“Uh… I think I would need to talk to my general about that, but where would that scholarship be?”
5 Likes
“It would be on Galactya. The Capital. Here, look.”
Protruding a polymeral arm, Thauvierd made a portable holowatch come out of his gelatinous mass. Protruding another small finger, he activated the device.
“There are more than seven and a half trillion people living on there. Around 5 on the surface, and 2.5 on the rings. Despite being an ecumenopolis, the capital’s environment is perfectly clean thanks to the fact that everything is produced in orbit. Weather Machines keep the climate globally temperate as well, and millions of gardens and parks cover the surface. A lot of buildings have giant plants growing over them. It’s a very pretty place.”
“You would be attending at one of the academies set up for the foreign programs, in the Diplomatic District. Of course, we could tune it for your level of knowledge, since there is a lot about other sciences you don’t know about yet. Also, you wouldn’t need to worry about money: you would gain temporary citizenship so we can give you your monthly universal basic income. That takes care of pretty much anything you could hope to have.”
“You would learn from Galactyan and Foreign teachers, travel the rest of our allied nations, take interactive classes and see all the different kinds of warp drives first hand.”
“I don’t want to force you to do anything, but think about it. In my opinion, it would be a good opportunity for you. You can contact me whenever you want, and talk about it. Here, take this.”
Extruding another arm from his body, Thauvierd handed Groydrus a strange object. It was a sort of small cube, with a holoprojector on it’s top side.
“It’s a portable instantaneous communication device that we created from an Akropii Particle Traverser. You need two for them to work, and I have the other one. Inside of it, there’s a microscopic cube that uses induced quantum tunneling to make electricity and light travel instantaneously from one to the other. You can use this to contact me whenever you like.”
4 Likes
Groydrus took the object in one of his hands, and looked at it hesitantly.
“I’ll have it in mind… How far is Galactya?”
3 Likes
“Well… from this very point, Galactya should be around… 1330 something light years away. However, with this ship’s Mirial Drive, we could get there in approximately 22 standard hours. Definitely better than the 221 days you would need with a regular Realspace Superluminal drive!”
“Anyways, here we are! The observatory. This glass is reinforce with carbon nanotubes, and, while you can’t see it, there’s an airwall adherent to the interior side. It’s an effector frame composed of trillions and trillions of nanobots that will hold in the air in case of a breach.”
“Now, look at the outside. If you press that button, it will emit two small flows of protons that will stimulate the Rainbow and Antimatter shielding. Rainbow Shielding can vary a bit in how it looks, but it’s usually similar to a colorful crystal or the shimmers of a bubble. Antimatter instead is usually invisible, but can emit a faint glow of blue due to interactions with space debris. When it’s hit with actual weapons, it gives off this bright blue radiance that is difficult to forget.”
“Why don’t you give it a try?”
5 Likes
“Ok, so, I just press this, right?” Groydrus said, pressing the button.
4 Likes
Two short beams of prismatic light were suddenly projected above the two cubes, two colorful holographic displays appearing in the air. Thauvierd pressed a holographic button, activating the communications interface. The two cubes then started displaying holographic projections of Thauvierd and Groydrus, relaying light and sound.
“So? Pretty handy device don’t you think? They’re still pretty hard to find, considering the Akropii are still debating whether or not they should grant us access to the production methods, but with trade rising they’re becoming more and more accessible. They still cost a mountain of Galyls though…”
“Anyways, it seems as though our little fun together is over. My team is notifying me that your two superiors have ended their little conference with your government. Let’s hope everything went well.”
“Oh and by the way, to power the communicator you just need a couple grams of hydrogen or helium every 200 days or so. Even then, you should be able to take the trasmitter cube out and connect it to another interface. It should be pretty easy, seeing how it’s pretty much compatible with even the least advanced of computers.”
“Anywho, it’s time to go. Follow me Groydrus!”
5 Likes
Groydus put the communitor in the bag of his military uniform, and replied, “Sure, let’s go.”
4 Likes
By utilizing a large service tunnel, Thauvierd and Groydrus arrived back at the meeting room in a couple of minutes. Souby and Taulsu, together with Thauvierd’s diplomatic team, were now back inside the meeting room, while the rest of the trrarrusian crew was giving weird suspicious looks to any member of the Galactyan personnel who happened to pass by.
“Welcome back everyone. Sorry if we made you wait, me and Groydrus were having fun discussing some of the ship’s systems.”
“Anyways, how did the communication with your government go? I hope everything went well and calmly.”
5 Likes
“Oh yeah, surely, everything went flawlessly.”
“We have been given full permission to realize diplomatic roles, so we will accept to discuss and accept any of your offers in the name of our nation.”
Mind reading wasn’t really needed to see in their faces that the talk did not go smoothly.
5 Likes
“Ah. I see.”
“I suppose they weren’t too happy about our intrusion. We should have thought of that more.”
“So… have they refused all communications and diplomacy, or did you manage to find a way around that? Convince them of trying at least.”
“If not, we will let you leave the ship as soon as you wish to and be on our way.”
3 Likes
“As we have said, we will be making the diplomatic decisions now.”
“Whatever their opinions on relations with outsiders is, is flawed, or irrelevant.”
“Damn…”
3 Likes
“Oh. OH.”
“Well in that case, I suppose you won’t be leaving us any soon!”
“Then we should better discuss the details into proposal. As we said before, we could start trading through a single orbital station, or another kind of habitat, around a planet of your choosing. We could trade construction advanced materials, weapons and services. For example, we’d be willing to terraform planets on commission, as well as building various kinds of machinery and implants to produce key components for some of our more advanced technologies.”
“Where would we be allowed to create our station?”
3 Likes
“Mhh… Kalgyul would be too much…”
“What about Tluasgrao? It’s relatively close to here and from Kalgyul.”
“I mean, it’s a pretty populated place, we are sure they won’t have too much resistance to an alien settlement?”
“They dont even know there are aliens in here, they might as well think it’s one of our stations.”
“We have pushed our luck too much already, we need to make sure this doesn’t get out of hand more.”
“Ugh… fine, uuuhhhh… aren’t the rebels quite pacifist? They are at least less xenophobic than all the others.”
“Yeah, and we extend this meeting time even more by asking them.”
“I got tired alredy with the old guy, we are not going to ask them. They owe us one, they won’t even care that much.”
“Do we have another option?”
“Unless you want to have a coup d’etat.”
“Then… what about Uoplyu?”
"That could work.
“Then Uoplyu it is. Groydus, give them the coordinates to there, taking this location as origin coordinates and the galactic center as the north.”
“Yes, sir. Here… we go! There.” Groydus answered, showing Thauvierd in his tablet a map of the planet with it’s coordinates in lightyears.
4 Likes
“Ah, thank you Groydrus. Seems like a perfect place to construct it.”
“Now, do you have any specifications or particular requests regarding the habitat, like what specific type? We could do a regular orbital station or go for something a bit more particular like a Centrifugal Cylinder, a Diskworld, an Orbital Torus or a Varied Gravity Sphere.”
“It doesn’t really change anything, but I assume one of the more particular habitats would possibly attract more traffic and trade. Couple that with a good dose of memetic architecture and we’ll be sure to have the most thriving trade center your nation has ever seen!”
5 Likes
“I understood half of those names…”
“A “Centrifugal Cylinder” will work. Just make sure to talk to the residents for us, okay? If not, they are going to freak out and come after us.”
4 Likes
“Here’s an example of one in Quadrant 6. I suppose your engineers have designed similar habitats as well - to Terrans and Pacificans, it’s known as an O’Neill Cylinder. A couple hundred kilometers large rotating space habitat shaped like a cylinder that uses it’s own rotation to simulate gravity. We could start with a natural environment and build a series of arcological buildings that will gradually expand over time as demand grows.”
“If it grows enough, we could simply create more habitats.”
“Anywho, don’t worry, we’ll be sure to state our intentions immediately. If you came with us though, it would be much easier to reassure them that we’re not trying to invade them. Not because they could damage this ship, absolutely not, but because many would probably die trying, and we don’t want that.”
4 Likes
“Oh, Tápò Tubes! I guess everyone calls them something different everywhere.”
“You don’t need to worry about those guys at Uoplyu, I doubt they would fight even for their food.”
"Sadly, we will be too occupied to assist there with you, we have already escaped too many duties with these last two meetings.
But, wait a second…"
Souby then takes a small notebook filled with pages made of some kind of fabric, and draws a crude symbol on one of the pages, before ripping it and handing it to Thauvierd.
“I think I got a friend over Uoplyu. Show them this drawing, and he will know in the name of who you come.”
4 Likes
“Well, giving sketchy and shady contacts to one of the highest diplomats of an ancient interstellar Empire usually isn’t part of anybody’s standard diplomacy protocol, but I suppose it will have to make do!”
Elphidae took the paper from Thauvierd’s hands and, thanks to her Exoself Augmentations, scanned the various symbols. While three of the symbols still eluded her, due to the relative lack of knowledge behind Trrarrusian Culture, she was able to recognize the serial numbers and read them to the rest of the team.
“Okay, let me scan it for a sec… B8879… clearly in hexadecimal so if I convert it to decimal it should be 755833. Also I have no idea what these symbols represent, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out when the cultural exchanges start flowing.”
“I’m not particularly fond of making guesses with so little information, but something tells me we will have to show this to someone when we arrive at our destination. Ecvanize, how far is the planet that Mr. Groydrus showed us?”
“Well, it’s 18,529 light years away from our current position. At full subVIV speed, we should be there in… 18,529 minutes. Boy do I just love easy conversions.”
“I hate to break it to you guys, but we’ll never be allowed to go there ourselves.”
“What?! Why not?”
“Come on Coyxiek, you know why. We are standard diplomats and yes, we are good at our jobs, but this is a bit more delicate, and way out of our scope.”
“Thauvierd’s right. We already took enough liberties as it is, we are not meant to go further. It was nice and we will make it into the history books most likely, but it’s time to go back home now.”
“It’s kind of a shame, but we can’t do nothing but comply. Besides, if things go well we could even have assignments at the trade habitat.”
“I guess so. However, who is gonna go there then? I doubt sending Imperial Intelligence or a division of the Imperial Fleet will be a good decision.”
“The Guardians. They’ll most likely handle it.”
“Oh. I see.”
“Listen, I too would like to stay more, but we really have no say in this. If the Council or the Emperors wish it, we are nobody to oppose their absolute choice.”
Thauvierd turned back towards Souby and Taulsu.
“So, Gentlemen. I believe it’s time for us to say goodbye. Getting to know you all was an honor.”
“I hope we will be able to meet again, under more permissive circumstances.”
“Be sure to have good luck in your endless battles. I’m sure you will pull through them all.”
“We’ll be sure to talk well of you to the Council of Clades and the Emperors.”
4 Likes
“We should leave too, it’s great to have a talk without dangers of assassination.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t tend to happen…”
“Good luck with Uoplyu, I have heard those are real pieces of sh- they are rude. Bye Mr. Thauvierd!”
The travel back to Glydy was marked by conversations about how weird Galactyans are, and about how aliens can’t leave them alone.
“How much do you bet we find more extraterrestrials this year?”
“Don’t talk me about it, it was stressing enough… But it went better than expected, now it’s a problem of the rebels.”
“Ha, losers.”
5 Likes