18:09 I guess he hasn't had to do much fighting yet. A live action game of asteroids doesn't quite feel like it counts. Another connection between what's happening in space and what we've already seen on Earth. Most of the hazards that they are encountering here, this debris field, are man made. This is pollution in space. This is space garbage created by people.
41:38 In Farrah's case, the euphemism does little to obfuscate the fact that this is meant to be her execution, whether by starvation, dehydration, or suffocation when her oxygen runs out, it is not a guaranteed execution, but the prospect of rescue seems so vanishingly faint under the circumstances as to be almost impossible. From chronicle we know that this is a standard type of punishment, perhaps not a common one, but regulated under imperial law. Is it mercy to give the exile the means to extend their life by three days? Or is it cruelty prolonging an already slow execution? These same questions can be asked of historical marooning. The practice is closely associated with the golden age of piracy, the roughly 75 year period from the end of the wars of religion around 1650 until 1725, a decade after the end of the war of the spanish succession. In fact, marooning became so closely tied to pirates and piracy that by the end of the period, the word marooner had become interchangeable with pirate. Maroon is both a verb in the sense of let's maroon that guy, and a noun, a term for those who have been marooned. Robert Louis Stevenson's massively influential treasure island calls the character Ben Gunn both the marooned man and the maroon, yet the noun form is older. There were maroons before there was marooning. The term maroon first entered English during the mid 16 hundreds, derived from the spanish cimeron. Initially, both words meant a formerly enslaved person who had escaped bondage and fled into the hinterlands to live an isolated, mostly self sufficient existence beyond the reach of the slaveholders and their enforcers. In the 15 hundreds, thousands of enslaved Africans and native South Americans escaped the barbaric tortures of spanish and portuguese colonies to eke out a desperate living in the mountains, jungles, and other inhospitable places. These cimarrons would occasionally raid the colonies from which they had escaped for the kinds of tools and supplies they could not easily make themselves. They made common cause with other enemies of the colonial authorities, including early pirates like the famous english privateer Francis Drake. Sometimes they traded food and information for tools, weapons, iron. Sometimes they collaborated, as in 1573, when a joint english cimarron expedition traveled overland by secret jungle paths to raid spanish silver caravans. To be made a maroon then, was, in a euphemistic sense, to be made free, but also to be isolated, deprived of almost every resource, and left to fend for yourself in a hostile wilderness. Marooning could be a simple expedient. Pirates capturing a ship might put her former crew or passengers ashore just to avoid having to deal with them. But, as in Zanskar, it was also a punishment, one sometimes enshrined in and regulated by the articles of agreement that governed life among the pirates. And in some cases, it was a means to get rid of someone without having to contend with the moral, legal, or political consequences of actually killing them, as in August 1520, when Ferdinand Magellan found himself having to decide what to do with a mutineer, who also happened to be the nephew of the archbishop overseeing all trade between Spain and her american colonies. The typical depiction of a pirate marooning went like the soon to be maroon, or maroons, who might be troublesome sailors, despised officers, or inconvenient prisoners would be rowed to shore in a small boat and left there with a few days worth of food and water and, very dramatically, a pistol loaded with a single shot so that the maroon might choose to end their own life, the implication being that to be marooned was often a fate worse than death. Historical novelist and pirate enthusiast Cindy Valar called it the most dreaded of all punishments, for it promised a slow, cruel death without hope of reprieve. Its hard to know how much credence to give this primary sources about piratical practices from that era are understandably scarce and highly sensational. Those who did the marooning tended to die violent deaths before getting the chance to write their memoirs. Those who were captured by government agents might claim, by way of exculpation for their crimes, to have been marooned, then rescued by a passing pirate vessel and pressed into service against their will. True or not, they had strong incentives to exaggerate the harshness of their experiences. Those who managed to slink quietly back into civilian life preferred to keep their heads down and not talk too loudly about all the crimes that they had done. Modern recountings of historical marooning as a punishment are pretty bare bones, tending to repeat the same handful of details with few, if any citations telltale signs to me that they are all drawing from the same handful of original sources, or they're just endlessly copying each other in a writer's ouroboros.
01:41 The time has come. Uso readies to board a shuttle to space on his way to look for his parents, while Marbet, acting as co pilot, readies the shuttle. Lieutenant Gomez and Leonid half heartedly brandish pistols at the air traffic controllers so that the PCST will be able to say they were forced to transport a league militaire mobile suit. Uso asks Shakti to come with him, but she actually plans to return to Casoarella. Odello, Warren, and Suzy had said theyd like to live there, and she expects that if they travel together theyll be fine. Shell wait for Uso and for their parents in her own home. Just a few minutes after the shuttle takes off, shes forced to change her plans. Odello and Warren are nowhere to be found. Having hidden themselves in the hold of the shuttle, Shakti tells a tearful Suzy that the two of them and Carmen will go to space after all. Aboard the shuttle, the stowaways dont hide for long. They come up through a hatch in the cabin floor and start arranging more fake hostage scenes. Odello even brought props and Warren a camera. Giddy and grinning, they pose for photos like tourists on vacation, trying to make sure the earth is visible through the windows in the background. Their excitement about going to space and general exuberance is a stark contrast with the serious, thoughtful mood among Uso, Marbit, and the shuttle captain. On the bespa occupied shuttle. Katagina struggles to move around in zero gravity, and Pharah seems annoyed at chronicles gentle kindness toward the young woman. In the distance, streaks of light betray an ongoing battle between the Kailaskili fleet and the Bagley team, and Pharah asks Chronicle to take his mobile suit and investigate. By the time he arrives, it seems like a meaningless fight. The Bagley team have only one ship left and yet have not tried to retreat or surrender. Chronicle is able to fly right up to the ship, shoot the bridge, killing the bridge crew and presumably the highest ranking officers left on the field, and fire off the surrender flayers. Despite their confusion over what exactly has happened, the remaining bagley team mobile suit pilots disarm and surrender. The other shuttle has run into problems of its own, a debris field full of asteroids, bits of destroyed ships and colonies, and other space garbage. A beam shield projecting off the front of the shuttle is meant to protect it, but it flickers on and off, obviously malfunctioning. The captain has to don a normal suit and go out himself in an attempt to make manual repairs, but the usual fixes don't seem to work, and on his way back inside, his tether snags on a passing asteroid, pulling him into the chunk of rock and knocking him unconscious. While Marbet stays at the helm, the boys make their first ever spacewalk, retrieving the captain and patching gashes in the hull. With the shield effectively useless, its decided that USO should use the victory Gundam to destroy or deflect any obstacles the shuttle cant evade. Odello clings to the outside of the mobile suit to act as an additional spotter. Finally arriving at Kailaskili, Farrah and Chronicle are shown into an ostentatious dining room, places already set for them. Famed Captain Tasilo Wago, seated at the head of the table, invites them to sit and asks Commander Farrah Griffin if she has anything to say for herself. Farah takes full responsibility for her failures on earth, but she struggles to maintain the facade of her usual confidence. Her brow creases with worry, and her hand shakes as she tries to eat. It seems there will be no typical court martial proceeding. I am the court martial, Tasila Wago tells her. The meal continues in near silence, and the captain waits until the dessert course to pronounce his verdict. Farrah will be cast into space. Chronicle attempts to speak up for the commander, but is warned not to interfere. In fact, he must carry out the sentence per protocol, she will be provided with a normal suit and three days worth of food and oxygen. Pharah barely manages to keep her cool, graciously thanking both men and joking as Chronicle leads her to the hatch until she is alone in the torpedo tube, shaking and cursing, lady guillotine is launched into the void of space. Uso manages to fend off or break up the most dangerous space debris. Once through the worst of it, he looks around and spots an entire building drifting nearby, and a Zanskar mobile suit is clinging to it, apparently stranded against everyone elses advice, he goes to investigate, finding two Zanskar soldiers there, one badly wounded, though they insist they dont want help, and one even fires a warning shot at Uso. He gently lobs a few oxygen canisters into the building for them. In Kasarelia, where hes from, helping strangers, travelers, and those in need is just what you do. The soldiers seem moved, and do not try to prevent him from leaving. With a wave, Ouco returns to the shuttle and continues his journey.