Gnaw, on 18 November 2013 - 04:56 PM, said:
Khellendros, on 18 November 2013 - 04:47 PM, said:
Galactic standard translation: "We can't actually do anything this round to stop them, and we'll have to wait till next round to attempt a counter."
![^_^](https://forum.malazanempire.com/public/style_emoticons/Malazan/smile.gif)
Khellendros, on 18 November 2013 - 04:51 PM, said:
I will enjoy seeing Morgoth, CF, D'rek and Tapper bite pieces off your alliance while you 'attempt' to chew pieces off me.
"Chmee Gnaw, the translator software we purchased from the Mechanema agree with out own translators. Stripped of the null content the messages says, 'Oops'."
"Chmee Gnaw. The linguistics department did as you requested. Using academic conferences as cover, we sent one of your security officers who posed as a grad student. The officer spoke with specialists from other species and came back with similar results. The semantic content of those messages all come out to some variation of "oops". He added that one Hydrani grad student was most helpful. They developed a rapport it seems, for the officer stated that "the beverage 'instant coffee' was prepared" for him as a celebratory drink upon elevation to the title "Honorary Member of the Adjunct Faculty for Biological Fertilizers at the elite Hydrani educational facility known as the Technical College of Agriculture,"
"Thank you Professor, the Chmee has had something urgent come up and needs to reschedule this meeting for another day. Our office will comm you with the details later."
In office:
"Secretary don't ever let that idiot in here again. All he had to do was send a summary. And find out who the security officer was; he deserves some attention for his excellent work."
In hallway:
"Professor, did it go well?"
"That idiot is in charge? Draco preserve us. I heard him tell the other idiot to promote the security fool. None of them realized they've been the object of a practical joke. Taken in like some back savannah freshman. If I'd have sent them a summary in plain Heroe's Tongue we'd have all lost our ears. And your idea! Excellent. My droning voice almost had them asleep by the third sentence just as you predicted."
"Thank Draco Professor."
"Don't thank him just yet. When you get back with my fresh cup of klaat we're going to have a chat about my "droning" voice."
"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." - Viktor Frankl