Coeus?

by Andur

  “Not all my espionage was related to the private sector. I also worked for the government. You know. Spying on an elder for another one. They have their differences despite what you might think. The system tries to make sure that they are keeping an eye on each other.” Melan explains.

  “Then teach me that spell.” I demand.

  Melan's eyes widen. “I already unleashed Sadina with that ability. Look around. Apparently she walked right past several faceless. Originally I didn't expect her to master the spell to that degree, but she must have trained it since we last saw each other.”

  “You mean you don't trust me?” I ask.

  “That's not how I meant it.” She answers with a pained expression.

  “Well then, let's get to work.” I spread my hands. “How else should I find a possibility to catch her?”

  Melan snorts. “Not before you tell me why the aliens are getting all crazy about us. That Forlorn ambassador, Illya? Yes, I think it was her. She was trying to talk to the authorities. In fact she may be still sitting in the reception room.”

  I smile “Oh, that's a long story.”

  Galactic Centre, Aether

  Cyla

  “Say it. Ma-Ma.” I wave my hand in front of Aurelia's face to get her attention. I have her on the thick carpet in the living room.

  It's hard work to look after the child alone. Gideon ran off for some stupid mission. Nonetheless that gives me the chance to to pull the first words out of Aurelia. When I connected to her this morning I think I got a first glimpse at a forming personality and self-consciousness. When children are at that stage it doesn't take long for them to pronounce their first words.

  Once more I move my lips in an exaggerated manner. “Ma-Ma!”

  Aurelia moves her lips, but doesn't make a sound. I sigh. Maybe it's too early after all. She still has the body of a baby. Her vocal cords must not be up to the task. The book says that almost all children start with mind speech first and only learn to articulate themselves with sound afterwards.

  Suddenly a shadow falls onto Aurelia and she starts grinning. I turn around to find Gideon looming above us. Before I can stop him he opens his mouth. “How about Pa-Pa? That's easier! Pa-Pa.”

  “Pa-”

  “Pa!”

  Aurelia wrings the disjointed syllables out of her mouth and I freeze up. All the hard work and it was stolen from me in a few seconds! I cup Aurelia's chubby face between my hands. “Gideon. Right now I want to strangle you!”

  “What did I do?” He steps back.

  I pick up Aurelia and place her in his arms. “That's for yourself to find out!”

  Galactic Centre, Aether

  Gideon

  I carry Aurelia to her cradle and place her there. Then I join the sulking Cyla on the sofa. “Sorry for... whatever I did?” I offer an apology, though I really don't get what I did wrong. Sometimes I don't understand her despite sharing minds. But right now she has closed up on me. “I had to do hard work recently. To be honest the next few weeks will be quite interesting.”

  Then I simply continue to fill Cyla in on recent events. She doesn't show an immediate reaction to my story. It's no wonder. Such revelations are hard to stomach.

  When I am done I give her time to think and switch on the projector for one of the walls. The wall is immediately filled with one of the alien news channels.

  What's displayed there is a report of what happened to our ambassador and what we did to the facility's staff. To my surprise most scenes aren't even censored. There are no scenes of dead faceless, so I suppose that Ed held that material back.

  Suddenly Cyla tilts her head. “Funny. I could swear that that yellow thing you shot at the beginning looked like one of the collectable monsters from that game of yours.”

  Then it finally hits me and I place a hand above my mouth. “You may be right! I shot Pikachu like some common rat!”

  For a while neither of us says a thing until Cyla finally judges the report. “It is a rat. And didn't you hate that game anyway?”

  “Yes I did.” No reason to feel remorse. I inch closer and put a hand around Cyla. “I also got a message from Sadina.”

  Cyla stiffens a little when I explain, letting out the last piece of the message. So I hurry to reassure her. “I think I've found the loophole which Sadina was using. I've also disconnected the house from the net nonetheless. There is no communication unless one of us explicitly requests it.”

  My better half starts massaging her temples. “This may be my first migraine as a married woman!”

  Her shifting body reminds me that I am on withdrawal since three days, so I lean onto her. “Are you sure? There might be a treatment.”

  “Oh, I wonder what that might be?” She asks and lets herself being pushed onto the sofa.

  I shift and pull off her trousers. Then I open my pants and push her legs apart, dropping myself onto her, hugging and kissing. I am not in the mood to waste my time with clothes. “Don't you get a little turned on when you know that someone could be watching?”

  “It's only you who is turned on by the thought!” She answers, closing her legs around me. “I for my part can say that I am repulsed, but I get how you feel on the matter.”

  I start rubbing against her and she switches off the report. “God only knows how we managed to get from such gruesome pictures to this!”

  “Who cares about pictures? I need you now!” I cup Cyla's chest in my hands and kiss her neck while she guides me inside her.

  “I shouldn't have married a wild beast like you.” She gasps and I start moving, pressing her hips against me with one hand while hugging her with the other.

  “And you are the beauty or what?” I mumble into her soft skin.

  Galactic Centre, Aether

  Aurelia

  But someone -is- watching! Mom, Dad, what are you two doing? I am fairly sure that isn't some kind of crawling exercise? I want attention!

  69. ~Thoughts.~

  “

  Resch announced that they will retaliate with all possible force, making their promise true. A privately entertained attack fleet fresh out of Breen dockyards arrived today in system! They requested an approach vector towards the Human ships. All eyes are directed at the two quarrelling parties. Tenpen fleetships announced that they will retaliate against anyone who break the peace. Who will make the first mistake?

  ”

  -Calderian news channel

  Galactic Centre, Aether

  Gideon

  An alarm wakes me up and I open my eyes, realizing where I am. I am still on the couch, hugging Cyla while she is using me like I am a bed-sheet.

  “What's wrong?” She rolls out out from under me and checks on Aurelia who is sleeping in the cradle close by. Since we got the child it became second nature to her to take a look at Aurelia when something wakes us up. It's like she is doing it on autopilot.

  I access the network to check the message, using my virtual reality to read the whole report. When I am done I curse and get to my feet, pulling up my trousers. Yesterday we did it until both of us collapsed from exhaustion. But thanks to that I had a very good and deep sleep. It's a shame that these fuckers have to wake me up at five in the morning. “It seems like our friends from Resch haven't had enough. If you excuse me, I've to go to my office.”

  Without waiting for an answer I teleport directly into the meeting room. Regulations be damned.

  The meeting room is used to talk about important stuff like handling our supplies, rotational shifts for our personnel, very important and interesting stuff.

  Grandfather is already waiting for me and I realize that I am the second to arrive. So that means that Hedeon called the alarm. Nodding to him I sit down and call up a tactical hologram of the system. The three dimensional representation flickers to life and shows me the situation. I start pulling on my lower lip while trying to make sense of the development.

  Apparently Resch Corp. has a private security fleet and it entered the system jus
t a moment ago. They registered themselves properly as incoming traffic to avoid problems with the other factions inside the heavily populated system. The issue is that their course leads them directly to Aether. Since we are still practically at war with them we can't allow them to get anywhere close to us.

  While I am studying the facts other important officials arrive. Isciat, the commander of our fleet. Gabriel, head diplomat in charge of talking to the society. Ed, as the commander of the faceless. Melan and Hedeon as my helpers in all issues regarding Aether.

  Strangely enough we also got guests whom I didn't quite expect.

  Roderik Waldheim and his assistant Kandy Frinil together with their handler Galia joined our little emergency meeting. To be honest I am not even sure if they are cleared to learn about this situation, or being involved in the decision making.

  I reach over to Melan and poke her hand with a finger, establishing a mental contact to get more information. Grandmother decides to share her knowledge directly.

  Apparently Roderik's status as the eyes and ears of Earth doesn't just allow him to wander around our city. He can also sit in on any important meetings which don't involve our stance towards Earth. But there aren't any people on Aether who can make such decisions anyway.

  So him being here now is a direct result of the disturbing news reports. Apparently he could have sit in on any of our earlier meetings, but trusted in the recordings which were made available to him.

  I've to commend his ability to hold back in such matters. Not that our earlier assemblies had any important topics. The problem with the aliens though gained his attention.

  My gaze wanders back to the hologram and my eyes set on the approaching fleet. “We could cloak ourselves and scatter our formation, hiding among the countless neutral alien installations. Our cloaking tech would allow us to evade them completely. There is no way that they can discern your signals from the background noise.”

  Isciat shakes his head. “Probably that's exactly what they want us to do.” He pauses for a moment to gather his thoughts. “I and my people studied the code of conduct for ships and ship-movement within this system very carefully. The one thing that's absolutely made clear is no cloaking, hiding or attacking ships within the system. Otherwise all other powers within the system are obliged to use lethal force against the offender.”

  Melan raises an eyebrow. “You are sure that there is no back-door like the one we used against Resch?”

  Gabriel raises a hand. “We used a legal grey zone in that case. The Zeen couldn't object to our attack against Resch's facility because it ran under the cover of being a war. The facility in itself already wasn't within Zeen jurisdiction. The only thing they could have done to intervene was hindering our people to enter the station. But since we can teleport we never had to set foot into the station's legal space.”

  Isciat takes over. “I am afraid that isn't the case here. The rules of conduct are worded in a way which includes every ship, even foreign attackers from outside.”

  I scratch my temple. “But wouldn't that mean that they can't shoot either? So they are simply trying to force us to do something stupid? Or are they intending to break the law of this system at the cost of their own lives?”

  They would surely be able to find some valuable piece of junk in the wrecks of our ships. It still sounds like a stupid thing to do.

  One fact is for sure. If all the ships around us turn hostile, our only remaining option is to teleport out of here and run. But that would mean that we didn't accomplish what we came here to do.

  Roderik decides to help. “Maybe you are giving up too early regarding the bending of rules.” He turns to face Isciat. “You said that any ship which attacks another ship is declared as hostile. What exactly is the definition of such an attack? Would boarding actions be permitted? Is ramming the enemy an option?”

  Isciat frowns. “I think boarding would be a permitted action. But ramming another ship is definitely a form of attack.”

  My eyes wander to the hologram of the approaching fleet. “If that's the case, then we've the advantage.”

  Kandy points at the hologram. “There are two hundred forty-seven ships in that formation. Even with all our escorts together we only have roughly two hundred ships. And didn't you say that you don't have that many faceless?”

  I shrug. “Our total tonnage is higher and if things get tough we still have Aether's population. It's highly unlikely to me that they can put as many soldiers into their ships as we have people.”

  “Sto- stop. Aren't you talking about your civilians? You have to start evacuating them! Get them to safety! Right now.” She gets irritated.

  Galia decides to stop them from embarrassing themselves any further. “You may be right in certain aspects, but you are forgetting about the differences between our people.”

  “Certainly, to all your knowledge a group of civilians from Earth would run away and hide when some unknown foe enters the city and starts shooting.

  But that's not the case with mages. If Resch's troops break into the city the reaction of the average magician will be to attack, especially after seeing what we recently spread in the news channels.”

  She takes a deep breath.

  “You already learned that our society is much more prepared for violence and the average magician wields powers equal to a bazooka. Imagine trying to subdue a population of Aether's size with an army. You can't disarm the civilians and have no way of winning their loyalty since we control our own media channels. The elders long since learned that governing mages can't be done by force or suppression. It's a fundamentally different group mentality.”

  Roderik takes a breath and runs a hand through his grey hair. “If you put it that way. I guess your elders are living a nightmare in order to keep your population in check.”

  Hedeon shakes his head. “We may be harsh on a personal level, but controlling the group is much easier than with humans from Earth. That's a large reason for why we left the normals. The average mentality of a magician tends to get carried away by the people who surround him. That's why our people often fought between themselves, following the petty discrepancies between humans. Until we stopped concerning ourselves with Earth's quarrels.”

  Roderik wisely doesn't comment the offensive speech.

  A smile crawls onto my face as I remember something. “I suppose our friends got a fixed approach course from system command. The same as we did?”

  Isciat nods. “That's very likely.”

  “Well then. Why don't we hack their systems and have a little electronic warfare? Once their course is predictable I don't see why we shouldn't use our incredible little helpers. I suppose my countermeasures against boarding actions are already implemented?” I raise an inquisitive eyebrow and look at our fleet commander.

  Isciat grins ferociously and nods.

  70. ~Teleportation.~

  “

  In all likelyhood, to all appearances... once you give the wheel to someone else... you shouldn't interfere with the driver.

  ”

  -Unknown

  Galactic Centre, Aether

  Gideon

  There is no doubt about the intentions of our friends. “The only real problem I have with the situation is how everything seems to be spinning out of control” I gesture at the hologram and let my eyes wander over the assembled people. “Sure. We've had more than enough time to prepare and the ships are still half an hour out of engagement range. Don't you think that all this is too easy on one hand and too outrageous on the other? These aliens are overreacting on several different levels. Stealing our ambassador for puny research reasons, keeping him somewhere where we can find him, sending a huge fleet of ships after us on neutral grounds.”

  Isciat nods slowly. “It feels like we are playing a game of which we don't know the rules.”

  Gabriel raises his voice. “Everything we have learned so far hints at two major players. The Zeen delegation is trying very hard to entangle us in t
his 'society of civilised species' and while it's true that there seem to be no serious strings attached, it's still hard to overlook the small subtleties. To be recognized by all important species for example, we would have to adhere to the laws of whatever species' sector we are currently moving through.”

  “If we fly through Forlorn space we are practically under their jurisdiction. If we move through Alliance space we have to play by their rules and so forth. That's very troublesome in the long run. We are currently talking to individual species like we did so far. StarDrive already researched a list of interesting candidates. As long as we can sway important and strong species we don't have to care about joining this society. Our ability to offer instant communication and transportation is a very strong argument in this matter.”

  “If the plans of our diplomats work out, we will be able to declare the space around our teleportation nodes as our property. Nobody will be able to force any rules or restrictions on us. The threat of placing the nodes somewhere in the void between stars also works very good.

  We are already assembling a group of supporters who see much more benefit in letting us trade freely than restricting us. The Alliance turned out to be very helpful in that regard.”

  Finally the diplomats ends his explanation and Hedeon decides to speak up. “So it boils down to how we are representing us to these two camps. The Zeen are trying to hold onto the established power while others are willing to ignore us if it benefits them.”

  Gabriel nods. “Yes, although we already are fairly certain that the Zeen are playing this game because they are involved in the war with the Drazi. They want to recruit us and other frontier-species as an anvil to smash the escaping Drazi ships. But they bit off more than they expected and now they are turning all gears to find out what exactly they stirred up. FTL communication is miraculous enough to these people, but our travel-speed is outright shocking them.”

  Those people. I wonder if we should see the aliens as that. People? Or is it safer to regard them as aliens? My thoughts wander back to when I took a look into the minds of several Drazi. Can we ever apply human standards to creatures as these?