Diplomatic Mission, Part 1 - Curiosity

Writing aboard a transport spacecraft while traveling between colonies, Seaplane reported back to JE staff about the progress of his diplomatic mission. Here we provide readers with a sanitized version of the original encrypted message:

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Lilabelle and I have so far visited five colonies – [redacted] – all within close proximity to Jonson Outpost, alas now renamed Rival Resort. Each colony already heard about the attack, but the colonists seem eager to find out more details. We spent hours describing how Rival's huge armada had overwhelmed the Outpost's defenses, then quickly consolidated control of the facility, after which they then began converting it into Rival Resort. Since our mission began soon after the attack, but before the conversion was completed, only [redacted] has so far has visited the facility post-attack.

The colonists knew that the Outpost had been unsuccessfully attacked earlier, with a much smaller force, so they were surprised (as indeed we were) that another attack would soon follow, this time employing an armada so massive that success was virtually inevitable. But aside from the drama of the attack itself, there remains the puzzle as to why Rival would expend such vast resources on so minor a target. And even more curious – why convert the facility into a resort, instead of, say, a fortress?

Only after extensive speculation throughout our discussions, plus some remarkable intelligence from [redacted], did the underlying motivation gradually become clear. Rival's overall goal seems to have been elimination of the military robotics lab, as he realized that lab was mainly servicing robots used by the colonies for their own defense. Ironically, early on Rival had actually encouraged the colonies to arm themselves, since his “divide and conquer” strategy benefitted by colonies fighting among themselves. Indeed, he even turned a tidy profit from gun running! But at some point, the colonies began to realize Rival considered them suckers, so the more insightful colonists including [redacted] realized they might soon need those warrior robots to restrain Rival's growing influence. In short, Rival attacked the Outpost with such formidable forces in order to ensure that defensive robots could no longer be sustained – and more importantly, could never be used against him!

As to why Rival decided to establish a resort, my amazingly insightful informant [redacted] explained the underlying reasoning. Rival realized that he could build something that would have wide popular appeal to bored space denizens seeking excitement, while also generating substantial profit for himself. Just as important, it would require little effort to defend, since the colonies would hesitate to attack a venue with such mass support. Thus Rival could kill two birds with one stone: make a tidy profit without having to expend resources to defend the cash cow.

Not sure how much diplomatic progress we're making, but after visiting the crucial [redacted] colonies, I'll update you on the latest situation....

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