The Republic of Texas

by on January 21, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

The Texas Ranger Abilene-class starships were fully upgraded to the best of our technology before The War. They received full Peloran tech during that conflict and further modifications have improved their performance since War’s End. They now boast the very best hyperdrive and inertial compensator technologies from both the Peloran and Texas technological trees. Modern engines generate far more thrust than the old, ancient engines of the pre-gravtech era, while maintaining the same silhouette as older Abilenes. They are small ships with big engines that can accelerate far faster than most other ships. And their Peloran hyperdrives can go deeper into hyperspace, where that speed advantage is further reinforced. Unofficial estimates suggest they can travel 150% faster than a front line American Navy squadron. The Texas Rangers do not comment on their actual top speed, maintaining it as an official secret of the Republic of Texas. But they are one of the fastest ships in space.

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The Republic of Texas

by on January 20, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

The Abilene-class starships that carry Texas Rangers across the stars are different from those that once sailed the void. The crew quarters that once served 150 tightly-packed crew and scientists have been reduced to a handful of single-occupancy quarters for the cybernetic crew and their assigned Ranger. The remaining space primarily houses holding cells and storage for relief supplies, weapons, armor, and other equipment. An Abilene carries enough supplies for a Ranger to outfit a posse of any conceivable size, or to bring relief to a community leveled by a natural disaster. Rangers are often the first to arrive after such incidents, making a well-provisioned Abilene a welcome sight wherever disasters occur throughout known space.

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The Republic of Texas

by on January 19, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

The Abilene-class cruisers began their lives as pre-gravtech spacecraft, but the Texas Rangers gave the Abilene-class gravtech frigates a new lease on life in the decades leading up to The War and beyond. They are small by modern standards, though generations of improving technologies have both opened up new spaces and then filled them back in as new missions were introduced. The original Abilene carried 150 crew and scientists into the distant void, but the Rangers are no navy to recruit such crews, and so their Abilenes are crewed entirely by cybernetic intelligences. Command for the starship officially rests with the senior Ranger on board, but the cybernetic crews maintain, repair, and run them with minimal outside input. Some are assigned to a common starship pool where any Ranger can take them out on missions. A single Ranger has commanded others for years or decades as they travel from colony to colony in their long mission to protect the common peace.

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Please Don’t Do Anything Stupid

by on January 18, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

TLDR version – Stay home. Be peaceful. Don’t provide them the visual of angry Trump supporters protesting the swearing in of Biden. Just stay home, watch a nice movie with your family, and enjoy your day like any other. Please don’t do anything stupid this week.

Full version.

Washington DC is locked down like East Berlin this week, with 10,000 (scratch that) 20,000 (scratch that) 25,000 soldiers deployed in it at the time I’m writing this post. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are more by Monday. We’ve got fences and walls and concrete barriers and all kinds of similar crazy going up right now. And of course there is all the silencing of moderates and conservatives on the social media platforms. Beyond that, I’m seeing all kinds of crazy ads exhorting Trump supporters to come out and protest all of this. Ads that do not look like the kind of ads I normally see from Trump supporters. Some of them have odd phrases or color pallets that are not common to the Trump side of the spectrum. But I study history, and I recognize some of those common elements.

Now some people may call me paranoid. They may even be right. But I was taught to distrust the government, and to distrust the media, and basically to distrust everybody who demands that I do what they tell me to do. So when I see phrases and color pallets that I recognize comes from people like that, I get profoundly distrustful of the entire situation. There are too many things going on right now when it comes to this week for me to be at all comfortable. In a nutshell, I’m getting bad vibes, and I have never regretted listening to those bad vibes.

So what I say to all of you, if you support Trump, listen to Trump. He told you to be peaceful. He told you not to promote violence. He told you to go home.

I reiterate that suggestion. If you attend any protests this week having to do with the swearing in of Biden, do not listen to any loud voices telling you to attack anything. Walk away if you hear anything like that. Don’t let the media see you near those bad actors. Better yet, don’t go to the protests. Go to work as usual if you are in a State where the governor hasn’t put you in lockdown. Go home and enjoy a good movie with your family. Watch the swearing in if you want to. But don’t go to the Capitol and protest.

I pray to God my bad vibes are wrong, that everything goes peacefully this week. But if something bad happens, don’t be there. Don’t take your spouse, don’t take your children, don’t take your idiot cousin Earl who might listen to a loud voice telling him to go someplace and do something stupid. Stay home.

Let Washington DC go through whatever pomp and circumstance they want to go through, behind their East Berlin walls, their tens of thousands of soldiers, and their battalions of main stream media reporters ready to tell the story of violent Trump insurrectionists trying to overthrow Democracy.

You stay home and watch everything they do. Or watch a movie. Your choice.

All I really want for you, for any of you, is for you to be safe in your home, your possessions, and your freedom to do or not do whatever you want. Please be careful to preserve that this week. Don’t do anything stupid.

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The Republic of Texas

by on January 17, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

The Texas Rangers have used a variety of spacecraft over the centuries, often obsolete designs retired by the Texas Navy. That is how they acquired their first Abilene-class frigates and F-2 Star Furies in the decades before The War came upon us all. Both were Pre-Contact designs upgraded with gravtech after the Peloran gave it to us, and both had continued to serve the Navy for decades. But the Rangers found them after their eventual retirement and chose to acquire all the examples that they could. The Rangers have used those two designs ever since, and they have even contracted new production runs from the original manufacturers to expand their fleet. Wherever you see an Abilene or Star Fury now, you can expect to see a Texas Ranger in short order. They do not tend to keep the peace from the shadows after all.

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