If we gave her the kids, could we still get her to nuke DC?
Screw it. Bring on the cyborgs! This’ll be fun!
“Goes Baltar on us”
Dude, that is a great reference.
///
But, as has been said before, you can’t negotiate with terrorists.
Even if we are all cut down by a tachyon burst, even if everything we know and love is destroyed.
We don’t give the monster her desired tithe.
But, I am not certain that our chosen leaders would agree.
I can only hope.
And be VERY thankful that this is just another Skald scenario.
Really, all she is asking for is 144 items that can be mass produced by unskilled labor. I’m not seeing the fuss. 
Once you pay the weregelt, you never get rid of the Dane.
So, it’s not just no. It’s Hell, no, bitch! Bring it!
I’ll gnaw her damn arm off.
“Well, okay… but not the Irish!”
…how clever does a sabotage/booby-trapping/fiendish/technical-letter-of-the-law-abiding attempt have to be before Medea respects it, and lets us be as a worthy adversary?
Like “they are healthy…as long as they all take their serum to suppress the Super Ebolaids virus shedding out of their gene therapied bone marrow. Oops, did we forget to tell you about that before the outbreak started in your fiefdom?” level, or more like “unfortunately, we have no children between 8 and 12 in the US”* level stuff?
*(There are at least three different ways of reading that claim, with vastly different levels of horror.)
How about we just make each kid swallow a small nuclear bomb?
Hold out at least until DC gets obliterated, (hopefully while congress is in session), then start sending over kids. We can always make more (and the making is kind of fun from what I remember).
Why wait for the obliteration? Well, it seems a good way to finally be rid of that BS-Boondoggle once and for all.
Thanks a lot Khen, we love you too! :mad:
Don’t worry, TC. You know I like you. Evil Enterprises will never allow you to come harm by our inaction unless doing so makes us a boatload of money.
While there’s merit to your view, every year that Medea has not conquered us is a year in which our highly-motivated espionage agents have the chance to infiltrate her organization and assassinate her, thus putting an end to her monstrosity, yes?
Is the announcement made only to the government? Or is it public? Because if it’s the former, I’m seeing the emptying of the orphanages in the short term, and the raising of currently-too-young orphans especially for the AppeaseTheMadBitch Programme. If the latter, I expect it will be a combination of asking for volunteers (ignoring the fact that few, if any, 8-12 y.os could meaningfully be capable of such) and supplementing it with a lottery system. One that miraculously never affects any kids in the 1% - you’d be surprised how broadly “all classes” could be interpreted. In time, if it continues, I expect an even less-equitable system to evolve, where it would become a punishment for transgressions of one sort or another - even the parents’ transgressions.
Not cave in - resist, passively. Evacuate her stated targets, offer no military answer, just don’t do what she wants. Like she says, she can (and will) come in and take them anyway, at no real bother to herself. Nor are 144 pre-pubescent kids really going to make a dent in repopulation. So the real purpose of the whole exercise is psychological - either it’s a test of your will or morality, or she’s trying to foment unrest, or she’s just fucking with you for S&G. In any of those cases, you gain nothing worthwhile by caving to her.
144 is less than 3 children from each state. I would expect that 3 kids who are Wards of the State will disappear from each state. They and a 24 place set of china will be winging their way to Merry Old England within 1 week of her demand.
This is how I want my government to respond. There is no way we could do anything to stop her within two weeks. 144 of our citizens, while a huge price to pay, buys TIME.
She will make more demands soon – more kids, more gifts. However, while we have the time we can negotiate with Evil Enterprises to assassinate Medea before she borrows the buggy. If, however, EE feels loyalty to one of their technomages (or does not want to offend the currently loyal technomages who were/are her friends) thus will not kill her, we still have time to work on other ways to overcome her. I would think some form of present, both historic and British, that will poison her, or will effect her mind enough so her loving fiance can avenge his first wife on the Empresses person.
I agree with the statement billions for defense not one penny in tribute. However, that was written about dealing with other countries that were within 10 years of technical capacity. With someone, or something, that is so overwhelming superior to our technology we have to do what we can to survive as a country. While we work to stop Medea while still paying tribute.
As an addition to Skald little mind game - Medea demands one of President Obama’s daughters (either one, his and Michelle’s choice) as part of the 2nd tribute. How does he respond? Does he respond differently if the demand (both first and second) are made publicly or if only the 2nd is made publicly or if both demands are made privately to the US government?
People fight hopelessly all the time.
I’d rather die in a hopeless fight trying to save my kids than just hand them over to a crazy person because they’re stronger than me. Maybe it’s not rational, but I hope we’d fight the crazy empress chick.