>\n[[So this is a Squidie?|Squidie]]<<endif>>\n<<if $stilltalking is "no">>\n[[Is it still talking to the others?|Still Talking]]\n<<endif>> <<if $catchit is "no">>\n[[How did you catch it?|Catch it]]\n<<endif>>\n\n[[What are you looking for, here?|Looking]]

You wake up with your tie still on. Oops.\n\nThere's a blinking red message on your screen.\n\n[[Use your screen.|LC Email]]\n<<if $shower is "no">>\n[[Take a shower.|Shower]]<<endif>>

"Great, I knew you'd be agreeable. And if you could throw in something positive--you know, the power of the human individual, something like that--it would be great for the troops. Your daughter's a Planetary Marine, right? Maybe she'll see it." He pays for the coffee with a very large bill and leaves. "We'll be in touch, doc."\n\n[[Go home|After the LC]]\n\n

Our enemy has enacted a policy of total war so <<cyclinglink $word13 "merciless" "grimly efficient">> that there are scant few historical comparisons we can point to.\n\n\n[[Continue|Body2]]

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When faced with the <<if $word13 eq "merciless">><<cyclinglink $word16 "cruelty" "remorselessness">><<endif>><<if $word13 eq "grimly efficient">><<cyclinglink $word17 "soulessness" "singleminded determination">><<endif>> of this hostile hive mind, one must ask: <<cyclinglink $word18 "is there a metaphorical chink in their chitinous armor?" "how have we earned the wrath of this alien god?">>\n\n\n[[Back|Body2]]\n[[Continue|Body4]]

These things used to just go through the university, but United Earth really tightened their grip since Mars fell. They're worried about morale, and don't want anything released that would make people panic.\n\n[[Back|Approval]]

<<if $word18 eq "how have we earned the wrath of this alien god?">> There were never any diplomatic negotiations with the Squidies, so there were few possibilities for offense as we understand it. First contact was also the first battles of this war. Perhaps it is a deeply impersonal genocide--it is possible that we are being <<cyclinglink $word19 "harvested" "cleared away to make the gathering of our plantary resources simpler">>. Ants, our previous example, identify nestmates by their pheromone secretions, and any ant without a matching scent is attacked. Maybe we smell wrong.<<endif>><<if $word18 eq "is there a metaphorical chink in their chitinous armor?">> Yes, the <<cyclinglink $wordsquidies2 "Retevenators" "squidies">> act with a unity of purpose unseen in human culture, but without internal <<cyclinglink $word20 "collision" "contrast">> they are deprived of <<cyclinglink $word21 "ingenuity" "comptetition" "the individual will to survive">>. While the collective consciousness of our alien foes are their greatest strength, it may also be their most dire weakness.<<endif>>\n\n\nCitations so far:\nObdala, Kirin. //Organic Propulsion: The Coffin Ships.// Cape Town: Biologism, 2139.\n<<if $word14 eq "The mongols occasionally absorbed conquered peoples into their nomadic empire.">>Bulag, Uradyn. //The Mongols at China's Edge: History and the Politics of National Unity//. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.<<endif>><<if $word14 eq "Even the Third Reich took prisoners of war on occasion">> Rummel, Rudolph. //Death by Government.// New Brunswick: Transaction, 1994.<<endif>><<if $word15 eq "Ford's assembly-line, one of the greatest triumphs of American high capitalism">>Batchelor, Ray. //Henry Ford: Mass Production, Modernism and Design//. Manchester: Manchester U. Press, 1994.<<endif>><<if $word15 eq "Soviet Russia's titanic industry, resulting from a top-down command economy">>Allen, Robert C. //Farm to Factory: A Reinterpretation of the Soviet Industrial Revolution.// Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2003.<<endif>>\nMarqien, Renda. //Collectivist Industry and the Retevenator Hive Factories//. Shanghai: The Economic Observer, 2137.\n\n[[Back|Body3]]\n[[Finish|SecondNight]]

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[[...|Day6]]

"We're hoping for some insight into the [[squidies]], to be frank. If we're going to turn this shipwreck around, we're going to need to employ pschological warfare. We need to get inside their heads. Or, their collective head."\n\n"Lieutenant, I think you're misunderstanding the nature of my work. There are no military applications. I'm a philosophy professor."\n\n"With all due respect, I'm the military man here, and I know a weapon when I see one, Professor. There is no blade keener than understanding. Sun Tzu said that. You deliver me the sword of understanding and I'll serve you up some sliced calamari, doc. What do you say?"\n\n[[I say you can go fuck yourself, you government spook.|Something Positive]]\n\n[[I plan on writing exactly what I intend to and no amount of carrot or stick will convince me otherwise.|Something Positive]]\n\n[[Sure.|Something Positive]]

It's hard to be inside the house. The [[letter|Burning]] is still on your desk. You and Caeth sit on the porch, drinking sodas while the sun is up and beers when it dips down. In the dwindling light, bats careen haphazardly overhead, catching mosquitos in their teeth.\n

Afterwards, you spend a long time waiting for the bus. It's past midnight when you get home.\n\n[[Go to bed.|Day5]]\n\n[[Go to bed.|Day5]]\n\n[[Go to bed.|Day5]]

You and Caeth burn it in your ancient backyard grill.\n\n[[Maybe this is why they give you a letter, for crematory purposes. You will never see her body.|LastNight]]\n\n[[If we were connected to her over those vast stretches of space, we would have felt it the instant she died.|LastNight]]\n\n[[Thank you for coming, son.|LastNight]]

The liftoff of the Black Arrow, some new super cruiser. It looks like a piece to some massive three-dimensional puzzle.\n<<set $usescreen3 = "yes">>\n\n[[Back|After the LC]]\n

The approval comes during a lull between sentences, while you are kneading your hands and trying to think of what comes next. There isn't much pomp to it. An email with the [[United Earth|Logo]] logo at the top. \n\nThis is good. It means funding, support and a minimum of censorship. You should feel more excited, but you were going to write this whether you were approved or not. You don't know how to pilot a star destroyer or fire a plasma rifle, so you're stuck writing academic papers.\n\nYou bend over your [[work|Intro]].

You aren't building a sword of understanding. Why are you still writing this?\n\n[[Go to bed.|Sleep3]]

Tipped with retractable barbs. Coiled with muscle.\n\n[[Back|Squidie]]

There is a prevalent idea in <<cyclinglink $word1 "academia" "the public sphere" "humanity">> that the <<cyclinglink $word2 "intelligence" "consciousness">> of our alien foes, dubbed <<cyclinglink $word3 "squidies by the news cycle" "Xenoteuthis Retevenators by the scientific community">>, is so foreign that it is incomporable to any human point of reference. \n\nPerhaps admitting <<cyclinglink $word4 "helplessness" "incomprehension">> comes with <<cyclinglink $word5 "a feeling of relief" "an unburdening of responsibility">>, so I do not fault my peers for this. \n\nThere can be no progress, however, from such a surrender. \n\nWe must <<cyclinglink $word6 "examine" "understand">> the force which now theatens to destroy us.\n\n[[Continue|Intro Cont.]].

[[...|Day2]]

The July light is dim through your curtains.\n\nThere's still work to do.\n\n[[Go to desk.|Body1]]\n<<if $usescreen3 is "no">>\n[[Use your screen.|Black Arrow]]\n<<endif>>

"After separating it from its hunting pack, we bombarded it with directed gamma waves. Or, well, marines did that. I sure didn't."\n<<set $catchit = "yes">>\n[[Back|Questions]]

Roy Norvell Graham

You doodle out a message to Tera. It's a little more badly spelled and sentimental than usual.\n<<set $usescreen4 = "yes">>\n\n[[Send it|ThirdNight]]\n\n[[Save it|ThirdNight]]\n\n[[Delete it|ThirdNight]]\n

Such an adorable, ridiculous name for the greatest threat our species has ever encountered.\n\n[[<|Sword of Understanding]]