Authors: Dr Jone Brown 

To: Department of History 

Subject: The Life and Death of Menagerie, The Greatest Accountant Ever

Background:

The best-known quality of the Hagbeadi Empire is their use of absurdly large swarms of cannon fodder. The second best known quality of the empire is their devotion to Maggdurr-esque biological abominations, such as their bio-factories and the fabled 58 headed space whale. No such abomination though has ever been nor will ever compare to the clerks of Meyer's Land, towering mounds of captured brains religiously devoted to processing the horrible logistics behind the Hagbeadi war machine. Entire communities assimilated into a mass, condemned to do accounting for the rest of their existence, truly a fate worse than death. One such unit however would beg to differ. This is an account of Accounting Unit A-ML-003's life told from what memories we have managed to siphon from its remains.

Formation and Early Life:

Accounting Unit A-ML-003 was an early Hagbeadi experiment composed of a collective of random POWs, animals, and other organisms amalgated into a grotesque think tank dedicated to clerical work. Earning the nickname of "Menagerie" among those unfortunate enough to drop off paperwork at its office, the unit was crucial to the Hagbeadi effort of accounting for the billions of units involved in the invasion of Meyer's Land, as well as putting any external diplomatic calls on hold forever. When Meyer's Land was completely integrated in 4121, Menagerie was transferred to oversee the production of the Aldorine Highway at an office complex on the rogue asteroid of Lothon, where the collective formulated the esoteric magic required to create an artificial hyperlane, all while ensuring those involved in the highway's construction were paid their due in biomass. Menagerie too was paid handsomely, being offered more unfortunate fauna and brains to be assimilated into its collective, boosting its processing ability and efficiency greatly with each addition.

Biology:

Menagerie was not a traditional hive mind by any means, but rather a mesh of hosts making best with what they have in their predicament, giving rise to a collective Menagerie identity. Initially, Menagerie was a semi-biological conglomerate, all its additions blending seamlessly into one another like conjoined twins taken to an extreme. As Menagerie began to reverse-engineer flip-flop communication lines, it soon learned how to install its collective identity onto others remotely by broadcasting its will directly into the brains of others. However, as these remote hosts were not a direct part of Menagerie, using them produced minor strain on the unit that could snowball quickly if too many remote hosts were active at a given time. Former remote hosts of Menagerie describe vague memories of possessing a workaholic personality, always doing work while communicating with other hosts on a "network". It is not known whether Menagerie had any influence on beings that lack a nervous system or intelligence. 

Workplace Stress:

As the Hagbeadi experienced more pushback in its expansion across the Gergosphere and the Maggdurr Operationzone, Menagerie was additionally burdened with portions of the clerical and accounting work required to maintain these turbulent frontlines. The immense interstellar war's logistical horrors dawned upon Menagerie gradually, then exponentially. By the 4430s, Menagerie was managing resource distribution, biomass rations, fleet logistics, and more on frontlines many thousands of light-years long, and the regular additions into Menagerie's collective was not enough. Despite the risk of disciplinary action, Menagerie began to add onto its collective on its own, assimilating computers, vermin, Omozian AI traces, and the occasional conscripted intern lost in the wrong part of the office. This was initially tolerated by the Hagbeadi due to more pressing concerns than an overworked supercomputer at hand, though by the time the fifth or sixth messenger unit went to Menagerie's cubical to never return, issues began to arise. Hagbeadi governing unit Tet Annexer ordered that all inter-office paperwork sharing would have to be done remotely, a decision mostly targeted at Menagerie's antics. Menagerie quickly spiraled into madness at the loss of autonomy and soon began sending sternly-worded flip-flop messages to its coworkers, threatening payroll sanctions and unionization. 

Going Rogue:

Fearing that Menagerie may go rogue, Tet Annexer went to disable the unit for cognitive correction. However, this soon backfired when Menagerie redirected a large portion of brain payment to itself, assimilating enough organisms to launch a daring escape from Lothon, hijacking and subsequently assimilating several transport units and nonorganic vessels to pursue a private search for more brains to add to its collective. Now a rogue unit, Menagerie began to assimilate not to further the Hagbeadi cause or to defect to any other faction, but to become the greatest accountant ever. Why Menagerie decided that such a goal was to be undertaken is unclear, but what is known is that Menagerie spent the next hundred years dodging Hagbeadi reclaimation parties, nomadic gerg raiders, and enemies of the Hagbeadi as it journeyed across the Gergosphere in search of empty clerical and accounting positions to fill in, all while killing, switching away, or assimilating any competition. By the 4580s, Menagerie had over 98,000 jobs in over 200 systems, performing all its tasks simultaneously by gradually converting to an array of interconnected hosts rather than a singular mass of conjoined people. Any payment of any kind recieved by Menagerie would be used to fund further expansion. It is thought that at its peak, Menagerie had office jobs as far away as the outer Star Union and MG.

Downfall and Passing:

As Menagerie continued to spread out, it soon became more difficult to manage its thousands of hosts from its main original mass in a fashion ironically similar to the reason the collective went rogue to begin with. Having neglected to expand its main mass, Menagerie was unable to continue its accounting empire and soon was forced to release a number of its hosts in an effort to preserve what it had, but it was too late. In 4601, Menagerie experienced a stress-related fugue that caused it to release all its hosts, including everything assimilated into its original mass. The remnants of Menagerie, dazed and confused, began to wander confused at how they spontaneously gained office jobs. Many attended visits to psychic shamans to determine the cause of their predicament, the memories of Menagerie soon becoming a recurring theme in all visits. It was but a matter of time before the story of the galaxy's greatest clerk came to be. Some believe that fragments of Menagerie's essence still live on in certain individuals.