First contact was not something the colony senate had ever
prepared for. Eamon had quietly sat through the first day of hysterically
reactionary babbling from the other representatives that had nothing but the senate to focus on. By lunch time on the second day he had had his fill of official
statements and oratory concerning the importance of this moment in history. He
was ready to get on to the actual moment.
The policy speeches were worse. Almost immediately the entire senate became entrenched in a 'nuke first excavate bodies later' versus 'unroll the welcome mat and share the planet' argument. Eamon avoided getting involved in the argument and spent the evening of day two researching their capability to actually nuke or in any way strike the new alien forest. It didn't take him long to discover that they didn't have a stockpile large enough of any weapon to do enough damage to matter. The satellite photos had confirmed that the alien forest was now the largest forest on the planet. The senate ended the second day having made no decision either way.
Eamon had reached his limit of bureaucracy. He messaged his aide and they met at the front steps of the senate building. Eamon was the first member of his family to run for a senate seat. He was currently the only member of the senate who was not a third, fourth or fifth generation politician and it showed. He was more interested in making sure the job got done than he was in assuring his families honor and his districts status among the colony. He did not fit in well and he had stopped trying to long ago. His aide was a sixteen year old fifth generation political wunderkind. None of the other senate members would care that Kepi was sitting in for him in the morning. He had no need to brief her, he knew she was likely more aware of the political aspects of the situation than he was. Her family had practically bred her for this job, when other children were learning their letters and basic math she was learning the senate families and the structure of the colony government. Truthfully without her he would be completely lost and he hadn't even hired her. She had appeared in his office on his second day and practically taken the place over. She ran him through education drills and briefed him on all aspects of every bill, law, and ruling the senate was considering, she never needed any notes, and he knew that when his time was up he would give the seat to her. Not because it was tradition for seats to travel down lines of ascendancy but because he and Kepi had conversations that ran long into the night about the direction they saw for the colony and what they wished for their people. She had chosen to be his aide because he was not a politician and she had every desire to change the way the senate ran and his was the seat she could accomplish her goals. No the senate would not miss him, until they discovered the force of nature that had taken his place.
He didn't want the Skyway security systems to pick his cruiser up so he had to stay dangerously close to the ground as he made his way to the forest. He didn't know what he would say when he arrived, he didn't want to think about the possibility that the species seen in satellite photos was hostile or predatory toward humans, and based on the size of the forest he knew that the task ahead of him was likely impossible but his sister's ship had landed somewhere in the forest and he was determined to make sure that she was all right.
Eamon had reached his limit of bureaucracy. He messaged his aide and they met at the front steps of the senate building. Eamon was the first member of his family to run for a senate seat. He was currently the only member of the senate who was not a third, fourth or fifth generation politician and it showed. He was more interested in making sure the job got done than he was in assuring his families honor and his districts status among the colony. He did not fit in well and he had stopped trying to long ago. His aide was a sixteen year old fifth generation political wunderkind. None of the other senate members would care that Kepi was sitting in for him in the morning. He had no need to brief her, he knew she was likely more aware of the political aspects of the situation than he was. Her family had practically bred her for this job, when other children were learning their letters and basic math she was learning the senate families and the structure of the colony government. Truthfully without her he would be completely lost and he hadn't even hired her. She had appeared in his office on his second day and practically taken the place over. She ran him through education drills and briefed him on all aspects of every bill, law, and ruling the senate was considering, she never needed any notes, and he knew that when his time was up he would give the seat to her. Not because it was tradition for seats to travel down lines of ascendancy but because he and Kepi had conversations that ran long into the night about the direction they saw for the colony and what they wished for their people. She had chosen to be his aide because he was not a politician and she had every desire to change the way the senate ran and his was the seat she could accomplish her goals. No the senate would not miss him, until they discovered the force of nature that had taken his place.
He didn't want the Skyway security systems to pick his cruiser up so he had to stay dangerously close to the ground as he made his way to the forest. He didn't know what he would say when he arrived, he didn't want to think about the possibility that the species seen in satellite photos was hostile or predatory toward humans, and based on the size of the forest he knew that the task ahead of him was likely impossible but his sister's ship had landed somewhere in the forest and he was determined to make sure that she was all right.
