“The risk was minimal. I took all the precautions to make sure there weren’t any incidents,” Seo-yun, his longtime partner, defended herself.
“Minimal!” Laura yelled out. “There wasn’t supposed to be any risk at all!”
“Everything went according to plan, and I am perfectly fine,” Adrian chimed in.
Laura swung towards him and prepared to rip into him when Tomas decided that it was enough.
“Laura,” he said firmly. She stopped and turned to look at him. For a moment, he could see her debating whether to ignore him or not, but finally she turned and walked to the window that overlooked the city.
Tomas cleared his throat and then turned to the two sitting on the couch. “What did you find out?”
“For starters, I know why the Sowir started wiping out other races,” Adrian said.
“We already knew that, because we don’t hear the Spirit of the Universe,” Tomas added.
“I mean, I know what they think this Spirit of the Universe is.”
Tomas raised an eyebrow, and made a Nel gesture for him to continue.
“Well, they think that this Spirit of the Universe is what binds all life, or rather all true life, together,” Adrian started. “In reality, what they call the Spirit of the Universe is actually a telepathic echo, the background noise of the Universe. At least, that is what the People thought. But I didn’t tell her that.”
“And how does this help us?” Tomas asked.
Adrian started to speak, but Seo-yun interrupted him. “When she realized that Adrian now fits into their belief of what makes a being real, she felt horror. She knew that her people had made a mistake; they hadn’t taken into consideration that a being could eventually develop telepathy and the ability to hear what they believe is the Spirit of the Universe,” she said enthusiastically. “If we show them that Adrian can hear it, they will understand that all life has potential to become what they believe is to be ‘intelligent.’ We can start talks, make peace.”
Laura turned and looked directly at Seo-yun. “Peace?” she asked scornfully. “After all they have done? They have wiped out two other races!”
“So, what, we will wipe them out in turn?” Seo-yun threw back. “What gives us the right to decide that they cannot be redeemed?”
“We can’t just leave them be, Seo-yun.” Tomas said. “And how would we even give this information to them? They don’t respond to our comms, and even if they are listening, they would not believe in it, not even from their own. Not from those that were captured. They will suspect a trick. The only way would be to get to their bigger worlds, directly to their leaders. But how would we do that? They keep millions of their agents close to them.” Tomas shook his head. “Let’s assume that you get them to listen, and we come to agreement. What then? We just let them go? Why even get them to talk if we are not willing to let them go unpunished?”
“We have no right to judge them, Tomas,” Seo-yun said.
“Why not?” Tomas asked. “What gives anyone in the universe the right to do anything? Nothing; we take the right ourselves. And the Sowir have committed genocide twice, maybe even more. Those they killed deserve justice.”
“So we kill them all?” Seo-yun asked.
“I agree with Tomas that they shouldn’t be absolved of their crimes,” Adrian said, looking at Seo-yun with regret. “But I also think that we should try and communicate with them. They must realize that they can’t win against us. If we can make them see that we are equal to them, we might be able to get them to surrender and keep their word.”
“Surrender under what terms?” Laura asked.
“We follow the same plan we already have, only they do it willingly. They abandon all systems they control, they stop using their agents, and agree to be confined to their home system. Agree to have our forces permanently inside their system. They will be allowed to move around the system, but they will be forbidden to have ships with FTL capability,” Adrian said.
“This all rests on us being able to convince them that Adrian can hear this Spirt or whatever it is,” Laura said.
“Yes.” Tomas nodded. “Which is why we are going to continue with our planned offensive. Adrian can try and find a way to open communications. Otherwise, we continue with our original plan.”
Chapter Three
October; Guxaxac – Guxcacul homeworld
Company Leader Sahib Adin read through the last communiqué from the Fleet Headquarters, letting him know that they would be starting a new offensive soon and telling him the timeline for the liberation of Guxaxac. He’d received the message through an FTL communicator that they had brought from the Empire. It didn’t communicate through normal space, so it being deep underground didn’t add any interference. Sahib sighed. He had spent three years living underground, surrounded by Guxcacul, as one of the Empire’s liaisons to the Guxcacul government. And while he had grown to like the big arthropods, he needed to see more people that looked like him, other than his team. Although he had received a promotion for his actions during the initial invasion of the Sowir territory. But sadly, his expertise had been needed for the mission on Guxaxac, as his team was probably the most experienced one in the Empire.
They had been relatively safe, and had seen little action over the last three years. The Guxcacul population had already been cut down to a small number, barely five million. And they all lived in the oldest Guxcacul city on the planet, Gaxasas, buried deep underground.
Before the Sowir had invaded Guxaxac, the city had not been occupied, aside from a few caretakers. The city had been a kind of a museum, and every Guxcacul would visit it at least once in their lifetime. Now it was their last refuge. After the Sowir invasion of the planet had started, a faction of the Guxcacul had taken it upon themselves to fortify the city. And they’d had enough time; the Sowir war had lasted a long time. Now this city held the last of the Guxcacul race. All other cities had fallen over the decades.
The only reason that the Sowir still hadn’t located the city was that its location hadn’t been recorded in any files. The city was sacred to the Guxcacul, so everyone who wanted to visit it would need to go on a pilgrimage, and the only clues of the city’s location were passed down orally. Now, the city was a fortress, reinforced over the decades to serve as the last bastion of the Guxcacul. And they had planned on making it their last stand. To them, it was poetic; the place of the birth of their civilization was also to be its end. Until Sahib and his team had given them hope. And soon, Sahib would be able to make good on the promise he had made when they’d arrived.
The Empire needed time to prepare to take the planet; they had never attempted anything like it. Time was needed to manufacture equipment designed for fighting underground, to train troops in its use, and come up with a plan. The easiest part was for them to clear the Sowir ships in system, but the ground was another thing entirely. The Sowir had hundreds of thousands of their soldiers—the animals they had genetically altered to be their slaves, and controlled via telepathy to be used as tools and agents—on the ground. The Guxaxac tunnels were filled with them. And now the Empire was finally ready.
Sahib got up from his improvised bed and exited what had been his home for the last three years. He didn’t need any special equipment to survive, as the Guxcacul lived in very similar conditions. The air here was dry and hot, which he could survive in, but thankfully the Guxcacul had rigged devices that cooled and moisturized the air inside the chambers for his team.