#ro2sid

[annleckie]

It's almost Republic of Two Systems Independence Day!!!!!

[ro2sid]

An Imperial Radch Fanzine Interest Form

Please click here to access the form to indicate your interest in submitting to the 10th anniversary Imperial Radch zine.

Due to Life, this form is releasing about one month late. Apologies for this, the brain has been quite uncooperative.

On the other hand, Translation State is out!! This is so exciting!!!!!!!!

On the third hand, please click below for the Google form to indicate your interest. The submission guidelines and general summary are in the form, and you can also read them below.

The year 2023 marks the 10th anniversary of the publication of Ann Leckie's debut novel, Ancillary Justice, as well as the publication of her new novel in the Radch universe, Translation State. In anticipation of this anniversary, we wish to release a fanmade zine to celebrate all of Leckie's work in this universe - the Imperial Radch trilogy, Provenance, and Translation State. The zine is expecting to accept submissions until Aug. 15, barring unforeseen circumstances. This form is an interest check to determine logistics for zine publication. The zine Tumblr will post a submissions form shortly - currently planned around June 15. Any zine-related questions should be directed to ancillaryzine@gmail[.]com or Ro2SID.tumblr.com for zine-related matters. If you have received no reply in about 48 hours, please contact me directly at sauronthegreat@gmail[.]com (yes, really), or tree#0597 on Discord. Please note that I am not in a North American time zone, which will affect response times. As Discord is rolling out changes to its name system, the best way to get in touch with me on that platform is on the fan-run discord server for Ann Leckie's work, Radchdome 3.0, the link to which can be found here: https://discord.gg/WAF8uv9f3k. My display name on that server will be tree. Submission Guidelines: The 10th anniversary zine will be a celebration of the Imperial Radch trilogy and its standalone sequels. The key criteria for submissions are appreciation and affection for the original work. These do not need to be uncritical, and respectful critiques of the work are important and welcome. This does not mean that the zine will not accept shitposts. It only means that the zine will not accept submissions that are apathetic to the original work. If you would like to submit a series of poems about how Breq is like a duck, we look forward to it.

The zine editor(s) are not currently equipped to handle certain topics due to their sensitive nature. These include sexual assault, child abuse, and suicide/suicidal ideation. Unfortunately this is not an extensive list of sensitive topics we will not be able to handle, but it is our best attempt based on our editor(s) boundaries. 

The original work deals with sensitive themes, some of which appear in our list and we do not wish to discourage exploration of them. Submissions that deal with these topics will not be rejected out-of-hand, but instead will be dealt with care. The zine welcomes NSFW work under the same guidelines.

[imaginariumgeographica]

Two Systems Independence Day Bread! It was difficult to fit 1000 eggs so I opted for two to represent Athoek and the Ghost System

[the-anchorless-moon]

Happy RO2SID! Have a playlist for the saddest, wettest, and most pathetic blorbo ever known.

Primadonna - MARINA It makes perfect sense that Seivarden is on top of the heap! She’s just better than you

Poor Little Rich Boy - Regina Spektor Being rich and from an old family isn’t enough to protect you from being a bit of a loser (affectionate)

Goodbye Balance - The Taxpayers When the going gets tough, the tough get wasted

Mary Celeste - Keaton Henson A song for Seivarden’s bouts of severe depression

Wisdom - Mother Mother Seivarden isn’t at all sure how her life ended up like this

Strawberry Blond - Mitski Seivarden is a pining mess, and nobody does pining like Mitski

Would That I - Hozier This song captures how Seivarden’s centered all of her emotions on Breq

That’s Okay - The Hush Sound Seivarden is out of her own time and almost everyone she ever knew is gone. She was never one of Breq’s favorites, but she’s still protecting Seivarden

Feel free to add song suggestions!

[a-side-character]

Heyy, is today the Republic of Two Systems Independence Day?

I was trying to find the date but nothing was concrete so I've just had it as today in my calendar

Someone who knows more than me please help me out 😭

[venndaai]

REPUBLIC OF TWO SYSTEMS INDEPENDENCE DAY FANWORK EXCHANGE, 2023 EDITION

This year is a pretty special one in the Imperial Radch/Leckieverses fandom! This October will mark the 10th anniversary of Ancillary Justice's publishing date, and this June we're getting a new Radch universe book, Translation State! So it feels important to run this exchange once again. I'm excited to get hype.

(The Republic of Two Systems Independence Day is a holiday mentioned in the Preface to the Traveler's Guide to the Two Systems. Ms. Leckie has told us it can probably be celebrated the Monday after Easter Sunday, when Peeps are cheapest. This year, that's April 10.)

TAG SET  —   COLLECTION

NOMINATION PERIOD: until February 26, 11:59 PST. NOW CLOSED.

SIGNUPS: Closed. February 27 - March 6, 11:59 PST.

ASSIGNMENTS OUT: March 7.

WORKS DUE: April 7, 11:59 PST.

WORK REVEALS: April 10, 12:00 AM PST.

AUTHOR REVEALS: April 17, 12:00 AM PST.

MATCHING: OR matching, on both characters and ships. (The signups should be simpler this year, now that I understand AO3 exchange tags better.)

MINIMUM: 500 words or a sketch on unlined paper.

DETAILS UNDER CUT

NOMINATIONS:

Go here to nominate tags!

There are three fandoms for this exchange: Imperial Radch, The Raven Tower, and Crossover. Characters/ships from Provenance, Night's Slow Poison, and She Commands me and I Obey go in the Imperial Radch fandom. Characters from the godsverse short stories go in the Raven Tower fandom. For Crossover, you can nominate crossover relationships between Radchverse and godsverse characters, relationships between Leckie and non-Leckie characters, or solo non-Leckie characters you want to see in a Leckie universe. Please put the second fandom in parenthesis after the character. For example: “Breq & Murderbot (Murderbot Diaries)”. 

For easy matching, all nominations will be Relationships. To nominate a solo character, write "Solo: (Character)". For example, "Solo: Medic". Relationships can be romantic, indicated by a “/”, or platonic, indicated by an “&”. For example, “Breq/Murderbot” would indicate a romantic or sexual relationship, while “Breq & Murderbot” would be platonic.

I've added general Worldbuilding tags for Radch and Raven Tower, but feel free to nominate more specific ones, like "Worldbuilding: genitalia festival".

We are a small and crazy fandom. There may be some injokes and OCs in the tagset. If you want to nominate something weird & obscure, go for it.

If you miss the nomination deadline by a couple hours, just message me and I’ll reopen the tagset for you. 

SIGNUPS:

You will need to make at least 3 requests, and 4 offers. For each request or offer, pick at least 1 fandom, 1 relationship tag, and one medium from the dropdown tagset. You can group your requests however you like; you could make 3 individual requests, each with one character, or three requests each with 20 characters- up to you.

If you only want to receive or create works based around worldbuilding, rather than characters, request/offer the “Worldbuilding” tag.

The way the matching works, you will be matched with someone who used at least 1 of the Fandom tags, 1 of the same Relationship tags, and 1 of the Medium tags as you. The work you create only has to use one of the requested relationship tags. 

You can pick “Any” for both offers and requests! Just remember that really does mean “Any”, and be prepared.

If you’re fine with both Art and Fic, you can check off both boxes, or just pick “Any” for that section. 

If there are things you very much Do Not Want in your gift, please list these in the Optional Details box for each of your prompts. For example: “DNW any appearances by spider mechs.” You are required to make a good faith effort to not include DNWs in your recipient’s gift. 

You’re encouraged to give your gifter some prompts! You can put these in the Optional Details box, or paste a link to a letter into the URL box. Optional Details are Optional, and your creator isn’t bound to follow them, outside of the DNWs. Only DNWs in your signup are enforceable, so put them there, not just in a linked letter.

You are allowed to mention characters and ships that weren’t nominated in your optional details, but remember, your creator matched on the tags you chose and isn’t obligated to include anything else.

If you are 18+, you can ask for or create NSFW, but your creator isn’t required to give it to you, so it would be polite to provide some SFW prompts as well. Only give someone NSFW if they ask for it in their prompts. 

ASSIGNMENTS: everyone will get an email through their AO3 account once I’ve run matching. The email will have your assignment in it. 

It’s possible there will be some people who won’t have anyone they could create for. I’ll email them through their AO3 email asking them to add more offers, and if they don’t respond in 24 hours, their signups will be deleted. If this happens to you and you don’t see my email in time, don’t panic! Just contact me and we’ll work something out.

Please don’t tell your giftee who you are. If you have a question, let me know and I’ll convey it to them. 

When you are creating your work, make sure you include at least one tag from at least one of your giftee’s requests, and don’t include DNWs. You only need to create one work, and it only needs to include one of the tags in your giftee’s signup. 

DEFAULTING:

If you can’t finish your gift, no worries. Just click the “default” button on your assignment page. If the person assigned to you also defaults, you may not get a gift. 

If you need an extension, just message me and let me know! If the posting deadline passes and you haven’t posted anything or contacted me, I’ll assume you’re defaulting. 

If you’ve posted your gift, and your creator defaults their assignment, a pinch-hitter will create a gift for you. Everyone who posts a gift will get a gift. 

POSTING:

Please post a finished work of 500 words or sketch on unlined paper by the posting deadline! You can continue to edit and add to your gift until the 10th, but you need to have something that could work as a gift by the 7th.

To post your gift, go to your Assignments page on AO3, and click the “Fulfill” button. Your gift will be automatically given to your giftee, but it will be hidden until the reveal date on the 10th. 

REVEALS: Works will be anonymous for a week after they are revealed. 

[darling-child-tisarwat]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie, The Murderbot Diaries - Martha Wells Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Mercy of Kalr (Imperial Radch), Ekalu (Imperial Radch), Seivarden Vendaai, Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq, Asshole Research Transport (Murderbot Diaries), Dr. Ratthi (Murderbot Diaries), Pin-Lee (Murderbot Diaries), Dr. Gurathin (Murderbot Diaries), Murderbot (Murderbot Diaries), Dr. Mensah (Murderbot Diaries) Summary:

Five years after the creation of the Republic of Two Systems, the Conclave begins to receive its first out-system representatives and guests. Docked at the newly created Quenes Station in the Ghost System, Perihelion strikes up a conversation with Mercy of Kalr.

[nerdywyrds]

Happy Republic of Two Systems Independence Day! My gift is for @imaginariumgeographica , who requested gardening! I hope you like it!

Featuring Tisarwat and a Bo, and Seivarden, Breq, Ekalu, Medic, Zeiat, and Kalr Five.

[ratskool]

im so sorry this is late, but here is my piece for RO2SID for @dps-winston   ! The prompt was “A split has formed in Anaander Mianaai... between her adult bodies and a faction who demands more candy and a later bedtime” this was a lot of fun to do in between class projects

[rithmatistkalyna]

Happy Republic of Two Systems Independence Day! 

Guess what y’all, it’s time for tea flavored truffles. Specifically, Lavender Earl Grey, Jasmine Green, and Chai truffles. Now, I make chocolate truffles on a semi-regular basis and I’ve experimented with lots of flavors, many of which have been very good. I’ve been halfheartedly meaning to experiment with using tea as a flavoring for a while, but not getting to it because the tea flavors seem so delicate compared to the chocolate and I was sure the tea was going to be overwhelmed. Y’all. I could not have been more wrong. These came out amazing. I packed up a baggie of them and left them in the carport for one of my friends to stop by and pick up and she reported back that they were bliss. These recipes are going very solidly into my flavor rotations (and they’re also pretty simple and will be available under the cut). First though, pictures of the finished products.

It’s Ro2SID, so, naturally, we have to have eggs and chicks so that we can endlessly annoy Sphene:

peep peep peep peep!

In honor of the Athoek gardens, we have the lovely green and purple fish, and the red and yellow roses:

And, since the mold with the fish also has a turtle, a Propriety Turtle:

and now, without further ado, let’s jump under the cut for recipes and process pictures!

Ganache is the fancy word for chocolate that you’ve mixed with cream and maybe also butter and flavorings.

Tea Flavored Ganache:

~130 grams heavy cream (a little over half a cup using US measures, note that you’re going to loose some of this volume in the process)

~200 grams semisweet chocolate chips (about 1 1/4 US cups)

1 heaping tsp of your tea of choice. If you are using bagged tea, my guess is that 2 bags would be a good idea

Put the heavy cream in a tiny sauce pan and put it on the stove on low. You want it nice and warm, but you don’t want the cream to boil. Stir the tea into the cream and let it simmer and steep for a while. I didn’t time it, but I got it set and then went off and browsed tumblr for a bit, so... You want the cream to taste distinctly of your chosen tea. It’s going to take longer than it usually takes you to brew a cup of tea because we are going for low and slow brewing here. Once your cream is nice and tea flavored, get a bowl with the chocolate chips and pour the warm cream through a tea strainer over the chocolate. Use a spoon to mash the tea in the strainer to get as much of the cream as possible through. Between the water that has boiled off of the cream and the cream that the tea absorbed you should be somewhere in the ball park of 100 grams of cream. Don’t stress about getting it exactly. In the three batches I made I ended up slightly over and slightly under. It’s fine. Carefully stir the bowl of chocolate chips and warm cream. The cream should melt the chocolate so that, with patience you can get it blended to a nice homogenous mixture. If your cream is cooler than mine (or the chocolate is colder, or the ambient temperature of the room is too low, or...), the chocolate might not melt entirely. If this happens pop the bowl in the microwave for about 15 seconds, or put it over a double boiler on the stove for a bit. The resulting mixture is your truffle filling. It’s going to be fairly runny right now, but if you let it cool for a bit it will thicken up enough to pipe, and if you chill it it will solidify enough to scoop and roll. 

Note:

In general, for truffle filling you want a mix of chocolate and cream that is approximately 2 parts (fairly dark) chocolate, 1 part cream by weight. This will make a nice creamy truffle filling that melts in your mouth but also sets up well if it’s reasonably cool. If you are new to candy making, it might be easier to shift that ratio a little more toward the chocolate. If you are adding an additional liquid flavoring you would want to cut back on the cream. Sometimes my goal is a firmer filling for whatever reason, but this is the ratio I used for these.

Pictures time:

The Lavender Earl Grey tea I used. It’s a Kroger brand. The lavender in it was very subtle. A traditional Earl Grey would be just as good. It’s reminiscent of orange chocolate, but so much better and far, far easier than the attempts I’ve made in the past at doing a citrusy chocolate truffle. 

We’ve got a local world market that is a giant warehouse of a grocery store and that’s where I got this tub of Jasmine pearls. You wouldn’t need to use pearls, its just what I happened to have on hand. 

I don’t have a good picture of the chai - one of my friends brought the tea I used back for me when she visited India and it came in a bag that I dumped into a mason jar. It’s not particularly photogenic, but it’s delicious.

You want a heaping teaspoon of the tea to go in your cream.

Once it is simmered with the tea, strain the cream into your bowl of chocolate chips. I started with 200 g of chocolate chips, so once I strained the cream here I ended up with 94 g. That’s absolutely close enough. 

Stir til it’s nice and smooth. Now you have truffle filling! (or, you know, eat it with a spoon, or put it on ice cream, or spread it on a scone or toast or something).

If you want to do molded truffles like the ones in the first part of this post, set the filling aside to cool off and set up a bit and get your mold out.

I got this egg mold on clearance after Easter at Michaels a few years ago. Here you can see that I’ve melted candy melts in a tiny mason jar. It’s not strictly necessary, but if you get a tub of EZ Thin and add a bit it definitely will make this easier. I’ve used a small paint brush (that is designated only for food things) to start painting the yellow details in the depressions of the mold.

For the two tone roses, I didn’t actually fill the depressions like I did for the eggs. Instead I aimed to get the yellow down in the deepest parts of the crevices, but left it so you can see the pink mold sticking out. When adding the red (or the green I added to the eggs after the yellow) the goal becomes to make sure the mold is covered and you can’t see it peaking through.

For extra structural integrity, add a layer of melted chocolate. If you want you can absolutely skip the candy melts step and go straight to coating the molds with chocolate. You can also skip the chocolate and just use candy melts as your coating. As you can see, I have my chocolate in a larger mason jar, which can either be microwaved or set in a water bath to heat and melt the chocolate. If you want really professional chocolates you can mess with tempering. If you just want something delicious it isn’t necessary, so I’m not going to go into the details here. There are two key things to keep in mind when working with melted chocolate:

1) Chocolate actually burns pretty easily, so be careful not to get it too hot. If it’s too runny it also won’t coat the mold well - you want it liquid, but still kind of thick. If you get it too runny, you can add more solid chocolate as you stir to help it cool down faster (a very careful version of this is also, incidentially, how to temper chocolate).

2) Chocolate and water are not friends. If you are using a water bath, be very careful not to get water in the chocolate. If you do, the chocolate will seize up clumpy and not want to melt nicely again. You can use seized chocolate to make more ganache, but not for coating. 

Once the chocolate hardens (either because you were patient or because you stuck it in the freezer for a few minutes to speed it up), add the filling almost-but-not-quite to the top of the mold-you want to be able to seal the filling in. You can spoon it in, but the easiest way I’ve found is to scoop the ganache into a ziplock baggie, cut a tiny triangle off one of the corners and pipe the cool but not cold filling in. If your room is warm, room temperature is fine. If it’s cold, you might want to hold the baggie of chocolate in your hands and let them warm it up a little before you try to pipe. 

If your room is cool enough you can just let the filled truffles sit for a bit, or you can pop it in the fridge or freezer so that the filling firms up nicely. Once it’s firmed up, use melted chocolate to finish filling the molds and seal in the filling. Unfortunately I failed to get a picture of that step. Then you get one last round of chilling/patience and your chocolates are ready for you to carefully pop them out of the mold. Be especially careful if you are doing something like the turtle that has limbs that are easily broken off. 

Hooray! Extra delicious homemade chocolate truffles!

But Kaly! What if I don’t have a chocolate mold?! 

No worries! I made chocolates for a couple of years before I discovered that chocolate molds were a thing you could buy at the craft store. I’m going to use a silicone mat in the next picture, but I’ve absolutely used a cheap plastic plate or parchment paper and had it work just fine!

On the right you can see the naked truffle fillings. I chilled the bowl of filling in the fridge until it was like firm clay and then used a spoon to scoop out small bits that I rolled into balls in the palms of my hands. This ends up warming them back up a bit, so once you have a batch rolled, pop it in the freezer for a couple minutes. Then carefully dip each filling one at a time into your melted chocolate. and set it on your mat/plate/parchment paper to cool and dry. The first time you try this you will likely get chocolate everywhere. Just be aware it’s going to happen and embrace the delicious mess. With practice you can get less messy. You can also roll the truffle fillings in something like finely chopped nuts or cocoa powder instead of dipping them. The green tea ones would probably be really good rolled in matcha powder! 

If you have any questions, feel free to ask! 

[kesbeacon]

Happy Republic of Two Systems Independence Day! My contribution is for Inconvenience on Discord, who requested an adventure - travelling back to the Itran Tetrarchy, years post-series, would be a pretty substantial adventure.

[chantecler420]

me, writing an email to my professor, on today, Ro2SID:

hi, i’m sorry i can’t come to class today is an important cultural holiday and i don’t want to miss the celebrations,

[gostaks]

My fill for @1nsomnizac for the Republic of Two Systems Independence Day exchange. The prompt was “events from the significant species conference with the presger"

[imaginariumgeographica]

Shrimp emotions? No, ship emotions. Im experiencing feelings that only a thousands year old warship could feel

[the-anchorless-moon]

Itran icon of the saint Seven-Brilliant-Truths-Shine-Like-Suns.

[ID: a drawing of a standing person with four arms outstretched wearing a pair of short pants and a wreath of jeweled white flowers. One arm is holding a ball, one is holding a knife, one is wearing an armguard, and one is holding a human head. Both the standing figure and the head are smiling calmly. /end ID]

[lemniskath]

Summary:

The idea that occurred to Sphene was simple. What if two entirely separate problems, the problem of creating credible evidence for the Conclave and the problem of no longer being able to get ancillaries from Athoek, had a single solution? Hwae didn't want those people anymore. Sphene might as well make use of them.

Notes:

This story is part of the Republic of Two Systems Independence Day exchange, and a gift for Gyps Fulvus.

Thanks for your prompts! I hope you enjoy the story. @gyps-fulvus