[Ah; so it's this line, is it. He frowns at his glass, thoughtfully, then:]
I see what you're saying, and I hate to disappoint you, but I doubt there's anything like that hidden away on the Sixth. Somewhere else, maybe, [and his gaze flicks up from his glass of water very briefly, very pointedly, like maybe has she consulted the other local Imperial citizens about this? hm?] but the things in our archives have been read. An Empire that lasts ten thousand years doesn't leave its smoking guns lying around in a library; even a highly protected, helium-sealed one.
[The Sixth has always been called the Emperor's reason, a moniker Palamedes has assumed, based on his own instincts and those of everyone he's known from home, to be a tongue-in-cheek way of acknowledging that their long-late founder said "no" a lot. He doesn't know for sure and he's certain he never will, because God is a liar and his Saint refuses to say anything directly, but still:
Historically, people have read the contents of the Sixth archives, and no one back home was ever so devout as to write off an obvious damage-doer as "just part of the Emperor's grand plan," or anything.
There's something else.]
Someone like me isn't going to crash down an entire solar system to prove a point. Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the man, and a person only needs to be called an unfinished inbred by the Empire's most lovingly devout once to think, hm, maybe religion isn't it for me? But there are people I won't gamble with, there and here.
[He holds up his hands, like, hold on;] Still, it's not as hard as you think to push buttons. Just tell him you don't want to be in his special club of people whose lives he claims ownership of and he'll nearly eat his own tongue.
no subject
I see what you're saying, and I hate to disappoint you, but I doubt there's anything like that hidden away on the Sixth. Somewhere else, maybe, [and his gaze flicks up from his glass of water very briefly, very pointedly, like maybe has she consulted the other local Imperial citizens about this? hm?] but the things in our archives have been read. An Empire that lasts ten thousand years doesn't leave its smoking guns lying around in a library; even a highly protected, helium-sealed one.
[The Sixth has always been called the Emperor's reason, a moniker Palamedes has assumed, based on his own instincts and those of everyone he's known from home, to be a tongue-in-cheek way of acknowledging that their long-late founder said "no" a lot. He doesn't know for sure and he's certain he never will, because God is a liar and his Saint refuses to say anything directly, but still:
Historically, people have read the contents of the Sixth archives, and no one back home was ever so devout as to write off an obvious damage-doer as "just part of the Emperor's grand plan," or anything.
There's something else.]
Someone like me isn't going to crash down an entire solar system to prove a point. Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the man, and a person only needs to be called an unfinished inbred by the Empire's most lovingly devout once to think, hm, maybe religion isn't it for me? But there are people I won't gamble with, there and here.
[He holds up his hands, like, hold on;] Still, it's not as hard as you think to push buttons. Just tell him you don't want to be in his special club of people whose lives he claims ownership of and he'll nearly eat his own tongue.