The conference room was still empty when AJ came by with the morning bagels. He had not stayed up last night to see the United States Government burp and decide to resume the simulation of constructive activity. Paid activity.

That is the aspect that interests the bakery, which has been reduced to a plaintive request to kitchen and delivery people that they will get paid as soon as the Federal offices are up and operating again today. That was part of the swirl of narratives this morning.

When hungry people started to drift in for the pre-lunch discussions Section Leader Miles and Emeritus director DeMille started handing things out to cover on the day we start the slide into wild abandon on Friday and slog through the weekend. Splash got the Yugo Update, where there is a report that the Russian Army (he almost said “Red!”) had established motivational units behind the front lines. Their purpose is to shoot any soldiers from the front from running away.

Apparently that was something handed down from Stalin’s army. “Troops behind the lines be alert for those fleeing The Front.Cleared to Arm, Cleared to fire.” Rocket frowned and sat down with a bagel and a Flat Yank creamy coffee.

Melissa was next, moving a bit slowly. She had been so energized by the talk about the Senate passage of what she refuses to declare the “Clean Continuing Resolution.” She had been a Deputy Chief at the General Defense Intelligence Budget when she labored for the government. She was normally tagged with some of the specific technical details on the budget process on The Hill.

She actually used to do things like the Budget Estimate Submission. That was part of the process of debating the merits of the twelve annual appropriations bills that Congress must pass each year to fund various federal agencies and activities programs. These bills cover the operations, salaries, and activities of the federal government for a fiscal year. She knows the intimate parts of the general failure on the part of our elected representatives to do their normal duties.

That was called Regular Order, used to justify the money collected annually from the taxpayers in open debate. We are now in a situation more akin to irregular order in which we have not yet appropriated the bills to fund a fiscal year that is already 15% in the past. Her assignment this morning was to explain what is going to happen in January, and if shutting down the Government in the middle of the fiscal year is now an established part of the irregular shredding of the legislative calendar.

She is the ionly one they trust to keep us honest when examining the general dishonesty on the other side of the River.

Rocket and Splash were proud that they stayed awake to see the President’s frank and brutal remarks about a bunch of stuff we won’t claim to understand until the Residential Medical Unit does the bi-monthly pass through Socotra House to determine if the displays of lassitude in the corporate spaces is something to be alarmed about.

Holly is Melissa’s Deputy and one of her tasks is managing workable contributions from the GenX and Z interns who are teaching us how to use the Artificial Intelligence machines to produce credible term papers and breaking news. That was a stark sort of list but the ChatGPT program is making some progress on the Emerging Topics list.

Miles frowned as he shoved the stack across to Holly for her to assign to whoever shows up on Thursday afternoon before the evening football game hysterics begins. “This is an imposing list and it is by no means complete. We assume the latest batch of Epstein messages will confirm that he was thrown out of Mar a Largo twenty-odd years ago and that the one lady whose name was redacted prior to release swore under oath that no on in an elected position had anything to do with her or anyone else.”

Holly frowned. “So, we assume that is just to kill time until we can shut down the government again in January?”

Miles nodded and DeMille laughed, since he was going to take the afternoon off. “I am going to note that we used to have nine planets until they decided Pluto just wasn’t big enough. That meant we only had eight major satellites of the sun, all with exotic names from mythology. Except ours, of course. Some people at CalTech have identified a large object way out there with a solar orbit that is perpendicular to the flat plane we normally see in the depictions of the orbits. And they have come up with a name that expresses the mystery of astrophysics.”

Melissa leaned in on her elbows, dramatically lined eyebrows arced up. “Is it in the Western mythological tradition? Or something from an ancient faith no one here understands?”

Splash smiled. “Yeah. They want to call it Planet Nine.”

There were some giggles from the south end of the table until Miles waved for silence. “That is not the only astro-physical thing we need to get a handle on.”

(View from Planet Nine inward toward the sun. The planet is thought to be gaseous, similar to Uranus and Neptune. Hypothetical lightning lights up the night side. Credit: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC).

Vapor was all over this one, since he received his call-sign after successfully landing his F-4 Phantom at Miramar with only gaseous fumes remaining in the tank. “You are referring to Comet A3-Atlas, right? That has a mythologic reference. Unless they named it after the book.”

AJ finished his Flat Yank and rose to grab his satchel and head for the Federal Aviation Bureau over by Dulles International. “Gotta go. The FAB may be hungry after working all morning. But Comet A3 may have some surprises for us all. It has exhibited ten different phenomena not previously observed in regular comets. This one turns colors. Blue not Red. The tail is pointed toward the Sun, not away from it, unlike Halley’s and all the rest. And now it is point directly at us, the 3rd planet from the Sun and is supposed to have a close approach here right around Christmas Day. Could be a bunch of sudden bright lights.”

There was silence around the table. Vic wanted to talk about his session with the vascular surgeon that suggested he might be returning to something like normal circulation, so he moved to squash additional discussion on what could, given the proper orientation, produce visitors from another solar system that may have named even CalTech can’t figure out.

“Could be some great Holidays with some extraordinary external events that could spark dramatic new Holiday traditions. Or something we need to think about as it gets closer and closer.”

AJ sat down again and ordered another Flat Yank. “The FAB Five can wait. They are going to have to work all the way until Atlas arrives.”

The discussion then turned to lunch, since breakfast was already cold. And from an astrophysical standpoint, it would be hours before the Northern Lights came south enough to see.

Copyright 2025 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com