I thought of something else about the Regency while working on something
else. (I have very good powers of distracting myself!)
>Quite why Norris has continued to call himself Regent for the 70 years
>following the events of Arrival Vengeance I don't understand.
It's actually a pretty responsible step. As regent, Norris or Seldrian
can't assume the office of Emperor without approval of a quorum of the
Imperial Moot, Lucan notwithstanding. Somehow I doubt that the nobles
left in the Regency constitute a quorum of votes. Now, conceivably
this could be circumvented by declaring that the Regency is all that is
left of the Imperium (but this is a questionable call, at best). The
only other option is for the Regency to technically secede, which it
never did during the Rebellion, unlike Daibei, Vland, and Antares.
Furthermore, by maintaining the fiction of an imperial regency, the
Regency asserts the continued existence of the Imperium. It's a
hedge against the future. The Regency seems to be protecting the
legal rights of the worlds in the Wilds to be in the Imperium, if
anyone still wants to be in one with Deneb. Otherwise, the possible
lack of any government claiming to be the "Third Imperium" could
cause problems with the other old governments moving in on the
ungoverned territory. It's a legal fiction. Undoubtedly, once
the Regency is able to recontact the other worlds of the old
Imperium and assess the situation, a more permanent decision can
be made. (In a sense, the Regency is in a semi-permanent state of
"crisis management" until then.)
Of course, none of this stops anyone from doing anything out there
in the Wilds. The Regency is only betting that someday, someone
might set up a bargaining table, maybe even they themselves, and
they know they'll want to be in a good bargaining position at that
table. After all, there's no doubt that someone will have to
negotiate with a lot of *very* angry neighbors about this whole
Virus business....
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Steve Bonneville | "Beware the tablespoon my son,
| The teeth that bite, the Claus that catch,
[email removed] | Beware the Subjects bird, and shred
| The serious Bandwidth!"
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