Travel permit

Bringing Libby to Seclusion station may be more difficult than I anticipating. She is willing to go, perhaps even eager to get out of Mehatoor. But transporting her in the Indagatrix gets a hard no from my political officer, the recently promoted mr. Firth. 

Not unless I can present proper papers from her Holder that she is to be transferred to Seclusion. In itself this is a very reasonable measure to prevent slaves from running away. But I do feel that mr. Firth should trust me a bit more. 

I am not sure if ms. Yubari's signature on a form would be legal - due to her condition, and probably also to her not being legally allowed to even own slaves. And of course, I cannot ask the heretic to sign a form, even considering that is ridiculous.

I seem to be stuck on this.

Rescued slaves

A crisis like the Drifter incursions can bring out the very best in people - but unfortunately also the worst.

This became clear over the weekend, as I saw a sudden influx of traumatized slaves into the Lamp's medbay. The heretic leader of the Sedevacantists had attempted to sacrifice these slaves to the Drifters, by dumping them in mobile depots in space. The idea was to have the Drifters experiment on them rather than on monks. While the saving of innocent monks is a good intention, the means are horrific.

A LUMEN fleet, commanded by Maria Daphiti, went to save these poor souls from a certain death, be it from a Drifter attack or by neglect and hunger alone in the depths of space. Sadly, not all could be saved, it was too late for some. Those that survived were brought back to Mehatoor. Mr. Ché Biko - a diplomat connected to a pacifist faction within the Federation, if I recall correctly - offered assistance by dispatching trauma experts.

That is very kind, but it is also very Gallente to forget about the healing of the soul. Abuse not only causes psychological trauma, it can also lead to a crisis of faith. I made sure to visit and comfort the escapees spiritually.

The commotion in the Medbay had a very detrimental impact on Libby, herself a former slave and victim of the heretic. Her fears that the heretic would come and take her back are again paralysing her. I will discuss with her my plans to have her transferred to St. Vasrayi's chapel Seclusion. Despite several attempts, I think it is clear that she cannot function in Mehatoor due to the presence of the heretic in the same system.

Simulacra

Again, there are worrisome developments on the Drifter crisis. Pilots (among them Michael Minate who reported it publicly) have found simulated baseliners. Vast amounts of data to create a copy of one particular person! Additionally, fragments of what appear to be images of an invasion plan have been found. 

Others have been asking why the Drifters experiment on us, exposing helpless monks to radiation and testing their limits. They are rightly expecting the Drifters to already have more than enough accurate information on our physiology. What they might not know accurately are our cultural habits, our psychology - different from empire to empire, for which they would have to redo their experiments in each of the four powers. 

Putting it all together, I think they plan to build a simulacrum - a copy of an existing person, to inhabit and behave in a manner that does not raise suspicion. They need the information on our behavior to make these simulacra blend in. 

This could be to create a spokesperson, or a negotiator to talk to us - if so it would be a first real attempt at conversation. The more probable explanation is that they want to infiltrate our ranks, replace people in crucial positions with their puppets, to help their invasion. 

I have discussed it with mr. Firth, who assures me that the MIO is having the situation under control and that I should not worry. I do worry nevertheless, and insisted that we devise a secret passphrase and commit it to memory, to be able to make sure that we haven't been replaced by Drifter simulacra.

PS. I need to warn Baron Redwolfe to be watchful for simulated pilots infiltrating his fleets. Oh, I also should not forget to ask him about the missing bookshelf LXXIII in his Order's library.

More celebrations

Today there was another party - a more private one this time, not Empire wide, just on board of the Indagatrix! 

Mr. Ivan Firth passed the promotion exam and thus met the final requirement for his promotion along the ranks of the MIO. I think he skipped a few rungs, thanks to our explorations and bringing back interesting artefacts. I do not know what these ranks or nomenclatures imply, but he is now Itinerant Frumentarius First class. He's got a new uniform too. 

It would be logical for him to now have more choice in his assignments and be able to do other things than look after a curious friar exploring about. So I think it is by his own volition that he stays on as political officer of the Indagatrix. 

He's arranged for an escape pod of his own, a new MIO type pod. It is, he says, safer and better equipped than the life support backup unit I had installed a while ago in the cargo bay. It will take up much less space, and has proven its worth in the recent Drifter crisis, where more than ever before search and rescue missions were successful. 

Victory in Tash-Murkon

A victory in Tash-Murkon! 

The Empress' home system had been the target of a Drifter incursion. The Navy and independent capsuleers such as our own pilots have worked hard to repell these "profane monstrosities" as the Empress calls them. They managed to destroy a Vigilant Dreamer, the hub of the invasion. Our scientists understand this structure to be some sort of spying and information gathering nexus, passing on the data to God knows where. With its destruction, the incursion came to an end.  

While the "Drifter Crisis" - as this was is called - is not over yet, it was a moment to celebrate. The Empress gave a speech, and commended all, saying that "the faithful have risen to that challenge like a righteous flame!"

She mentioned the valiant pilots that were there to deal the final blow to the Dreamer - among them Arataka Research Consortium fleet commander DutchGunner, whom I had the pleasure to fly with in the past. Although some view the ARC with suspicion due to their neutrality, I think their actions now prove their good intent. They have been fighting these Drifters for a long time in wormhole space, and share their experience in the extermination of that threat.

Although not mentioned by name in the Empress' speech, let us not forget the great efforts of our own Baron Redwolfe and his fleets, that have worked closely with the Amarr navy. Last I heard they have been doing search and rescue missions which by now saved hundreds of Amarr navymen, During these missions, they have encountered and destroyed many more enemy vessels in the process. Let our pilots and the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl take pride in having earned the gratitude of our beloved Empress and of all Amarr!

Meditations on immortality

Capsuleers. Contrary to baseliner belief, we are not eternal. But we are not quite mortal either. Our immortality is a potential to endure in time, but it is to be sharply distinguished from eternity as is found in mathematical truths or in God[1]. To put it plainly: we can be killed and erased from existence, just not by the mere passage of time.

What does our immunity to aging mean for our life? What becomes of this transhuman condition?

We are probably still too “young” to know. It is not clear yet what will happen to the inner, contemplative aspect of our existence, to that intimate realm of thoughts and love and meditations considered by many theologians to be superior to the worldly realm of actions.

But in the realm of actions and interactions, for capsuleers already a first hint of a change has manifested itself in that small span of time since we came into being: A disproportionate number of capsuleers retire from public life.

Humans in all ages - before this one - enter the public life, not merely because bringing things into the public confers reality to them[2], but more so because it is the only way mortals can attempt to give permanence to things beyond their own finite lifespan. Our deeds, our words, the artifacts we make, they perish with us if we do not share them with others. But when potential lifespan knows no limit, there is no longer a need for a public to guarantee the permanence of such things.

In no other race is this retraction from the public to the private more evident than in the Jove, the oldest race to have conquered mortality. The need to engage with each other and with a common shared world seems to have dissipated in them altogether. The Sleepers have locked themselves out of the public sphere for good. And the Jovian disease I consider to be an extension of this condition from their active life to their inner or contemplative life - a hint of what lack of mortality does to the mind, in the end. 

[1] The Great Fall and subsequent coming of the Dark Ages has deeply rooted in our common subconsciousness the conviction that nothing humans can make lasts forever and that only God offers the eternal.

[2] Consider the question “Did you hear that too?” A perceived sound is only real when it is confirmed through shared experience. Note that reality and truth are not the same – while it may be very true that the person asking the question hears a sound, they consider that sound real only if others hear it as well.

Chained books

I researched the monastery's library for writings about the Order of Saint Tetrimon, in particular their early history in the Khanid Kingdom, after their banishment from the Empire. That is when they would have tried to smuggle ancient relics out of the empire.

Books like to hide from us. You think you put your book near the sofa, but it turns out to be at the bedside. The more books you have around you, the harder it gets to keep track of their location, especially in an ancient and undigitized collection. The easiest way was to actually chain books to the bookshelf or lectern. That way, they cannot get very far from where they are supposed to be. 

Now, for a small collection, you can just keep a list of all the books you have. But for a big collection, you will need help finding the book. That is where shelfmark tags come in. 

Books get a tag, usually on the spine, and that mark is basically a set of coordinates, like latitude and longitude for a planet's global positioning system. For example, if you see written in red lettering III A 3 you know the book's location is bookshelf III, right side (left one would be written in black), top shelf, third book - each successive coordinate in the label lets the librarian zero in more closely on the book's location.

On the side of the bookshelf or lectern, you can find a shelf list. That is also arranged "geographically". The top of the left column corresponds to the top of the left part of the shelf. The collection of various shelf lists is itself turned into a book, the very earliest versions of library catalogs, and its place is on the first lectern. 

The oldest volumes of the library of the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl Monastery, the ones that date back to the days of the Khanid order of Paladins and their interaction with the Tetrimon knights, are not digitized or catalogued, but they do use the shelfmark tag system. 

After an entire day of getting my bearings using this ancient GPS, I found that what I am looking for should be on bookshelf LXXIII. 

However, between shelves LXXII and LXXIV is just a blank wall without bookshelf or lectern.

OOC picture credit: https://www.herefordcathedral.org/chained-library

Monastic libraries

There has been disconcerting news that the Drifters, during their incursions, have been torturing monks that they captured at a deep space monastery, just to find out the limits of their endurance. May God give them strength and reward their for their martyrdom. 

I am not sure what I can contribute against that threat, but I am grateful that Baron Redwolfe leads the counter-incursion fleets. So, both to take my mind off the atrocities reported in the news, and to help the baron where I can best, I went back to Neyi IV, to the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl Monastery. 

We recently provided climate control units for the Monastery's library so now I went back to inspect them. I found the place much improved; the units work well, and also repairs and proper insulation at the windows have been completed. 

Along with those repairs, the layout of the library itself, like many monastic libraries, helps keep the books in good condition. As is typical, it has long and fairly narrow rooms with vents to protect against damp atmosphere, with thick walls to keep temperature from following daily fluctuations. The lecterns project at right angles from the windows, providing adequate lighting, and they have slightly angular surfaces to lay out the books without straining the backs of the bindings. There are shelf lists affixed to the lecterns, to catalog the books on the nearby shelves - the precursor of the modern library catalog. Rules as these were laid out long ago in the Instructiones Custodem Librorum by Saint Aloysius of the Quill, a blessed doctor of the faith that I often pray to and hold very dear in my personal venerations.

Anti-drifter fleets

The Drifter crisis deepens; and now the Empress has called upon all to take our vengeance on the drifter abomination. For LUMEN, Baron Redwolfe has taken the initiative to lead our pilots. 

This does not surprise me, as chapter master of the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl, the presence of Drifters should be especially enraging, and the Empress' call would resonate well with their reverance to the late Empress Jamyl.

From the early footage, I am seeing some resemblence between the new structures that appear during the incursions and ancient Talocan ones... I hope Baron Redwolfe and his fleet take time to get some footage and measurements on that.

Drifter incursions

Nothing good comes from the meddling of the Deathless with Jove technology, and his abductions of Upwell infomorphs for God knows what evil plan.

The Drifters are not taking this lightly. This time they are not using battering rams to try and enter Zarzakh... It is us who have become their target! The ACN has reported of skirmishes with Drifters in various parts of the Empire. 

There is no full scale invasion, but our navy is on high alert and working hard to keep us safe. Nevertheless, some systems have been undergoing incursions. The Drifters again use some sort of spacetime engineering, because in the systems where they do their incursions, ship velocities and warp speeds are increased. And they have found ways to diminish shield resists and drone effectiveness - that should not bother our fine navy ships that rely on armor and lasers! 

Our technology has much progressed since the time of their cowardly attack on Empress Jamyl, they will face the wrath of the faithful. I will urge capsuleers and baseliners alike in my next sermons to help cleanse Empire space from these devils and avenge the blasphemous attack on the Empress!

PS. Not all news is bad today - I was able to give lady Ashand, callsign 'Deceiver's Echo', the information file on her relative.

Goodbyes and a gift

I visited lady Agatha Adelath today, she is recovering from her surgery. All seems to be well, and she looks a hundred years younger, like a sprightly 300-year old and not a day more. 

So it was time for me to say goodbye to Mr. Maulus.

Lady Agatha was of course very happy to be reunited with Mr. Maulus, even if she cannot move about yet very much. Also Mr. Maulus seemed exceedingly happy to be back with lady Agatha! He lept up into her arms.

Her ladyship insisted on giving me a gift for keeping Mr. Maulus while she was undergoing the medical procedure. She wants me to have sailing ships of her late husband. I refused, citing my vow or poverty that only allows me to have ships that are strictly necessary for my quest - apart from the Indagatrix that I use frequently, I only have some shuttles, the Ratakh Hubrau, a hauler and a Stratios for the Takmahl labyrinth, and a logistics vessel gifted to me by lord Utari. And all those put together I already consider to be a lot.

But lady Agatha is not easily deterred, and she said that I should consider the sailing boats on permanent loan rather than property. And that I really should sail the rings of Hama VI with one of these slow ships. According to her it is very meditative to be coasting along on the waves of small ice crystals that undulate along the gas giant's rings, while basking in the golden glow of Hama's orange-red sun setting on the planet. That sounds so idyllic that I think I will just do it.

Dranera and the fish

It was a nice evening out with mr. Ivan Firth, he was more friendly now that his promotion exam was over. In his role as political officer on board of the Indagatrix, he is very uptight and severe, but a few shots of Narkian brandy made him much more relaxed. 

We talked about a lot of things, about the Ministry and the Theology council, and I told him about my aspirations, as a child, to become an inquistor. To my surpise, he did not know about that, or perhaps he forgot about it, because I would be surprised if this is not in my MIO background file.

I knew even less than I know now, and I wanted to be a heroic inquisitor chasing heretics across the galaxy. It sounded adventurous to me. And the holomovies about inquisitors beating evil masterminds were fantastic. 

But I didn’t pass those exams, I never got the degree. Mind you, I was good at the theoretical courses. But the practical part… I failed grievously on Applied Torture 101.

In that introductory course, students are not working with humans. You learn the basics by training on bunnies and furriers and geese ducklings. Cute animals, to better learn to detach yourself from your subject. I just could not stand the squeaks and shrieks, and the combination of gore and cuddly fluffiness. I fainted every time.

So, professor Dranera, an exquisitely pedagogical bully, figured I should start with something easier. He came up with this idea that I start with torturing a fish. It was a carp, I remember that fish.

This was a public humiliation. He told me in front of the whole class, as he plunked the fishbowl on my torture workbench. He said, ‘Here, that one won’t squeal!’. I was put on the spot, he bellowed out: ‘Savnar, what method will you use on your fish?’ I was nervous and made the wrong snap association in my mind.

I answered ‘waterboarding’.

Everybody laughed, but Dranera was furious. He thought I was mocking him, but it was just nerves acting up and me saying the first association that came to me. I was dismissed from class, and soon after that, I quit the program, and switched to a Theology degree in stead.

I failed to become an Inquisitor because I suggested waterboarding to torture a fish.

Exams

Mr. Firth was a bit grumpy when I asked him about Echo's relative. But he agreed to do it. It took him a lot of time.

He got results back to me today. And explained his earlier grumpiness: apparently, he was taking the exam for promotion. I thought he had already done that, but apparently he failed the first time around, and could retake it now. 

The result is not yet known, but he has the look of a student whose tension is lifted after the exam, and who suddenly feels the tiredness of the weeks of studying wash over him, making him for the moment too exhausted to worry too strongly about how it went.

I suggested we go for a drink, and for the first time since I've known him, he agreed.

Curious Request

There are always rumors circulating, in any congregation. 

After mass, as people greet each other on their way out of the chapel, one can almost see these rumors fluttering about like butterflies. They feed on the nectar of scandal, and move erratically from one group of faithful to another, pollinating brains with hearsay. The higher on the societal ladder that the scandal is about, the sweeter the nectar.

This is not something that can be stamped out, even by the harshest sermon and the sternest priest.

They reach my ears, but usually I ignore them. This time, a particularly nasty rumor is going around about lewd behavior by our Directrix. Such rumors tickle the imagination of our baseliners to no end, and they happily blow it out of proportion, to the point that any sane mind safely dismisses it at once.

But then I got this unusual request by the Directix: to help out certain persons that have uncommon professions. Well, perhaps not all that uncommon, but rather jobs that are frowned upon of by the more puritanical circles of clergy. Of course I am willing to help fellow man and woman, and if these rumors were not going around, I would have made nothing of it. But now I admit it has me a little worried.

Offline organs

Lady Adelath's Genolution organs were ready - and as per her request they do not connect to galnet, they remain fully offline. The workaround is that the she will have ports in her neck, to plug in datacrystals that update the organ's software when necessary. It will look as if she's a capsuleer with those, and she was quite proud to tell me she'd be "just like you".

The surgery took place today, and it appears all went well! Good news. 

This also means that - after still some period of time for post-surgery recovery - Mr. Maulus can return home. That will be good. We get along well, but Mr. Maulus demands a lot of time and attention, and I have to say I am looking forward to being alone with Mittens again. 

Searching the records

From time to time we have visitors to the library who want to use our access to the Book of Records, to find ancestry or relatives, for example to complete a family tree. Yesterday we had a high-profile visit, a capsuleer with callsign Deceiver's Echo. She is related to lord Ashland, a holder of a minor house. 

The young lady Ashland wanted to find her mother - and we did find the marriage link, and a record for her mother. At least, they are still in good standing with the Empire. But I had sad news for her: according to our records, her mother has passed away. Now, she was not originally Amarr and spent a lot of time in Yulai and in the Republic, so there is a very small possibility that record may still be wrong.

We did unearth another mystery. She appears to have a brother that she did not know about. And there is some seal on the record, I am not allowed to view it. I will ask mr. Ivan Firth, the political officer on the Indagatrix, how to best proceed. At this point, there is no need yet to bother the reverend mother Kahoudi. Mr. Firth is a bit lower on the Ministry's hierarchy, but I think he has enough clout to find out what is going on.

The Monastery of the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl

Yesterday I had the pleasure of visiting the monastery that now houses the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl. 

It is an ancient structure, actually predating Empress Jamyl's time. I am correct it was built by the Khanid Order of Paladins. It had fallen into disrepair, around the time that also the Tetrimon Order of Saint Jamyl had become inactive. That is, untill Baron Redwolfe put his shoulders under the project of reviving this order to which his ancestors belonged and restoring both the order and the monastery to their former glory. 

Of particular interest is a large library that belonged to the Khanid Order of Paladins. It contains a vast number of ancient scrolls and I do not think that they have been translated or studied ever before. These paladins practiced the Exercises of Saint Aloysius of the Quill and had their knights copy scripture and write up things by hand. So many secrets lie there, and records of forgotten histories! I felt like a child in a candy shop! 

But looking at the bad climate control, this was closer to a candy shop of horrors. 

Time and nature took its toll on the library. The current shielding of the windows helps to keep rain and wind out - but nothing more. It is woefully unsatisfactory - I do not blame Baron on the Order, this is something that requires the tender love and care of proper librarians and conservation experts. 

I have arranged for a quick transport of climate control equipment - temperature and humidity should not be allowed to just go along with the weather outside, but should be very carefully controlled and kept at an optimum for preservation. Lighting should be adapted too - there are gorgeous frescoes of star maps that we must protect from fading. A team from the Lamp's library is going over to install the equipment as I write down this log entry. I'll go and inspect things as soon as they're ready.

Pochven wormholes

The Talocan were masters in weaving jump connections between stars. They did not use the gate network that we found in space and that the core powers still use to this day. I am curious about their technology - I believe that it was later copied by the Jove and may now resurface in Zarzakh. I am also interested in the network logic behind these connections. Deciphering this will lead us to discover hubs in their ancient network and it will offer new insights in this ancient race.

Coming Sunday, I plan to go the recently restored monastery of the Tetrimon Order Saint Jamyl. This order is a chapterhouse of LUMEN, headed by Baron Redwolfe. The monastery has a repository of ancient star charts which could be of use for my current investigation.

Another connection that I see is the Triglavian's creation of Pochven. They blocked the existing jump gates and created new pathways. The spontaneously appearing wormholes reacted to that, as they did in Turnur. The wormhole connections to Pochven were studied by Electus Matari - a rebel group that we had a temporary alliance of convenience with during the first and second Khybernaut wars. They compiled an entry manual to Pochven. 

This proved very useful in the wars against the Khybernauts, but it also showed that the C729 wormhole connections to any given Pochven system randomly walk around in only a limited amount of target systems, close to the original location of the Triglavian occupied system. For example, to get to the occupied Amarrian system of Raravoss in Pochven, one has to scan for wormholes in the following set of systems:

image from: https://pochven.electusmatari.com/

This is of course different from Anoikis. But I think it shares the property of randomness hiding regularity. If it could be deciphered for Pochven, perhaps it can too for Seclusion.

Research question

Wormhole connections are random. Supposedly, at some point, they were not. They were controlled by one or more Talocan orbital structure the size of entire star systems. However, when that went defect, the wormholes started appearing and shifting randomly, which they do up to this day.

Nevertheless, some veteran colonists of the wormhole systems have developed an intuition about the general region where the next static wormhole will pop up. They say things like "Oh, we have had our highsec static show up twice in Caldari and then in Minmatar space, the next one will likely be Amarr." Perhaps they are just guessing. They cannot explain the logic behind their hunches. But it has been noted by some etnographers of the voidlanders - as our wormhole colonists call their culture - that these hunches tend to be right in a statistically significant way.

This does imply that there is some hidden order in the apparent randomness, an order that we have not discovered yet. The cluster's brightest minds - at Hedion University, in the Arataka Research Consortium and in the Signal Cartel - have devoted all their energy to it, and could not find a pattern.

That should not stop a lesser mind like mine to take a fresh look at the problem, an make their own inquiry for the fun it. Of course, one should heed the failures of the past. Going for the grand goal of predicting every new connection is a proven delusion. Similarly, it is impossible to map out the entire time-evolving network of wormhole connections, even for a formidable alliance as ours.

So, I will start very humbly by looking at our very own corner of Anoikis, where I can ask Publius to give me daily information on where our C1 static leads to. I will then look for geometrical patterns in space,  tracing how the exit of our static makes its random walk around the Anoikis cluster. To me, that seems more relevant than arithmetic patters based on wormhole identifier numbers. 

Reflections on YC126

The start of a new year is a good occasion to reflect on the previous year. 

At the personal level, I thank God for guiding me into making a bit of progress with my quest. One lead that I continued to investigate is that the Takmahl, settling in the Araz constellation, had taken the holy relics. After searching there rather thoroughly, this trail led me onwards to Aridia, along the Blood Raider highway from Araz to Delve. I found a Takmahl biodroid with the help of my friends, and clues of the involvement of the Jove. I tried to find a passage into Jove space, only to find that other capsuleers who did so before me closed that door and lost their mind. These are still leads I must pursue this year, continuing in Aridia with a focus on the Anath system. I also need to gain more knowledge on the Jove and on the Talocan - the latter are a common denominator behind both the advance of the Takmahl and the Jove. A parallel (and very different) line of investigation is the idea that the Order of St. Tetrimon, working for the Council of Apostles, hid the holy relics. I followed that particular trail to Mezagorm, but had to abort that search prematurely. I will return and continue the search.

At the level of the Societas, and Khimi Harar at large, two notable events spring to my mind. Firstly, Prince Seraghis and his Zaraehvar combat group fought bravely to pacify Aridia, but after initial victories, the protracted battles wore down their forces, and they retreated, leaving the security in Aridia fully in the hands of the Amarr Navy again. They also left our blessed alliance. 

Secondly, there appears to be a wormhole renaissance, with waves of new settlers going to Anoikis. Our wormhole system of Seclusion has become a bustling industrial hub, thanks to the efforts of Publius Cornelius Felix, and his associate Isidorus. At Pilgrim's rest, we have now enlarged the Chapel and dedicated it to St. Vasrayi. The increased focus on Anoikis will be a help in my investigations of the Talocan.

At the level of the Empire itself, the notable news of this year are the new insurgencies flowing over from the warzone into high security systems such as Mehatoor. These have been a concern, and we have helped suppress this, earning praise from our beloved Empress. The insurgencies have also heralded the advent of a new type of warclone, the vanguard. The insurgencies and the vanguard are linked to a new enemy, the Deathless, whose illegitimate use of a Jovian station is putting the Drifters on a war footing, causing alarm not only in our Empire but in the other concord powers. 

Calendars and numerology

Another year has passed. In our own traditional calendar, we welcome the year 23363. Since New Eden universal time was agreed upon at the Yoiul Conference, people commonly use a calendar that sets year zero at the time of the Yoiul Conference. In that scheme, we are now entering the year YC 127. 

Having an universally agreed master clock to which others are calibrated is essential for trade. Official timestamps allow to find out who placed a buy or sell order first. But establishing this is particularly difficult for interstellar trade. Two traders moving at relativistic velocities with respect to each other disagree on the order that events take place - the concept of simultaneity is relative to the frame of reference. So, a choice must be made beforehand on an arbitrarily chosen "trading frame of reference" for timekeeping; an "arbiter" that says who or what comes first. 

This master clock and master frame of reference is kept fixed at the Secure Commerce Commission headquarters in Yulai.

For the purpose of determining who is first, the choice of when to put "year zero" is irrelevant: only time differences matter, not an absolute value. But apparently, it does matter for numerologists. I had a discussion with one at the new year's reception at the library. Numerologists like to play mathematical games, especially with prime numbers. I was informed that 23363 is a product of just two primes, 61 and 383. Before the advent of quantum computing, such numbers were used in cryptography, since it was believed then to be computationally very hard to find the prime factors for large numbers.

The number 127 is also prime, moreover it is a so-called "Mersenne" prime. Those are prime numbers with an additional property: they are equal to some power of two, from which one is subtracted - the seventh power of two is 128, subtracting one gives the prime number 127.

I have no idea why this matters to numerologists.