Post by Lorpius Prime on May 11, 2009 2:16:24 GMT -5
"We're not seriously considering this, are we?"
"Of course we're considering it, Bernardo. You don't just reject an offer like this out of hand, no matter what the price is."
"Ed, we can't give them the Mars colony, are you out of your mind?"
Pascual was thumbing quietly through briefing papers while his uncle and Councilor Durante argued. They were in one of the Executive Building's conference rooms. It was furnished more like a lounge, and Pascual was enjoying the opportunity to stretch out his legs on a long couch without annoying Sonia or causing a diplomatic incident.
"No, Councilor, and that's not the sort of thing you should be suggesting. We can give them the colony habitats if we need to, even Willy thinks so."
The Chief Executive of the OES jerked a thumb at the small man sitting at one end of the conference table and reading the same reports as Pascual. He froze in mid-reach for the small cup of tea beside him.
"Ah, well yes, obviously we can give it to them if it comes to that," he said, looking unhappy about getting pulled into the argument. "But the aftermath wouldn't be pretty. Even if we compensated the stockholders, they're going to lose nearly a decade and all the revenue they're expecting, it could destroy some of them. But we don't have funds to pay compensation."
Eduard Molinas had seriously wrong-footed his political opponents by selecting Wilhelm Trautmann as his Financial Councilor. Trautmann was a highly respected German technocrat who had been a driving force behind the reform of the European Central Bank in the 2060s. The choice had immediately silenced about half of the Chief Executive's critics denouncing Molinas for corruption and cronyism, while throwing the other half into confusion. The latter group was suspicious, but had never been able to figure out why a solid anti-corruption figure like Trautmann would associate with the Molinas administration. Now that the Bank of Mexico had completely folded UBS into its own operations—and Eduard's bureaucrats had meticulously excised its records—they probably never would.
"You don't think we can scrape up the cash for three colony ships?" The Chief Executive rested his chin on one hand.
"No, I don't. Those three ships cost more than the Fleet's entire new line of cruisers. Lockheed's had to mortgage more of itself than any time since 2054 to pay for the project, and they're not even half of the ownership. And then there are the people who've already bought their passage over. If we seize the colony, those tickets are worthless."
The sixth man in the room decided it was time to speak. Admiral Lavrentiy Kozlov had been a necessary concession to the Russian Federation in order to secure its vote in the General Assembly for Molinas' election. Not that Russia actually had enough votes to make a difference, but no Chief Executive in his right mind was going to openly defy the country so soon after it had joined the planetary government. But after the election, the Chief Executive and the Admiral had discovered they got along rather well, and more often than not came down on the same side in policy matters.
"Due respect to my fellow councilors," the Admiral said from beneath his peaked cap, "but the laser these aliens are offering us is worth more than the entire Fleet. We must have it, and damn the expense."
Councilor Durante turned slightly purple. He and Kozlov did not get along, and Pascual suspected that his uncle's old friend deeply resented having to share influence with the newcomers on the Council.
Trautmann sighed and ran a hand through his hair, "I can't speak to the military considerations, obviously. I'm just saying we don't have the money to do this smoothly nor without upsetting some very important people in the business community. We can probably lean on the Americans to raise their contribution, and maybe Brazil as well. But the Indians are already pissed as hell at us, and no one else really has enough to make a difference."
"You forget your Euro-buddies," Kozlov snorted, but Trautmann shook his head.
"The Commission would probably be willing, but they're in the same boat we are. None of the member states like us very much, and they're certainly not going to want to make it easier for us to torpedo half their market leaders."
The Financial Councilor shrugged, almost helplessly, and no one said anything for a minute, mulling over their dilemma.
Chief Molinas turned around in his chair, "What do you think, Pascual?"
Pascual blinked, and shifted to sit upright on the couch. "Ah…" He looked between his uncle, the briefing papers still in his hand, and his still-fuming boss.
"Well, if we can't afford not to have it, but we can't afford to pay for it…"
His uncle raised an eyebrow, and Pascual shrugged, might as well just say it.
"Let's take it." He flicked the papers he held with a finger, "The Admiral's got a team in place to board their ship and take control of the laser. Tell them to go ahead and do it."
Trautmann blew out his cheeks, "That's one way to get what you want."
The Chief Executive looked grim, and he turned back to Kozlov for an opinion. But it was Durante who spoke first.
"They came to us for help, Ed. They need us and they're willing to give us technology in return. I don't think we can afford what they're asking for, but if we attack them, we'd be destroying the first opportunity to make a genuine ally that we've had."
Pascual was glad there were no Bats in the room to hear that, but not because he didn't think what Durante said was true. His uncle nodded, and rubbed the graying hair of his temples for a moment before looking back up.
"Lavrentiy?"
Kozlov made a face, "Actually, I agree with Councilor Durante here. Colonel Solyanov thinks his men can probably take the ship if they have to. One of our cruiser captains did some good spy work, and the alien ship doesn't appear to be any more armored than our own. But there are still a lot of unknowns. In particular, we don't know what sort of small arms the crew might be carrying, so we could be in for a surprise if we try anything."
He paused for a moment, and everyone nodded their acknowledgment. "But more importantly, sir," he said to the Chief Executive, "even if we got our hands on the laser no problem, there's a lot where it came from. These Tadpoles, if I may use the term, got to this system using a warp engine, even if their transport doesn't have the same technology. This laser was their opening offer, God knows what else we could get if we press them."
"Warp engines?" Trautmann's eyes were wide with imagination.
"The Bats will never let it happen," Durante said, but even didn't sound wholly convinced now.
"All right," Chief Molinas sighed, and looked to his Financial Councilor, "the Admiral's right, Willy, we have to do this. You've got to find a way."
Trautmann held out his palms, "The money isn't there. I appreciate the necessity of this move, believe me. But if we make the deal, it's going to hurt people, some of them quite badly. There's no way we can rig this so it won't."
"Do your best," the Chief Executive said, then turned to his Foreign Councilor. "Bernardo, we're going to go forward on this one. But I need you to sit down with Lavrentiy before you go back to the table tomorrow. Figure out what else we can squeeze them for before sealing the deal. And if you need to," he nodded gravely, "talk to Khatib about getting the Bats out of the room."
"Hyarahek will know something's up if we do that," Durante pointed out.
"He's going to know something's up no matter what we do. But I'm not feeling particularly generous towards him right now, so let him squirm. We refuse to roll over for anyone else; we're not going to do it for the Bats either."
Durante nodded, and Chief Molinas made one last sweeping glance around at the others in the room, then stood up. Everyone else hurried to do the same.
"Right, well I promised the Governor of Zacatecas that I'd call him back, so I need to go change hats. Thank you, gentlemen."
"Thank you, Chief," everyone said in return. They remained standing while the most powerful man on Earth left the room.
Admiral Kozlov was the first to plop back down into one of the large padded armchairs. He eyed Durante, "So, Councilor, just how much loot do you think you can swindle out of these creeps in return for saving their asses?"
Senior Command Operative Hyong Yaheek of the Republican Intelligence Service had long ago stopped pretending to have any respect for the man who was his official superior. His only vindication was that his superior had never shown any respect to Hyong. The practical result was that neither was surprised that the other did not salute when they met.
Ambassador Hyarahek did not even look up when Hyong entered the office. Instead, he continued to read whatever memo had been in front of him, while tapping a foreclaw against the surface of his desk. He was seeing how long he could ignore Hyong before the Operative began conversation. Hyong, however, was having none of it; he took a memo pad of his own off his belt and sat down in one of Hyarahek's chairs.
The Ambassador set his work down at once, looked over to Hyong, and hissed.
"I have issued instructions that you are to exchange your hat while assigned to this station, Operative." Hyarahek's eyes were fixed on the martial blue of Hyong's beret.
"I am a soldier," Hyong responded, clipping his memo pad back to his belt before he had a chance to activate it. "My commission gives me the right to wear this uniform, and you do not have the authority to revoke my commission."
"Insubordination!" Hyarahek seethed.
"Against an illegal directive, yes." Hyong scratched at the fur of his chin, this routine bored him.
Hyarahek replied with a few more curses and insults, none of which required Hyong's direct response. Eventually, he sputtered to a halt; he picked up his memo again, still glaring at his subordinate.
"You are becoming an embarrassment to this mission, Hyong Yaheek."
"Then grant one of my offers to return to the colony. I believe your office now has several copies to choose from. Or I can send another, if you like."
Hyarahek twitched. "You are becoming an embarrassment to your country," the Ambassador said.
"Isn't that why my country decided to 'relocate' me and my ilk to this backwater?"
The Ambassador's fur stood up slightly and the skin of his wings began to uncurl, but he ignored Hyong and pushed ahead.
"The human Khatib has told me that if this human female's family chooses to begin a lawsuit against you in their court, there is nothing his government can do to stop them." He looked at Hyong as if expecting the Operative to be humbled by the news.
"Yes, I am quite familiar with this planet's legal system, more than you seem to be. But even if the Humans do 'press charges', as they say, the court has no authority over me."
Hyarahek's claws closed around a heavy stone which he had brought from their home planet to adorn his desk, and for a moment it seemed he was going to throw it at Hyong.
"It's not about their authority! It will create a spectacle which will cause the Humans of this 'Venezuela' region to denounce you and weaken our influence over their government!"
Hyong made a dismissive gesture, "Their government does not care. They believe the people of this area to be backward reactionaries, which they are. Neither Gracia nor I have done anything wrong. If anyone is jeopardizing our influence with the Humans, it is you."
Hyarahek stood up and smoldered for a moment.
"They're holding negotiations with the Kekregka in secret now," he said accusingly.
"Because they want what the Kekregka can give them, and because you've made it clear that you're absolutely unwilling to allow that."
"We cannot permit these barbarians to acquire such technology independently."
"Threatening them will not accomplish that goal," Hyong said, and he waved a scolding claw at the Ambassador. "Nor will assigning irritable fools like Gaxahyeng to monitor their negotiations."
"Then what does my expert intelligence operative suggest is the appropriate action to prevent this transfer?" Hyarahek's nostrils flared in irony.
"You cannot," Hyong replied, and straightened his beret while waiting for Hyarahek to decide whether or not to start screaming. After the Ambassador had kept silent a moment, he went on. "Unless you want to destroy their entire world now, that is."
"Governor Shyankyang may consider it now after this development."
Hyong shrugged in the manner that the Humans had taught him, "Otherwise, the best you can do is attempt to prevent further deteriorations of the situation?"
Hyarahek leaned against his desk, tapping his claws, "And how do we do that?"
For a brief moment, Hyong wished his sense of duty was more relaxed. It would have been nice to tell Hyarahek to solve his own problems, and let the fool flounder and fail. But honor bound him too tightly, and it was his duty to serve his state and his race, no matter how much they might let him down in return. If Hyarahek still needed to be carried like an awkward pup to his destination, Hyong would accept the burden. At the very least, he could always drop the Ambassador into a ravine if he changed his mind later.
The Orrery was a gift from the Bats. A fully volumetric display, it was superior to any Earth planetarium, both in the quality of its images and the level of detail it could project. The Bats had claimed it would plot every object within 100 AU of the Sun, and thus far no astronomer had found anything which the Orrery missed. The orbital data weren't perfect and required constant updates from observatories, especially if anyone flew by with a warp ship, but it was still the most impressive astronomical tool Humanity had ever encountered.
And its greatest use was as a tourist attraction.
Plenty of Earth corporations, not to mention intelligence agencies, had wanted to take the thing apart to figure out how it operated, but the Bats had made their displeasure with that idea quite clear. At the same time, Earth couldn't risk using it for any serious official purposes, lest they allow sensitive conversations or material to be compromised by any spying equipment the Bats might have included.
Ultimately, it had become a permanent exhibit on the ground floor of the Earth Fleet Museum where it was open for public viewing in a large, circular auditorium. The auditorium could seat 200, and for the most part the Orrery ran through a standard program accompanied by a recorded narration. At the moment, there were only two people in the auditorium, and they were taking advantage of some of the Orrery's more advanced features.
Pascual Molinas spun a dial to slowly zoom out from the enormous gray sphere which hovered in the middle of the room. The sphere was a moon named Titania, a satellite of Uranus and home to the race of aliens Pascual called Tadpoles. The Tadpoles had only arrived less than three years ago, and no one on Earth had good enough information on their colony to even plot its location on Titania, much less display good imagery of it. If the OES dispatched ships there now, it would be the first opportunity they had to gather such intelligence. Titania continued to shrink in the display. The Tadpoles' massive warp ship did not appear in its orbit around the moon either; spacecraft were not included in the Orrery's data.
Uranus appeared in the display, first as a great blue hemisphere reaching from floor-to-ceiling, and then as a defined spherical body on its own right as the perspective continued to widen. Eventually, Titania was lost below the Orrery's resolution limit, and Uranus moved to the center of the display.
Pascual zoomed away faster now, and he entered a command which would deform the display's scale, exaggerating major objects to make them easier to locate and identify. Saturn and its iconic rings soon crept into view, and Pascual recentered and enlarged to focus on the next planet into the Solar System.
The gas giant filled the air of the auditorium, and Pascual swept the display around until he located Titan. The giant moon was an opaque orange haze, so he entered a new command into his controls. It had taken a while for the Orrery's human owners to figure out how to fully interface with the device's computers. Once they had gained full access to its database, however, the modifications had been easy. Brilliant blue highlights appeared beneath Titan's dense atmosphere. They marked habitats, factories, spaceports, and weapon emplacements. The weapons far outnumbered the other installations. Most of the habitats and industrial parks were clustered in on dense settlement while the weapons littered the entire surface, covering every possible approach to the moon. Each was a laser or particle beam of staggering size. Placed on Earth's moon, a single one had enough power to burn through the atmosphere and turn any of Earth's mountains into plasma. The Bats had transformed Titan into a fortress of frightening power, one worthy of the moon's namesake.
The Bats had arrived first in the Solar System, in 2045. They had settled originally on the Jovian moon Ganymede, where their colony had been defended by weapons just as powerful, but far fewer in number. When the Charterlings appeared in 2048, it took them three months to destroy the Bat colony and drive them from Jupiter space entirely. Forced to regroup on Titan, the Bats had learned their lesson.
Behind Pascual, the museum curator who had helped him access the Orrery's controls stood up to take a phone call. After a moment with a hand pressed to his ear, he stepped forward and tapped Pascual on the shoulder.
"I'll have to leave you for a bit, Mr. Ambassador. Please try not to break anything."
Pascual grunted an acknowledgment while the older man went out a back door.
He zoomed out more quickly now, and his simulated camera raced to the other side of Solar system, all the way across the Sun and inner planets to where Jupiter was waiting. While Titan had displayed a scattering of blue pinpricks, the Jovian moons floated in a cluttered jungle of red and yellow highlights. Ganymede and Callisto each sat at the center of a dense cloud of space stations, mostly orbital defense platforms.
The Charterlings' invasion had terrified the nations of Earth. Everyone had known that the Bats had weapons, powerful weapons, but no one had really thought the implications of that fact all the way through. Nor had the Bats been all that eager to encourage in humanity the notion that their species could be successfully challenged by any other. Their defeat at the hands of the Charterling colonial expedition had been the wake up call which finally shocked the nations of Earth into pooling their resources and founding Earth Fleet in 2050, and the Organization of Earth States a year later.
Yet if the Charterlings had shown humans fear, the Kyhyex had taught them desperation. Since the very first strike on the original Bat colony, their diplomats on Earth had been promising the humans that the atrocity would not go unanswered, that the Charterlings would pay. The Bats' vengeance had come in 2053, in the form of a fleet of "allied" ships escorting more colonists and supplies from the Bat homeworld. At the time, Earth didn't really know anything the aliens themselves beyond the name by which the Bats called them: Kyhyex.
Prior to 2053, all of the alien "military" ships humanity had seen had been essentially the galactic equivalent of armed transports or patrol boats, not serious battleships. But the Kyhyex had shown up with an actual war fleet: eight ships, the largest of them over two kilometers long. The first thing they had done was destroy the entire Charterling colony on Io, and with the same strike carve out enough of the moon's surface to leave a crater larger than the Valles Marineris on Mars. The Charterlings managed to coordinate their remaining defenses before they were utterly wiped out, and the Kyhyex departed a few weeks later. There had been no direct contact between them and Earth, but they had sent a message to humanity all the same. Earth Fleet could not hope to fight against such weapons. If it ever came to war with the aliens, any of them, Earth would lose, swiftly and completely.
Pascual didn't know if it was a testament to humanity's determination or its stupidity that 2053 was the year that most of the last remaining holdouts among Earth's nations joined the OES. That had done a little to boost Earth Fleet's morale, especially when Singapore announced that, in addition to acceding, it would be building its own space elevator to complement the one under construction at Quito.
The Kyhyex had returned in 2057 with their own colony ships and, thankfully, without the accompanying battlecruisers. They had planted themselves on Callisto and begun mining the Jovian moons themselves, despite the Charterling defenses harassing them every step of the way. A low-level war had been ongoing between the two races ever since.
Earth had at least managed to establish limited contact with Kyhyex representatives after their return. Unfortunately, the Kyhyex were not a very talkative bunch, nor was there ever much communication even when messages were exchanged. The best response the OES had ever managed to extract from the aliens about why they would return to the Solar System and settle on planets that put them in constant conflict with another species was because they "liked" this system, no further explanation was ever offered.
The Bats had said that the Kyhyex consumed large amounts of sulfur, which could be found among the Jovian moons in great supply. But sulfur wasn't exactly rare; it seemed odd to choose to endure so much death just so one could mine a particularly abundant source. One shouldn't try to comprehend the Kyhyex, the Bats had responded, they simply didn't think like normal animals.
Pascual shook his head. He was just zooming the Orrery's display out again when the door to the auditorium opened again. Pascual acknowledged the curator's return with another grunt, and began to pan the display over towards Mercury, the home of the final and in many ways the most troubling of the enigmas which humanity now confronted within its own Solar System.
"Excuse me, Ambassador Molinas?"
Pascual stopped fiddling with the Orrery controls, the curator sounded nervous.
"What's wrong, Jose?" Pascual asked, and turned around.
It was immediately clear what was wrong. The curator had not returned to the auditorium alone. He was standing next to an alien, a seven-foot-tall Bat who had his wings folded behind his back and was staring directly at Pascual.
Pascual got up out his chair and bowed slightly towards the Bat.
"Forgive me, Ambassador," the curator said, "but he asked to speak with you. I thought you would prefer to—"
"No no, it's okay, Jose. Of course I will speak with our guest. I think we should probably go back to my office, though."
The Bat returned Pascual's bow. "Here is just fine, Ambassador Molinas," he said, then turned to the curator. "Excuse us, please."
"Uh…" Pascual didn't know what to say, he hadn't meant returning to his office as a suggestion.
But the curator held up a hand, "It is all right. We're at low ebb anyway; I am sure the museum administrators will not mind if I close the Orrery off for a while to a private meeting of… men such as yourselves."
"Er, thanks," Pascual said, and the curator hurried back out of the door.
After it closed solidly, the Bat chuckled, and Pascual stared. He tried not to be too obvious about it, but chuckling was not a usual Bat noise. It also did not help that Pascual did not recognize this particular Bat. It was dark in the auditorium, and the Bat did not wear any distinguishing clothing, not even their usual beret.
"I suppose I should feel bad about taking advantage of the situation," the Bat said, and chuckled again. "But I have always wanted to use one of these without, ah, supervision."
He waved a clawed hand at the Orrery's projection, and began walking down the aisle towards the center of the auditorium.
Pascual cocked his head. "Well, the controls are over here," he pointed to the console in the little booth along the back wall of the auditorium.
The Bat ignored him, however, and walked straight down into the middle of the display. The visible portion of the Orrery's mechanism itself was a flat black cylinder, about three feet tall, which stood up like a raised stage with the auditorium seating ringed about it.
"We had one at my school," the Bat narrated, while Pascual wondered if he should be walking down the aisle after him. "I was always too worried about the instructors to have any fun with it. My friend, however, was a far less obedient pup."
The Bat put his arms out so that his hands were reaching into the space above the Orrery. The image of barren Mercury shuddered overhead. He made a gesture with both hands, and the camera sped away, back to the exaggerated view of every major planet.
Pascual raised an eyebrow, no human had ever been able to interact directly with the Orrery's display; the Bats had never implied it was even possible.
But this Bat reached out towards Jupiter and made a twisting motion with one hand. The camera raced back in to display only the gas giant and its moons.
"Oh, I see you have figured out how to create dynamic overlays. I don't think we included that in the interface we gave you, useful though." He made a fist with his claws and flicked his wrist. The cloud of highlights showing Charterling and Kyhyex installations disappeared. Intrigued, Pascual had followed the Bat down the aisle, and was now standing next to the alien, looking up at the Jupiter system overhead.
"I bet you haven't ever tried this, however." He made another series of complicated motions which caused the entire display to shrink downward, until the red planet and its moons were hovering at chest height only a few feet away. The Bat adjusted the scale for a few moments, until he seemed to get it just the way he wanted it. Then he reached out and grabbed one of the moons.
Literally, he grabbed it. Pascual's jaw dropped. The Bat had closed his claws around one of the little spheres, Pascual thought it was Europa but he wasn't certain, and plucked it from its position in the display. This was a level of interactivity of which no one had even dreamed the Orrery might be capable.
Pascual continued to watch in awe as the Bat rotated the display around with one hand while still holding the moon captive in the other. Then, most shocking of all, he flicked the little planetoid like a marble, sending it careening into Ganymede.
Both moons exploded, shattering into tiny molten pieces which showered down into the atmosphere of Jupiter, stirring up storms and blast waves, and onto their neighbors, producing plenty of new, impressive craters. The Orrery showed it all in bright, exquisite detail, an absolutely perfect simulation as best as the eye could tell. Pascual couldn't take his eyes off of the magnificent, and terrifying, scene.
"There's just something deeply satisfying about completely wanton destruction, isn't there?" the Bat asked.
Pascual blinked, "Um… in a sim, maybe—that's not permanent, right?" In the display, Jupiter's atmosphere was still roiling from the aftermath of the devastation.
"Oh, no," the Bat flicked his wrist again, and Ganymede popped back into existence, just as pristine as it had been a minute ago. "Just a simulation, as you say. Although I can't say I would be very sad to see the Charterlings eliminated in such a way."
Pascual shook his head, trying to recover from the shock of the moment and start thinking professionally again. "Earth will be very unhappy if you start blowing up worlds like that. Is that what this is about?" Pascual hoped he wasn't about to have to make an emergency phone call.
"No," the Bat said, and sighed, "forgive me, Ambassador. It was just something of a daydream I had never been able to fulfill."
"I see," Pascual said cautiously.
"What I would actually like to discuss are the secret negotiations your government is holding with the representatives of the Kekregka."
"The negotiations are not 'secret'," Pascual waved a hand to dismiss the notion. "We simply thought it in the best interest of harmony to conduct the conferences alone. Your people and the, ah, Kekregka, do not see eye to eye on many things." What Pascual meant was "we can't put your people in the same room as the Tadpoles without one or both of you throwing a screaming fit", but he politely did not say that.
"It is an academic distinction, Ambassador; the negotiations are closed to us. I will not say that our representatives are entirely blameless in this matter—"
Pascual snorted, not quite involuntarily. The Bat pretended he hadn't noticed.
"—but we are concerned by the development," he finished.
"My government understands your people's concern, ah… forgive me, but I do not believe we have actually been introduced."
"No," the Bat said, and he bowed again. "I am Hyong Yaheek, representing the Republic, at your service."
Pascual froze. "Ah, are you certain you should be here, Mr. Hyong Yaheek?"
"It's actually two names; so I am properly referred to as Mr. Yaheek by your conventions, not like most of my colleagues. And yes, I am quite certain I should be here."
Pascual filed away the little tidbit about the Bat's name for later use, but grimaced at the rest of what the alien had said. This was the Bat that Deputy Councilor Khatib had recommended be declared persona non grata after a revelation in the Venezuelan media that he had become romantically involved with a human woman. Chief Molinas was still mulling over the decision; the story hadn't really spread into the international news yet and no one in the government wanted to fan those flames right now. But if the press caught Pascual and the Bat meeting privately, that was exactly what would happen.
"Mr. Yaheek, then. I am sure you are aware of the controversy surrounding you in the local media. I don't think it is appropriate to be elevating your profile at this time by conducting negotiations through you. Perhaps you should return to your embassy."
"Nonsense," the Bat's wings unfurled slightly, and he made a slashing motion with one arm. "Hyarahek has authorized me to speak on this matter, I have a message concerning the arrangement your government is making with the Kekregka."
Pascual took a deep breath. He wanted to ask Yaheek to come back to his office, and they could talk there, secure from any prying eyes. But travelling there would risk being seen and recognized as well. He glanced to the auditorium's door, wondering how much time they would have before the curator returned or would have to start letting other people in again. Surely the older man would give them a warning first.
He sighed, "And what might that message be?"
"We will not object to the trade you wish to make with the Kekregka," he said, and Pascual's eyebrows rose in surprise. "We do not believe that you are fully ready to handle this technology, but we will not object if you take possession of it nonetheless."
"But?" Pascual asked, waiting for the catch.
The Bat nodded, "However, we must insist that if Earth does make this trade, that you allow a representative of my people to accompany your delegation to the seventh planet of this system and monitor the negotiations."
Pascual's eyes narrowed, "Mr. Yaheek, I don't think either my government or the Tadpoles—excuse me, the Kekregka—would take kindly to one your ships following along."
"Not a ship, Ambassador," the Bat said, "just a representative. Me, in fact."
"You're okay with the trade, but you want us to take you to Titania? You?" Pascual was incredulous.
"That is correct." He folded his wings in front of him with a satisfied look.
Pascual shook his head, "And I was worried about taking you along to my office."
"Excuse me?"
"Nevermind," Pascual waved the thought away. Then he sighed again. It was going to be a long day.
"Of course we're considering it, Bernardo. You don't just reject an offer like this out of hand, no matter what the price is."
"Ed, we can't give them the Mars colony, are you out of your mind?"
Pascual was thumbing quietly through briefing papers while his uncle and Councilor Durante argued. They were in one of the Executive Building's conference rooms. It was furnished more like a lounge, and Pascual was enjoying the opportunity to stretch out his legs on a long couch without annoying Sonia or causing a diplomatic incident.
"No, Councilor, and that's not the sort of thing you should be suggesting. We can give them the colony habitats if we need to, even Willy thinks so."
The Chief Executive of the OES jerked a thumb at the small man sitting at one end of the conference table and reading the same reports as Pascual. He froze in mid-reach for the small cup of tea beside him.
"Ah, well yes, obviously we can give it to them if it comes to that," he said, looking unhappy about getting pulled into the argument. "But the aftermath wouldn't be pretty. Even if we compensated the stockholders, they're going to lose nearly a decade and all the revenue they're expecting, it could destroy some of them. But we don't have funds to pay compensation."
Eduard Molinas had seriously wrong-footed his political opponents by selecting Wilhelm Trautmann as his Financial Councilor. Trautmann was a highly respected German technocrat who had been a driving force behind the reform of the European Central Bank in the 2060s. The choice had immediately silenced about half of the Chief Executive's critics denouncing Molinas for corruption and cronyism, while throwing the other half into confusion. The latter group was suspicious, but had never been able to figure out why a solid anti-corruption figure like Trautmann would associate with the Molinas administration. Now that the Bank of Mexico had completely folded UBS into its own operations—and Eduard's bureaucrats had meticulously excised its records—they probably never would.
"You don't think we can scrape up the cash for three colony ships?" The Chief Executive rested his chin on one hand.
"No, I don't. Those three ships cost more than the Fleet's entire new line of cruisers. Lockheed's had to mortgage more of itself than any time since 2054 to pay for the project, and they're not even half of the ownership. And then there are the people who've already bought their passage over. If we seize the colony, those tickets are worthless."
The sixth man in the room decided it was time to speak. Admiral Lavrentiy Kozlov had been a necessary concession to the Russian Federation in order to secure its vote in the General Assembly for Molinas' election. Not that Russia actually had enough votes to make a difference, but no Chief Executive in his right mind was going to openly defy the country so soon after it had joined the planetary government. But after the election, the Chief Executive and the Admiral had discovered they got along rather well, and more often than not came down on the same side in policy matters.
"Due respect to my fellow councilors," the Admiral said from beneath his peaked cap, "but the laser these aliens are offering us is worth more than the entire Fleet. We must have it, and damn the expense."
Councilor Durante turned slightly purple. He and Kozlov did not get along, and Pascual suspected that his uncle's old friend deeply resented having to share influence with the newcomers on the Council.
Trautmann sighed and ran a hand through his hair, "I can't speak to the military considerations, obviously. I'm just saying we don't have the money to do this smoothly nor without upsetting some very important people in the business community. We can probably lean on the Americans to raise their contribution, and maybe Brazil as well. But the Indians are already pissed as hell at us, and no one else really has enough to make a difference."
"You forget your Euro-buddies," Kozlov snorted, but Trautmann shook his head.
"The Commission would probably be willing, but they're in the same boat we are. None of the member states like us very much, and they're certainly not going to want to make it easier for us to torpedo half their market leaders."
The Financial Councilor shrugged, almost helplessly, and no one said anything for a minute, mulling over their dilemma.
Chief Molinas turned around in his chair, "What do you think, Pascual?"
Pascual blinked, and shifted to sit upright on the couch. "Ah…" He looked between his uncle, the briefing papers still in his hand, and his still-fuming boss.
"Well, if we can't afford not to have it, but we can't afford to pay for it…"
His uncle raised an eyebrow, and Pascual shrugged, might as well just say it.
"Let's take it." He flicked the papers he held with a finger, "The Admiral's got a team in place to board their ship and take control of the laser. Tell them to go ahead and do it."
Trautmann blew out his cheeks, "That's one way to get what you want."
The Chief Executive looked grim, and he turned back to Kozlov for an opinion. But it was Durante who spoke first.
"They came to us for help, Ed. They need us and they're willing to give us technology in return. I don't think we can afford what they're asking for, but if we attack them, we'd be destroying the first opportunity to make a genuine ally that we've had."
Pascual was glad there were no Bats in the room to hear that, but not because he didn't think what Durante said was true. His uncle nodded, and rubbed the graying hair of his temples for a moment before looking back up.
"Lavrentiy?"
Kozlov made a face, "Actually, I agree with Councilor Durante here. Colonel Solyanov thinks his men can probably take the ship if they have to. One of our cruiser captains did some good spy work, and the alien ship doesn't appear to be any more armored than our own. But there are still a lot of unknowns. In particular, we don't know what sort of small arms the crew might be carrying, so we could be in for a surprise if we try anything."
He paused for a moment, and everyone nodded their acknowledgment. "But more importantly, sir," he said to the Chief Executive, "even if we got our hands on the laser no problem, there's a lot where it came from. These Tadpoles, if I may use the term, got to this system using a warp engine, even if their transport doesn't have the same technology. This laser was their opening offer, God knows what else we could get if we press them."
"Warp engines?" Trautmann's eyes were wide with imagination.
"The Bats will never let it happen," Durante said, but even didn't sound wholly convinced now.
"All right," Chief Molinas sighed, and looked to his Financial Councilor, "the Admiral's right, Willy, we have to do this. You've got to find a way."
Trautmann held out his palms, "The money isn't there. I appreciate the necessity of this move, believe me. But if we make the deal, it's going to hurt people, some of them quite badly. There's no way we can rig this so it won't."
"Do your best," the Chief Executive said, then turned to his Foreign Councilor. "Bernardo, we're going to go forward on this one. But I need you to sit down with Lavrentiy before you go back to the table tomorrow. Figure out what else we can squeeze them for before sealing the deal. And if you need to," he nodded gravely, "talk to Khatib about getting the Bats out of the room."
"Hyarahek will know something's up if we do that," Durante pointed out.
"He's going to know something's up no matter what we do. But I'm not feeling particularly generous towards him right now, so let him squirm. We refuse to roll over for anyone else; we're not going to do it for the Bats either."
Durante nodded, and Chief Molinas made one last sweeping glance around at the others in the room, then stood up. Everyone else hurried to do the same.
"Right, well I promised the Governor of Zacatecas that I'd call him back, so I need to go change hats. Thank you, gentlemen."
"Thank you, Chief," everyone said in return. They remained standing while the most powerful man on Earth left the room.
Admiral Kozlov was the first to plop back down into one of the large padded armchairs. He eyed Durante, "So, Councilor, just how much loot do you think you can swindle out of these creeps in return for saving their asses?"
* * *
Senior Command Operative Hyong Yaheek of the Republican Intelligence Service had long ago stopped pretending to have any respect for the man who was his official superior. His only vindication was that his superior had never shown any respect to Hyong. The practical result was that neither was surprised that the other did not salute when they met.
Ambassador Hyarahek did not even look up when Hyong entered the office. Instead, he continued to read whatever memo had been in front of him, while tapping a foreclaw against the surface of his desk. He was seeing how long he could ignore Hyong before the Operative began conversation. Hyong, however, was having none of it; he took a memo pad of his own off his belt and sat down in one of Hyarahek's chairs.
The Ambassador set his work down at once, looked over to Hyong, and hissed.
"I have issued instructions that you are to exchange your hat while assigned to this station, Operative." Hyarahek's eyes were fixed on the martial blue of Hyong's beret.
"I am a soldier," Hyong responded, clipping his memo pad back to his belt before he had a chance to activate it. "My commission gives me the right to wear this uniform, and you do not have the authority to revoke my commission."
"Insubordination!" Hyarahek seethed.
"Against an illegal directive, yes." Hyong scratched at the fur of his chin, this routine bored him.
Hyarahek replied with a few more curses and insults, none of which required Hyong's direct response. Eventually, he sputtered to a halt; he picked up his memo again, still glaring at his subordinate.
"You are becoming an embarrassment to this mission, Hyong Yaheek."
"Then grant one of my offers to return to the colony. I believe your office now has several copies to choose from. Or I can send another, if you like."
Hyarahek twitched. "You are becoming an embarrassment to your country," the Ambassador said.
"Isn't that why my country decided to 'relocate' me and my ilk to this backwater?"
The Ambassador's fur stood up slightly and the skin of his wings began to uncurl, but he ignored Hyong and pushed ahead.
"The human Khatib has told me that if this human female's family chooses to begin a lawsuit against you in their court, there is nothing his government can do to stop them." He looked at Hyong as if expecting the Operative to be humbled by the news.
"Yes, I am quite familiar with this planet's legal system, more than you seem to be. But even if the Humans do 'press charges', as they say, the court has no authority over me."
Hyarahek's claws closed around a heavy stone which he had brought from their home planet to adorn his desk, and for a moment it seemed he was going to throw it at Hyong.
"It's not about their authority! It will create a spectacle which will cause the Humans of this 'Venezuela' region to denounce you and weaken our influence over their government!"
Hyong made a dismissive gesture, "Their government does not care. They believe the people of this area to be backward reactionaries, which they are. Neither Gracia nor I have done anything wrong. If anyone is jeopardizing our influence with the Humans, it is you."
Hyarahek stood up and smoldered for a moment.
"They're holding negotiations with the Kekregka in secret now," he said accusingly.
"Because they want what the Kekregka can give them, and because you've made it clear that you're absolutely unwilling to allow that."
"We cannot permit these barbarians to acquire such technology independently."
"Threatening them will not accomplish that goal," Hyong said, and he waved a scolding claw at the Ambassador. "Nor will assigning irritable fools like Gaxahyeng to monitor their negotiations."
"Then what does my expert intelligence operative suggest is the appropriate action to prevent this transfer?" Hyarahek's nostrils flared in irony.
"You cannot," Hyong replied, and straightened his beret while waiting for Hyarahek to decide whether or not to start screaming. After the Ambassador had kept silent a moment, he went on. "Unless you want to destroy their entire world now, that is."
"Governor Shyankyang may consider it now after this development."
Hyong shrugged in the manner that the Humans had taught him, "Otherwise, the best you can do is attempt to prevent further deteriorations of the situation?"
Hyarahek leaned against his desk, tapping his claws, "And how do we do that?"
For a brief moment, Hyong wished his sense of duty was more relaxed. It would have been nice to tell Hyarahek to solve his own problems, and let the fool flounder and fail. But honor bound him too tightly, and it was his duty to serve his state and his race, no matter how much they might let him down in return. If Hyarahek still needed to be carried like an awkward pup to his destination, Hyong would accept the burden. At the very least, he could always drop the Ambassador into a ravine if he changed his mind later.
* * *
The Orrery was a gift from the Bats. A fully volumetric display, it was superior to any Earth planetarium, both in the quality of its images and the level of detail it could project. The Bats had claimed it would plot every object within 100 AU of the Sun, and thus far no astronomer had found anything which the Orrery missed. The orbital data weren't perfect and required constant updates from observatories, especially if anyone flew by with a warp ship, but it was still the most impressive astronomical tool Humanity had ever encountered.
And its greatest use was as a tourist attraction.
Plenty of Earth corporations, not to mention intelligence agencies, had wanted to take the thing apart to figure out how it operated, but the Bats had made their displeasure with that idea quite clear. At the same time, Earth couldn't risk using it for any serious official purposes, lest they allow sensitive conversations or material to be compromised by any spying equipment the Bats might have included.
Ultimately, it had become a permanent exhibit on the ground floor of the Earth Fleet Museum where it was open for public viewing in a large, circular auditorium. The auditorium could seat 200, and for the most part the Orrery ran through a standard program accompanied by a recorded narration. At the moment, there were only two people in the auditorium, and they were taking advantage of some of the Orrery's more advanced features.
Pascual Molinas spun a dial to slowly zoom out from the enormous gray sphere which hovered in the middle of the room. The sphere was a moon named Titania, a satellite of Uranus and home to the race of aliens Pascual called Tadpoles. The Tadpoles had only arrived less than three years ago, and no one on Earth had good enough information on their colony to even plot its location on Titania, much less display good imagery of it. If the OES dispatched ships there now, it would be the first opportunity they had to gather such intelligence. Titania continued to shrink in the display. The Tadpoles' massive warp ship did not appear in its orbit around the moon either; spacecraft were not included in the Orrery's data.
Uranus appeared in the display, first as a great blue hemisphere reaching from floor-to-ceiling, and then as a defined spherical body on its own right as the perspective continued to widen. Eventually, Titania was lost below the Orrery's resolution limit, and Uranus moved to the center of the display.
Pascual zoomed away faster now, and he entered a command which would deform the display's scale, exaggerating major objects to make them easier to locate and identify. Saturn and its iconic rings soon crept into view, and Pascual recentered and enlarged to focus on the next planet into the Solar System.
The gas giant filled the air of the auditorium, and Pascual swept the display around until he located Titan. The giant moon was an opaque orange haze, so he entered a new command into his controls. It had taken a while for the Orrery's human owners to figure out how to fully interface with the device's computers. Once they had gained full access to its database, however, the modifications had been easy. Brilliant blue highlights appeared beneath Titan's dense atmosphere. They marked habitats, factories, spaceports, and weapon emplacements. The weapons far outnumbered the other installations. Most of the habitats and industrial parks were clustered in on dense settlement while the weapons littered the entire surface, covering every possible approach to the moon. Each was a laser or particle beam of staggering size. Placed on Earth's moon, a single one had enough power to burn through the atmosphere and turn any of Earth's mountains into plasma. The Bats had transformed Titan into a fortress of frightening power, one worthy of the moon's namesake.
The Bats had arrived first in the Solar System, in 2045. They had settled originally on the Jovian moon Ganymede, where their colony had been defended by weapons just as powerful, but far fewer in number. When the Charterlings appeared in 2048, it took them three months to destroy the Bat colony and drive them from Jupiter space entirely. Forced to regroup on Titan, the Bats had learned their lesson.
Behind Pascual, the museum curator who had helped him access the Orrery's controls stood up to take a phone call. After a moment with a hand pressed to his ear, he stepped forward and tapped Pascual on the shoulder.
"I'll have to leave you for a bit, Mr. Ambassador. Please try not to break anything."
Pascual grunted an acknowledgment while the older man went out a back door.
He zoomed out more quickly now, and his simulated camera raced to the other side of Solar system, all the way across the Sun and inner planets to where Jupiter was waiting. While Titan had displayed a scattering of blue pinpricks, the Jovian moons floated in a cluttered jungle of red and yellow highlights. Ganymede and Callisto each sat at the center of a dense cloud of space stations, mostly orbital defense platforms.
The Charterlings' invasion had terrified the nations of Earth. Everyone had known that the Bats had weapons, powerful weapons, but no one had really thought the implications of that fact all the way through. Nor had the Bats been all that eager to encourage in humanity the notion that their species could be successfully challenged by any other. Their defeat at the hands of the Charterling colonial expedition had been the wake up call which finally shocked the nations of Earth into pooling their resources and founding Earth Fleet in 2050, and the Organization of Earth States a year later.
Yet if the Charterlings had shown humans fear, the Kyhyex had taught them desperation. Since the very first strike on the original Bat colony, their diplomats on Earth had been promising the humans that the atrocity would not go unanswered, that the Charterlings would pay. The Bats' vengeance had come in 2053, in the form of a fleet of "allied" ships escorting more colonists and supplies from the Bat homeworld. At the time, Earth didn't really know anything the aliens themselves beyond the name by which the Bats called them: Kyhyex.
Prior to 2053, all of the alien "military" ships humanity had seen had been essentially the galactic equivalent of armed transports or patrol boats, not serious battleships. But the Kyhyex had shown up with an actual war fleet: eight ships, the largest of them over two kilometers long. The first thing they had done was destroy the entire Charterling colony on Io, and with the same strike carve out enough of the moon's surface to leave a crater larger than the Valles Marineris on Mars. The Charterlings managed to coordinate their remaining defenses before they were utterly wiped out, and the Kyhyex departed a few weeks later. There had been no direct contact between them and Earth, but they had sent a message to humanity all the same. Earth Fleet could not hope to fight against such weapons. If it ever came to war with the aliens, any of them, Earth would lose, swiftly and completely.
Pascual didn't know if it was a testament to humanity's determination or its stupidity that 2053 was the year that most of the last remaining holdouts among Earth's nations joined the OES. That had done a little to boost Earth Fleet's morale, especially when Singapore announced that, in addition to acceding, it would be building its own space elevator to complement the one under construction at Quito.
The Kyhyex had returned in 2057 with their own colony ships and, thankfully, without the accompanying battlecruisers. They had planted themselves on Callisto and begun mining the Jovian moons themselves, despite the Charterling defenses harassing them every step of the way. A low-level war had been ongoing between the two races ever since.
Earth had at least managed to establish limited contact with Kyhyex representatives after their return. Unfortunately, the Kyhyex were not a very talkative bunch, nor was there ever much communication even when messages were exchanged. The best response the OES had ever managed to extract from the aliens about why they would return to the Solar System and settle on planets that put them in constant conflict with another species was because they "liked" this system, no further explanation was ever offered.
The Bats had said that the Kyhyex consumed large amounts of sulfur, which could be found among the Jovian moons in great supply. But sulfur wasn't exactly rare; it seemed odd to choose to endure so much death just so one could mine a particularly abundant source. One shouldn't try to comprehend the Kyhyex, the Bats had responded, they simply didn't think like normal animals.
Pascual shook his head. He was just zooming the Orrery's display out again when the door to the auditorium opened again. Pascual acknowledged the curator's return with another grunt, and began to pan the display over towards Mercury, the home of the final and in many ways the most troubling of the enigmas which humanity now confronted within its own Solar System.
"Excuse me, Ambassador Molinas?"
Pascual stopped fiddling with the Orrery controls, the curator sounded nervous.
"What's wrong, Jose?" Pascual asked, and turned around.
It was immediately clear what was wrong. The curator had not returned to the auditorium alone. He was standing next to an alien, a seven-foot-tall Bat who had his wings folded behind his back and was staring directly at Pascual.
Pascual got up out his chair and bowed slightly towards the Bat.
"Forgive me, Ambassador," the curator said, "but he asked to speak with you. I thought you would prefer to—"
"No no, it's okay, Jose. Of course I will speak with our guest. I think we should probably go back to my office, though."
The Bat returned Pascual's bow. "Here is just fine, Ambassador Molinas," he said, then turned to the curator. "Excuse us, please."
"Uh…" Pascual didn't know what to say, he hadn't meant returning to his office as a suggestion.
But the curator held up a hand, "It is all right. We're at low ebb anyway; I am sure the museum administrators will not mind if I close the Orrery off for a while to a private meeting of… men such as yourselves."
"Er, thanks," Pascual said, and the curator hurried back out of the door.
After it closed solidly, the Bat chuckled, and Pascual stared. He tried not to be too obvious about it, but chuckling was not a usual Bat noise. It also did not help that Pascual did not recognize this particular Bat. It was dark in the auditorium, and the Bat did not wear any distinguishing clothing, not even their usual beret.
"I suppose I should feel bad about taking advantage of the situation," the Bat said, and chuckled again. "But I have always wanted to use one of these without, ah, supervision."
He waved a clawed hand at the Orrery's projection, and began walking down the aisle towards the center of the auditorium.
Pascual cocked his head. "Well, the controls are over here," he pointed to the console in the little booth along the back wall of the auditorium.
The Bat ignored him, however, and walked straight down into the middle of the display. The visible portion of the Orrery's mechanism itself was a flat black cylinder, about three feet tall, which stood up like a raised stage with the auditorium seating ringed about it.
"We had one at my school," the Bat narrated, while Pascual wondered if he should be walking down the aisle after him. "I was always too worried about the instructors to have any fun with it. My friend, however, was a far less obedient pup."
The Bat put his arms out so that his hands were reaching into the space above the Orrery. The image of barren Mercury shuddered overhead. He made a gesture with both hands, and the camera sped away, back to the exaggerated view of every major planet.
Pascual raised an eyebrow, no human had ever been able to interact directly with the Orrery's display; the Bats had never implied it was even possible.
But this Bat reached out towards Jupiter and made a twisting motion with one hand. The camera raced back in to display only the gas giant and its moons.
"Oh, I see you have figured out how to create dynamic overlays. I don't think we included that in the interface we gave you, useful though." He made a fist with his claws and flicked his wrist. The cloud of highlights showing Charterling and Kyhyex installations disappeared. Intrigued, Pascual had followed the Bat down the aisle, and was now standing next to the alien, looking up at the Jupiter system overhead.
"I bet you haven't ever tried this, however." He made another series of complicated motions which caused the entire display to shrink downward, until the red planet and its moons were hovering at chest height only a few feet away. The Bat adjusted the scale for a few moments, until he seemed to get it just the way he wanted it. Then he reached out and grabbed one of the moons.
Literally, he grabbed it. Pascual's jaw dropped. The Bat had closed his claws around one of the little spheres, Pascual thought it was Europa but he wasn't certain, and plucked it from its position in the display. This was a level of interactivity of which no one had even dreamed the Orrery might be capable.
Pascual continued to watch in awe as the Bat rotated the display around with one hand while still holding the moon captive in the other. Then, most shocking of all, he flicked the little planetoid like a marble, sending it careening into Ganymede.
Both moons exploded, shattering into tiny molten pieces which showered down into the atmosphere of Jupiter, stirring up storms and blast waves, and onto their neighbors, producing plenty of new, impressive craters. The Orrery showed it all in bright, exquisite detail, an absolutely perfect simulation as best as the eye could tell. Pascual couldn't take his eyes off of the magnificent, and terrifying, scene.
"There's just something deeply satisfying about completely wanton destruction, isn't there?" the Bat asked.
Pascual blinked, "Um… in a sim, maybe—that's not permanent, right?" In the display, Jupiter's atmosphere was still roiling from the aftermath of the devastation.
"Oh, no," the Bat flicked his wrist again, and Ganymede popped back into existence, just as pristine as it had been a minute ago. "Just a simulation, as you say. Although I can't say I would be very sad to see the Charterlings eliminated in such a way."
Pascual shook his head, trying to recover from the shock of the moment and start thinking professionally again. "Earth will be very unhappy if you start blowing up worlds like that. Is that what this is about?" Pascual hoped he wasn't about to have to make an emergency phone call.
"No," the Bat said, and sighed, "forgive me, Ambassador. It was just something of a daydream I had never been able to fulfill."
"I see," Pascual said cautiously.
"What I would actually like to discuss are the secret negotiations your government is holding with the representatives of the Kekregka."
"The negotiations are not 'secret'," Pascual waved a hand to dismiss the notion. "We simply thought it in the best interest of harmony to conduct the conferences alone. Your people and the, ah, Kekregka, do not see eye to eye on many things." What Pascual meant was "we can't put your people in the same room as the Tadpoles without one or both of you throwing a screaming fit", but he politely did not say that.
"It is an academic distinction, Ambassador; the negotiations are closed to us. I will not say that our representatives are entirely blameless in this matter—"
Pascual snorted, not quite involuntarily. The Bat pretended he hadn't noticed.
"—but we are concerned by the development," he finished.
"My government understands your people's concern, ah… forgive me, but I do not believe we have actually been introduced."
"No," the Bat said, and he bowed again. "I am Hyong Yaheek, representing the Republic, at your service."
Pascual froze. "Ah, are you certain you should be here, Mr. Hyong Yaheek?"
"It's actually two names; so I am properly referred to as Mr. Yaheek by your conventions, not like most of my colleagues. And yes, I am quite certain I should be here."
Pascual filed away the little tidbit about the Bat's name for later use, but grimaced at the rest of what the alien had said. This was the Bat that Deputy Councilor Khatib had recommended be declared persona non grata after a revelation in the Venezuelan media that he had become romantically involved with a human woman. Chief Molinas was still mulling over the decision; the story hadn't really spread into the international news yet and no one in the government wanted to fan those flames right now. But if the press caught Pascual and the Bat meeting privately, that was exactly what would happen.
"Mr. Yaheek, then. I am sure you are aware of the controversy surrounding you in the local media. I don't think it is appropriate to be elevating your profile at this time by conducting negotiations through you. Perhaps you should return to your embassy."
"Nonsense," the Bat's wings unfurled slightly, and he made a slashing motion with one arm. "Hyarahek has authorized me to speak on this matter, I have a message concerning the arrangement your government is making with the Kekregka."
Pascual took a deep breath. He wanted to ask Yaheek to come back to his office, and they could talk there, secure from any prying eyes. But travelling there would risk being seen and recognized as well. He glanced to the auditorium's door, wondering how much time they would have before the curator returned or would have to start letting other people in again. Surely the older man would give them a warning first.
He sighed, "And what might that message be?"
"We will not object to the trade you wish to make with the Kekregka," he said, and Pascual's eyebrows rose in surprise. "We do not believe that you are fully ready to handle this technology, but we will not object if you take possession of it nonetheless."
"But?" Pascual asked, waiting for the catch.
The Bat nodded, "However, we must insist that if Earth does make this trade, that you allow a representative of my people to accompany your delegation to the seventh planet of this system and monitor the negotiations."
Pascual's eyes narrowed, "Mr. Yaheek, I don't think either my government or the Tadpoles—excuse me, the Kekregka—would take kindly to one your ships following along."
"Not a ship, Ambassador," the Bat said, "just a representative. Me, in fact."
"You're okay with the trade, but you want us to take you to Titania? You?" Pascual was incredulous.
"That is correct." He folded his wings in front of him with a satisfied look.
Pascual shook his head, "And I was worried about taking you along to my office."
"Excuse me?"
"Nevermind," Pascual waved the thought away. Then he sighed again. It was going to be a long day.