“What’s the big idea, Jerry?” Seth demanded, giving the Administrator an unhappy look. “Why does the Swarm have internet access?!”
Jerry gave Seth a level glance. “Why would they not?” He asked. “There’s no longer anything on there that they’re not allowed to know.”
“You didn’t ntion this to us!” Seth protested.
“You didn’t ask.” Jerry replied.
“But…that’s not how we operate here!”
Jerry gave Seth a displeased look. “And yet you did the sa to Heather.” He pointed out.
Seth stopped cold. “But that’s…”
“Different?” Jerry prompted. “Different how? Because you’re doing it for a ‘good cause’? No. This is how you’ve chosen to act, so this is how you’re going to be treated. If it isn’t clear, I’m not happy with how you and the other gods in your coalition have been behaving.”
“Then why didn’t you just tell us?” Seth asked. “Why go through all this passive-aggressive nonsense?!”
“Do I not get a say in how this plays out?” Jerry asked. “I am not so impartial observer., I have my opinions and desires as well. But…I think this will be the extent of my interference; it’s a big enough boost for quite so ti. And, before you get any other ideas, I will help you with things as before; I will not actively sabotage your efforts, nor will I withhold my assistance. I just wished to put a finger on the scales.”
Seth was silent for a long mont. “Isn’t this a bit…large for a finger on the scales?” He asked weakly.
Jerry raised an eyebrow. “I simply did not give you information unprompted. You were more than capable of realizing the ramifications of your actions, and did not think things through all the way.”
Seth didn’t have a coback to that. Jerry had always impressed upon his Higher Beings the importance of thinking through their actions, and he, along with the others, had failed to do so in their haste. “I understand.”
“Good. Now, please do a favor and call the rest of the Higher Beings here; this conversation has made realize that it is high ti we hold a eting about the brewing tension.”
Jerry stood at the podium of the auditorium, gazing over his Higher Beings. They had all gathered pretty quickly, and were looking at him with a sense of nervous anticipation. “Well…” Jerry began, “I think it’s ti we all have a discussion about recent events, and about the Swarm. I have to admit that I haven’t handled this in the best way, and I’ve let us beco divided.
“So, I want us to sit down and talk about this like adults. To begin with, I want to make sothing clear; no more withholding information from each other, no more acting in bad faith. It happened once with Heather, and again when I didn’t explicitly say that breaking information restrictions would also an the Swarm could potentially access the internet. All it’s doing is driving us further apart, and to go any further would risk a catastrophic schism. If it happens again, there will be severe consequences.
“With that out of the way, give a mont to lay out my feelings on the swarm in their entirety. It is no secret that my belief is that the Swarm should be allowed to take over and beco the status quo should they prove themselves capable of doing so, but allow to once again explain why I believe this.
“This all cos back to power, and specifically the power to defend ourselves from outside threats. Our current peace is maintained only by the promise of mutually assured destruction, and being able to project significant our power during the battle for planes is paramount in assuring others that we have not gone soft.
“And, in the event that we are thrust into another war, our universe will be on the front lines, both as a target and as a protector. We protect not only our own, but countless others, and we need the strength to back that up. This may seem extre to so of you, given our long period of peace, but I assure you that, when our peace is broken, it will begin to make more sense.
“I think it is no coincidence that almost all of us who were alive during the Administrator War support the Swarm to so extent. We have no wish to see repeats of what happened before, and this is a comparatively small price to pay for increased security in the future. For those of you who were not around during the war, no matter which side of this debate you are on, I would ask that you once again go and look through the Administrator War section of the archives. Preventing that is the ultimate aim of allowing this.
“And, in my eyes, we are responsible for the Swarm’s existence and perpetuation, not Alia, not Lia, not Rose. We were the ones who turned a blind eye to the Urge for so long, which resulted in Alia, and we chose not to stop her when she was experinting. And then I was the one who didn’t stop her when it looked like she would succeed. She didn’t know better at the ti, and even now I am the one mandating that they move forward.
“This is to say that I would ask that you don’t hold any personal animosity towards them. As several of you have said, it is just that their line for what is acceptable for the ‘greater good’ is different from yours. And, as I have ntioned to a few of you, I have recently made up my mind to make them into Higher Beings should they succeed. That ans I’ll expect you to treat them like any other Higher Being; you don’t have to be friends, but I need you to at least be cordial to them.”
He sighed pensively. “I’m not asking you to suddenly switch sides or anything. I’m just asking that we all approach this more amicably. I understand that this is incredibly divisive, and that’s reasonable, but let’s not burn millennia of good working relations over it…yes, Dana?”
Dana, Goddess of Dreams, lowered her hand. “I’m not going to pretend I understand what the Administrator War was like, because I don’t. But…do you really think this will be best for our people in the long run? That this new way of life is better than the old one?”
“Yes.” Jerry said. “While it is admittedly a heavy-handed way of doing things, it does fix many of the issues we struggle with and provides previously unthinkable opportunities for technological advancent. The war itself is kinder than most as well, so I believe that, in the end, the benefits will far outweigh the drawbacks. I believe the coming couple of years will be an excellent proof-of-concept for what I anticipate might co in the future.”
“We’ve done biotech before.” Dana pointed out. “It’s not necessarily better, and the Swarm hasn’t done anything to resolve the outstanding issues with it, like needing to feed everything.”
“A fair point, but I think you’ll find that, with the sheer mutability the Swarm provides that standard engineering wouldn’t, those problems will be significantly less of a hurdle.” Jerry replied.
“Why not just take the good parts then?” Dana pressed. “We leave Ratha alone, and work on making a new system that allows people to transform life in that way.”
“Have you looked at their system?” Jerry asked, raising an eyebrow.
Dana paused. “Not in detail, no. Why? Is it that hard to separate?”
“It’s a ss. A huge ss, one that I’ve been trying to untangle and have been making little headway in. Alia will be helping with this in the future, but it’s not quite as simple as just picking out the parts we like and the parts we don’t. It’s a package deal, and for solving the randomness problem with additional upsides? I think it’s worth it. Yes, Hector?”
“What about the precedent this sets?” Hector, God of Heroes, asked. “That mortals can play god and we’ll just let them?”
“What about it?” Jerry replied, frowning. “We never forbade it, not when it had been attempted before, and not now. As far as I recall, we’ve only ever stepped in if it gets to the point of mass sapient experintation. Besides, those three won’t be ‘mortals’ in the public eye, so I don’t think it will get to that point. Willow?”
“I’m sorry, this is sothing of a tangent, but I’ve been wondering for a while now…on the off chance the Swarm fails,” Willow, the Goddess of War, began, admirably weathering the dirty looks so of the other gods gave her, “or in the more realistic scenario that we run out of Worship to fund World Saviors before things run their course, how are we going to handle our planes? I an…people are already getting used to having a asure of connectivity between planes, I feel it would be kind of cruel to suddenly take that away from them. Are we going to connect our planes like Amy does or are we going to have them go no contact again?”
“It’s a question I’ve been pondering myself.” Jerry said. “Unlike Amy, we don’t have a standardized system between our planes, which makes integration a lot harder. That’s yet another benefit of the Swarm; it allows us to do so in a sowhat easy way. But…I think it is ti we consider it. I’ll begin looking into avenues for integration should the Swarm be stopped. Matthew?”
“On the subject of the Swarm failing, what will we do with their souls? I an, I assu they’d at the very least go to an afterlife instead of being reincarnated, but do we want to keep them alive and up here to keep Alia happy while she helps you?”
Jerry’s eyes flicked to Connie, who was wearing an expression of barely restrained hopefulness. “I’ll consider it.” He said. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, it’s far less involved than plane integration.”
There was a short pause before another god raised their hand. “Yes, Terrence?”
“I feel like they’re going to wipe out multiple cultures.” Terrence, God of Tradition, said. “Can we at least make them try to…not? So far they’ve just treated the world as one homogenous area and I’m worried about everything that’ll be lost.”
Jerry frowned. “Did you ever think to just ask them?”
Terrence stopped. “Well, no, but…this shouldn’t have to be said!”
Jerry sighed. “And why wouldn’t it need to be said? Lia grew up a peasant, even with the education she had courtesy of Nailah’s policies, I doubt she had much of a grasp of culture differences, especially given how cultures are still re-diversifying after Rose’s reign as the Ruby Emperor. Alia wouldn’t care to learn, and Rose either believes making no ntion of it will end up with the cultures preserved well enough or doesn’t know enough about modern Ratha culture to weigh in.
“Whatever the case, they’re reasonable people…well, Alia still isn’t quite there yet, but if you tell Lia and Rose about your worries, I wager they’d listen, and probably even agree with you. They are not normal mortals, haven’t been since Lia was reincarnated; there’s no need to hold yourself back from talking to them as equals. I understand that this isn’t your only gripe with the Swarm, and that’s fair, but just because they’re on the ‘other side’ doesn’t an you can’t have a peaceful talk with them.”
Terrence hesitated for a mont, then nodded. “I’ll do that.”
There were a couple more questions, but nothing else pressing ca up, so Jerry dismissed the gods and returned to his quarters, where he began to look for his old notes on integrating the planes. He didn’t think the Swarm would fail, but it would be good to brush up on the work he’d done in the past, just in case.
Heather sighed as Seth approached. “What do you want, Seth?” She asked icily.
“I wanted to apologize.” Seth replied. “I was out of line and I’m reflecting on my actions. I should have let you know that we would still be using your clips in promotional material. I don’t expect to be forgiven right away, but I want you to know that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to make things right.”
Heather frowned. Seth and the gods allied with him had abused her trust and hurt her deeply, and she was still upset over the betrayal. She hadn’t been sure what to do with them going forward, and she certainly wasn’t ready now. “Look,” she said, “I’m still hurting over this. I trusted you, and you stabbed in the back for…what, a tiny bit of extra oomph to your claims?
“Even that backfired once I caught wind of what was happening. I’m disappointed in how little it took to make you turn on . I don’t think I’m ready to forgive you fully just yet. I understand why you did what you did, but I don’t agree with it, nor does that make it okay. But…I’d like to hear an apology for the matter of Fae’s parents, too.”
Seth opened his mouth as if to defend himself, then paused. “I’m sorry.” He said. “If a matter such as this cos up again, you have my word that I will do my utmost to ensure it won’t go through.”
“As if your word ans anything to anymore.” Heather huffed. “But I understand the sentint. Don’t think this ans I’m changing course, though; I’m past the point of no return here, and it will take a significant change in the Swarm’s leadership style to make change my mind again.”
“I didn’t think it would.” Seth replied. “I just wanted to begin the process of making ands. But…I’ve said my piece, unless you need for sothing else, I’ll get out of your hair now.”
“Please do.” Heather said. “I’m going to go take care of my own business.”
Once he was gone, Heather let out a sigh. If she was being honest, she really did want to make up with him, deep down. She hated fights amongst the gods, and being involved in one didn’t suddenly make her more anable to the idea. But…this wasn’t a small offense, and she didn’t want to get taken advantage of in this manner again. Perhaps she just needed a couple of years to cool her head, but until then…she was going to make sure that Seth’s actions – and the actions of the gods allied with him – didn’t go unpunished.
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