Starborn Smith [Massive Scifi MultiFusion / Celestial Forge]

[Mastersgt]

They will start worrying about it, but it isn't an immediate concern. At least not for a few years. Even in the worst case, someone can be thrown into Stasis for a bit for healing.

Click to shrink...

While it may not be an immediate concern for the Jaffa with Goa'uld Larva already, what I was more concerned with was their kids, who NEED a Larva implanted the moment they start going through puberty because their immune system shuts down.

 

[Mcalgar]

I may have missed something, but why would they be worried about procuring larval goa'uld for the serkha? In the show, the reason it was a problem was that all known queens (after Egeria's death) were allied with the System Lords and obviously wouldn't be handing out larva to rebel jaffa. I don't see how that matters since they have Egeria, a goa'uld queen, who can in theory start producing larva. Which would also (eventually) increase the Tok'ra's numbers. Sure, it'll probably be more than a bit awkward to tell her that they need her to start popping out larva, but it's not like they don't already have a solution to the problem. Was there was a reason she can no longer produce larva that I missed?

 

[BlazingHyperion]

While it may not be an immediate concern for the Jaffa with Goa'uld Larva already, what I was more concerned with was their kids, who NEED a Larva implanted the moment they start going through puberty because their immune system shuts down.

Click to shrink...

That is a very good point. For some reason, I remember the episode where Teal'c's son was going through the process. I remember Teal'c not wanting him to go through with it, and for some reason, I thought the Immune System only started failing once the Symbiote had entered the body.

I may have missed something, but why would they be worried about procuring larval goa'uld for the serkha? In the show, the reason it was a problem was that all known queens (after Egeria's death) were allied with the System Lords and obviously wouldn't be handing out larva to rebel jaffa. I don't see how that matters since they have Egeria, a goa'uld queen, who can in theory start producing larva. Which would also (eventually) increase the Tok'ra's numbers. Sure, it'll probably be more than a bit awkward to tell her that they need her to start popping out larva, but it's not like they don't already have a solution to the problem. Was there was a reason she can no longer produce larva that I missed?

Click to shrink...

This was the other reason that they weren't in a Hurry. Egeria is planning to start having more kids. The chances of a Prim'ta successfully bonding with a host are something like 50/50 that they both die or both survive. That is to say, the Serkha need new Prim'ta, and Egeria needs the Serkha to help raise her kids.

There is a very good relationship possible there.

 

[BlazingHyperion]

Author's Note: This chapter was written using text from the Stellaris paragon_1_l_english.yml file, which is part of the Stellaris source file. Certain lines are copied directly from the game file.
- - -
POV: Marcus Novak.

Through the camera, the room was full as we watched on as a syringe filled with a clear liquid was injected into a strange blob in a petri dish. As the syringe was pulled out and placed in a case to be sterilized, the blob seemed to bubble slightly before it began to fall apart.

A cheer filled the room. It had taken months of work, but we had finally neutralized the bacterium. As everyone started popping out the alcohol, I exited the room and prepared to send a message to James.

That the man had asked me to call him James really went to show how much he had changed.

- - -
One hour later.

I sat in the temporary presidential office. Just a few days prior, the elections had wrapped up. It was a close election, but Ariston Pyrros won the position of president with 42% of the vote. In second place was Elpir Stavrou with 36%. The remaining 22% was split about equally between eight other candidates, with third place getting 3% of the vote.

So, Ariston Pyrros became the first president of the Republic of Kaelastrum, and Elpir Stavrou the first vice president. A location for a bureaucratic center had been set aside, but there were still weeks of planning and design before construction would begin.

With me were the new president, vice president, and Ma'chello.

Ma'chello nodded. "Alright, tell us what you've got."

I smiled. "We have finished neutralizing the bacterium that was gifted to us by Astrocreator Azaryn. The thing is a marvel of biology. It could theoretically be directed to take any shape, and take in any material. Frankly, if we had a few decades of time and a few thousand researchers, this bacterium could lead to fully organic buildings, not to mention automatically regenerating ships."

The president raised an eyebrow. "I was under the impression that this gift was a test of some sort."

I nodded again. "It most certainly is. It will take decades of research and development before we can make anything truly viable. That we could neutralize it within just a few months was only really because of Arthur cheating. It would have taken twice, maybe three times as long to solve the problem if it hadn't been for that."

The President nodded. "Then how do you wish to proceed?"

"According to Arthur, the Astrocreator will have another test for us. If he is correct, then solving this one will be easier than this first test." I responded immediately.

He nodded. "Alright then. Your mission is approved. Good luck."

I stood up. "Thank you."

- - -
Twelve hours later.

I stepped from the Stargate and once more arrived in the clearing of Azaryn's Vivarium. I was once more amazed by how incredible the inside of the ship was. In fact, I could barely even tell that I was on a ship at all.

Standing before us once more was the Astrocreator herself. She spoke the moment my eyes turned to her. "Have you neutralized my gift?"

I nodded once and produced a sealed container, which I handed to her as I approached. "We have."

She looked down at the small vial before carefully unsealing it. I nearly jumped back as she let the normally toxic bacterium into her hand. "Wonderful! I appreciate and applaud your efforts. Now, I have another question."

The bacterium literally dissolved in her hand, disappearing into thin air. I watched on in fascination, as did the others who had come with me. It took me a moment before I caught myself and returned my attention to the Astrocreator. "Please ask away."

She smiled and opened her mouth. "To escape death, would you take the life of another?"

I responded with a shrug. "That depends; I wouldn't hesitate to remove a parasite that was killing me, but I have faced death multiple times to save the life of another human."

She seemed to be surprised by his answer. "You would? Please explain."

I smiled bitterly. "I may be a scientist, a researcher before anything else, but I am also a soldier. It is my duty to follow orders and to protect those who depend on me. If I can save another life with my own, then I have died for a good cause. In the same vein, I would also kill an enemy to save someone else if the situation presented itself."

Azaryn seemed particularly fascinated by the concept. "I am afraid we will have to continue this conversation at another time. Before my next query, I have another gift for you. It is a Rafflesia Azathea, a type of flower, native to my ship. I challenge you to make it bloom."

Behind us, the Stargate dialed once more. I raised an eyebrow but shrugged‌. "Thank you for the gift. Hopefully, we won't be gone so long with this one."

She nodded as we left through the gate.‌ "Farewell for now."

- - -
The Next Day.

We had spent several hours ensuring that the plant was in the correct type of soil. From there, we spent several more hours taking cellular samples and analyzing the plant. It was unlike anything ever seen in any Star League record.

When a small current was driven through a cell, it was absorbed without seemingly any change. It was as if the energy had just disappeared.

With that as the starting place, we began ramping up the current. We only realized that we were missing something when the entire output of the Claymore's 650-rated fusion engine produced no detectable effect at all. The amount of power that had been shoved into the flower was enough to vaporize an entire mech if it was funneled through the ship's defenses. Instead, we got absolutely no response.

When we inspected the bud, we could not find any difference at all.

We all sat around the conference table. The room was silent. Someone at the back of the room spoke. "Maybe we can borrow the reactors from one of the Ha'tak?"

We all turned to stare at him silently. He seemed to squirm in his chair. I let out a sigh. "Does anyone have a better idea?"

Everyone was quiet. I let out another sigh. "Alright. I'll see what I can do."

- - -
POV: Arthur Sinclair.

As I connected the sixth cable, I stepped back. "Alright. Check the connections."

A few moments passed before I heard someone yelling behind me. "It's connected. Get yourself over here."

I exited the hall and entered a nearby room. Inside, a dozen people were staring at a display.

Major Novak, on the other side of the room, spoke. "Alright. Begin the test."

With the flick of a switch, the displays on the wall burst to life. Absolutely massive quantities of energy began flooding into the bud. We all turned to look at it, and it was as if nothing at all was happening.

After almost 10 minutes, there had still been no noticeable change in the flower itself. Finally, Major Novak spoke. "Cut it off."

Upon examining the flower, it was determined that it had indeed begun blooming, but with the reactor from a single Ha'tak, it would take almost 2 years for it to reach full maturity.

The major looked exhausted as he turned to me. "Arthur, can you connect a second reactor?"

"Sure? I'd need approval to do so first."

Two hours later, sure enough, I was hooking up a second Ha'tak reactor. The results were not great. An increased power input definitely increased the speed, but it was nowhere near enough. It had probably shaved a couple of months off that two-year time frame. Even worse, a linear increase in power did not result in a linear increase in growth speed. Even attaching all seven Ha'tak reactors would only decrease the needed time to maybe a year and a half at best.

The major and all of his team looked devastated. Luckily, I had an idea. "What about the Dyson Shield?"

They all turned to me as I continued. "We don't know where the energy for the Dyson Shield comes from. If it produces excess energy, then it could probably force the flower to bloom in a short few days."

Major Novak frowned. "Why weren't we doing that before?"

I shrugged. "We haven't needed the power for anything. I can't guarantee that it will work, but we could probably go look at the emitters."

- - -
Four hours later.

I whistled out loud as I looked at the values shown on the display. As it turned out, the shield itself had an energy cost equivalent to 0.2% of the star's total energy output. That is to say, the Dyson Shield turned 99.8% of the energy the star released into usable power.

I felt confident in saying that was more than an actual Dyson Sphere, since those would produce a lot of infrared light, and likely required just as much energy for maintenance. Now, the main issue was actually finding out how to direct the energy to a place where it could be used.

Of course, the best way to go about this was to leave it to my first perk. I made sure to copy the maintenance schematics for the shield onto my compad and then hopped into a Tel'tak to take me down to the small hangar within the structure.

The entire emitter was shaped similarly to a candlestick. The base of the machine was only 30 kilometers across, while the main shaft was barely 500 meters in diameter with a height of 50 kilometers.

Of course, ‌relatively speaking, compared to even just the size of the Star Hold, let alone the Ringworld itself, the entire thing was pretty small. Despite that, it likely rivaled some DoME megastructures in sheer mass, if not purely in size. The Star League's Department of Mega Engineering had built some truly gargantuan solar arrays for terraforming inhospitable worlds. Some of those had diameters in the hundreds of kilometers.

We entered one of the half-dozen hangars that littered the entire facility. The inside had been pressurized for me to check out, so with a gentle tap on the wall, my first perk activated.

First Perk Activated. Partial Blueprint Acquired: Cybrex Dyson Shield Generator. Energy Emitter

That was… pretty simple. The power was transmitted to a few locations, including the Star Hold, and a few receivers that were on the Dyson Sphere.

I got back onto the Tel'tak, which took me to the other generator.

First Perk Activated. Partial Blueprint Acquired: Cybrex Dyson Shield Generator. Emitter Controls

That's what I was looking for. I got back into the ship and had my pilot take me back to the Stargate. After a quick walk, I was once more back with the good people from DoME. "I can get it to work."

A cheer filled the room. Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. Now that we actually had an official bureaucracy, I needed confirmation from someone higher up. The new president quickly signed off on the project, and before I knew it, I was making my way to one of the Power Receivers.

I had downloaded the information on the facility from the Starhold Databanks, so with the DoME researchers and the bud in tow, we approached the massive tower that pointed out of the surface towards the sun.

Using one of the larger hangars, we all entered the facility to find it completely devoid of any decoration. Luckily, we knew where we were going.

It took us just a few minutes to find one of the strange rooms through which the power was routed from the tower to the rest of the Ringworld.

In reality, the Ringworld could operate with just the power it received from the sun directly, but the extra power certainly didn't hurt. Though with the knowledge of the inner workings of the Ringworld's Environmental Maintenance Systems, I could say that these were not originally part of the structure. The EM systems had been cut away around the structure to fit it in.

With help, I disabled the power to the room and, using newly manufactured Naquadah wiring, I connected the bud. It didn't even take that long, which was a massive weight off my mind.

Once we were sure everything had been properly connected, and ran some connection tests, everyone left the room. Using only cameras that had been placed as far away from the flower as possible, we watched as I hit the button.

Instantly, the cables seemed to snap, as the massive magnetic field that was induced due to the massive current pulled on all the magnetic material within the room. Luckily, they had all been tied down sufficiently to prevent any damage.

For two long minutes, it seemed as though nothing was happening. Finally, someone seemed to have noticed something. "It's gotten bigger."

Opening my compad, I compared the images, and sure enough. The bud had grown ever so slightly bigger. I gulped and turned to the major. "How much power is that thing taking?"

The major looked rather pale as well. "About 2000 times the output of a Ha'tak reactor."

I shuddered. That was… absolutely batshit insane. It wasn't even close to a fraction of a percent of the overall production of the Dyson Shield, but it was far more energy than we had access to anywhere else. Over the next four hours, the bud slowly opened up to reveal an absolutely beautiful red and yellow flower of not inconsiderable size.

The stem itself was already a meter in height, and this flower was almost as wide. Luckily, the cylindrical structure that had been used to keep it contained was actually large enough to prevent it from getting squashed.

After 10 minutes of inactivity from the flower, we finally cut off the power supply. The Major turned to me. "Thanks for the help. There is no way we would have been capable of opening her up without you."

I nodded. "Absolutely. We needed to get an understanding of the Ringworld's power generation at some point. It's good that we figured this out now rather than in an emergency."

We began packing up. The flower was wheeled off while I began inspecting the Naquadah wires. Naquadah was an absolutely insane wonder material. This wire could conduct an absolutely massive energy flow, and as far as I could tell, it resulted in no flaws or breaks within the material itself.

While the intermission had been fun, it was time to return to the XJF project.

- - -
Author's Note:
So, the researchers don't have a regular powersource capable of making the flower bloom, so they have to use a power source that is several thousand times over-kill (power-wise). 2000 Ha'tak reactors is not even a fraction of a fraction of a percentage of the total energy output of a star. If anyone knows how I could explain that better in the story, then lemme know.

Chapter #65 was out yesterday on Discord, and the return to the Inner Sphere has finally begun. 65 itself is still technically in the Deep Periphery, but its within the sphere of influence of the Inner Sphere, so I'm going to count it.

If you wanna read it, then join at this link: [ LINK: https://discord.com/invite/dbVKfqYw5T ]