Revolution Chapter 9 (Spoilers)

[kyli]

Outside of the Generations, it's very rare, even among the faey, to express talent very young. Most express around or after puberty as I understand it. Still earlier then you can get a Jack but certainly not a child anymore.

[Not a ID]

Point taken, the "recent" examples we have in story are either generation Children, who can even express in the womb, or children of very powerful telepaths absent the Generation legacy. So using the children from the Strip isn't very valid.

However the powerful telepaths can express at very young ages even absent being a Generation. But I'll concede the very young telepaths are enough of an exception to not be anything to necessarily worry over. Their getting access at a much younger age still poses potential challenges and problems going forward. As that ability to interface is likely to be a multiplier on their ability to learn skills and acquire further information(which is used to further develop said skills). It is very likely to generate a very pronounced skill gap in the following years between the telepaths and non-telepaths, and not just in the things directly relevant to telepathy, which those societies had already learned how to handle with varying degrees of success.

[Not a ID]

The bigger problem with regards to Karis is that would be where you have the "other factor" in play. Jason is presumably going to allow "qualified" persons to use the biogenic Gestalts and associated equipment. The Biogenic hardware is where the real risks exist. That Biogenic hardware is also a large part of the concern about the Generation population exploding like it did. Those biogenic crystals are basically crystallized forms of the virus that created the Generations. If you have access to the viral component of the Generations DNA, you have most of what you need to create a biogenic crystal and associated systems.

Okay, doing a full re-read for the first time in a long time. The above description is slightly off. The Biogenic cystals come from an crystalline organism on Kimdori, they came first. The Generations program came about when the crystals alone were not found to be enough. What is not made clear in the story to date is exactly how the Generations themselves relate to the crystals specifically. Whether their interface capability came from mimicking the DNA of the crystals, or mimicking the Kimdori. That said, the Consortium, way back in Unification (Book 3) has people likely barking up the wrong tree, but it is something the Faey and Humans alike will now have to contend with given this public statement was made by them at that time:

The abomination has many names, but the Karinnes call it Cybi. It is a sentient computer built from the DNA of organic creatures, including the Faey.

But moving to another thing:

Which is why I'm highly certain that the resonant telepathic technology Fel had a recent inter-galactic contact mention is going to be a big thing in the coming years. They're going to want a means of distracting others away from biogenics specifically, and that just may fit the bill. As the person they spoke with seemed to believe there was in fact a range limitation suggests there could in fact be one for that tech. If that tech is able to cover even as little as 100 lightyears at a time, it becomes an option for also helping the various empires get out of the strangle-hold the Karrines have on real-time long distance communications, while also potentially reducing the exposure House Karrine has on their biogenic systems, allowing many of them to be pulled back.

And biogenic systems have a range limitation for communication, but "it gets complicated" as the most powerful transceiver is what determines the range, and the warp gates help extend that range considerably.

From Secession (book 5):

If we strung high-power biogenic relays between here and Andromeda, a communion link could bypass the Teryon communications delay. Communion, like all forms of telepathy, exists outside of the common concept of time. I could communicate with a biogenic unit in Andromeda in real time, so long as my transceiver had the power to reach that far. My current one does not, it was designed to give me galactic coverage to contact or recall scout ships in case of a dire emergency, not intergalactic capability. It would take 35,240 Class XII biogenic relays set at optimal distance to establish a communion link to Andromeda. But once the gate was linked, the relay system would no longer be required. Communion can cross a gate as easily as other forms of communications using a directional peer to peer biogenic relay pointed at the gate”

. . .

“Easiest workaround. Can we build a biogenic transceiver capable of reaching Andromeda?” Miaari asked.
“Theoretically, yes,” Cybi answered. “But the transceiver itself would have to be placed at least 163 light years away from the current main array on Karis to prevent them from interfering with each other. They’d generate crossband interference if too close together.”

. . .

“Actually, having something like that might be handy, if only so we could track a biogenic unit or Generation the Consortium or Syndicate manage to capture,” he noted. “I wouldn’t be able to commune with it unless it had a working biogenic comm, but Cybi would be able to sense it, even from here.”
“That is one of the few things I’ve never understood about Generation technology. Why could you not commune?” Miaari asked.
“Communion from a living mind has many of the same restrictions as normal talent,” he answered before Cybi could. “And the main array is a transmitter, Miaari, it modulates the communion so it can exponentially boost its power to make it reach that far. The communal comm transmits communal telepathy. It takes another biogenic comm unit to demodulate it. If we didn’t do that, then Cybi would fry the brain of every Generation and burn out every biogenic crystal on Karis every time she communed with anything outside our solar system, because of the power she’d have to put behind it to make it reach that far. Now, if a Generation in Andromeda had a gestalt, then I could commune with him or her from this desk,” he explained, rapping his armored knuckles on it. “The power of the unit on the other side doesn’t matter. In that respect, the array acts like a telepath. As long as one has the power to reach that far, both can communicate.”
Cybi nodded. “Just so. That’s why we have the biogenic network here on Karis, it doesn’t require ‘transmitting’ the communion over vast distances. It is a distinction between what you might call a local system and a remote system.”

As such, it seems to be a safe bet that resonant telepathic technology would likewise be constrained in regards to its range. And plays back into their fib being somewhat reasonable for the person they spoke to from that Galaxy as he had no way to know from where they came, of where the closest relay was relative to them. Although he(or those he later spoke to) were possibly skeptical of the claim because with that kind of ability to scale, it would be quite the risk to have ships routinely operating well outside of communications range while talking about "trying to be careful." Of course, the whole biogenic aspect of things may suggest that even a Class XII biogenic relay equivalent for their tech may be quite the engineering undertaking with a large resource commitment, as it would have taken 35,240 of those to get to Andromeda from Karis.

[Not a ID]

On children and expression and the Generations in particular: No Gestalts until graduation from Primary School. They've also traditionally been restricted in what they can commune with up to that point as well. So there is at least that little backstop on the House Karinne side of things. I'd expect they'd stick to that practice with resonant technology as well, not that it matters on Karsa at this point. They'll undoubtedly advise that the Faey and the Terran governments do the same(and have a decent chance of it being honored). Now when/if they obtain resonant tech and share it with the Confederation, whether they honor that advice is another matter. But as to the expected age of a Generation and their expression of telepathy:
From Secession(Book 5):

Outside of Jason’s own children, 51% of all the new Generation-born in the first wave of births had expressed, right around the age of 5.5 years on the average. Cybi had told him that that was about right for a Generation, so that didn’t make Rann or any other others too unusual, at least in the perspective of the House of Karinne and the history of the Generations.

Other tangential items: In Subjugation(book 1) it also is explicitly mentioned by Jason that "some races" engaged in genetic engineering to develop Telepaths of their own, often in direct response to encountering the Faey. While that doesn't seem to ever be brought up again, Jason certainly spent plenty of time brooding about the Generations having been engineered to be what they are. That backstory as to the origins for a number of the telepaths that exist in the Galaxy is likely to come back in a significant way in the near-ish future I'm sure. As the Karinnes and Kimdori try to prevent the others from creating even more Generations for their own respective races. I'd almost be surprised if one or more of the leaders doesn't bring up that very fact in the "near future" (deliberately) where Jason can hear it.

And another potentially looming issue: Tribulation (Book 4) had Jason contending with brain damage suffered as a consequence of having merged with Cybi. Jason was infected with viral therapy to heal the damage, the only other person who needed treatment was Rahne, as the only other Human Generation with a Human synaptic pathway map. The ending of Book 4 is likely to be coming to Jason's attention in the coming months, as I suspect the humans who were hit with his mutated form of the retrovirus won't have to contend with that particular complication, but it is going to become quite rampant among the humans who were on the receiving end of the FMS version. That also would help explain why it mutated after encountering him.
From Tribulation(Book 4)

But at this time, the need for the projection of self was important.  The large, black-furred Kereth stood beside her projection within the room, having delivered his final report to her in person, as she had commanded.  He stood there with arms folded, tail swishing absently as he looked at the image of Jason, then glanced at Cybi.  “You don’t have to worry about him, Cybi,” he assured her.  “He may suffer an occasional minor headache, but no other side effects.”
      “How long will it take?”
      “Three to five months,” he replied.  “If Songa catches it in its early stages, she might try to interfere.”
      “I have access to her medical scanners.  She will not catch it.”
      “Just keep a close watch on him.  You know how volatile Generation DNA can be when it’s forcibly manipulated.  The long history of cancer in his family is a glaring indicator of that.  Make sure you scan him for cancer at least once a week.  It will appear quickly and spread like wildfire within him.”
      “I will ensure he remains well.  Thank you, Kereth.”
      “I am ever at the service of a CBIM, my Lady,” he replied easily, then he was quiet a long moment.  “Are you sure this was the right path?  Perhaps we should have had Rahne undergo this procedure first?  After all, they are the only two who are susceptible to being harmed by you in a merge.  The children share Faey synaptic maps, they’re immune to the damage.”
      “No.  Jason is the most compatible with me.  We have the strongest merge.  For this to work, it had to be him.  The safety of the house depends on it.”
. . .
It was from there that she began her vigil, watching her Grand Duke every second, keeping scanners on him to watch for any cancerous cells that appeared because of the Kimdori stem virus within him, slowly altering the DNA in every cell of his body in a very small, very subtle manner, correcting the minor genetic error that had caused her to harm him in the merge.  It was a genetic flaw that Jason and Rahne shared, and a flaw that only Jason and Rahne suffered, that would cause them harm if they exerted too much power in a merge.  Rahne too would undergo this therapy once Jason had completed it, and it would be done quietly, so Jason would not know about it.
      He had forbade her to restart the Program.  This was not the Program, but altering her Grand Duke’s DNA to heal him of the flaw that harmed him in the merge would certainly fall within those restrictions, should he know what she was doing.  For his own good, she would keep this secret.
      Her devotion to Jason as a friend and a Grand Duke was eclipsed only by her duty to the house.  For the good of the house, this had to be done.

(Dahnai was already pregnant with Raisha well before Jason underwent the above mentioned treatment, so that genetic information would have been lacking from the database of the FMS.)

[Not a ID]

Outside of the Generations, it's very rare, even among the faey, to express talent very young. Most express around or after puberty as I understand it. Still earlier then you can get a Jack but certainly not a child anymore.

On children and expression and the Generations in particular: No Gestalts until graduation from Primary School. They've also traditionally been restricted in what they can commune with up to that point as well. So there is at least that little backstop on the House Karinne side of things. I'd expect they'd stick to that practice with resonant technology as well, not that it matters on Karsa at this point. They'll undoubtedly advise that the Faey and the Terran governments do the same(and have a decent chance of it being honored). Now when/if they obtain resonant tech and share it with the Confederation, whether they honor that advice is another matter. But as to the expected age of a Generation and their expression of telepathy:
From Secession(Book 5):

Outside of Jason’s own children, 51% of all the new Generation-born in the first wave of births had expressed, right around the age of 5.5 years on the average. Cybi had told him that that was about right for a Generation, so that didn’t make Rann or any other others too unusual, at least in the perspective of the House of Karinne and the history of the Generations.

I guess this should be amended, as something else seems to have happened later in the story. Given Rann and Shya are merging with their Gestalts by book 8.

Retribution Chapter 2:
Kaitha (New Year’s Day), 4405, Faey Orthodox Calendar
Wednesday, 28 November 2018 Terran Standard Calendar

“And I can push you out of it when I want to,” she replied immediately as she sat down on the floor in front of the couch, sitting between Cybi and Cyra’s legs. Rann joined her seconds later, and the two of them zoned out as they merged to their gestalts and no doubt started playing a game of some sort.

Subjugation's epilogue has this date stamp:
Brista, 4 Kedaa, 4396 Orthodox Calendar
Monday, 15 November, 2009, Adjusted Calendar
And Rann was born the day prior. So he'd be 9 by human reckoning, 10 by the Faey methodology. That's a far cry from being 25 and a graduate of Primary School.

Of course, the Gestalt mentioned in Retribution probably is restricted in some form, but it is still pointing towards Generations with biogenics access (and presumably Telepathic Resonance tech in the near-ish future) having significant advantages later on as they're using the stuff far earlier than others can. Given it seems most Generations are expressed by the time they're 6.