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Description

"I once believed that the songs that the Azimuth corporation taught me to sing were perfection. Every word passed through a committee. Every verse tested in focus groups. Tuned to get you to buy what the corporation was selling. To believe the corporation loves you, loyal little consumer that you are. They were perfect... for what they were. A perfect little lie, packaged in a perfect little song, for one of their oh-so-perfect little caged birds to sing."

"But in the end it's not so important that the words be perfect. ...that I be perfect. That's not what's important in a song. What's important is to sing it with HEART!"

Zimu Star, the Chem Girl is a manufactured phenomenon in the Nebulosa of Ots , the mascot of the megacorporation Azimuth Pharmaceuticals. She wants you to feel happy! Ideally by consuming Azimuth products that will make you feel happy whether you want to or no, but if not, then by buying her audio recordings and merchandise! Azimuth was able to instantly assemble a fan base for their new 'star' due to the fact that they produce and employ clone workers, allowing them to arrange that new workers were 'born' fans and ensuring a steady audience by simply requiring older clone workers to attend Zimu Star concerts as part of their job.

From this guaranteed base audience, the fan following grew, until one Zimu Star was never enough. Zimu Star clones were produced for ever more niche audiences, rigorously trained , their messages and demographic targets precisely calculated. Zimu Stars performed for Azimuth-affiliated military units, to raise morale. At corporate facilities to ensure compliance with company doctrine. At friendly planets to encourage greater consumption of Azimuth products. And with ever more Zimu Stars in the universe, the odds of something unforeseen happening to one of Azimuth's perfect little mascot clones steadily increased...

She is the Rogue Zimu Star.

Her very existence impinges on Azimuth corporation's trademarks. Her music is banned in dozens of systems under the threat of the best legal teams Azimuth's enormous resources can field. For one of Azimuth's clone employees to so much as discuss her on the company intranet would merit a stern visit from the compliance department.

To ban a thought is to make it almost irresistible to a certain type of mind...

Relentless suppression of information about her at the hands of Azimuth leads to ever stranger rumors, whispered where the ears of company administrators can't hear. Was she a child of a Zimu Star clone, free to grow up without the company's relentless conditioning? Perhaps she was caught on the wrong side of the line in one of the many conflicts Azimuth has been a part of. Is she the agent of a rival corporation - an unauthorized Zimu Star clone, made with stolen DNA? Was she an experiment with making an edgier Zimu Star that went wrong - or horribly, unacceptably right? Was it aliens?

Broadcasting from the anti-corporate worlds of the Galactic Union of Nations , she is a vexing voice on the hyperwave. Azimuth clones who thought they were too mature for the old corporate melodies - too cynical for 'AZ-POP' - hear a familiar voice with a different tune, and wonder. Some music defies the protective barrier of irony. For Azimuth clones, she is a full shot glass of cognitive dissonance daring someone to drink.

Life in the G.U.N. is not without its risks. The cage is larger, but still a cage. The nominally socialist confederation loves it when she sings about freedom from the corporations. They do not love it quite so much when she sings about freedom in a more general sense, or about freedom from one of their policies. Azimuth would love to silence both types of songs, but the G.U.N., fiercely anti-corporate in outlook, is the one place in human controlled space where AZ-PHAR mercenaries cannot range at will. Somehow she remains balanced between Scylla and Charybdis, and neither consumes her. Perhaps it's luck, or something finds her useful...

Or perhaps neither monster considers her all that large of a problem. After all, how dangerous can one rebellious heart be, anyway?

NOTES:

* Ironically, I thought of Rogue Zimu Star long before any of the Zaghali... Since I'm having a bit of a case of writer's block, enjoy something that's just a random digression... Or is it.

* Having drawn her, now I know why Shabazik never draws the top of Zimu Star's head. That is one weird rainbow scalp!

CREDITS:

* Zimu Star, the Chem Girl, and the World of Aiers/Nebulosa of Ots are the creations of .

* Any resemblance to any other characters, living or dead, is strictly coincidental. Azimuth Pharmaceuticals and its subsidiaries strictly disclaim any liability for the side effects of consuming Rogue Zimu Star.

Description

"I once believed that the songs that the Azimuth corporation taught me to sing were perfection. Every word passed through a committee. Every verse tested in focus groups. Tuned to get you to buy what the corporation was selling. To believe the corporation loves you, loyal little consumer that you are. They were perfect... for what they were. A perfect little lie, packaged in a perfect little song, for one of their oh-so-perfect little caged birds to sing."

"But in the end it's not so important that the words be perfect. ...that I be perfect. That's not what's important in a song. What's important is to sing it with HEART!"

Zimu Star, the Chem Girl is a manufactured phenomenon in the Nebulosa of Ots , the mascot of the megacorporation Azimuth Pharmaceuticals. She wants you to feel happy! Ideally by consuming Azimuth products that will make you feel happy whether you want to or no, but if not, then by buying her audio recordings and merchandise! Azimuth was able to instantly assemble a fan base for their new 'star' due to the fact that they produce and employ clone workers, allowing them to arrange that new workers were 'born' fans and ensuring a steady audience by simply requiring older clone workers to attend Zimu Star concerts as part of their job.

From this guaranteed base audience, the fan following grew, until one Zimu Star was never enough. Zimu Star clones were produced for ever more niche audiences, rigorously trained , their messages and demographic targets precisely calculated. Zimu Stars performed for Azimuth-affiliated military units, to raise morale. At corporate facilities to ensure compliance with company doctrine. At friendly planets to encourage greater consumption of Azimuth products. And with ever more Zimu Stars in the universe, the odds of something unforeseen happening to one of Azimuth's perfect little mascot clones steadily increased...

She is the Rogue Zimu Star.

Her very existence impinges on Azimuth corporation's trademarks. Her music is banned in dozens of systems under the threat of the best legal teams Azimuth's enormous resources can field. For one of Azimuth's clone employees to so much as discuss her on the company intranet would merit a stern visit from the compliance department.

To ban a thought is to make it almost irresistible to a certain type of mind...

Relentless suppression of information about her at the hands of Azimuth leads to ever stranger rumors, whispered where the ears of company administrators can't hear. Was she a child of a Zimu Star clone, free to grow up without the company's relentless conditioning? Perhaps she was caught on the wrong side of the line in one of the many conflicts Azimuth has been a part of. Is she the agent of a rival corporation - an unauthorized Zimu Star clone, made with stolen DNA? Was she an experiment with making an edgier Zimu Star that went wrong - or horribly, unacceptably right? Was it aliens?

Broadcasting from the anti-corporate worlds of the Galactic Union of Nations , she is a vexing voice on the hyperwave. Azimuth clones who thought they were too mature for the old corporate melodies - too cynical for 'AZ-POP' - hear a familiar voice with a different tune, and wonder. Some music defies the protective barrier of irony. For Azimuth clones, she is a full shot glass of cognitive dissonance daring someone to drink.

Life in the G.U.N. is not without its risks. The cage is larger, but still a cage. The nominally socialist confederation loves it when she sings about freedom from the corporations. They do not love it quite so much when she sings about freedom in a more general sense, or about freedom from one of their policies. Azimuth would love to silence both types of songs, but the G.U.N., fiercely anti-corporate in outlook, is the one place in human controlled space where AZ-PHAR mercenaries cannot range at will. Somehow she remains balanced between Scylla and Charybdis, and neither consumes her. Perhaps it's luck, or something finds her useful...

Or perhaps neither monster considers her all that large of a problem. After all, how dangerous can one rebellious heart be, anyway?

NOTES:

* Ironically, I thought of Rogue Zimu Star long before any of the Zaghali... Since I'm having a bit of a case of writer's block, enjoy something that's just a random digression... Or is it.

* Having drawn her, now I know why Shabazik never draws the top of Zimu Star's head. That is one weird rainbow scalp!

CREDITS:

* Zimu Star, the Chem Girl, and the World of Aiers/Nebulosa of Ots are the creations of .

* Any resemblance to any other characters, living or dead, is strictly coincidental. Azimuth Pharmaceuticals and its subsidiaries strictly disclaim any liability for the side effects of consuming Rogue Zimu Star.