The CFA officer chuckled. "Not so fast, Mr. Larkinson. Sigrund is undoubtedly responsible, but you are the person who has enabled the hybrid AI in the first place. You are the equivalent of a child who pressed a button on a console that accidentally caused a battleship to fire a main cannon onto a populated planetary surface. The weapon systems merely do as instructed. It is you, the button pusher, that holds actual responsibility for the damage inflicted as a result of your actions." "That's unfair! Your analogy is complete nonsense! Those 'weapon systems' you are referring to are not unthinking machines. They are instead controlled by at least one sentient, intelligent alien individual. Sigrund is the real button pusher!" Ves quickly came up with two names. "The first bastard who ruined so many planets is Senator For Life Camden Tovar. That old geezer was desperate to obtain a vial of high-grade life-prolonging treatment serum, but didn't have the MTA merits to redeem one through the proper channels. Instead, he followed up on the alien equivalent of a scam call and send a troop of disposable soldiers into the deep frontier where the sandman race traditionally resided. Even if that old and greedy scumbag could not foresee the existence of a monster like Sigrund, he is definitely the original decision maker who bears the guilt of tipping the first domino stone!" Captain Reze weighed this argument but shook his head shortly afterwards. "His hands are stained with blood. There is no doubt about that. However, his guilt does not absolve yours, Mr. Larkinson. You were in a position to stop or prevent multiple states from getting wiped out in their entirety, but instead you decided to act in your own self-interest which inadvertently doomed more than a quadrillion human lives. You can deny your culpability for these crimes all you want, but it is through your hand that all of these life-bearing planets have died en masse!" "I reject your description." Ves stubbornly crossed his armored arms. "You can spin the tragedies of Sand War in so many different ways. What you say might be true, but only if you look at it from a specific angle. It just so happens that I completely disagree with your stance. I may have been closer to the action, but I was just a single cog in an enormous machine. How can you possibly expect me to exert any agency over my actions? I was drafted by the Bright Republic's Mech Corps at the time, so I had no choice but to follow orders and complete the mission to the best of my ability. Are you saying that is wrong, Captain? Is the CFA in the habit of allowing its subordinates to disobey direct orders and deliberately sabotage their assigned missions?" That was a clever argument. Captain Reze could pretend as if he was a harbinger of justice all he wanted, but Ves knew quite well that the CFA had far more blood in its hands! The fleeter responded with an acknowledging nod. "You have made a decent point. The CFA's hierarchy must be respected. Officers have the ability to disobey their instructions, but only under a strict set of narrow rules. To be frank, I am opposed to the blind respect towards authority and lack of flexibility in our organization. While that may have held the CFA together over the centuries, many developments have taken place that leads me to suspect that we are not adapting fast enough to respond to the threats that are approaching from multiple directions." Ves looked surprised. "That is... a rather progressive take on the situation. I did not expect to hear that from a fleeter." "I am not an average fleeter." Captain Reze grinned at Ves. "I truly wish that my real self is here at the moment. He could make excellent use of the information that I currently bear. Would you like to make contact with him after you have concluded your ordeals? You can contact me directly and without attracting the attention of the Big Two by sending a specific code to this address." The CFA officer projected a galactic net address as well as an entire page that was composed of random numbers, letters and symbols. Ves grimaced at the sight. "I don't have a habit of colluding with the CFA. Besides, do you think I'm a fool who knows nothing about spycraft? I also see no reason why I should send an encrypted message to a remote stalker. Who knows how many of my secrets you are attempting to leak to your principal!" Captain Reze did not admit his guilt but waved the encrypted message away. "Fine, then. Just send a random message if you wish. The contents of your letter are of no consequence as long as my real self is able to deduce that it comes from you. He will question you why you have learned about him, but I am sure he will be happy to open a dialogue with you. Even he is able to tell that you are a mech designer that will wield great influence over the mech industry and human society in the future." "No offense, Captain Reze, but don't you have a job to do at the moment?" Ves grew impatient again. "You're supposed to be judging me for my sins or something. I don't think this dream sequence will be happy if you keep taking advantage of this special moment to help your original self." The CFA officer smiled. "You are correct. Do not reject this opportunity. You will need all of the allies that you can get in the Red Ocean. My real self may be a part of the CFA, but that does not mean he rejects what mechs and the MTA stands for. If you talk to him, you will find that he is more open-minded than other fleeters. Sooner or later, you will grow influential enough that you will attract greater scrutiny from us. Would you prefer to be monitored by a hardliner who detests mechs with every fiber of his being, or would you rather be handled by a more supportive element of the CFA?" "Hm, you make a good point. I will consider your offer." Avoiding the CFA all the time was not a permanent solution. Although Ves relied on the MTA to shield him from probes, sooner or later he would become too prominent to hide the full implications of his expanding works. If Ves managed to build a bridge with an arm of the CFA, then he would not only be able to understand the powerful naval organization's stances a lot better, but also have the option to negotiate deals with the help of an insider. "Let us get back on track." Captain Reze said and waved his arm across the surrounding space. "Seeing that you refuse to admit culpability towards the massive death toll of the Sand War, let us move to a different war that is much more directly related to your actions." The surroundings changed to show a cityscape that was engulfed by fires, explosions and lots of fighting. Ves initially wondered where he was, but soon noticed several mobs of armed and angry heavy gravity variant humans fighting against each other. Hardly any of them looked like professional soldiers. They all appeared to be civilians that had just picked up a weapon or two before proceeding to run out into the streets and fight against any dwarf that belonged to the other side! "The scripture doesn't lie! Vulcan is a human!" A fanatic claimed as he lifted up a small totem of Vulcan in the guise of a human in one hand and recklessly fired his laser rifle with his other hand. An opposing dwarf lifted up a statuette of Vulcan in the guise of a dwarf. "You foul tall folk admirer! Our greatest dwarven god is not a human! He is a dwarf and the most magnificent one of all! Death to the tall folk and their misguided slaves!" Dwarven blood spilled across the ground in such great quantities that whatever street maintenance bots were active simply weren't able to mop it all up fast enough! Soon enough, mechs started to get into the picture as well. A stocky mech of dwarven proportions even crashed the current firefight by stomping through a structure and planting its feet directly onto the largest concentration of Vulcanites that were aligned to the Dwarven God Cult! "Our prayers have been answered!" More mechs showed up. Loyalists and rebels began to tear up the streets with such great intensity that the fanatics on foot who tried to contribute to the fight in their own way inevitably got squashed or struck by collateral damage. The surroundings shifted. A different planet came into view. The architecture was different, but the battles were roughly the same. The dream sequence rapidly flicked from planet to planet. Sometimes, Ves got a close and personal view of the ground action. Other times, he hovered in orbit where he could look down on how the religious dispute had engulfed so many different population centers. The civil war that had spread across the Vulcan Empire had become so violent and destructive that too few dwarves were paying attention to the humans anymore. That was a mistake. While the Vulcanites were completely absorbed by the throes of fanaticism, the surrounding human polities bordered the Smiling Samuel Star Sector sharpened their knives while watching with glee. Once the Vulcan Empire had beaten itself up extensively enough, those human states pounced! Mech army after mech army poured in from all sides! Though the Vulcan Empire's vast and extensive military still maintained a large amount of defensive troops who had largely stayed out of the religious strife, the dwarven mechs could only hold the line for a time. Without the support and unity of a functional dwarven state, there was no way for the Vulcanite mech armies to hold back the onslaught for long! Planet after planet that had already become half-ruined by dwarven infighting toppled within days as vengeful human invaders easily crushed the remnants that were still fighting their futile struggle. The dream of an ideal dwarven state was over. The Vulcan Empire collapsed and much of the Smiling Samuel Star Sector returned to human hands. Though the human invaders tried their best not to commit wholesale slaughter on the dwarven people in order to avoid condemnation, they were anything but gentle in their treatment of the humanphobic Vulcanites. Ves watched all of this happen with a neutral expression. He understood quite well what had happened to the Vulcan Empire during this period. Unlike the Sand War, it was not easy for him to deny his involvement in the events that took place in Smiling Samuel! "Well? What do you have to say, Mr. Larkinson? Do you acknowledge your primary responsibility for stoking sectarian strife in a large dwarven state that has directly led to the deaths of countless dwarven lives and an even greater loss of property? Do you admit your culpability in the fall of the Vulcan Empire and a direct loss of confidence among the dwarves who live in the rest of human space?" Ves vigorously denied the accusations. "What? No! It's not my fault these dwarves decided to go to war over each other! I just distributed a lot of statues, that was all. What the Vulcanites do with them is their business. Those fanatics decided to go to war against their perceived enemies on their own accord. I never compelled them to ruin their own state." "Look at what you have wrought, Mr. Larkinson! You are the progenitor of the Vulcan Empire! Your meddling of the past has led to the rise of a dwarven state that has always rested on a foundation that is deeply flawed. It is through your reckless and thoughtless actions that the division among the Vulcanites existed in the first place. A destructive civil war was already on the horizon. Yet instead of using your abilities to mend the wounds and temper the Vulcanites as you have done with the Hexers, you instead abused your craft to escalate the conflict, thereby causing it to set the Vulcan Empire aflame!"