“Still, they are powerful weapons, ones that our enemies don’t know about,” Adrian said.
“Perhaps… it is something that is easily deduced. If you can move your ships faster than light within the system, why shouldn’t your missiles have the same capability?”
“It is one thing to suspect something and quite another to face it in combat,” Adrian sent. “How many did you bring?”
“Twelve hundred.”
“I hoped for more…”
“I have brought everything we need to build more, but if you want my ships to build more of the missiles, the production of the defense platforms will suffer,” Lurker of the Depths said.
“I’ll think about it. In the meantime, Kar Daim has given us one small moon to set up as a temporary base for our people as well as a more permanent embassy. I want you to start placing modules on the ground as soon as possible; put the personnel areas and living quarters down first. Shara Radum might be changing, but there is still friction; I would much rather our people had a place where they can take leave without worrying about offending some Shara Daim.”
“Of course, we can start right away,” Lurker of the Depths sent.
“Good. I’m afraid that we will need to keep your people away from the Shara Daim. They might have started a change, but there is still thousands of years of them looking down on other intelligent life. I hope to have you by my side when we go to the front; hopefully your presence will be a good experience for them.”
“I understand,” Lurker of the Depths sent.
Adrian felt the weight of those words; he knew that the Sowir might understand that more than anyone else. “Of course.”
“When will our forces go to the front?” Lurker of the Depths asked.
Adrian shook his head as he answered, “I don’t know yet. Our stealth scouts have been scouting out Erasi forces and relaying information to the Shara Daim, who have managed to regain a few systems and halt the Erasi advance. There haven’t been any new large-scale battles in months; the Erasi are content to hold and reinforce the systems they have already taken, while the Shara Daim are preparing for a push to recover their territory. The Emperor has asked us to hold off on sending fleets until our people can finish our talks with the Erasi. The Erasi are trying to clear the air about their attack on my ships, which they call a minor incident, and want to repair the relations between us. Tomas is trying to get them to pull back from the Shara Daim territory and pay restitution to both the Empire and Shara Daim.”
“I doubt that they will agree to that; they planned this attack long before we came into the picture. And I also doubt that Kar Daim will be amenable to just letting the Erasi get away without paying in blood,” Lurker of the Depths added.
Adrian grimaced. “Yeah, I talked with her about it. She wants them to pay, but I managed to convince her that termination of hostilities is in her people’s best interest. Although the price she will ask if they agree is substantial. As for the Erasi, I agree, but we still want to give them a chance. It has been made clear to them that if they continue with their aggression against the Shara Daim, we will respond by providing aid and technology as well as declaring a state of war between us and the Erasi, which will mean us stopping all trading with their companies. I think that they are hesitating because of that, if nothing else. The Erasi are not like the Empire, and some of their companies have a lot to lose if we go to war. Our diplomats think that the companies are putting pressure on the Erasi ruling caste.”
“But you still don’t think that they will agree and pull back?” Lurker of the Depths asked.
“No. As you said, they had planned this for a long time. And with everything we have learned about them, we know that they like to meddle and influence other civilizations in order to eliminate threats. They were not able to influence the Shara Daim because they are a very xenophobic civilization—the Erasi couldn’t get a great enough foothold to manipulate them—and they were far too powerful to be taken out easily. I suspect that the Erasi had a hand in manipulating other races around the Shara Daim to breed distrust and resentment against them—although I doubt that they needed to apply much effort—so that when they finally struck, the Shara Daim would be alone,” Adrian responded.
“Plausible, but not certain. We don’t know their true motives and should not allow ourselves to believe assumptions. That could lead to false conclusions. My people have learned that lesson well.”
“You’re right. Hopefully our diplomatic talks with them will give us more clues about their true motives.”
Chapter Two
One month later; March; Year 58 of the Empire — Tarabat
Aileen stormed into the Empire’s compound on Tarabat furious, followed by two Warpath adepts trained in Sha recently sent from Sanctuary to act as additional support. Once inside, she made her way to one of the offices and entered, leaving the two adepts on their own. Inside, she was met by the compound head Björn Borg, who waited for her to drop onto one of the couches that was against the side wall before speaking.
“That bad, huh?” Björn asked.
“I hate this kind of politics where you say one thing but mean something completely different, giving half-truths and twisting words for your benefit. The Empire got rid of those politics a long time ago, but the Erasi are such a jumbled mess of agendas, corruption, and manipulations that I don’t know how they even function,” Aileen said tiredly.
“Well, they are a jumbled mess of many races, corporations, and ideologies,” Björn said.
“Ugh,” Aileen grunted. “They are blocking me, stalling for something, and I can’t figure out what!” She raised her voice. “I can’t figure out if they are really concerned with our threats or if they are pretending to be! And I certainly can’t figure out what they want!”
“The Shara Daim will not wait for long. If the Erasi don’t agree to terms, they will attack to regain their worlds and people; they won’t allow the Erasi any more time to set up defenses,” Björn cautioned.
“I know, which is why I am so frustrated. We have two more months until the Emperor’s deadline, and I doubt that Erasi will somehow miss us leaving Tarabat. They’ll know that we are stopping with negotiations,” Aileen said.
“What about our other channels?” Björn asked.
“Our contacts are too far down the ladder to know anything useful. We didn’t really have time to make a good net,” Aileen said.
“And companies?”
“The company leaders assure me that they will not allow their government to go to war with us. They don’t really care for the Shara Daim, as they never really had many deals with them. But we have proven ourselves as fair and secure trading partners. And our economy is growing; we are an investment, a pretty large and potentially very lucrative one,” Aileen said.
“But you don’t think that they will manage to sway the Erasi government,” Björn said.
“No, I think that the companies have a lot of sway in the Erasi, sure, but we have been dealing with mostly midlevel companies in the outer sectors of the Erasi. Their larger and more influential companies are in the core, and I doubt that they will care.”
“So you think that continuation of the war is inevitable.”
“Sadly, yes. I don’t think that the Erasi government really cares that much about us. They look at us as a minor player.”