In The Hallowed Halls of Harvard
Meeting of the Collegiate Council
On a small stage what was once an audience chamber there stood a small stage, before which approximately sixty seats have been assembled, on which sat the members of the council, an exclusive club of the top-of-the-top, creme de la creme of the two thousand strong caste of the Majors.
On the stage, a podium of debate there sat an embellished table, whose hand-carved walls spoke of the history of the Harvardians, behind it sat three people, like judges, the Grand Rector, Provost, and Vice-Provost, the people holding the de facto executive power of the state. Allan Lowe struck his gavel against the desk, he was the arbiter of the Sacred Debate, and held one-third of the veto power.
"My fellow esteemed, we meet to discuss the course of our nation for this week, and next months, many issues are facing our state, but I trust that with your voice being heard, you shall provide only the best solutions to the maladies that plague us, let us begin, who shall first take the stand, and who shall be their opponent?"
He began, now came the tense waiting, who first shall take voice, who first will speak up and engage in combat on words that have always been so honorably fought in these buildings. One of them stood up, his hand straight up.
"Yes?" Allan asked.
"As my fellow honored are aware, winter has once again came to these lands, and I believe I have a solution, we could farm every day of every year, not stopping for winter, if we set up indoor farming." He spoke, before making his way to one of the debate stands.
Then another member stood up, proclaiming:
"I shall be his opponent!" She said, also making her way to one of the debate stands.
"Very well, you two may begin." The Rector proclaimed.
"As I previously said, my project is incredibly simple, to set up indoor farming plants, we have the critical heaters and lamps to accomplish this task, and we have a multitude of old buildings we could refurbish to become dedicated farms, no longer would we need to rely on traditional farming and would be able to free up hundreds of brute hand and assistant minds."
"You may have the necessary resources, except one critical, you lack electrical energy, whatever old world plants we could repurpose, and those of our own creations are already working full time."
"Couldn't we just build more powerplants?"
"The rapid winds of the bay don't stretch for long near the shore, unless you find a way of colonizing Dead Salem."
"Hmm, yes, the space is quite limited, however, we have access to a powerplant which generates enormous amounts of energy from the old world, surely, we could awaken it."
"The station is on a reservoir, we may awaken it, even operating a skeleton crew for a short period of time, but we lack then the power to pump the water back in."
"The Barbarians that raided us have in their possession a nuclear powerplant that was deactivated just before the collapse, they won't use it, why won't we take it and reawaken the fission."
"The Collapse took time, we don't know its makeup, we don't know if it is even operational, the barbarians may just be sitting in empty buildings that used to house these instruments of fission."
"Then what do you propose?! We starve!"
"We should have enough supply, we still have hunting and fishing until the bay fully freezes over, even if not, we could still fasten our belts and ration our food."
He looked like he still wanted to say something, but was taking a painfully long time to do it, eventually, the Grand Rector buried his hopes, striking his gavel, announcing the end of their duel.
"Mr. Kowalski, I must side with Mrs. Ellis, your project may not proceed, you may bring it up again to convince us if we should allow you to run a test plant, however, you may only do so in the summer."
Provost and Vice-Provost then gave a short.
"Aye."
Both opponents went back to their seats, one debate was over, many more to come.
Life is Slow, on the Freezing Water
A Fishing Boat
He enjoyed the swaying of the boat, he always liked it, back and forth, back and forth, he closed his eyes and rocked to the tune of the swaying, it was like mother's comfort, gently hugging her son and rocking with him to calm him, back and forth, back and forth, back and.
He got woke up by a slam before him, and a voice he knew telling him.
"We caught fish!"
His friend then put a crate of newly caught fishes, he, in turn, started to take them from the crate, and with his cleaver, he started chopping the fishes head before with a couple of swift motions he also descaled the fish, with the scales flying everywhere, gutted it, and then made it slide to another container, that one full of ice.
He got done by around the same time his friend came back, with another crate, he sure was lucky to be able to be on a ship with his friend, it really made the work fly easily.
"Hey, what was that you were doing previously?" He asked
"You know, no work, so I nodded off, the sea rocks here so gently I imagined it was my mama that was hugging me again."
He replied, while gutting, decapitating, and descaling yet another crate of fishes, as they were chatting mid-work. Suddenly a horrible, ear-splitting sound could be heard from the left side of the ship. Both of them raced there.
Looking over the edge, they saw a chunk of frozen ice scraping itself by their ship before finally leaving them alone. Then so suddenly as to be even more sudden than the sea ice showing up, the Dean-Captain got out of his cabin.
"Aye, get back to your work!" He commanded
"Sir, there's, there's sea ice!" Somebody from the back of the crowd shouted.
"Ice?! Dammit! Well, we've got a couple of weeks of fishing, so let's make the most of it, everyone, to their station!"
Everybody cheered along with the captain before going off to work on their station. The captain walked back to his cabin, these Brutes were all supposed to be half-idiots, he thought to himself, then why does he keep noticing as if something brighter within them was shining through, from his room he looked at the Brute that was previously rocking back and forth, yes, he was sure he notified a glimpse of something in there."
In The Hallowed Halls of Harvard
Continued Meeting of the Collegiate Council
Fruitless debates were waged for hours, mostly on the continued preservation of knowledge, neither one being promising, neither one leading anywhere, Allan was tired of this, endless debates on how to best preserve paper, and which department actually should keep the tomes of preserved knowledge and schematics, both preserved, and reverse-engineered. Then finally someone stood up, who had a more interesting idea.
"My fellow honored, I'm sure you too have started picking up something on long-dead radio channels, it seems, the Endless Radiophonic Silence has finally been broken, I propose we triangulate from where the signal is coming from, from my entry calculations, it won't be particularly hard."
Allan knew this man, the leader of the Department of Applied Mathematics, as the name implies, tasked with preservation, continuing, and furthering the mathematical thought of yesteryear. Another man then also stood up, Allan recognized him as the head of the Eugenics Programme.
"What do you want to triangulate it for? To break the policy of Pure Isolation, idle curiosity? Both reasons are outrageous!"
Vice-Provost signaled the two men to take their stands, before a fight would break out amongst the Collegiates, breaking the policy of Pure Isolation that has been the core tenet of the Eugenics Programme and the effort to increase human intelligence to its limits has always been controversial, no one would yet dare allow for anyone to enter their border, let alone migrate, that could mire what they were constructing for generations, but many have since felt that not allowing on-border trade and research and trade caravans was choking them, that movement has been invigorated recently, nearly every Major remembered the tragedy of those few bullets striking the bricks of Harvard, horror of horrors, one bullet even broke a window.
"I want to triangulate it to know how far away it is, and if it may be a threat, additionally, perhaps with the Rector's blessing, we could send an expedition to there to know the message, and know the sender, and gather knowledge."
"So you want to break the policy! Do you not understand what that entails, no, we need to preserve what is already in our borders."
"There is nothing more, we cataloged everything, unless we stumble onto something that even the old world knew nothing of, then our purpose will be for naught as we will be preserving nothing, knowledge not applied is knowledge wasted."
"The risks are too great! What if they will want to come to us, or any of the Brutes or Assistants you'd take on such journey would be seduced by the outsiders, it would ruin everything."
"And if we don't do this our genetics will soon look less like a tree and more like a circle, this is why we still allow for peak specimens to settle in our borders if they find us, but our standards are too high for anyone outside the Programme to be able to complete them, you will doom us eventually."
"Do you not hear what you speak! Do you want your children to be idiots because you found out there some half-savage woman, and your faulty hormonal impulses made you think you fell for her?!"
"Every pursuit comes with an inherent risk, by not risking you don't progress, and we vowed to only progress."
"Some risks are too big!"
"But this one isn't!"
The debate was quickly devolving into a screaming match, seeing the writing on the wall, the Grand Rector banged his gavel.
"That is enough, this project shall proceed unhampered."
The Grand Rector decreed, thus breaking for what may be the first time, a long-held taboo. The Provost and Vice-Provost looked at him with uncertainty, but after a period of deliberation during which a tense silence stretched over the hall, but eventually, they went back to their normal position, seemingly not objecting, but not approving either.
Border Control, Intelligence Passport
Border Guard Station on an Old World Asphalt Road
"Hey, what ya' doing after our shift?" He begun rather awkwardly, he was on border guarding duty with a new person stationed in their force, the border here was calm, very calm in fact, there weren't many visitors around here.
He rather liked it like that, he could just enjoy the nature, he really liked how the nature looked, though he wouldn't dare tread into it without company, 'foaming at mouth, shoot on sight', he recited in his memory one of the many short nature-warning poems that he was taught during training as a young boy of no more than 10, apparently, they were supposed to help him remember things, though, quite ironically, he couldn't remember how the assistants called it.
"You know, nothing much, just going to eat, I don't really know anyone here." The woman, draped in the same uniform as his replied.
"Well, you could come to my barracks." He proposed, before feeling a bit hot and going red on the face as he realized what he's said. "I mean, I-i have the, uh, poker night with some friends, and, maybe you, um, could join, you know how to play poker?"
"Not really, but I'd love to join, if you'll teach me how to play poker." She replied with a smile.
"Oh! Great!, I'm sorry if I sounded, a bit, you know."
"Yeah, don't wo-" she got cut as both of them heard a noise, a snap of a branch.
In a moment the jovial tone of the two border guards vanished, as they grabbed their rifle previously swung over their shoulder, and turned towards the direction of the sound, pointing their guns there. Their instincts snapping into place, a strange mixture of dopamine and adrenaline was being released by their body into their system, they, of course, knew not of it.
"Who's there! Show yourself!" He shouted.
"You have trespassed onto Harvardian territory! Show yourself or we'll open fire!" She added.
Soon enough some brushed rustled as a young-looking man with tattered clothes and a backpack emerged with arms up, he was incredibly dirty. Seeing that the trespasser was not hostile, he lowered his rifle.
"Follow me." He ordered, soon after they were walking in a column with him up front, the man, and her closing it.
"I do not know who you are, but we will subject you to a test to see if you can settle here." He told the man a line he was trained to tell.
"Settle? I-i, I just want to trade, my family is living near a river, please sir, we've heard of what the Harvardians have done, we wanted to just humbly ask for help, it's winter and we can't gro-" He cut his pleas off before finishing with another line trained to a t.
"You've come here, it means you are here to either settle, or attack."
Back at the forward outpost they lead the man into a room with only one entrance and a window through which he apparently could not see them, but they can him. She went to guard the entrance while He reported to their dean-assistant.
"Ma'am, a settler has came.,"
"A settler? Well, that's new here, I'll do the test, you can go back to your duties, someone else will carry them out if needed." The dean replied, already searching her drawers for something.
They've went back, no sense in hanging around, especially to see the test results, from what he heard nearly no one succeeded it, maybe for the better, he had a feeling any outsider would feel lost in their country. Going back to their post up on the road, he started telling Her about how to play poker, as if nothing had happened.
In The Hallowed Halls of Harvard
Continued Meeting of the Collegiate Council
For a while no one said anything, the taboo's power, long-held by this council, was at last broken, Allan didn't know if he should be happy, that at last what he felt crippled them for so long, yet as a Grand Rector he could do naught for that, but merely wait until the Collegiate Council so proposed, unless they are stuck in grid-lock for two meetings straight, only then could the Rector and Provosts have both executive and legislative powers.
Allan wasn't sure, if he should thank the bandits that came so close to The Harvard, if not for them, perhaps this anti-isolationist movement would now be in its dying throws, instead of the blossoming it currently experienced. As soon as these thoughts clouded his mind, someone stood up, one of their generals, once an assistant lifted to a major for repelling a multi-clan bandit attack.
"I would like to propose something" he begun, without any pleasantries. "As we all know, the accursed banditry has been plaguing our border since the beginning of our rule, and year after year, seeing we do not strike back, are getting bolder, more vicious, the bounty that we present with our technology is too great for them not to lust for."
He took a breath.
"I propose we eliminate the root cause of the problem, simplify one piece of the strategic calculation, as have fuel, and ammunition, I propose we first smoke them out with flame-throwers, and shoot at anybody that tries to escape the carnage, move methodically, with gun coverage and overwatch being present to guard against their potential guerilla attacks, as you know the terrain is mostly flat forest and overgrown ruins that would easily catch fire, they have nowhere to run and thus I propose to split their territory in the middle, to drive one group to the corrupt zones of mutation to die in there, and the other half to drive to the peninsula, where they would have nowhere else to run, preparations for it should take two months, thus we would not have to do it in wintertime, I nicknamed this operation 'Savage Burn', and I will say this, May Cape Cod Burn."
It seems that some people for a second to object to this, before yet another person stood up, yelling, "May Cape Cod Burn!"
That person was followed by another, then a few, and then the majority of the hall, the few that wanted dispute were probably too terrified to dispute anything. Allan was horrified, he did not expect such knee-jerk reactions to a wrong dealt a month ago in December, this scorched earth tactic, yet the support was overbearing, he looked at the Provosts, with the hope that they may yet veto this.
His hope was shattered when the Grand Provost stood up to join the rhythmical chanting of "May Cape Cod Burn!"
The chanting lasted for three excruciating minutes, Allan counted each and one of them, his previous euphoria at a taboo shattered, was washed away as he realized what fueled by anger the anti-isolationist ideology had become, yet having no choice, he banged his gavel and simply said.
"This operation may proceed if there is no other opposition." He quietly hoped some opposition would now stand up.
May they Never Break-in Again
Border with the Cape Cod Bandits
Her heart was racing, even though the sounds of a gunfight were slowly fading, the bandits probably got to some kind of a cache of a major, probably deservedly if said major was stupid enough to keep their stuff here. She slowly peeked out of cover, being followed by her 15 men strong squad, thankfully they didn't sustain any casualties, though she didn't know what happened to Nick's squad, hopefully, he wasn't dead.
She immediately saw a large metal square some 30 or 40 meters before them, with a gun poking out of it that as soon as she got her head off out cover started to buzz and slowly rotate.
"Duck!" She jumped backwards, landing on her back next to another cover before quickly slumping over, some concrete from that cover landed on her head, as just centimeters over her head a small hole was being carved by bullets.
Suddenly she heard a battle cry, unmistakably of one of the many bandit clans that ruled Cape Cod, it was coming towards them, she aimed at the line of her cover and shot in the eye the first bandit that showed his ugly head over the cover, she was used to it, these bandits attacked semi-regularly, anywhere from two weeks to three months, but during winter they always got worse.
The bullets from the machine gun were still flying as her squad of brutes shot and killed physically, she tried to help as much as possible to those that were struggling, but at least 5 men were wounded if not dead. She looked at a brute near her, Frank.
"Throw them a 'nade!" She screamed, before placing her hand out of cover but from the path of bullets, a distraction so Frank could aim, it worked spectacularly.
After that gun was silenced they lunged out of cover, trying to shoot the retreating bandits, this whole attack was a distraction, she jumped through her cover, and was about to jump through the last layer of cover, before she noticed the new guy, Charlie, who had just wrestled his opponent to the ground and was standing over him with a pistol pointed towards him.
"Good job Charlie, shoot him!" She ordered, but before she saw the deed she refocused on shooting the retreating people, it wasn't very honorable, to shoot them in the back, but everyone shot had the potential of more tech reclaimed.
Just as she thought the last bandit fell, suddenly she heard Frank behind her pushed to the ground and felt someone, also try to push her, she resisted and the opponent started running, that's when she saw an unwashed, filth covered, bandit, revolting at the smell she instinctively shot, the bandit dropped to the ground, she shot two more times until he stopped wriggling.
She rushed to Charlie, only to see him crying and on his knees.
"I-i couldn't, he wasn't carrying anything, he looked at me, and his eyes, he looked so scared."
She placed her hand on Charlie's shoulder. "Don't worry, I'm not gonna blame you, but you'll still gonna need to go somewhere, don't worry, you'll be back soon enough."
She then walked away, so that Charlie couldn't hear her, before activating a two-way radio. "Company command? Private Charles has a fault, you're gonna need to pick him up for further Pavlovian, thanks."
Suddenly someone gently tapped her shoulder, turning around she noticed it was Frank. "Ma'am, your hand." She looked at her hand, indeed there was a bullet hole, must have not noticed over the adrenaline, she was starting to feel the pain, it will be tough to heal.
In The Hallowed Halls of Harvard
Ending of the Meeting of the Collegiate Council
Silence even more overbearing had been laid over the council, though under flowing emotions would be visible even to the idiotic minds of the Brutes, Allan was scared of what next may even be said, before the seemingly youngest member of the council, whose head has not even yet shown the signs of a grey hair that typically adorned the heads of the Collegiates.
"It seems to me, that we are still mired of not keeping our oath, for, we may know everything that has happened in our borders, and what happened before the Collapse, yet we know naught of what happened in the past two hundred years after the Collapse, this, gap can be rectified with constructing of three expeditions, one small airship per expedition, only minimal crew and supplies to last two months, and the mission to map what has arisen in America after the fall, one expedition heading northwest, one expedition heading southwest, and last one heading south, to minimize risk, the only landings and contacts with the locals are allowed only in the event of resource shortage"
Allan was relieved to hear what the young man has said, it would obviously require the construction of airships, but they still can be made, and crew only assigned what they would get if rationing of food was placed so that their expedition would not be a drain on the food stockpile other than what they would already get.
"This project is approved."
He said before anybody rose to the opposition, though it wasn't like anybody would try, even the Director of the Eugenics Programme who was nearly in tears from his previous defeat.
"Any further propositions?"
He asked, and when he was met only with silence for the next consecutive thirty minutes he then asked.
"Should this meeting be formally ended?"
He was met with an "Aye" from all of the Collegiates, and thus the meeting ended, leaving him conflicted over what had happened, though one thing was obvious to the listeners, what has happened would be a change to their whole society.
Summary of Relevant Events
- State of Harvard starts attempting to triangulate the signals position.
- State of Harvard begins the building of three airships.
- State of Harvard begins preparation for Operation "Savage Burn"