Need help with "Star Chronicles" (my eight-way sci-fi fanfiction)

[Simplicius]

I can't come up with anything for the Picard/Halo stuff (I know very little about Halo), sorry.

As for the "downstream" idea, where would that place Farscape? Do you remember there's that scene with Vala where they play up the fact that her actress was in Farscape?

[Yukaphile]

...

Farscape... is not part of this verse...

In any case, at least the story is slowly building into a coherent narrative. Part 1 is FINALLY almost done.

Hey, do you know Babylon 5? Can't remember if you do, and too lazy to scroll back.

Seriously, how do I handle the Babylon 5 stuff? There are a few things left unaddressed with the allied fleet's entrance to help against the Shadows, namely Emperor Cartagia and Mr. Morden are still alive, William Edgars is still plotting his telepath virus, Garibaldi has not been reprogrammed "yet," the Narn are still enslaved by the Centauri, and so on. I think following the driving off of the Shadows that then Sheridan would wanna resort to an information war, rather than directly confronting their own ships. That could change if Clark begins bombing civilian targets like he did in canon, but with the presence of the Shadows, he might moderate his tactics. He always struck me as just lashing out blindly through the bombing of 10,000 civilians from Proxima III. I do think not long after, that an ISN reporter would come to B5 in order to get a report, like canon, and possibly earlier, in order to fuel Clark's propaganda, learn how to twist these new arrivals into a way to whip Earth into a xenophobic frenzy. I also think that with Number Two there, that Luke lets out a "piece" of Kosh into Number Two to send back to Mars and keep in touch, that this "piece" of Kosh Luke is able to access as a tether to his consciousness within Luke's head, since Vorlons apparently like humans need direct eyesight, and the Force knows no such boundaries.

[Simplicius]

No, sorry, I've seen Babylon 5 but I don't have a good working knowledge of its universe, characters and so on. How will the Undine factor into things, since you've forged a connection between them and the Vorlons?

[Yukaphile]

That's very dependent on my Voyager rewrite. That said, they are going to be very useful for the rampaging of Zerg Overworlds. And since they are grafted with Shadow DNA, I'm wondering if their planet killers would be of the few who could wipe out the planetoid Brood-Mothers. Kerrigan crafted them specifically so that they would function like the Cerebrats even if they are NOT Cerebrates, in that only dark energy can kill them for good, since they just reform. And no planet-blast is precise enough completely incinerate the planet to nothing, not even the Death Star. I also think the resurgent Palpatine's Dark Empire centered within Byss in the Deep Core would be one of the few factions able to consistently kill Zerg Overworlds since he is using Battle Meditation that filters into every single soldier in the Dark Empire war machine, while Vader whole rules the Galactic Empire is confined to conventional military hardware.

[Yukaphile]

One thing I wanna do is COMPLETELY subvert character shields, lol. Like, HARD. One thing that impressed me about The Rift Saga that this is based on is character shields are useful as ice in winter. NONEXISTENT. Riker died, Crusher died, Luke died, so many more died... haha. I REALLY wanna hammer home that realism here. Space is FUCKING DANGEROUS and you could die at any time. Now granted, Picard and Luke have to survive to the end, but everywhere else? Who knows? I might also subvert expectations, like those in canon who survived die here, and those who died survive, see?

[Yukaphile]

An idea I'd had is that during the era of stability in the Cold War type technology race of Part 2, that while the religious caste grants the Chrysalis Device to those experiencing "racial dysphoria," that at the same time, the Klingons petition for garland wars against the Minbari warrior caste. Ritualized warfare with no need for conquest or to establish a power base over the beaten enemy, just honor and death, and whoever is stronger. Tbh, given how the Minbari warrior caste has been presented, I think they would initially REFUSE the petition, lol. Maybe Neroon takes over the warrior caste, and allows this.

[Yukaphile]

Here's a transcript I just worked on, for this fic.

(A chime comes to Vader within the hyperbaric chamber.)
IMPERIAL COMMANDER: Lord Vader, you have a visitor.
VADER: Who is it?
IMPERIAL COMMANDER: Well, I... I don't know, sir. He won't give us a name. But we've scanned him for weapons or chemical residue. He's clean. And he has all the proper identification. Do we let him in?
VADER: Inform whoever it is that I don't entertain guests, Commander, as you very well know.
VADER: Yes, my lord.
(Vader tries to meditate, but then another buzz comes.)
VADER: I am starting to feel irritated by your constant disruptions, Commander. Surely that's not your goal here?
IMPERIAL COMMANDER: I'm sorry, Lord Vader, but the visitor is rather persistent, and... I don't know, there's just something odd about this. Orders, sir?
(Vader feels a hint of curiosity.)
VADER: If he wants to be a fool, then so be it. Let him through.
(He opens the hyperbaric chamber. And in steps Mr. Morden. Vader instantly senses the Shadows on either side, but because that they are not attacking him, the Sith Lord decides instead to let it all play out first, to lure them into overconfidence, especially given how Mr. Morden inclines himself respectfully before him.)
MORDEN: Lord Vader, I take it?
VADER: Yes? What do you want with me?
MORDEN: But that's what I came to ask you! What do you want?
(Vader is tempted to kill him, but can sense the Shadows, and their dark aura is all that stays his hand, although he remains curious.)
VADER: Before we continue this conversation any further, I should tell you, young one, that I will not take lightly to any poor attempts at humor, so if that was a jest, then we have nothing to discuss.
MORDEN: No... pardon my impudence, but you've misunderstood my intent, Lord Vader. I wasn't trying to make fun of you. I apologize.
VADER: Who are you?
MORDEN: Eh, that's the other guys' routine, not mine. But what I just asked you a moment ago, still true. What do you want, Lord Vader?
(Now fed up that the Shadows do not want to reveal themselves, Vader stands up, igniting his lightsaber. Morden flinches back.)
VADER: What I want is for you to stop playing games. Why have you come to bother me surrounded on both sides by Force shadows?
MORDEN: You... you can see them?
(The Shadows then appear, and Morden bows.)
MORDEN: I apologize again, Lord Vader. It seems I've underestimated you. But rest assured — we are not here to attack. We want to help.
VADER: What are they?
MORDEN: These are my, um... associates, and we've come with a question. I hope you'll answer this time. What do you want?
VADER: Like I told you, I don't take kindly to jests.
MORDEN: We're not joking. What do you want?
VADER: Is this a loyalty test from the Emperor, to test my faith?
MORDEN: We've here because we want to be, nobody forced us. What do you want?

Here's an earlier one, lol.

JACEN: A sentient hologram?
CORTANA: (goes on a long list of her abilities)
JACEN: Why are you naked?
CORTANA: What?
JACEN: You're naked. Why?
CHIEF: Hmm, that's a good question.
CORTANA: Huh. You know, believe it not, you're the first one ever to ask me that question, but since you're an ally, it's probably safe to tell you. Put shortly, it's to judge the way outsiders react, to throw them off guard so their true feelings are revealed long enough to analyze and file away for future reference. You know what they say, first impressions are everything! Lets me keep the upper hand.
CHIEF: Smart tactical decision.
JACEN: Well, it's not like I'm complaining!
CORTANA: Yeah, and your true feelings are spelled out right there on your face, big boy. But we don't have time for that now. Listen up!

[Yukaphile]

Tempted to make Disney canon Star Wars the negative-matter universe, like the antimatter universe on Trek (which is in the first foldspace iteration, same as the Star Wars Galaxy), while Legends is the positive-matter universe. That's quite a change, since years ago I swore I'd never include Disney canon in any of my fanfiction.

[Yukaphile]

Anyone wanna read the timeline? I've edited it since then.

[AquaReggie]

Hmmm, sorry if this was addressed earlier, but why does the Star Wars Empire steamroll the Federation? One of my beefs with Star Wars (both old and new) EU is that it often felt as though nothing changed in decades or even milennia, except for new superweapons. In the Old Republic era, you still had an empire of people with Villainous British Accents and grey uniforms versus a noble (er, somewhat noble) republic.

To bring it back to the fanfic. The Star Wars 'verse encompasses most of a galaxy, some of it very heavily industrialized, so that does lie in the Empire's favor. However, its impossible to actually use all of that force at once, since a lot of the Empire's military has to be deployed across its own galaxy to suppress rebellion+defend from rando aliens. On the other hand, the Federation loves new tech so much they probably have warp cores printed on body pillows, and as discussed in other threads, their ships are actually very powerful. To sum up, I don't really see the Empire winning unless they're allowed to just swamp the Federation with bodies while not being disturbed by other players.