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Saga - Legends Acenou Collection I [Spring Bingo Challenge]

Discussion in 'Fan Fiction- Before, Saga, and Beyond' started by Mechalich, Apr 6, 2023.

  1. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    Title: Acenou Collection I (five shorts)
    Author: Mechalich
    Timeframe: 18-15 BBY
    Characters: Brend Litnor (OC), Aes Rimi (OC), Dusk (OC)
    Genre: Slice-of-Life, Science Fiction
    Keywords: Agriculture, Refugee, Kessurian, Ogemite, Hamadryas, Sarkhai, Zabrak
    Summary: Five vignettes regarding small developments on the continent of Acenou (on Ord Varee)
    Notes: these shorts were written for the Spring Bingo Challenge 2023. The characters within are the lead characters from Of Small Propagules. There are some minor spoilers for that story as a result.
     
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  2. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    Shadows Old and New

    Dusk could see the bonfire, in the distance. The bright glow of the great stack of burning logs, all those from the last year too damaged to serve in palisade, wall, or structure any longer sacrificed for brightness against the growing shadows of a fast-fading day. She could follow patterns in the shades it threw off, as well, track motion by gap and shift and shading. In this way, though the procession of her kinsmen remained hidden from her eyes by the walls, she followed it, nonetheless. It gladdened her to know they marched, that the Sarkhai of Acenou chose to celebrate the coming sowing period in the old way. Many old things were lost, here, including the grain itself – for the species would not flower in the light of Ord Varee’s primary and had been replaced with a genetically engineered alternative. They needed to hold on to all that they could.

    For that reason, Dusk knew she must remain beyond the walls, kept fast to her self-imposed exile. Awakening to that knowledge had pained her greatly, but she retained every portion of the resolve of that day. The wound had been healed by Human science, or rather Anomid science borrowed by Humans, but she would not claim that a miracle. It did not suffice to bridge the gap.

    Instead, she perched in the tree branches and watched the shadows as the Sarkhai traced their way around the star pattern of the town’s palisade and threw forth handfuls of seed onto the crop lanes laid out beyond.

    Seed that would be entirely eaten by birds, of course, another difference from Sarkhai. The grain that was to be planted later, for cultivation, would be drilled into the soil to prevent that outcome. From her perch on the outside, Dusk watched the first birds gather in response to this unexpected bounty. Briefly, she contemplated shooting at them, but quickly discarded the idea as foolish. Not only would this accomplish nothing, for the avians would return as soon as she moved on, but the discharge of her weapon would disrupt the ceremony.

    That was not her role. She was a silencer of true threats, not a raiser of false ones.

    That role yet held, though Acenou’s threats generally had only half as many legs as those of Sarkhai. They were comparatively fragile as well, a single disruptor hit sufficed to disintegrate them completely, to the point that she barely needed to aim anymore. Cruelty and cunning, however, made up the gap. And she fought alone, one to protect two hundred thousand.

    Difficult odds, especially given the artificial mobility of the continent’s two-legged predators. Outside help from the Humans made it better, a little; from the Zabraks, a lot. Though still not enough.

    She would train other Cullers, if not for her exile, and because she was terrible at teaching. Truthfully, she was glad to be spared that. Perhaps, in time, the roads across hyperspace would be safe again and youths could return to Sarkhai to learn the ancient trade.

    Probably not, of course. It was never so simple. Something to do with politics, a facet of life she steadfastly ignored. Far too complicated to one devoted to the simple dance of predator and prey.

    The procession passed on by. Shadows grew into gloom, then darkness. Dusk descended from the boughs to the ground. She might have no true home anymore, but her bivy sack was very comfortable compared to a night spent in the branches and vastly preferable when no emergency beckoned. Only a fool unnecessarily courted stiff limbs and an aching back in the morning.

    Though a small woman with the light frame of a Sarkhai, Dusk’s motion nevertheless jostled the branches as she descended. This time around, she dislodged something unusual through the motion, a pale object caught bright and stark by the first light of the second moon. Curiosity piqued, she sought it out where it came to rest amid the knee-high herbaceous growth and finger-length layer of decaying leaves.

    It was a pale, greenish-brown ovoid, speckled with rounded, overlapping spots that reminded her of the texturing of polished marble. An egg, she realized after a moment’s examination. It belonged to some woodland bird, not any domestic fowl of the kind Humans kept. She wondered what kind it might be, and whether it might be edible. After a moment she realized this served as a perfect excuse to ask Brend.

    Taking a picture and dispatching a missive using her datapad, she wondered if the agronomist would call back in the morning. She hoped so. Having a Human friend was a new thing, not old, but necessary to hold fast to herself as one doubly exiled. She was, herself, much like a fallen egg, but Brend had scooped her up and built a new nest for her.

    Inspired by that thought, Dusk climbed back up, found the little bowl of sticks and mud, and placed the ovoid back alongside two others. New things, new choices, for a new world.

    Though when morning came, she still wondered how it might have tasted.
     
  3. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    False Light Forward

    It was possible, just before the break of dawn amid the earliest days of the spring thaw, to place a specially crafted candle in a window amid the wild rock formations of Acenou's northeastern canyon lands and thereby recreate a specific spectral glow and stony backdrop with sufficient precision to convince the senses that they were no longer on Ord Varee, but instead had returned to Iridonia. Not for long, of course, no more than a dozen minutes on the best days, but even that short glimpse mattered. The chance to feel that light, see that stone, and pretend she was home again, that she had miraculously turned back to the clock to the loving and warm portion of her life before she'd become a frightful functionary and clawed her way up to the heightened posting of de facto governor. No longer the one they called Mistress of Magma where they thought no one could hear, but simply a woman trying to make her way through life in troubled times. A brief interval in which she could recall who Aes Rimi had been, once, and dream of who she might have become, the path she would have sacrificed anything to walk instead, had war not torn the galaxy apart.

    Blissful, that chance to lay everything aside and let the light wash over her. The cool almost-darkness as the first gleams of the harsh sun broke over the distant eastern canyon walls. A profound, transcendental, opportunity to let go to lay aside the burdens of leadership. One utterly worth abusing the privileges of the same to take a speeder out alone on an unrecorded flight plan and land here.

    She needed this restoration, this chance to go back to a time before her clan joined with others in an exhausting migration away from the divisions the Separatist movement sowed across Iridonia, across all Zabraks. Would that they could go back even further, thousands of years even, to a time before the Sith sundered her species and divided them forever against themselves. A rift felt even here, where others surrounded them and unity was essential to survival.

    Aes drank in that dream, that alternative past and future revealed in the false colors unlocked by the flickering flame, and clasped it close to her. For the rest of the year to come she knew it would remain there, a crystal of serenity to guide her through the hard choices she must make as the custodian of so many lives spread across numerous disparate heritages. The governorship had fallen to her, abandoned by cowards who did not dare the struggle of survival. She was Zabrak and would meet that challenge.

    The final guttering flash passed through the slit cut off the distant escarpment face. The hard, reticulated light of Iridonia reflected in orange eyes. She drank it in without blinking. The task she shouldered now was not one she could cast aside. Her kind were survivors. That skill her leadership would, must, transmit to others. They had been cast into a hard, wild, land and then forsaken by those who promised them succor and support. A story her species knew all too well, one her ancestors had lived all those long millennia ago on Iridonia. Just as those primal Zabraks had done, she swore the people of Acenou too would rise to overcome this challenge. Not only would they survive; they would thrive.

    The ceremonial candle, its wick measured carefully to match astronomical events, snuffed out precisely one second before the illusion shattered.

    With a deep breath Aes rose from where she knelt on the stones, clenched her fists, and turned to walk back to her ship. As she took the first step, her eyes caught movement in the scrub brush to her right. Turning sharply towards this swift blur, her right hand descended to her hip and the blaster that waited there. The canyon lands of Acenou were wild yet, and, she knew, not without dangerous predators.

    A second shiver passed through the thorny bushes, and Aes relaxed in response. The creature triggering such echoes as it passed was far too small to present any threat.

    Seemingly sensing this regard, a fuzzy form dashed across the path. It looked back towards Aes but once before disappearing into the undergrowth, bounding away in a hopping motion powered by enlarged hind legs.

    A bunny, she recalled the childish Human name given to these creatures. Brend had mentioned them to her, once, part of his justification for needing to fence in intensely cultivated garden plots. Such a little puffy fuzzball hardly seemed capable of impacting crops measurably, but further shifting shivers amid the vegetation suggested this one was far from alone.

    In numbers, Aes was reminded, even small things may transform into a voracious horde.

    It seemed the little, large-eared herbivores thrived here, despite the seemingly desolate nature of the gullies and washes. An inspiring thing to witness, for surely a Zabrak could do better than they.

    She could not go back to Iridonia. A sad truth.

    She could, and would, make Acenou a home for the many instead, and claim it happiness.
     
  4. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    Bird Saps

    Tens of thousands of maple trees wrapped with red and white yarn by staunch Hamadryas worker effort. An aged method, passed down across generations, to determine which of the trees would be chosen for the first, red, tapping, or the second, white, tapping. Yet that marking was only half of the ritual by which the foresters expressed their love of the trees that provided them with a caloric and nutrient-critical syrup supply. It was meant that roughly half of those knitted bands should be a sacrifice, cut away by the gnawing action of a squirrel-like animal that found the yarn stimulating. Acenou, though it provided suitable sap-bearing trees and in the woods bison a source of appropriate yarn, lacked any equivalent of this specific climbing rodent.

    This presented a problem, for the trees who lost their binding chords were those spared the tap each year, and thus they were protected from overuse. The Hamadryas would not allow the yarn to be cut. It must be bit through, and by the actions of a true forest animal.

    Like so many problems of this kind, it eventually worked its way up the bureaucratic chain to wind up atop Brend's desk. Helpfully, it came with a partial solution already obtained. A Hamadryas veterinarian had managed to train small camelids native to the forest to bite through the yarn upon command. However, this had produced an objection that the animals were not acting randomly. Doctrine demanded an animal make the differentiation.

    After a series of clarifying messages exchanged with a Hamadryas veterinarian, forester, and theologian, Brend worked out that it would be acceptable to divide the trees into two groups randomly using a computer, and then simply have one half chosen as those to be spared. It was a matter of finding an animal that could be trusted to perform a neutral decision-making process.

    He did not, initially, try to solve that puzzle on his own. Instead, he ordered Jan to trawl through the archives for any similar existing method that might be adapted overnight. The range of options of the analysis droid could examine vastly outpaced the scope of Brend's imagination.

    The JN-66 droid possessed remarkable analytical powers, and somewhere in the midst of millions of data files uncovered a suitable process within the records of an entirely different theology. The concept of an oracular animal, one that made choices between possibilities absent any variable material inducement, appeared suitable. Reflecting on this, Brend supposed there might be a measure of truth to the concept. Jedi could foresee the future, if vaguely. Why not an animal? The touch of the Force need not be limited to sentient beings.

    Further correspondence with the veterinarian suggested that a corvid could probably be trained to the Hamadryas' needs. Not ideal, birds had a relatively low value among their culture, but acceptable. The priesthood capitulated, the chosen crow picked one of two identical caterpillars off visually identical branches, and the harvest went forward.

    Brend considered this one of the easier solutions on his record, resolved mostly through the benefit of owning a high-powered analysis droid. He rewarded Jan with a professional wax and buffing treatment. The Hamadryas rewarded him by inviting him to the Syrup Festival in late spring. A joyous occasion filled with sugary deserts, it ought to have been a pleasant diversion. Instead, it was an opportunity to discover that he was severely allergic to Acenou's variety of maple pollen when he came down with a crippling case of hay fever.

    Medication mitigated this but made everything tasteless. He begged off as soon as politeness allowed. In a sense, he supposed it was fitting. He'd done little, so what right did he have to reap the perks? At least the tapping succeeded. A local supply of sugar was highly significant. Refugees or not, the people of the galaxy possessed an insatiable sweet tooth.
     
  5. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    Baroque Buzzkill

    There was a problem with the bees. Or perhaps, viewed from the opposite end, it was a problem with the swallows for eating too many of the bees. However, given that the swallows were indigenous to Acenou's oak savanna and the bees had been imported from offworld, Brend was inclined to side with the birds. The Vorzydiaks, unfortunately, did not agree. They needed the bees to cultivate Vorzyd orchids, as without them to chew open the buds the precious flowers could not bloom.

    And, of course, the prospect of life without the flowers was simply not to be contemplated. Brend found this to be immensely frustrating, especially as it was not his first encounter with Vorzydiak obstinacy. He'd already dealt with the issue of the prairie breeze being above the strength their preferred grain cultivar could endure while successfully pollinating and their inability to cultivate their native Vorzyd yeast as a leavening agent on Acenou. Preferably, the problem could have simply been ignored. Except, the Vorzydiaks possessed a fanatically obsessive labor culture and were capable of fostering a hyper-productive integrated agricultural system so long as everything was lovingly arranged to their taste even in the absence of advanced technology. They could not afford to be neglected.

    A specialized hedgerow layout had handled the wind issue, and they'd been able to replace the yeast with powdered inorganic baking salts. The bees were the last hurdle to clear. Or perhaps the swallows, since the specialized adaptations of the pollinators to their orchid partners were not readily amenable to change or replacement. The joys of multi-planet integrated agronomy.

    The Vorzydiak farmers, with the typical uncompromising seriousness of their species, proposed simply exterminating the swallows using remotes. That would save the bees, certainly, but even a very simple ecosystem model made it clear this would cause a catastrophic predator release response by the locust population. Presenting the certainty of an all-consuming plague had dissuaded them from that course, for the moment.

    They countered, afterwards, by challenging Brend to convince the swallows to leave 'their' bees alone. Though this initially sounded fantastical, upon consideration it was a far more reasonable idea than it seemed. Various substances existed that, while non-toxic, birds found utterly foul-tasting. Some, in powder form, could be sprayed upon bees and carried harmlessly between their hairs. It would not take much training to teach the swallows that the little buzzing black and yellow balls were not suitable meals.

    After some experimenting, he managed to find a compound that worked to protect bees in microcosms. The next step forward involved figuring out how to coat enough bees in the open environment to achieve an ecosystem-wide impact. Inevitably, these bees were not the type to live in large, centralized hives that could simply have been periodically sprayed. That would have been far too simple. Instead, they were semi-social burrowers who lived in tunnels of no more than ten individuals.

    Spraying the orchids might have worked, but those notoriously finicky plants lived up to their reputation by reacting extremely poorly to the powder. The Vorzydiaks mirrored this in their opinion of the very idea of spraying their sacred flowers. In frustration, Brend suggested the farmers come up with ideas as to how to treat the bees instead. The results might have been comical, at another time. With the entire harvest in the balance, they were decidedly urgent.

    One enterprising student, however, managed to design a device that would coat the bees as they passed through a narrow tube. She seemed to think that coaxing this behavior would be as easy in the wild as in the lab where she could pick them up and push them around with forceps, a clear failure to reckon with the idiosyncrasies of insect behavior. Given the option with experimental placements in the wild, the buzzing harvesters went absolutely everywhere except through the tubes.

    The secret to agronomy, Brend believed, was persistence. Try enough options and eventually one would eventually emerge as viable with enough effort behind it. Thankfully, the existence of droids allowed for the acceleration of that iterative process, as did the massive data resources available to an agent of the Galactic Empire. Thousands of holos representing hundreds of hours of bee behavior were reviewed by Jan, his JN-66 droid, in less than a day thanks to the miracle of parallel processing. Out of the results they were able to devise a bait station that successfully lured the bees into walking through the tubes.

    It was a baroque, ridiculous-looking, and fragile assemblage of glass, metal, plastic, and liquid sugars, but Vorzydiak handymen banged them out in a rush, just in time to save the year's orchids and allow the harvest to proceed. The swallows spent their time angrily swooping through the flower fields, as if registering their displeasure at this deprivation.

    Brend felt slightly bad about this, but if the price of the win was a few angry birds, he could accept that. In agriculture, as in life, there was no pleasing everyone.
     
  6. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    Feathers & Fees

    The kites were out hunting on the autumnal equinox. They wheeled in the sky above the long rows of berry bushes, occasionally resting atop the harvester droids as the machines slowly crawled back and forth gathering in the ripe red fruit crop. Older models, the harvesters lacked precision. Berries shook free and dropped to the ground regularly, leaking sugary fluid across the coppery colored soil. One butterfly after another fluttered over to seek this easy meal, and the kites followed, satisfying a meatier hunger.

    A pleasant scene, generally, with the sun shining over clear skies, the crop coming in, and the majestic gray and black birds swooping gracefully through the air. Aes could have stood on the hilltop and simply watched it unfold for a long time. That, of course, was not to be. She did not get to leave the city simply to see the sights of the continent. That freedom was not afforded a ruler.

    She had been summoned, instead, by a dispute. An all-too-common case. This one, as it happened, was not about land or resources, as most were, but instead turned on the fate of the wheeling raptors. Not that they knew it, though their habit of diving at humanoids who got too close suggested a certain prescient wisdom.

    The Kessurians, whose territory this hilly coastal region this was and whose labor had cultivated the berry crop, wished to capture some of the birds and use them in falconry. That sport, for reasons that could not easily be imparted to outsiders, was of considerable importance to the species, bordering on an obsession by their would-be upper class. The Ogemites, who lived instead some distance to the east, objected to this. They claimed that the kites were the sacred avian hosts of the spirits of their departed ancestors and that placing them under the sway of hood and gauntlet was a form of slavery. They demanded a complete prohibition of any interference with the birds.

    Aes considered the Ogemite claim rather ridiculous. Yes, the specific ethnic variation of the species who had found refuge on Acenou did possess lightly gray feathered hair of a shade that almost perfectly matched the head feathers of the kites, but their homeworld was halfway across the galaxy and the animals were native to Ord Varee. The Ogemites contended that their dead found their way to a suitable local host on every world they settled, and on Acenou they'd chosen the kites. A sacred hymn, which a highly sonorous choir was presently performing only a few meters behind her, had appeared as if from nowhere to justify this.

    Silly though it might be to an outsider, the Ogemite belief appeared sincere. Certainly, they had no other reason to antagonize the Kessurians – a significantly more martial and locally numerous species they were in no position to oppose through force. The intransigence of the montral-bearing clay-soil color aliens on the issue was also rather aggravating. Acenou had numerous resident raptors suitable for falconry, of which the kites were among the least important. Surely, they could have simply exempted this one out of generosity, but no, they had asserted their property rights in a most irritating fashion.

    Now it fell to her to make a decision that appeased both sides, avoided violence, and did not lose her administration respect it desperately needed.

    The truly depressing part was how typical this sort of dispute was.

    Seeing that the Ogemites had come to this meeting dressed in flowing white robes and gathered together to belt out religious music at the top of their lungs while the Kessurians wore formal business attire and milled rather aimlessly about the wind-whipped hilltop, Aes determined that the latter represented the obvious target. They would forsake the kites as pets, given a suitable inducement and a sop to their species' honor, she was certain of it. The tricky part was to find a workable combination before everyone got offended enough to pull weapons.

    It was a nice day. Aes thought she might as well just ask.

    The Kessurian leader was a tall woman, nearly two meters at the tip of her montrals, who sat on a stool in the center of their contingent. Her left arm featured a robust leather gauntlet and a massive, preening eagle. Impressive, but ostentation meant nothing to the Zabrak governor. “Greetings,” she told the falconer. “Nice day out. I'm sure you want to spend it hunting across the skies with your bird. So, perhaps you can tell me what it would take to solve this mess and then we can all break before lunch?”

    A smile broke across the clay-shaded woman's face. It seemed this approach found favor. “The kites fly above our land, resource of the world. As long as that remains true, my people will always choose them for sport.”

    Carefully, Aes untangled this statement. The first implication was that she could, using her authority, pass a law protecting the kites and expect it to be respected. That would not sit well, of course, smacking of favoritism as it inevitably must, and she rejected it immediately. The key, she filtered out, was to somehow produce an arrangement wherein the kites were no longer viewed as a natural resource that did not require governmental intervention.

    A moment later, staring out at the harvesters upon which the birds rode as they shredded their prey, the connection clicked over in her mind. “Those droids,” she pointed to the bulky units. “Are property, not a resource, and anyone who took one would be guilty of theft, correct?”

    “Yes,” the Kessurian gave no reaction to this seemingly obvious statement.

    “Then, cannot the kites become property as well? All of them?” Modern remotes could track and identify every single bird in the population. “Sell them to the Ogemites,” Aes determined. “They can be property and still live in the wild.”

    The falconer's smile broadened. “That will be expensive. They are highly valued.”

    Aes returned the grin. “Ogemites are skilled merchants. They can afford it.”

    Not entirely true, none of Acenou's refugees were rich, but payoffs, even heavy ones, were ultimately cheaper than violence.

    The Ogemite leadership, knowing this, agreed immediately, though they chose to insist the payment be labeled an 'offering.'

    Unexpectedly, Aes indeed found it possible to break before lunch and watch the eagle hunt a marmot on the heights. A suitable treat for a holiday.
     
  7. earlybird-obi-wan

    earlybird-obi-wan Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 21, 2006
    Yes more about Brend and his friends. Great details about where he is living
     
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  8. Chyntuck

    Chyntuck Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Jul 11, 2014
    I haven't read Of Small Propagules yet, though it was on my list already bcause of its awesome title, but I have to say, these ficlets made it even more intriguing. I never expected that a story that focuses in such detail on agronomy and environmental management could be so exciting, but here we are!

    Your worldbuilding here is simply amazing, both with the plethora of alien species, some of which I udnerstand to be refugees and others native, and the constant contrast and tension of nature vs culture. I went and looked up some of the more obscure species, but that was in fact just to check if they were somewhere in canon, because you flesh them out really well throughout these ficlets and there was truly no need for background information.

    I also loved the thematic progression from one story to the next. The themes of nature, agriculture and the environment are already present in the first two, but they take a back seat to the themes of exile and nostalgia as Dusk and Aes try to reconnect to their home cultures through ceremonies and rituals. But from the third story onward, we really witness the confluence of the themes of nature and culture with the ingenious issues you devised and the ingenious solutions you had your characters propose. I could quote a rather large chunk of text to illustrate my point, so I'm limiting myself to two favourites:
    Beyond the giggles at this line, this is a great example of something that a species would deem culturally important enough to make a fuss over it. The Vorzydiaks could shift their efforts to another crop, but they don't want to because this one matters to them.
    Another great example, with the contrast between the species for whom this is truly an issue of culture and identity, and another who are in this to assert their privilege.

    As a side note, I also loved Jan the archivist droid and their input into the various issues. This line:
    ... was so cute, it made me laugh out loud.

    Lastly, I loved how you inserted the prompts in the stories, and in particular your use of "kites". I had no idea that "kite" was also the name of a bird of prey, so I'll go to bed less ignorant tonight :p but the meaning you chose here also made perfect sense for the overarching themes of these stories.

    =D=
     
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  9. Mechalich

    Mechalich Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Feb 2, 2010
    So. I am very biased, but the influence of agricultural science and environmental management is profound, for good and bad. For example, Norman Borlaug has a very strong argument for 'most important person of the 20th century not widely known.' This is an area where policy makers, engineers, and scientists, can make major life-changing decisions in surprisingly short timeframes. Considering the sometimes advanced technologies of Star Wars, even more so.

    Because the populations on Acenou are refugees, maintaining ties to their heritage is of great importance to them, however, the nature of switching planets imposes certain practical barriers to doing so that would generally not be found otherwise. Though in some cases this is simply an extension of real world issues, for example, relocating a plant species to a new environment and then discovering that the obligate pollinator isn't found there is something that's cropped up many times throughout human history (also why most of the biggest crops are wind-pollinated grasses that don't have this issue).

    Personally, I think droids are important to Star Wars and should be used when possible and I dislike how all too often they appear only as comedic relief. Droids can do things organic beings cannot. I imagine an analysis droid like Jan having a Chat-GPT-esque ability to answer almost any question, only to have a real theory of knowledge and truth rather than just conversational fitting. If you have a tool like that available, use it.