Within the aetherscape behind Uixtr Xkcd’s closed eyes, during a moment of stillness he was able to secure while traversing this unfamiliar distance, he accessed a personal message node which possessed certain formal criteria. It was the Vedani habit closest to encryption. Unique filtering of the aetherscape was a personal trait similar to physical appearance. The message needed to be formulated specifically to Uixtr, not multi- or widecast; it needed to be single-author, not anonymous or conglomerate, and of a minimum familiarity of association in public quanta; of linear fashion, not fragment-pieced, and of information density significant to Uixtr’s set threshold. Someone needed to know to send this specific kind of message in order for it to land in Uixtr’s node, which would reject any other form.

This time, there was one. Uixtr dissociated from his environment as he examined communication that linked him to his people while he was alone from them. It was from Oibhn Clnr. The message emerged from an interrelation of referential indicators, a meta-layer of information that described the context of the missive, while indicating how the foreground communication arises with a connector diagram fed by live related data. With Vedani communication, ‘linear’ did not refer to spatial arrangement of symbols, but that one item preceded another in following or prioritized logic. From its contextual constellation, this linear message stretched, waved, and morphed from one item to the next.

OIBHN: We’re done using up the rolls of grey foam. Only one tuning polygon remains in Imperium space. At first the scavengers were the usual private-interest suspects, then a new one to note, appearing solo. Then came various investigators, then investigators accompanied by military escorts, who remained posted. They may or may not have noted the distribution throughout every federet and nearly every galaxy. Probably not all of the placement data belongs to the same sources. They seem unaware that we’ve achieved full coverage, or if they know, then they still haven’t figured out the office machines. To their credit, they might. We now have wide pluralities of transanchor coordinates, having developed additional capacity and new capabilities. Our system administrators have sharpened their skills and are ready with the upper hand. They’re not going to know what’s hitting them, but we’ll spell it out. Our signal will be impossible to ignore.