The Four Mirrors
A Sequel to Legacies
By MMM/AJ
A/N: Hah well, it took another whole year to get this chunk out to you guys, but that's at least better than the 2 years that the last one took. I suppose that's some improvement! I totally deserve any nasty reviews I've gotten over my update speed, but hey, I'm still going. I do thank anyone still with me here, and I ask you to bear with me. The horrible new Mewtwo "Formes" that Gamefreak recently unveiled definitely damaged my willingness to write and go on, but I've pressed on. FYI, for the purposes of this fic, Gen 6 and those horrible fugly formes do not exist. I will not even attempt to fit them into my fanon, they will simply not even be acknowledged anytime in this trilogy. Thanks for reading!
Chapter XX – Nolus 8
July 15, 2256
Nolus walked down the steps leading to Opulous's lab, grunting to himself occasionally in frustration as he repeatedly thought about his grievances with his brother. The doorway to the lab was sealed shut and the familiar sign was still hanging next to it, warning him not to press the Call Button if the lights on the door were red. Unfortunately, the lights were indeed red that day. Nolus's luck just wasn't holding up.
"Arceus Damnit, Op! Now is not the time!" Nolus growled.
For a few moments, Nolus debated on how to handle this. The red lights usually meant Opulous was working on something either extremely sensitive to vibration that could be damaged if he was jolted in shock by a call chime, or something dangerous or unstable. He also knew that in most instances, Op had telepathy blockers so he couldn't be interrupted during his work. This was a matter of legislative importance though, he couldn't just stand there and wait for the lights on the door to turn blue! Nolus turned the dilemma over in his mind a few more times before deciding to try the Sodalis anyway. Even if it was unlikely he'd manage to contact Opulous through it, it was worth trying.
The calming effects of the Sodalis washed over Nolus as soon as he connected; it was difficult to stay mad when he felt the oneness of hundreds of thousands of minds washing over him. The sensation was only overwhelming and confusing for a fraction of a second before the expertly-skilled minds of Sodalis's volunteer operators carefully limited the scope of Nolus's connection, sensed his desire to find Opulous, and directed his link toward the lab. Nolus was still in awe of how smoothly the Sodalis worked, despite how it seemed to be garnering a sort of spiritual mystique to it in the eyes of some K'tellians. As he and the Operators sensed around for Opulous, he mused idly how amusing it was that inevitably such advanced technology could be regarded as magical by a certain percentage of the population.
Defying Nolus's expectations, the telepathy blocker wasn't actually active in the lab and he could sense Opulous inside the lab. He wordlessly thanked Arceus and Lightest for his luck and began to prod at Opulous's mind insistently until Opulous replied.
"Hmmm? Nolus? What is it?"
"Opulous, open the door please. I have important political matters to discuss with you."
"Ah, please give me ten minutes to help Venius disengage from the ion synthesizer device, that machine is dangerous if it is jarred while active." Op replied emotionlessly. He didn't even seem bothered by the potential for his brother's face being melted off by plasma.
"Venius? What is he doing in there?" Nolus asked insistently.
"Weapons research. We're collaborating on a prototype anti-armor artillery shell that uses a mantle of negative ions to-"
Nolus cut Opulous off suddenly, irritation evident in his tone. "Ugh, weapons research again? How much of our taxpayer money are you going to waste when we're at peace?"
"That is not for me to decide. I will let you raise a complaint with Venius after I have safely deactivated the synthesizer." Opulous replied curtly, then disengaged from Sodalis entirely.
Nolus disengaged from the link a moment afterward, crossing his arms in frustration and tapping his foot impatiently. First they leave him v-mail recordings threatening to veto his zoning legislation, and now they're wasting their time and K'telle's money building artillery shells? Nolus simmered as he waited, the soothing effects of Sodalis fading away in the face of that anger. His righteous fury only served to prolong how long the wait felt, and the perceived length of the wait amplified the fury in a nasty positive feedback loop. When the lights finally turned blue and the door mechanisms clicked and clanked open, Nolus was practically at Venius levels of anger himself. He immediately greeted Opulous at the door with a fresh tirade.
"So, trying to hide away inside your lab after leaving me that threatening v-mail eh? I guess you want to delay a High Council vote as long as possible so my law won't have a chance to get on the books until after new industrial zoning has been laid down!"
Opulous, ever the cool-headed diplomat, replied without even showing a trace of anger. "No Nolus, if I was attempting to hide I would have activated the lab's telepathy inhibitors."
That cool, disarming logic stole some of Nolus's indignation, but didn't serve to take away all of it. He pushed past Opulous into the lab and said "So why even come down here to do research at all when you know I want to have a voting session?"
Opulous stared blankly at Nolus for a moment, then replied "I apologize, I forgot. I have been too excited for my latest project. I'm working on-"
Nolus again cut Opulous off. "Stow it. I don't care what you're working on. Where is that warhawk brother of mine?"
"Venius is just around the other side of Machinae Prime." Opulous replied, pointing around left past the gigantic computer.
At this point though, the singular term 'computer' was insufficient to describe the electronic chimera that dominated the center of Opulous's lab. Over the years as the population of Teyn had continued to skyrocket, the computational load on both the Sodalis volunteers and Machinae Prime had skyrocketed too. Now 20 volunteers constantly rotated in and out of the hook-up chamber next to the Sanctum above them, and Opulous had continued attaching more upgrades to the hulking computer core. By now the system was the size of an elephant and it was coated in so much knotted, confusing wiring that a tech support intern would probably drop dead in terror at the sight of it. It had been so long since Nolus had last been down here that the sight of the monstrous machine stole his thunder and left him amazed for a few seconds.
"By Lightest, Op. How the hell do you maintain this thing when it has more wiring than the rest of the Central Tower combined?"
"It's easy. I've memorized what every wire does." Opulous replied, then casually walked around the behemoth as if this was just no big deal.
Nolus shook his head a little in bewilderment at this, unable to regain his indignation as he tried to wrap his mind around it. Even studying the entire genomes of Pokemon species seemed less brain-bending. He followed Opulous around the machine and spotted Venius waiting for them next to a huge series of complicated tanks, pipes, wires, and a holo-computer console. Venius looked slightly amused, he had obviously heard Nolus ranting at Opulous before and was waiting for a chance to say his piece. In an instant that bewilderment was gone and Nolus's fury swiftly returned to him.
"You know you could have caused me to melt my face off with this thing." Venius said smugly, pointing a finger at the dangerous mishmash of devices behind him.
"You'd certainly deserve it you haughty asshat. How dare you recruit Opulous to try and fight my environmental policies!" Nolus snarled.
"Oh ho ho! You do a disservice to your brother by just assuming he's some easily manipulated toady. Maybe you should focus less on your own dryad rage and stop to think a little bit?" Venius said, still sounding quite amused.
Nolus again felt a spike of cold skewering through the flames of his anger and he turned to look at Opulous. Op's gaze was fixed on Nolus, and while it seemed to be as neutral as ever, there did seem to be a tiny trace of disappointment in his one organic eye.
"You...you actually agree with him, Opulous?" Nolus asked.
"Some of his points have logical validity. Not all of them of course, but I believe that, as is true most of the time, the correct path lies in the middle between the two extremes." Op stated plainly.
Nolus heaved a sigh in sad frustration and replied "Extremes? Come on. You know we're capable of building tall skyscrapers, look at the Central Tower! It's almost a mile tall now! All I'm asking is that we limit urban sprawl by placing strict limits on Teyn's outward expansion, and compensate by making the city's buildings taller! We will save the grasslands outside for your Luxrays to roam in peacefully, Venius." Nolus protested.
Venius didn't seem too moved by Nolus's little appeal to his beloved pride. "Nolus, do you know how expensive it would be to just rip the roofs off of hundreds of buildings to add more floors on? Do you know how difficult it would be to retrofit their support structures to handle the additional weight? Where's the money going to come from? I'm not giving it up out of my budget, that's for sure."
"You know that Cygnus has the final say on economic matters now that you effectively shoved off all those duties on him. Perhaps now you wish you hadn't because his High Council Vote could mean you and Op either successfully killing my legislation, or the High Council deadlocks on it and we open up to a Low and Mid Council vote to break the deadlock. It's never been done before, do you really want to risk it?" Nolus replied coldly.
"Do you? Up until now, we've been nearly unanimous on every Council Vote we've taken, and the K'tellian public has had our backs for all of it nearly 100%. We don't know what could happen if a big political divide comes up and the voting sessions get this tense over Sodalis. What if there was a vote of No Confidence in your leadership? Or mine, even? When we set up this government we agreed that we'd only ever allow ourselves to be High Councilors indefinitely with the express allowance of the people. Do you think it's worth severely testing the stability of our political system now when we're still in such a small, vulnerable stage of development?" Venius asked, that smug grin now fading into deathly seriousness.
Venius raised a finger to protest, but then found no words as the implications of what Venius said began to sink in. It was true, their system of government was still in its infancy and it was totally untested by any sort of major conflict. What if one of the four of them was forced to step down over this kind of argument? They may have been leaders, but they were also still brothers. There was very real potential for a painful, permanent rift in their family over this, and that was saying nothing about what anger-prone Mewtwos in the general public might do if tones became too heated in political debate. Nolus was acutely aware of their species' anger problems, the old incident with Kaira still seemed fresh in his memory. Was this really worth such a huge risk? Nolus thought about this for several painful seconds while Opulous and Venius burned holes into him with their intense stares. Ultimately, when he thought of huge bulldozers and industrial machines crushing innocent Oddish Pokemon to death in the name of reckless K'tellian expansionism though, he made up his mind.
"Well Venius, we're at peace now, our government is still corruption free, and I have faith in our peoples' capacity for calm, rational discussion. I will take this argument to Cygnus and the Low and Mid Councils if need be, but I warn you one thing. You'd better not act insulting and inflammatory at the next Council meeting."
Venius shrugged his arms and said "You're the one who walked into this lab yelling, not me. Look in the mirror again Nolus, you're still letting your dryad rage cloud you. I'll keep calm and civil if you will."
Venius's cold, calculated words were like a Lugia's aeroblast attack snuffing out the flames of his anger. He felt like all the fight had been blown right out of him, and he was left the fool, at least for a moment.
"Fine. You'd better go get ready to meet with Cygnus, I'm going to put on my best case to convince him."
Venius's serious look returned to that smug grin and he said "Good, I'd expect nothing less from you."
Venius then vanished from the room in a flash of yellow light, having teleported away to gather his paperwork. Nolus heaved a sigh and turned to regard Opulous. "Look, Op, I'm sorry about what I said about you, alright?"
Opulous still had that same little tinge of disappointment in his eye for a brief moment, but either he then forgave his brother or hid the feeling perfectly. "I understand how your passions drive you, Nolus. All is forgiven. You and Venius are very much alike, the main difference is in the causes you each choose to follow."
Nolus wasn't sure whether this was a compliment or an insult. He shrugged that odd conundrum off to focus on his worry about how he might have hurt his brother's feelings. "Maybe, but I brushed you aside when you tried to tell me what your project was, and it sounded like you were working on something other than Venius's artillery shells too. Were you?"
To Nolus's relief, his show of interest immediately had a positive effect on Opulous. Op suddenly beamed with excitement, forgetting entirely any disappointment he might have been clinging to as he prepared to launch into his usual energetic description of his latest project. Nolus smiled a little too, he was glad he knew his brother well enough to mend any wounds so easily.
"Yes I was. I was going back and forth between my own work and helping Venius with his. Did I ever tell you how I was working on the designs for a machine that could transmute one type of matter into another?" Opulous asked.
"You've mentioned it a few times, yes. You said you just needed to get past the stumbling block of completing those psionic inductors you wanted to finish, correct?"
Opulous nodded and replied "Yes, and I have! Come on, I simply must show it to you!" He then led Nolus around to another table in the octagon-shaped lab facility. Aside from being strewn with various tools, the table contained plenty of small, expensive-looking complex parts. There was a nano-manipulator machine with a microscope-like viewport, and a large inductor coil in the center of the table, hooked up to several computers and a power supply. It looked extremely similar to the Triton I inductors that the Sodalis was based upon, but it had a tiny little logo on the side of the lower casing that had a picture of Poseidon's trident and "II" splayed proudly over it.
"Nolus, may I introduce you to the Triton II Telekinetic Inductor. Using nothing but electrical energy, and a bit of proper computational power, I can do this!" Op said, leaning over the console and typing lightning fast.
The coil lit up with an aura of purple light, humming much louder than any Triton I coil would have. Op then picked up a small socket wrench and held it in the air above the extremely expensive coil. Nolus knew how much these machines cost, he winced slightly when he saw Opulous's hand let go of the wrench. If it struck the coil, that was tens of thousands of dollars down the drain. But no, the wrench juked and jiggled a little in the air when released, then hovered above the humming coil!
"Wow...so you're not messing with me right? It's not just an electromagnet holding a metal tool?" Nolus asked, looking quite impressed.
"I'll prove it." Op replied confidently. He snatched the wrench out of the air, then grabbed a plastic bit of tubing and dropped it above the coil. It hovered just the same as the wrench.
Nolus whistled in amazement then said "Wait, you're not cheating and using your own telekinesis are you?"
Opulous looked almost hurt by the distrust for a moment, like a kid whose parent had just told him his crayon drawings were ugly. "Never!" He said emphatically.
Again Nolus felt a pang of guilt at insulting his brother like that. He hastily scrambled together another response suitably tailored to fit Opulous's personality. "Well I'm just using a healthy dose of skepticism. All scientific progress should be doubted and tested in a fair, unbiased manner."
Again this worked like a charm and the offense dematerialized from Opulous's face, replaced by a total understanding. "Of course, of course! I should have given you more credit Nolus, you have studied enough genetics to have a scientific mind after all. Of course when I present my papers about the device and give demonstrations, I will voluntarily place myself inside a small, localized psionic disruptor field to prove that the device is functioning independently without outside assistance."
"That's the spirit. So how will this let you transform matter?" Nolus asked, getting back to the original topic.
Op quickly snatched the piping out of the air and shut down the Inductor to save energy. "Simple. If we can use telekinesis to pressurize plasma to make it hot enough for nuclear fusion to take place, we can use even more telekinesis to pressurize plasma to achieve a heat that mimics the interior of stars, where lighter elements are fused together to transform into heavier elements. Given a powerful enough Inductor coil and infinite energy from the Blue River, we could theoretically compress and heat plasma enough to mimic the primordial soup of dissociated protons, neutrons, and electrons in the big bang. This soup can then be theoretically channeled into cooling chambers, and more inductors can use extremely precise, targeted microtelekinetic fields to manipulate these subatomic particles into any type of atoms we desire. After all, garbage is all made of protons, neutrons, and electrons, and so are gold, platinum, uranium, and everything else. All I need to do is create strong enough variants of the Triton II to compress the plasma enough, and precise enough variants to manipulate individual subatomic particles. The base device is complete, now all that remains is tweaking!" Opulous explained, sounding like a blissful teenager describing his favorite video game.
"Wow, that is amazing, but damn, don't you think precise enough inductors would be...inordinately expensive to produce?" Nolus said, trying to keep some practicality in consideration.
"Only in the short term. Think of the ramifications Nolus! It is nothing but an investment, you put the initial money in to create the inductors, then once the machine is complete, you can literally turn feces into platinum to sell! The dividends would so far outpace the initial costs that it would be foolish not to invest in it!" Op replied, his tone completely undampened by Nolus's doubt.
"You're sure you can even succeed in designing Inductors that precise?" Nolus asked.
"Absolutely. It is only a matter of patience and perseverence." Op said with absolute confidence.
Nolus smiled, half in amused resignation and half in appreciation for his brother's indomitable spirit. "Alright, I believe you! Now all you have to do is get past the fact that we're about to go into a High Council meeting to squabble over funds that are already limited as is."
This seemed to finally put a damper on Opulous's exuberance. He gave Nolus a sympathetic look. "Now you can see why I agreed to side with Venius against your measure."
"Indeed. You know I won't just give up on it though." Nolus replied, returning that sympathetic look. He hated being at odds like this with his brothers.
Opulous suddenly smiled, despite the acknowledgement of their rivalry here. "As Venius previously said, I would expect nothing less from you."
The diplomatic meeting chamber for K'telle's High Council was built on floor 24 of the Central Tower in Teyn, and thanks to the fact that they could use telepathy to speak to the other councils, it was rather small and nowhere near the Mid or Low Council chambers. It was a simple circular room with a large circular metal table in the center. There were four chairs specifically shaped for Mewtwos around the table, circular recessed lighting, and a single holo-computer terminal projector built into the center of the table. Nolus had a tendency to arrive early to these meetings and today was no different, he turned on the lights and sat down to read from a novel saved on his personal datapad while waiting for his brothers to arrive.
Almost as if Arceus was trying to give Nolus a break, Cygnus was the first to arrive. Nolus saved his spot with one finger tap and smiled at his brother.
"Well Cygnus, I assume you've heard over the grape vine that your vote is the coveted one today. If you've read my legislation though, forget what you read. I revised it a bit in the last hour since I had that little scuffle with Venius."
Cygnus pouted a little bit and replied "But I just finished reading it."
"Then I'll give you a rundown of the changes when the meeting starts. Don't worry, I'm not going to try to sell you on it until everyone is here, I'm no cheater." Nolus said with a grin.
Opulous arrived next, he still seemed to have that same glow of excitement about him. "Good evening brothers. I will have a proposal of my own once we have finished discussing yours Nolus."
"I remember. Though you probably need something akin to a full blueprint of a prototype before you get anything." Nolus pointed out.
"I do." Op said with a confident grin.
Venius finally arrived and greeted them with a polite nod. Each of them sat down now and connected to Sodalis. Nolus could immediately sense all their mental presences quite clearly, it was comforting and familiar despite their recent tensions. Not long after that the four of them opened up more broadly, letting the various people on the other councils and the general public look in and listen. This was the most disorienting part, Nolus could feel hundreds, then thousands of psychic third eyes focusing on him and his brothers. He was old enough by now not to be terrified by it, but this experience would be a true nightmare for anyone with stage fright. He and his brothers were being watched by at least half of K'telle, the other half were likely not on Sodalis for various reasons such as sleeping, working, or taking care of their families. Sure, the link may have kept any of the public from yelling out to them over the proceedings to heckle them, but it was still an eerie feeling.
"Thank you for gathering for this meeting everyone. In the interest of meeting extremely high standards of the K'tellian people and coming to a proper compromise, I have been revising my current proposal furiously after receiving criticism from the rest of the High Council." Nolus opened, speaking entirely through telepathy now.
"Please state your proposal clearly from the beginning, since the other two councils have not had a chance to consider it before now." Opulous replied.
"Of course. I propose a limitation to the size of all K'tellian cities, binding them to a maximum size of one square mile. This will curtail the spread of urban sprawl, protecting the natural grassland habitat of K'telle and the wild Pokemon that currently reside there. Furthermore, I have multiple ideas for how to counteract the severe limitations on growth this law would propose, the first of which being that K'tellian cities pursue a policy of vertical expansion. If currently existing buildings were to be retrofitted for additional floors, and all new buildings were to be made as skyscrapers, we could theoretically continue expanding Teyn for a considerably long period. Given the fact that Graphene has become such a cheap and powerful building material and K'tellian-produced Montablo steel and tritanium are plentiful, all it would require would be time and the effort of our local architects to achieve this goal. The Central Tower is a positive example of what can be accomplished through modern engineering and materials, we only need to keep following that example."
Venius then chimed in. "K'tellian population growth has continued at a geometric progression for the last decade though. In less than 5 years we will have such a population that we won't be able to contain it within a city that small even if all our towers were as large as the Central Tower."
"That's where my next idea comes in. This is one of my recent additions to the bill. I propose that we found four new cities to contain K'telle's expanding population. Instead of having one single super-city like Denver, which is over 200 square miles, we divide our population up and have five exceedingly tall cities, each only one square mile. After that, we can consider adding more small towns and cities for further population settlement. This will ensure we carefully keep the prosperity of K'telle's wildlife in mind while still providing our own people with plenty of space to live."
One of the Low Councilors chimed in, Talas Aurah. "Councilor, if I remember correctly, when our families moved here and cleaned out the toxic waste originally, the only type of Pokemon that lived on this land were Grimers and Muks. They were the only kind that could tolerate the lethal radiation emitted by the tens of thousands of drums filled with radioactive waste. In the time since, they have left, and I believed the land has been mostly free of Pokemon since, has it not?"
"Incorrect. A large amount of Pokemon have migrated from Johto ever since we first started the program in conjunction with Maris Pullano to revitalize the Orre region. With Orre's once-barren deserts transformed into fertile farmland, that opened up a land route for wild Pokemon to explore and migrate southwest to K'telle. The great divide was a difficult barrier for some to cross, but those with enough perseverance and a little cleverness used our bridges or just climbed their way. Notable migratory species include Luxrays and their evolutionary line, Absols, Arcanines and Growlithes, and a large variety of flying types. I could list more, but this session would drag on for quite some time. I have already performed an ample amount of research, all of which is publically accessible through the computer databanks linked to Sodalis. The Councils and the public can read it at their liesure." Nolus replied proudly.
Nolus could mildly sense the rippling psionic impressions of emotions through Sodalis as the council members considered what he had said. Though the public couldn't interject verbally, Low and Mid Council members could speak. They milled over this, checking the study and then reading Nolus's mind to confirm he hadn't fudged the studies. Nolus didn't mind this, he was proud of them for being cautious and thoughtful. That was the spirit of their government after all. Eventually Cygnus chimed in.
"So from what I have heard, Opulous and Venius both oppose this proposal. May I ask why?"
"Because it'd pose a significant monetary cost. Retrofitting buildings not meant to carry more weight than they already do will be ridiculously expensive and difficult. Some might even have to be torn down entirely and rebuilt from scratch. Families and businesses will have to be shuffled around, taxes will have to be raised to pay for it, and our state coffers will still be strained by the end of the quarter." Venius replied.
Opulous chimed in "I also would like to add that my next proposed project would be competing for funding against this one. Even if the addition of the new cities to Nolus's proposal eases some of the financial burdens, I will still vote against it out of a longer term need for money for my own research."
Nolus then said "This is why your vote is necessary Cygnus, if you vote against my bill, it will die. If you vote for it, the High Council will be deadlocked and we will pass it to the Low and Mid councils for a tie breaker. What do you think?"
Nolus waited expectantly as Cygnus paused to think. It seemed like all three councils were gazing at him with their third eyes, holding their breath. He finally said "I am K'telle's current chief economist, I know our current finances better than anyone here. I believe this proposal might not be as costly as you think, Opulous. It would create a significant number of new construction jobs, especially given the idea of founding new cities. The opportunity for more growth will help ease the burden of the costs. Therefore I will vote yes on the measure."
A surge of surprise and excitement jolted through the Sodalis as the other two Councils reeled from the deadlock! This was the first time this had ever happened in K'tellian history, surely they were all about to be written into texbooks for today's events! The various assortments of Mewtwos on both councils began to debate amongst themselves over Sodalis, and as the news spread, more K'tellians joined the link to watch the spectacle. For a bit, Nolus's fear about political divisiveness reared its ugly head again. But amazingly, the soothing and empathic effects of the Sodalis eased any flaring passions and helped K'tellians keep a calmer head as they considered the issue. Only a few seemed to grow angry over the issue, but since the Sodalis seemed to absorb and lessen negative emotions through its own sense of unity and patriotic togetherness, that anger faded quickly.
The votes began to come in rapidly, and while Nolus was relieved his people were handling this conflict so smoothly, he did still feel a shaky, nervous chill at the prospect that his bill could fail. The totals swerved back and forth between passing and rejecting the bill, but when the final count finally arrived it was concluded that the bill should be passed! What Nolus felt in that moment was equal parts relief and pride; he felt proud that his bill could stand the test of a multi-council vote, and relieved that so many innocent Pokemon could still have homes without fear of bulldozers rolling in to crush them! He knew K'telle could handle this kind of hurdle, after all they had built the Central Tower already!
"Thank you everyone! Doing the right thing may not be the easiest path for K'telle to take, but it is the best path for us all in the long run. I promise to do my best to help with the remodeling efforts in the coming future. Now Opulous, you had a proposal to share?"
Strangely enough, Opulous didn't seem too saddened about Nolus's proposal passing. "Yes I do. I am actually encouraged by Cygnus's words about the potential for economic growth, so the sheer ambition of my next project may not be as much of a hurdle as I believed. Allow me to show you my proposed new mega-project."
Opulous reached his hand forward and laid it on the holo-computer terminal in the center of their table. He accessed it wirelessly and used the connection to bring up a large holographic blueprint. It looked like there was some kind of polyhedron shaped structure on top of the flat portion of Paladin Station. Paladin Station seemed unchanged, it still had the lower spire that connected it to the Blue River and the flat disc portion on top for people to live in, so this modification seemed to make the whole station look very vaguely like a baby's pacifier. The polyhedral structure had a big door on the top, and several small cylindrical sections protruding from its sides. The scale was gigantic, it would probably cost billions of dollars to build!
"This is the proposed matter transformation device, which I will call the Alchemical Furnace, after the ancient human myth of alchemy. It may seem large in scale, but the sheer size is necessary not only to enable large scale transformations, but to safely contain the extreme temperatures necessary to achieve the transformations. To melt down solid matter into a plasma of protons, neutrons, and electrons, the furnace will need to operate at 10^8 degrees Kelvin at minimum, and containing such an extreme temperature would be infeasible without a structure this thick and large, reinforced with multiple layers of shielding and cooling systems. The system works by taking in any type of fodder matter through the top gates, heating it until it melts into plasma, and then funneling it into the cooling chambers attached to the sides of the main furnace chamber. Inside these chambers, thermoelectric generators work to reclaim a portion of the energy expended in heating the plasma for re-use, while most of the heat is vented into space. Triton II inductors will manipulate the atoms as they form again, inducing fusion reactions to create any stable element on the periodic table."
There was a stunned silence over Sodalis, or at least as close to a silence as there could be when no true sound was ever made through it in the first place. Eventually Cygnus chimed in "Opulous, do you have any idea how much this would cost? The materials alone would run in the hundreds of billions of US Dollars. I've been planning to put K'telle onto a new purely digital currency and I have no idea if it'd even be possible when trying to handle the burden of this cost."
"Ah, but think of it as an investment, Cygnus. As I explained to Nolus before, the furnace will be capable of transforming anything and everything imaginable into any other type of matter. We can gather pollution sludge and gases from industrial processes, ship them up to the furnace, and quite literally transform them into gold, platinum, or any other valuable metal. Within days of coming online I can guarantee it will pay for itself and then some. You as our chief economist should be able to recognize the immense potential for profit here." Opulous boasted.
Nolus decided to ask a question about the project that had been nagging him from the beginning. "Opulous, if this works as well as you're saying, could we even potentially take money from human nations to dispose of their trash for them? Because if it does work that well, this furnace could potentially eliminate all waste and pollution from modern society!"
Opulous smiled again and replied "Absolutely it could. It has something for all of us. For you Nolus, it would allow at the very least our own nation to operate 100% waste free. For Cygnus, it has the potential to churn out immense amounts of profit that could propel our economy into a golden age. For Venius, it could provide more than enough raw materials to build an entire fleet of starships to defend our space with."
A slight tinge of nervous fear returned when Nolus heard Opulous talking so casually about fleets of warships like that. The last thing Nolus wanted was to see humanity get yet another reason to be terrified of Mewtwos. Still, the prospect of a waste-free society was far too exciting for him to focus on. "I'll definitely vote for this proposal!" He said.
"As will I." Cygnus added.
"Then we are unanimous, I will also vote in agreement." Venius finished.
Opulous beamed with joy and said "Thank you everyone! I promise I will work dutifully with you Cygnus to properly manage the costs of the project."
"Excuse me though, High Councilor? What about the fact that Paladin Station is currently entirely staffed by humans from the Japanese government? It's not likely that Japan will want to work with us to build a new addition onto the station." One of the Low Councilors chimed in.
"Ah, I anticipated this concern. Technically, humanity illegally seized control of the eight space stations of the Blue River when the Psi-Slayers attacked Shakara's protectorate fleet. Legally, the stations are still property of Shakara, even though she is still unfortunately missing. We could still argue that, according to an old treaty signed between Japan and the Protectorate, that control over Paladin Station at the very minimum should be returned to us. If we don't try to push for all 8 stations, it's likely that the prime minister will agree." Opulous explained.
This brought a smile to Venius's face, and Nolus had to chuckle a little in admiration of the effort Opulous had put into the research. "Since Venius has been handling the majority of our diplomatic efforts, I will leave negotiating that to him. Are there any other matters anyone would like to bring up for now?"
The other brothers shook their heads and Nolus then said "Very well, then I declare this council meeting adjourned."
Chapter XXI - Venius 10
June 1, 2261
Standing aboard the bridge of K'telle's first military starship, Venius was gazing at the viewscreen and watching the spectacle in orbit above Earth. A huge metal skeleton of scaffolding and supports had been built atop Paladin Station and hundreds of K'tellian workers were buzzing around the colossal project hard at work. The show was amazingly pretty, each Mewtwo leaving a contrail of psychic energy behind them as they flew and each trail was its own unique color. The psychic air bubbles they used to breathe safely out there in space glowed brightly, so it was almost like watching a swarm of electric bees buzzing around a new hive.
"Are we filming this, lieutenant?" Venius called out to the ship's sensor officer.
The officer, a female 'Two with yellowish-red fur and a proud, professional demeanor, replied "Aye aye Councilor. 32K resolution holocameras are active."
Venius smiled, feeling pride and patriotism welling up within him. In that moment, as he gazed on at the product of his brother's brilliance and his peoples' hard work, it really seemed to strike home that they had truly done what his father had only dreamed of. It had been awhile since Venius had seen Tanis's spirit around, Tanis tended to watch silently in the background and not interfere with the living. But Venius knew he was around and he couldn't feel any more proud of what they had done. The activation of the Furnace was still probably at least 5 more years away, but somehow they had made it this far into the construction while also founding two of the four new planned cities and without going into strangling international debt. This was a testament to just what their species was capable of when they put their minds and resources together.
There was a small, subdued mechanical click as the doors to the bridge opened and allowed someone in. Venius turned to see his prodigal son, Emael Redclaw, stepping onto the bridge. He was very stern and formal now, the years had aged him into a rugged military commander type with lines across his face and a stoic demeanor. Venius was reminded of his own advancing years for a moment as he gazed upon Emael's face, wondering just how long he and his brothers could keep prolonging their lives with anti-aging drugs. He must be older than his grandfather was when he died of old age. Those dark thoughts were interrupted when Emael saluted him and spoke.
"Councilor. With your permission I have a few matters I need to discuss with you in private quarters." Emael said, keeping his tone rigidly formal.
"Yes yes of course Emael, follow me." Venius replied, not bothering to match the tone. He led Emael through a few doors to a small meeting chamber and took a seat.
Emael cleared his throat and said "Councilor, I'm worried about the recent increase in anti-K'tellian propaganda being produced by the United States. Have you seen some of the advertisements they've been airing over their holovision networks?"
Venius's feelings of patriotic pride immediately melted into frustration and he released a heavy sigh. "I've seen a few. I stopped after the first two or three because I was worried I'd end up bursting a few blood vessels in my brain. Let me guess, my decision to stop watching was entirely justified?"
Emael gave him a grave stare that told Venius all he needed to know. Venius heaved another sigh and said "Great. Just give me the barebones details alright? I need to know, but I don't want to grind my teeth down all day."
"Well apparently the US is really upset at us for starting the construction of a military armada. The latest adverts compared this to when Ares first started building his empire by using shell corporations as fronts to secretly create military warships." Emael replied.
Venius's blood began to simmer in his veins and red started to form in the edges of her peripheral vision. He clenched his fists tightly and calmly spoke. "Let me guess, another masterpiece of fearmongering from our good friends in Vulpix News?"
"Right on the money, councilor. The latest one even directly compares you personally to Ares." Emael said with a deadly serious look.
Venius began to grind his teeth and the red tint in his vision grew thicker. He took one long, deep breath to calm himself and then said "Ok. Alright. I will be calm. I will not let this get to me. Tell me at least that these ads are limited entirely to the US."
"These particular ones are, yes. There are still some similar ones right nextdoor in Japan too though, Hoenn TV is filled with them."
Venius waved his hand dismissively and said "That's Genning for you, asshat's been pulling that shit since day one. Expecting anything different from him would be like expecting water to be dry."
Emael gave Venius a concerned, almost sad look. "Councilor, may I have permission to speak freely?"
"Of course Emael, anytime we're in private you can."
Emael reached out and put his hand on Venius's. "Dad, I'm worried about you. You're 73 years old now and every time I see you boiling with rage like that, I worry what the stress is doing to your health. I know those anti-aging nanites have been studied enough for us to know that there's no nasty hidden side effects, but I don't know what will happen if you keep taking them and subjecting yourself to all this strain all the time. Maybe you should consider retiring now and letting K'telle elect a new High Councilor in your place?"
Venius felt touched that Emael was that concerned for him. He even felt a surge of pride that somehow, through all his growling and yelling, that he had managed to instill a proper sense of empathy into Emael. He squeezed Emael's hand and said "Emael, you know as well as I do that this isn't just about me. This is about duty and our species' future. Sure we may be at peace now, but I won't be able to live with myself if I were to resign and then someone like Genning were to declare war. We're still clustered in one little nation here, it'd still take only a few good bombing runs to wipe our people out. I'm not going to rest until I know for sure that humans can't possibly come close to wiping us out again."
Emael smiled at Venius and eventually drew his hand away. "I understand. I feel the same way, it's why I volunteered for the army as soon as you started it. While I do hope we never have to live to see the day that our people have to die in wars, I do know that you will make sure every single ounce of pain they cause us will be paid for ten times over in their own blood."
Venius chuckled and patted Emael on the back firmly. "You're damn right about that. Besides, we'll have much nastier problems to worry about than me getting sick if someone ever found flaws with youthening treatments."
"For sure. Now if you don't mind me changing topics, there is one other thing I have to ask. We've seen Opulous and Nolus start their new little cities in the years since Nolus suggested we branch out, but you and Cygnus haven't done so. Are you ever going to get around to that? Remember how it was suggested each one of you should found at least one city of your own?" Emael said.
"Yeah, I guess I should, but I've been focused so heavily on weapons research and military development that I haven't gotten around to it. I suppose I should be encouraged by the success of Opulous's growing little city of Nilaya. Did you hear he's even starting another big Central Tower in that city too?"
Emael chuckled and said "Yup, I've even seen the blueprints. He's planning it to be even larger than the one in Teyn. Your brother's nearly as ambitious as you. Still, you didn't answer my question Dad, when are you going to found your city?"
Venius sighed and said "Alright alright, I'll put some thought into it! The more cities we have after all, the harder it will be to kill us all with a good series of coordinated strikes. Hmmm, but what would we call my new city?"
"Ah, well to tell the truth I've actually already been thinking about that." Emael replied immediately.
"Oh ho, so someone's got an ulterior motive for pressuring me!" Venius chuckled.
"Hey, just because I want to be involved in this new city doesn't mean it's still not best for everyone that we build it!" Emael pointed out.
"True, true. So let's hear that idea of yours."
"Alright! I actually was thinking about making up a name with multiple meanings that still sounds pretty and exotic. What I came up with was 'Belicia', which would be a reference to the word 'Bellicose', which means an aggressive willingness to fight. At the same time it could also reference the Italian word "Bello", which means beautiful." Emael suggested.
"Hmmm, that's actually not a bad idea at all. I like it. Alright Emael, but if we found this city soon, I'm going to have you bring in your enlisted men to help build as a part of their training and exercises." Venius said with a grin.
"Consider it done."Emael replied proudly.