• Ghosts of Eden
• Diary of Events
• The Tale of the Deceitful Monkey - Steve M's version.
• The Kurita Experimental Ship

Session 20

Roland does his best to be charming during his meal with Andi. Andi, however, is immune to his charms. Roland confirms that a number of Trilon's internal departments are also upset about the price rises for the asteroid belt. He states that his uncle, an exec 4, would be prepared to do a favour for family mongolians, apparently, being big on family. There is a clear implication that the prices would go down were Andi to resume her marriage to Robert. Roland also implies that things are afoot within Trilon: "Trilon's getting bigger - uncle's got an inside line."

Komiko checks in with everyone to ensure they will be on board in time. Robert seizes the opportunity to get her to authorise the purchase of a microwave magnetometer emitter to help him study the ceramic bugs. Komiko extracts the information that it would be useful for studying bugs from him. In the end she authorises the purchase but gives Robert a direct order that hi is to inform her of anything he will put in it.

Andi checks her messages and finds one from her family about fertility treatment. There was a solar flare incident in 2266 which afflicted all spare farers but especially the belt communities. Dr. P. Itzamna from Forethought won a tender for screening and intervention. The programme lasted a decade and was considered exceptionally good value for money by the communities involved.

The crew take the opportunity to load the Joyous Venture's file system with papers on Gantz theory, anything Trilon has on Xenoanthropology especially as relates to all the planets on the next leg of the journey. They all hang onto the high status clothing they obtained from Forethought.

Andi hacks in the Trilon Personnel records in order to assess the crew's interview records. She finds the system worryingly easy to get into however the initial criteria for recommending interviewees for short-listing are under much higher security. When Andi finally accesses them she finds that the files have been marked "CEO only" and moved to TriXi. Trilon's CEO is unknown but apparently has just moved away from Earth to TriXi. This is not on their flight plan even though its Trilon's Ursa Major Hub. The crew wonder why Komiko would not visit this, especially with the CEO there. Robert speculates that Trilon may already have a gravitic wave communicator and this might be the basis of Ichiro's offer.

Once in Hyperspace the crew relate their encounter at Forethought to Komiko. Komiko is struck by what she interprets as Ichiro's claim to be the heir of the ancestors. Much speculation follows on the possibility that Forethought might have found a cache of ancestor related artifacts on or near Prometheus. Especially striking, in this regard, is Forethought's choices of names, Prometheus, and acronyms, F.I.R.E (Forethought Industrial Research Enterprises). Komiko is deeply suspicious of Ichiro's offer and thinks him a little mad but is prepared to consent for the crew to visit the base on Ocean.

Komiko discusses the implications of the DNA intervention. She hypothesises that the first intervention prompted the development of language while the second coincided with the rise of organised civilisation. She points out that although there is little research on what the inserts do there is research that shows that damage to the insert can be linked with learning disorders.

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