The Tomb World Ch17

Daniels shifted on the makeshift chair the Gotari had made for him, it was uncomfortable, especially in his black-gold armor, but Daniels refused to complain. Because today the Gotari were finally bringing him and the other captains out of the military hanger and into their actual city.

The hovering cargo pallet jack slowly plodded behind the strange hover tug thing and Daniels took the chance to calm his nerves.

He looked to Foric. “Did the data we sent you help?” he asked, looking for anything to break the quiet tension.

Foric looked away from the passing scenery. “It was both helpful, and confusing. There was much in your history we did not understand, and much more that didn’t translate. But the cinematography you include was very interesting. This Star Wars was most enjoyable, was it accurate to what traveling through space is like?”

Daniels cleared his throat and began to regret putting Nelson in charge of assembling the data exchange. They saw that the Gotari included much of their own cinema history and Daniels had ordered Nelson to include some of Earths most foundational films. But he had been thinking more John Wayne, the Sound of Music, or documentary on the Amaterasu’s journey.

“No. That series was made long before we made first contact. In fact I think it was made just a decade or so after the moon landing. There are more realistic films if you would like?”

“Yes, that would be fine, but also more Star Wars, you gave us episodes four, five, and six, we would like to see the first three though.”

“Ah, maybe not.” Daniels said.

“Was there something wrong with those? I do not know your culture, but surely three more movies wouldn’t be made if the first three were bad?”

Daniels really didn’t want to explain the differences between Star Wars trilogies and all the other media made over the last three centuries.  “We can discuss that, but later.” Daniels deflected. The prequal trilogy alone might cause a diplomatic incident, let alone the dumpster fire that was the seventh trilogy. He wasn’t a fan, but even he knew that was a bad idea.

“Did you have any questions about the history part of it?” Daniels asked instead. The other captains and Eliza were sitting in the back chatting with Fezzen, so this was a moment where Daniels could speak candidly with Foric.

Foric thought. “I did. There was much confusion and debate. We were most interested in your first contact, you said the Union conquered your people, but to some it doesn’t seem that way.”

Daniels nodded “Its not a universal opinion even amongst Terrans. But I firmly believe what I said. There may not have been an invasion with soldiers and tanks, but we more or less are a conquered species. Its something you can only really understand if you lived on Earth or Mars.”

“Hmm” Foric hummed, or rather he made a different noise that the translator then translated into a hum. He looked out to the side and looked to where the Unions representatives were riding in their own platform.

The Union representatives had protested vehemently to riding in the same cargo lift as the Terrans, and delayed the departure until a separate own was procured. Then they demanded to include three members of their crew for every one Terran. But Foric had handily shut that down by threatening to leave the Union here and only allow the Terrans to come.

Daniels had hoped the arrogate Zxx’thi would continue protesting, but maybe Noskin saw the naked desire in Daniels eyes and had relented.

“We also read their history.” Foric said after a while.

“Oh,” Daniels said.

“They have suffered much from ‘deathworlders’. The Kruhur, the Aunviry, Vokl’o’hul, Nonvin, and many more.” Foric said gravely. “They even sent much footage of humans going wild and attacking people. It was… unpleasant to watch.”

Daniels nodded. “We ain’t a passive species by any means.”

“No, your history showed that. But what I found curious is that the Union never mentioned what happened to those threats, they just disappear.”

“Yeah, they wouldn’t include any of that. Many of them aren’t around anymore, died off. Some people claim it to be a curse of all Deathworlders, consuming and destroying until they die. But there are plenty of species that were just fine and dandy until the Union came along. The Nonvin supposedly had a thriving multiplanet spanning empire until Union ships showed up on their borders.”

“That is a big claim. You speak of species killing.”

Daniels met Foric’s eyes “Did they tell you what became of the Kruhur homeworld?” he asked.

“No, they said the Kruhur were void dwellers, voidlings, preying upon innocent ships in the darkness of space.”

Daniels took out a tablet and did a quick search, and holographic image of a planet appeared, except this planet was cracked all the down to the core. “Draxar, the Kruhur homeworld. No nothing more than rubble. If you believe everything the Union tells you then the Kruhur really were the worst of the worst, but I don’t think anyone deserves this.”

Foric stared at the image in aghast horror. “Surely no one could do such a thing?” the translator gave him a pleading tone.

Daniels shook his head and then pulled up another image. “This footage recovered from the Nonvin homeworld Krak-shaw. The red gas is Vaxis, a deadly poison that is almost universal.”

Foric licked his lips “Almost?” he asked.

Daniels shrugged “Terran immune system are notoriously strong. In fact the word often used is ‘psychotic’, which roughly translates to being aggressive to insane and problematic levels. It often attacks our own bodies and causes a lot of pain. Vaxis is some sort of super virus, or bacteria that needles its way into the victim’s body and shuts down all the signals being sent by your nerves; it doesn’t work on us. But the gas they use to disperse Vaxis hurts like a motherfucker, not pleasant.”

“You speak from experience.” Foric stated.

Daniels nodded. “Had a run in with pirates, they thought they could use the gas to kill us and take my ship at the time. It burned our eyes like a hot iron, filled our lungs like molten lead, and made our skin break out in hives and boils, and left us all sick for days, but other than that we were fine.”

Foric looked cowed. “Sounds awful.”

Daniels shrugged “Theres’s ways to treat the effects of the gas afterwards, but at the time I couldn’t really properly process the pain. Terran brains can dump loads of chemicals into our system to get us through the pain and fight our way out. Most species have similar analogues, and even some of the same chemicals, but not to the same degree as ours. In a life or death situation our blood get filled with a chemical cocktail of adrenaline, norepinephrine, and several others leaves only two responses to danger. Fight or Flight.”

“Then you really become unthinking savages during those states like the Union says?” he asked cautiously.

“Sort of, it is hard to think straight through that kind of influence, but we’re sapient creatures. We can still think and reason, its just harder. Soldiers are trained to think in certain ways when we’re in that state, higher thought becomes a distant memory and training takes over. The videos they likely sent you are of civilians backed into a corner, letting the chaos and panic over take them.”

Foric looked upset “So you are saying I saw non-warriors ripping the heads off people?”

Daniels nodded. “Yes.”

“So their fears are not unfounded.”

Daniels frowned. “To a certain degree no. But again, I don’t think anyone deserves the way the Union treats us. Theres one more world I wanted to show you.” Danels pulled up a video. In the video Foric watched with muted horror as glaciers collapsed, as the oceans rose and flooded the land, as the sky filled with smog and sunshine became rarer and rarer.

“What world is this?” He asked, though Daniels got the sense that he already knew.

“Earth, shortly after the Union took over. We were just beginning to recover from the effects of industrialization and rampant climate change. We worked very hard to pull ourselves back from the edge, and then the Union did something to push us towards total decline. Earth was classified as a class twelve deathworld, now it’s a class fourteen and we’re barely holding on. Membership in the Union is supposed to grant us aid in these sorts of situations, but they haven’t listened. All the Union brings is death and destruction.”

“But what does this have to do with us?” Foric asked. “We face an enemy that we cannot stop, we face an inevitable death hanging over our heads.”

Daniels closed the video. “I just wanted you to see who you’re dealing with. The Union might just have the resources to fight back and kill the swarm, from what it can see they aren’t too powerful individually. And as awful as it sounds, I don’t think the biomass of three worlds is enough for them to overwhelm the Union. They’d need to know about other life barring worlds to try and reach some sort of critical mass that would overwhelm the Union’s massive navy. But from what you said the swarm seem to be on some sort of reactionary auto pilot. But accepting Union help comes with costs.”

Foric stared into Daniels eyes. “And what can you offer? You said you are just an exploratory company, what warships do you have, what weapons can you give us to fight the swarm?”

Daniels hesitated, in a matter of fact he did have warships and weapons to offer them. but he couldn’t reveal that right now.

Foric gaze became more piercing. “You are just a exploratory company, right? Because my instincts tell me otherwise.”

Daniels looked away.

Foric sucked in air through his teeth. “So, there’s more to your group than you’ve been telling us.”

Daniels grimaced, “I’m not really allowed to say.”

Foric looked unconvinced. “Are you stronger than the Union… no never mind, if you were than you would have rebelled already. I can see there is no love lost between your two peoples. But what would you ask of us in return?”

Welp, no going back now. “Hypothetically. We would ask for an exchange of technologies, we give you our stuff, and you let us study some of the tech you’ve uncovered. Beyond that there might be further talks of cooperation and alliances.”

“Alliances against the Union?” Foric asked suspiciously.

“Likely. We want to be free, but the Union sees free Deathworlders as a threat. There will likely be a war.”

“I see. So the Union would offer help for subjugation, while you would offer help in exchange for dragging my beaten people into a war that is not ours.”

Daniels sighed. “Likely.”

“What promises could you make us?” He demanded.

Daniels frowned. “Not a lot. We’re very much the underdogs in this situation.”

“oondir dogh?” He asked butchering the word.

“We’re weaker, less numerous, less advanced,” Daniels clarified, “The only things we have going for us is our physical traits, which mean jack-all in a space battle, and the fact that the Union is weak in this sector. Any aid they promise would be years and years in coming. But I can make you one promise.”

“What, what could you promise?”

Daniels met Foric’s eyes and prayed the alien would see his honesty. “If you side with us we’ll be equals. You’ll be our friends, and if there is one things Terrans have going for us in this whole mess is that we never abandon our friends.”

Foric huffed “That is not as reassuring as you make it sound.”

Daniels smiled. “that’s because its hard to trust words. Words can be false or exaggerated. But watch how we act. I’m confident you’ll see the truth in that.”