[Message from Alliance Central Government for all Reaver Companies. Two worlds have been reported missing as of this morning. The entire population has vanished, leaving no trace of violence, conflict or the source of the attack.] The message in Max's daily morning brief informed him.
Now, that was much more concerning than the usual messages about trade conflicts, the Reavers introducing disruptive products to the market and the petty political squabbling that never seemed to end.
Whole worlds full of people didn't just go missing. That wasn't a thing that happened. At least it wasn't on their end of the universe.
Here it happened with alarming regularity, and everyone knew where they were going. But what would the Darklings need with a bunch of peaceniks from a backwater colony in the Alliance? They didn't have any advanced technology that the Darklings might be interested in, and neither planet had a particularly high population.
It didn't make any sense for the Darklings to have taken them, but there weren't really any other suspects unless there was something on those planets that the memo didn't mention. Watching who came to claim the empty worlds would give them a much better answer as to why they had vanished than simply speculating from the other side of the universe.
There was also news from Uncle Lu. They were working on a mass production Super Heavy Mecha based on the schematics for their new units, which Nico had sent over. He had grand plans to redesign the whole aesthetic to be more to his tastes, which Max feared would end up as a walking cathedral. There wasn't much he could do to stop the eccentric man, but someone would surely step in if he tried to put simulated stained glass windows on the armour plating.
His message had also come with a request that Max send over more data. Nico had sent the completed design, but none of the research data, design steps or the half dozen new scientific theories that had been implemented in order to make the Mecha work as well as they did.
Nobody on his staff could determine how or why it worked, only that it did, and if they messed with it, it stopped working entirely.
Max could sense the frustration in his message, even with just text, so he prepared the information that the man had requested and then scrolled through the rest of the messages.
They had another birthday coming up soon, and Mary Tarith was requesting that they return if possible.
The Reavers had ten more Destroyers full of new pattern space capable Titan Class Mecha ready to finish out the requisition that the Koleska had made nearly a year ago when Max and Nico had first arrived here, so their presence wasn't urgently needed, other than for research.
The daily updates from Felicity were as entertaining as always. The AI had taken on the role of a nameless marketing executive, giving advice to businesses aboard the World Ship, supposedly as a government service. She provided them with market data and various plans to improve customer service, loyalty and public happiness, which she declared was the direction of Max himself.
ραΠdαsΝοvel.cοm In a way, it was. He had told her to take good care of them and keep them happy within the regulations set forth.
The video clips that Felicity had sent from various events on board were all looking like a good time, and from what he could tell, crime was down. Both arrests and reports were down, and requisitions for building goods in established neighbourhoods were way down as well, suggesting that property damage was declining, whether criminal or for the purpose of renovation.
The World Ship's economic data looked good, and the memo that he got from the Governing Council said basically the same thing that Felicity did, though without the personalized touch of the AI, who seemed quite emotionally invested in the enjoyment of the events that she was asked to help plan.
The report from Terminus was much more interesting than the others. The students were on school vacation, and they had stopped at a newly renovated resort world in the Death Wind Territory, with following stops along the Border Nations.
The unfortunate Admiral was drowned in students, parents, and Alliance tourists to the point that every room was booked full, and they were having extra guests try to sneak in above the room occupancy limits so that they could get a space at the party.
It sounded like utter chaos but in a good way for the ship.
The Academy was building a reputation for excellence, and they would be hosting an international science competition once the next semester started, in which they had high hopes of winning podium places, according to the Headmistress.
That would be an incredible accomplishment for any new Academy, especially for one that was being run by a multispecies group. Focused learning techniques for a single species often turned out the top minds in the Alliance, and that was a model that the Academy on Terminus had totally avoided with their "all qualified students are welcome" attitude.
Other than that, things seemed to be normal, but the two missing planets worth of colonists kept popping up in Max's mind as something that should be looked into by someone with more knowledge than a low-paid investigative police force from a planet that had never heard of the colony before.
Not by him personally, though. It needed to be done quickly, and Mary Tarith would probably show up like the Arisen Army to murder him in his sleep if he didn't bring Nico back for at least one major event a year.
Plus, it was her birthday, and that was a CAKE holiday. Once she remembered that it was her birthday coming up, she would definitely want to go back home for a day or two.
It might do the researchers some good to see what a human family interaction was like, even if it was a family as insane as the Tarith Family. They were here to learn new things, after all.
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