2209.05.01
You owe Captain Dragomirov a nice bottle of wine over the "puzzle or ruins" bet the two of you made. Completing the last of the puzzles - arranging a set of blocks so as to represent the decay of the Higgs boson - caused ancient machinery to whir to life, spinning up a hologram depicting the solar system with a marker placed on the Jovian moon of Io, alongside scrolling lines of text. Linguists are already doing their best to puzzle out what the message means, but at this point it is fairly clear there
is a message, and it was intended to be found.
On the one hand, it's a bit creepy. But on the other, it's heartening to know that the species that inhabited the galaxy in eons past did
something other than ruining their homeworlds and killing each other.
The Maui departs for Jupiter.
2209.07.01
"Okay, and what do these 'aerosolized exotic particles'
do?" you ask Captain Reid, rubbing your temples. The good captain, insistent on checking every corner of every system she enters, had gathered samples of an unusual substance from a toxin-coated moon in Andack, which she seems extremely excited about.
"So far, it seems to have mild mood-boosting and hallucinatory properties," she reports, beaming.
Wait, what? You place your hands on your desk. "Captain Reid. I don't recall seeing a request to conduct a study on human subjects come across my desk."
"With respect ma'am, I've read the regulations, and you don't need to file a request to test something on yourself."
You can practically hear your blood pressure rising. "You discovered a rare and exotic material as part of a United Nations-funded scientific expedition and decided to, what, snort it? Huff it?"
This drug use thing is getting a bit out of hand. Order Captain Reid to return for a stint in rehab?
[X] (Drugs) Yes (The Einstein returns to Sol; Beatrice is out of action, with a 10% chance each month to lose the 'Substance Abuser' trait and return to active duty).
[] (Drugs) No, not unless it starts interfering with the quality of her work.
You decide to order the Einstein to survey Uskion next, as it's a hyperspace jump closer to earth, while you make your decision.
2209.10.01
Kore's local administration has officially commenced its first meeting, and is happy to informs you that their atmosphere shares similar hallucinatory properties to their sister colony's! (Oh joy, more drugs.) It's not at all clear how or why the planets developed such similar flora - perhaps a future study for Captain Wang, who is now busily surveying systems inside the Sejanis Expanse nebula which are resistant to long-range scans.
In more concrete news, Captain Reid reports the discovery of a primitive form of spaceship - a 'solar sailer' powered only by its home star - orbiting the gas giant Uskion V. (Why is it always gas giants with this woman?)
Under your new, more expansion-focused leadership, the Sumoneta system has been brought into humanity's sphere of influence by the new construction fleet, while the other has been sent to accompany Captain Okada further afield.
2210.01.01
Election year! The next three months will be hellish, as campaign season always is.
Will the thread, acting as the population of humanity, support a candidate? You currently have an accumulated 2200 Unity. For context, the next tier of the Expansion tradition tree costs 2500 Unity, and you generate 80 per month. Support costs 500 Unity and appears to boost the candidate's chances by roughly 10% per time. You can vote for the same candidate multiple times using "[X] (Elect) Candidate x2", x3 etc.
[X] (Elect) No, let democracy play out.
[] (Elect) Pavel Dragomirov (Currently head xenoarchaeologist; 19% chance)
[] (Elect) Cordelia Whitfield (Currently Exoplanetary Secretary; 26% chance)
[] (Elect) Katya Zhivenkova (Currently leading Physics research; 26% chance)
[] (Elect) Sophie Lebouef (Currently Secretary General, 28% chance)
Galactic Situation said:
