SECOND VERSION EDITORIAL TEAM
Editorial Meeting Minutes
Meeting No.: [012]
Classification: [Underground Intergalactic]
Status: [A Six-Second Kiss Triggers a 2.5-Million-Light-Year Crisis in Physics]
Location: [McDunDun — Mars Branch]
Date: [Silver Eagle 7024: Six Seconds Later]
Attendees:
☑ Snowy Owl 🦉
☑ Little Turtle 🐢
☑ Big Eye 👁️
☑ Dustshark 🦈
☑ Little Pinky 🐭
Author 🖊️
☐ Absent ☐ Observing ☐ Defending Himself
☑ Investigating What Humanity Could Possibly Do with a 5,000-Year Lifespan
Item 1: Five Thousand Years Later, the Author Is Still Completely Mad
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Let’s begin.”
Author 🖊️: “This time, I’ve written proper hard science fiction! It’s the year 7024. Humanity has colonised Mars, terraformed Venus, and developed warp drives!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “Warp drives? Please explain the physics.”
Author 🖊️: “It’s five thousand years in the future!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “So the laws of physics stop applying after five thousand years? Why don’t you just say humanity has learnt to generate electricity from love?!”
Translator 🙊: [Hard science fiction has automatically been reclassified as hard-to-justify fiction.]
Author 🖊️: “Anyway, human emotions are now regulated by the SPC — the Space Peace Council!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “Who’s the chairwoman?”
Author 🖊️: “Cici.”
Little Pinky 🐭: “She still hasn’t retired after five thousand years? Is her pension the biggest black hole in the universe?”
Author 🖊️: “And Serena is the Director of Emotional Ethics.”
Dustshark 🦈: “Cici and Serena? Paul had better get Ennis to sell him some life insurance. Preferably with reincarnation cover.”
Big Eye 👁️: “Let’s establish something first. Are these two future versions of the original characters, clones, or were you simply too lazy to invent anyone new?”
Author 🖊️: “It’s a parallel universe!”
Big Eye 👁️: “Fine. Canon quarantine protocols are now in effect.”
Author 🖊️: “The important thing is that Paul and Vivian take off their helmets in a naturally breathable area of Mars and kiss for six seconds. Vivian even uses her lily brooch to cut off all surveillance!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “Wow! Vivian finally makes the first move!”
Author 🖊️: “Romantic, isn’t it?”
Little Pinky 🐭: “For once, you’ve managed to write a woman with some agency. What happens next?”
Author 🖊️: “Cici sentences Paul to exile on Proxima Centauri and Vivian to exile in Andromeda.”
Everyone: “WHAT?????”
Little Pinky 🐭: “I take back what I just said. You give Vivian six seconds of agency, then sentence her to two and a half million light-years?!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “How extraordinarily creative. Particularly the part where you’ve managed to turn a romance novel into a report on intergalactic human trafficking.”
Item 2: Sentencing Disparities on a Cosmic Scale
Little Turtle 🐢: “Proxima Centauri is 4.24 light-years away. Andromeda is approximately 2.5 million light-years away. That’s a difference of nearly SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND TIMES! What exactly are your sentencing guidelines?!”
Author 🖊️: “Paul kissed her. Vivian also disabled the surveillance.”
Big Eye 👁️: “So kissing gets you four light-years, but switching off a camera gets you two and a half million?”
Translator 🙊: [SPC sentencing formula: Author’s Personal Preference × Light-Years.]
Little Turtle 🐢: “A fusion-powered spacecraft travelling at one-tenth the speed of light would take TWENTY-FIVE MILLION YEARS to reach Andromeda! Do you have even the slightest concept of time?!”
Dustshark 🦈: “By the time Vivian gets there, the SPC will probably be an archaeological site.”
Author 🖊️: “There’s a wormhole network called 101!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “Oh, so it exists because you say it does? Where’s the entrance? How is it stabilised? Where does the energy come from? And why can it reach Andromeda when Paul still has to spend forty-two years travelling to Proxima Centauri?!”
Author 🖊️: “101 only operates intergalactic services. It doesn’t stop at Proxima Centauri.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “WHAT DO YOU THINK THIS IS, A CROSS-HARBOUR BUS SERVICE?!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “I admire your enthusiasm for public transport. However, we are currently discussing astrophysics.”
Author 🖊️: “Fine. I’ll open Route 102.”
Big Eye 👁️: “Rejected. Room 101 has suffered enough. You are not turning the original story’s trauma into an intergalactic transport interchange.”
Item 3: The Case of the Missing Six Seconds
Little Turtle 🐢:
[21:17:04 | Both individuals remove helmets]
[21:17:05 | Surveillance interrupted]
[21:17:11 | Surveillance restored]
[Evidence of kissing: 0]
Big Eye 👁️: “So how does the SPC know they kissed?”
Author 🖊️: “Because Chapter One is called ‘The Six-Second Kiss on Mars’.”
Translator 🙊: [Confirmed: Government has obtained access to the Author’s spoilers.]
Little Pinky 🐭: “HAHAHAHA! So after five thousand years, the justice system has started conducting criminal trials using chapter titles!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “ABSOLUTE NONSENSE! A chapter title is not evidence! And another thing — have you explained the oxygen levels, atmospheric pressure and radiation shielding in this naturally breathable area of Mars?!”
Author 🖊️: “They’ve just come out of an area where helmets are required.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “THEN PUT THAT IN THE STORY!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “You may infer what happened from their behaviour before and after the interruption. But an inference must not be presented as a confirmed kiss.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “Also, the lily brooch does not glow.”
Author 🖊️: “Not even after five thousand years?”
Big Eye 👁️: “Canon violation. Rejected. You are not upgrading the lily brooch into a disco strobe light.”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Thank you, Author, for reminding us once again that technological progress does not necessarily lead to better taste.”
Item 4: Emergency SPC Trial
Cici: “Paul, do you admit removing your helmet?”
Paul: “Yes.”
Cici: “Vivian Poole, do you admit disabling the surveillance system?”
Vivian: “Yes.”
Serena: “Madam Chair, kissing between consenting adults is not illegal.”
Cici: “Agreed. Paul is sentenced to exile on Proxima Centauri. Vivian, Andromeda.”
Serena: “DID YOU HEAR A SINGLE WORD I JUST SAID?”
[Appeal deadline: 14 days]
[Appeal location: SPC Headquarters, Mars]
[Personal attendance: Mandatory]
Paul: “How am I supposed to attend in person from Proxima Centauri?”
Cici: “You may appoint an agent.”
Vivian: “And the agency fee?”
Cici: “Charged by the light-year.”
Dustshark 🦈: “BRILLIANT! Arrest, exile and legal fees, all in one package! Cici’s running a publicly listed intergalactic mafia!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “A light-year is a unit of distance! You haven’t even specified the price per light-year! What sort of administrative system is this?!”
Big Eye 👁️: “You can write the SPC as an abusive authority. But you are not implying that the original characters somehow deserve these idiotic sentences.”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “This trial beautifully demonstrates how a civilisation can advance five thousand years technologically while successfully preserving a Stone Age justice system.”
Item 5: The Proxima Centauri Portuguese Egg Tart Medical Crisis
Author 🖊️: “Wait! Paul submits an emergency application!”
[SPC | Medical Support Application During Exile]
Paul: “I request that Serena accompany me to Proxima Centauri.”
Cici: “On what grounds?”
Paul: “There are no Portuguese egg tarts on Proxima Centauri.”
Cici: “And?”
Paul: “Forty-two years without Portuguese egg tarts could cause severe psychological trauma. I request a Chief Medical Officer to provide counselling throughout the voyage.”
Cici: “Approved.”
Everyone: “WHAT?????”
Serena: “MADAM CHAIR! When did I agree to this?!”
Cici: “You’re the most suitable candidate.”
Serena: “But I’m the Director of Emotional Ethics!”
Cici: “Effective immediately, you will also serve as the ship’s Medical Officer.”
[Personnel Transfer: Approved]
[Serena: Proxima Centauri Medical Support]
[Term of Assignment: 42 years]
[Portuguese Egg Tart Allowance: Zero]
Little Pinky 🐭: “HOLD ON! Vivian gets sent to Andromeda, while Serena spends FORTY-TWO YEARS alone with Paul?!”
Dustshark 🦈: “FORTY-TWO YEARS! Even soap operas wouldn’t dare drag out a love triangle that long! You’ve basically opened a BREEDING CENTRE IN SPACE!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “Well done, Author! Vivian gets to be the heroine for four chapters, then you ship her off to Andromeda so Serena can take her place!”
Author 🖊️: “I just wanted a Portuguese egg tart.”
Little Pinky 🐭: “THEN GO AND BUY ONE! Why the hell do you need to kidnap a woman for forty-two years?! What is this, a bakery with compulsory staff recruitment?!”
Translator 🙊: [Translation: The Author is using Portuguese egg tarts as a cover for another love triangle.]
Little Turtle 🐢: “RIDICULOUS! You don’t get a clinical diagnosis of psychological trauma just by filling in an application form! And why can’t they bring egg tarts with them?! Frozen storage! Onboard baking! Food synthesis! You’re telling me NONE of these technologies exist after five thousand years?!”
Author 🖊️: “…”
Little Turtle 🐢: “YOU HAVE FUSION ENGINES AND WORMHOLES, BUT YOU CAN’T MAKE ONE BLOODY EGG TART?!”
Dustshark 🦈: “The entire civilisation has completely screwed up its technology tree! They can fly to Andromeda, but they can’t bake a custard tart!”
Big Eye 👁️: “Formally rejected. Paul cannot use his craving for egg tarts to justify Serena’s forced exile. Serena is not a complimentary medical appliance supplied with the spacecraft.”
Author 🖊️: “But Cici has already approved it!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “The female-reader abandonment rate is getting ready to return to 93%. Congratulations, Author! You’ve successfully recreated your greatest commercial disaster!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Author, thank you for using a single Portuguese egg tart to demonstrate character objectification, administrative abuse and the complete collapse of your world-building.”
[SPC Latest Notification]
[Serena has appealed her compulsory transfer]
[Estimated Processing Time: 43 years]
Dustshark 🦈: “HAHAHAHA! She’ll finish the forty-two-year voyage and STILL have another year to wait for the appeal!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “YOU’RE HEARING THE APPEAL AFTER HER ENTIRE ASSIGNMENT HAS ENDED?! DOES YOUR PERSONNEL DEPARTMENT USE FOSSILS AS A FILING SYSTEM?!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “May I suggest that the next time the Author craves a Portuguese egg tart, he checks his nearest bakery before rewriting intergalactic population policy?”
Item 5 — Addendum: The Scumbag Defence 🤣
Author 🖊️: “But Paul’s a womanising bastard anyway! He kisses Vivian, then gets Serena to accompany him for forty-two years. That’s completely in character!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “Does Serena have the right to refuse?”
Author 🖊️: “No. Cici will force her aboard.”
Little Turtle 🐢:
[SPC | Classified Experimental Directive]
[Subjects: Sample 87, Sample 171]
[Experiment: Room 104 Emotional Rehabilitation Programme]
[Course Duration: 42 years]
[Objective: Continuous Collection of Emotional Data]
Dustshark 🦈: “HOLY SHIT! THE ENTIRE SPACESHIP IS A MOBILE ROOM 104!”
Translator 🙊: [Paul uses Portuguese egg tarts to request companionship. Cici uses scientific research to authorise a forty-two-year human experiment.]
Little Pinky 🐭: “Vivian gets sent to Andromeda! Serena gets locked inside Room 104! BOTH WOMEN HAVE BEEN SET UP!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Author, you thought you were writing about a womaniser. Instead, you’ve produced the intergalactic edition of the Original Colours Project.”
Author 🖊️: “So the plot works?”
Big Eye 👁️: “It works. And so does the evidence establishing the SPC’s crimes against humanity.”
Little Turtle 🐢:
[Portuguese Egg Tart: Bait]
[Paul: Test Subject]
[Serena: Test Subject]
[Author: Accomplice]
Dustshark 🦈: “Congratulations, Paul! You’ve won an all-inclusive FORTY-TWO-YEAR EMOTIONAL REHABILITATION HONEYMOON PACKAGE!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Please remove the word ‘honeymoon’. This is an illegal human experiment.”
Author 🖊️: “So… what about the egg tart?”
Everyone: “YOU’RE STILL THINKING ABOUT THE BLOODY EGG TART?!”
Item 6: Vivian Strikes Back
Author 🖊️: “Vivian arrives in Andromeda and immediately sues the SPC!”
[Supreme Court of the Andromeda Colony]
[Case: Vivian Poole v. Space Peace Council]
[Ruling: SPC Exceeded Its Jurisdiction]
[Original Exile Order: Invalid]
Little Pinky 🐭: “YES! Vivian finally doesn’t have to sit around waiting for a man to rescue her!”
Big Eye 👁️: “Non-canon independent storyline approved. At least this time you remembered Vivian has a brain and the right to make her own decisions. She’s not just background decoration to make Paul look important.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “However, the SPC has also imposed a temporary immigration restriction. Exiles are prohibited from returning to their original home planet.”
Author 🖊️: “Vivian’s original home planet is Earth.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “So?”
Author 🖊️: “She goes straight back to Mars.”
Big Eye 👁️: “The legal loophole is acceptable, provided you establish the exact wording of the regulation. You are not having the Supreme Court make rulings simply because the Author says so.”
Translator 🙊: [Entire SPC Legal Department transferred to the edge of the Milky Way for remedial primary-school reading comprehension.]
Dustshark 🦈: “And what about Paul?”
[Paul’s Sentence Review: Original Ruling Upheld]
[Reason: Emotional Calibration Incomplete]
[Romantic Ambiguity Index: 84]
Little Pinky 🐭: “FIVE THOUSAND YEARS! HE STILL CAN’T GET FROM 84 TO 85! Paul, are you running the free trial version of a relationship simulator?!”
Dustshark 🦈: “I suspect his emotional processor is a 7-bit counter, and one or two of those bits are fried!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “84 is 1010100 in binary! Even if the least significant bit is fried, we can just skip straight to 86 — 1010110! Problem solved!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “Then hurry up and fix it!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “We submitted that patch 4,950 years ago.”
Author 🖊️: “Then why hasn’t it been fixed?”
Big Eye 👁️: “You rejected it. Your reason was—”
[Wouldn’t 86 be moving too fast?]
Everyone: “…………”
Dustshark 🦈: “WHAT THE F***!!!! FIVE THOUSAND YEARS!!! AND YOU’RE STILL WORRIED ABOUT MOVING TOO FAST?!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “AND ANOTHER THING! Your code says index == 85! Even if we jump straight to 86, NOTHING WILL TRIGGER!”
Author 🖊️: “Then just change it to index >= 85! Easy!”
Little Turtle 🐢: “THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT THE PATCH FROM 4,950 YEARS AGO DID! AND YOU PERSONALLY REJECTED IT!!!”
Translator 🙊:
[Paul: NORMAL]
[Hardware: NORMAL]
[Root Cause: AUTHOR]
[Diagnosis: Author has failed to write the plot beyond 85 for FIVE THOUSAND YEARS.]
[Recommended Action: REPLACE AUTHOR]
Author 🖊️: “FINE! I’LL FIX IT RIGHT NOW!”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Please do.”
Item 7: The Grand Finale
Author 🖊️: “Vivian returns to Mars and marches straight into SPC Headquarters.”
Cici: “What do you want now?”
Vivian: “I’d like to apply for a tourist visa to Proxima Centauri.”
Cici: “Purpose of visit?”
Vivian: “To make up for those six seconds.”
Everyone: “🤣🤣🤣”
Little Turtle 🐢:
[Interstellar Intimate Contact Application]
[Requested Duration: 6 seconds]
[Approved Duration: 5 seconds]
[Reason for Partial Rejection: Emotional Threshold Exceeded During Sixth Second]
[Appeal Deadline: 14 days]
Author 🖊️: “So what happens to the remaining second?”
Little Turtle 🐢: “You can apply to pay it in instalments.”
Little Pinky 🐭: “ONE SECOND SPREAD OVER TWELVE INSTALMENTS?! A kiss lasting 0.083 seconds every month?! WHAT IS THIS, A HIRE-PURCHASE AGREEMENT FOR A WASHING MACHINE?!”
Dustshark 🦈: “JUST KISS FOR SIXTY SECONDS AND GET IT OVER WITH! With a forty-two-year voyage ahead, you could kiss until your lips fell off and STILL not reach the bloody destination!”
Big Eye 👁️: “Rejected. You are not turning intimate relationships into an SPC monthly direct-debit service.”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Everyone, please stop supplying the Author with ideas for sequels.”
Translator 🙊: [Author has submitted a sequel proposal: Silver Eagle 8024: The Seventh Second.]
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Rejected.”
Author 🖊️: “Why?”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Because Paul still hasn’t reached 85. At this rate, I fear the readers will complete their emotional calibration before he does, even if you write another thousand years.”
Final Resolution 🔨
✅ Silver Eagle 7024 approved as a non-canon spin-off
✅ The six-second kiss may remain
✅ Vivian must retain her independent storyline and ability to fight back
✅ SPC may remain an absurd intergalactic bureaucracy
❎ The lily brooch must never glow
❎ No additional wormholes numbered 101, 102 or 103
❎ Serena must not be treated as a complimentary Portuguese egg tart medical accessory
❎ The Author must not use five thousand years of technological progress to conceal primary-school-level physics errors
❎ The Author is prohibited from practising intergalactic criminal law
[MEETING ADJOURNED]
Three seconds later.
[SPC Latest Notification]
[Offence: Unauthorised Discussion of the Six-Second Kiss]
[Sentence: Exile of the Entire Second Edition Editorial Team]
[Destination: Beyond the Observable Universe]
Little Turtle 🐢: “THAT’S ENOUGH!! THE OBSERVABLE UNIVERSE IS DEFINED RELATIVE TO THE OBSERVER! OUTSIDE IT ISN’T A FIXED DESTINATION! YOU HAVEN’T EVEN PROVIDED COORDINATES! HOW IS A SPACESHIP SUPPOSED TO NAVIGATE?! AND THEN THERE’S COSMIC EXPANSION, CAUSAL HORIZONS, THE SPEED-OF-LIGHT LIMIT—”
Dustshark 🦈: “Little Turtle, STOP TALKING ABOUT PHYSICS! The Author can’t even solve a Portuguese egg tart problem, and you’re trying to explain cosmic horizons to him?!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “I’m more interested in something else. If we’re exiled beyond the observable universe, will the Author still be able to receive our one-star reviews?”
Author 🖊️: “Don’t worry, everyone. I’ve got a solution.”
Big Eye 👁️: “Emergency Canon lockdown.”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Author, please do not exhaust the very last reserves of our patience.”
Author 🖊️: “Wormhole 104—”
Everyone: “YOU CAN GO THERE YOUR BLOODY SELF!!!!!”
[SPC Final Supplementary Notice]
[Author’s Exile Application: Approved]
[Exile Destination: Other End of Wormhole 104]
[Accompanying Personnel: None]
[Return Journey: Not Provided]
[Personal Belongings: One Portuguese Egg Tart]
Little Pinky 🐭: “WAIT! Why are we still giving him an egg tart?”
Dustshark 🦈: “Even death-row prisoners get a last meal!”
Little Pinky 🐭: “I’m just feeling sorry for the egg tart.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “THE OTHER END OF THE WORMHOLE HASN’T EVEN BEEN DEFINED! YOU CAN’T JUST—”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Little Turtle, on this occasion, I suggest we refrain from pursuing the scientific objections.”
Little Turtle 🐢: “Why?”
Snowy Owl 🦉: “Because the Author has finally found somewhere he cannot interfere with any canon characters.”
Big Eye 👁️: “Unanimously approved.”
[Author Teleported Successfully]
[Canon Contamination Risk: Eliminated]
[Portuguese Egg Tart Status: Consumed]
[Latest Message from Author:]
“Actually, I’ve got an idea for Silver Eagle 9024—”
[WORMHOLE 104 PERMANENTLY SEALED.]
🐛🕳️🚫