***Saggitarius Arm – V.C.***

***Travil, the Ambassador***

“What do you mean? They tried to kill us? Why?” I asked the question even as I did my best to come up with a logical answer. The mere knowledge of the Lmir’s connection to the Demons would impact our relationship with the G.S., but was there any point in devoting precious resources to killing us after the fact?

Even if they moved just a single ship to do so out of spite, the cost would be astronomical compared to the lives of a few ambassadors. There wasn’t any point or justification as far as I could see.

And if faced with accusations, our government would do anything to deny our existence. We knew that before we went on this mission. Our lives were insignificant compared to the good that we could create for all Lmir should we succeed.

Iris let out an aggravated sigh and moved to my room’s office table where she took a seat on the chair.

“Those scouts that found us at the rendezvous point. All we did by destroying them was to delay the message from getting out,” she explained. “Either your people weren’t as thorough as they should have been, or the scouts managed to launch a stealth satellite before they were destroyed. It must have transmitted a recording of what happened to another scouting party that arrived a few days later. The message of certain factions among your government conspiring with the V.C. has been out since a few days.”

She knew? Why didn’t they bother to tell us anything!?

She paused for a moment and gathered her thoughts. “Our agents within Lmir space have reported increasing activity among the Lmir government and news channels. It looks like the current mainstream of Lmir politics is trying to engender a pro-G.S. climate among your people. At least that’s what all the propaganda on the news channels is all about these days.”

“How-” I wanted to ask how the Demons could know of all that, but the answer was sitting right in front of me. To any random onlooker, Iris was just a young, healthy, and beautiful Lmir woman. Who was to say that Iris was the only Demon who had taken on Lmir biology?

But unlike her, the others had actually bothered to learn about Lmir society and blended in seamlessly. Were they ordinary people working ordinary jobs while they watched the news feeds, thereby transmitting the information directly to the V.C.’s high command? Or did they even have government positions?

Exactly when had the infiltration process started?

I closed my eyes, suddenly no longer wondering how the V.C. was able to silence entire civilisations once they agreed to the uploading process. They probably had their agents already on all the essential worlds, just waiting for someone to press the button.

“Scratch that.” I waved my hand dismissively. “That still doesn’t tell me why the G.S. would think that killing my delegation would be helpful to them in any way!”

Iris smiled. “Because despite their stubborn refusal to talk to us, they actually know a little too much about how we operate. They know our morals and the limitations that are dictated to us by the Blue. Either someone told them, or their A.I. has deduced the proceedings from spy reports.”

“Limitations?” I asked.

She shrugged. “I have told you about the process your people would have to go through to join the V.C. A part of that is to send you guys back with the token – once we have shown you what the V.C. has to offer. If they killed all of you beforehand, then it would require us to give out a second token and repeat this tour with another group. One requirement of starting the upload process is to have someone agree to it who is fully informed about who and what we are.”

I huffed. “That sounds a little too ritualistic to be practical. As far as I understand, there is nothing that stops you from deploying this upload process as a strategic weapon. You are obviously in possession of a method that allows you to use it on a massive scale. There is no other explanation for entire civilisations going dark overnight. Either you already have everything that’s necessary in place in the form of nanotech, or it involves some arcane technology that’s far beyond our people! In either case, there would be nothing that we could do about it. We are already at the stage at which you would send us back to make the decision. So everything has to be ready for us to pull the trigger.”

I winced at the comparison, but it was accurate. The Demons’ morals were twisted from my point of view. They promised the annihilation of a people’s entire civilisation, then gave a single person among them the activation button to a doomsday device and promised him and all his loved ones a sweet afterlife!

Then they leaned back and waited in anticipation of him pulling the trigger for everyone else.

I already tried to argue the point with Iris for days, but in the end, she just told me in a fatalistic way, ‘someone has to make the tough choice’.

“That’s partly true,” Iris admitted to my earlier suspicion. “In the beginning, we freely used our nanotech as an offensive weapon to convert entire planets. But the Blue quickly realized that they had done the equivalent of giving control of a nuclear weapon to a group of toddlers. Hence, they came up with the procedure that we are going through right now. It’s the Blues’ way to make us do some work for it. I don’t pretend to understand why they do what they do, but I think that they want to prevent us from getting lazy.”

So that was the answer that had me perplexed for so long. In a certain way, the upload process was indeed the weapon that I had suspected it to be. The hints had all been there.

I smirked ruefully. “Like adding an activation passphrase to a restricted news channel. They didn’t want to take away the technology entirely, just limit its ease of use.”

Iris shrugged, clearly not bothered by revealing something that made the Demons look less like the unshakable civilisation that they wanted us to see. “Anyways, we have anticipated the attack and seen to it that there are fake-versions of my ship all over Icarius. When the G.S. raiding fleet attacked, they destroyed one of those fakes. In fact, they went to great lengths to make it look like collateral damage.

“They managed to get their ships as close to our early warning systems as possible without actually triggering them. We might have to rethink the defence systems for all of our expeditionary fleets, now that they revealed how much they know about our capabilities. We have to place early warning systems further away from Icarius to increase the time we have to react.”

She looked at the ceiling. “It might even be the preferred outcome. Now, the G.S. thinks that your people are dead and that they have more time to convert the Lmir’s public opinion towards giving them more aid against us. It means that we have a little more time before they decide to sterilize the worlds that are the closest to our expeditionary fleet.”

“How many of your people died to achieve this?” I asked.

“Died?” Iris looked at me with an incredulous expression. “None.”

I sighed and decided to rephrase the question. “How many lost their bodies?”

“Oh…” Iris’s eyes drifted off into the distance, which told me that she was accessing G.O.D.

“A few millions. They attacked the main gravity projectors and there are some major habitats around those because of the required maintenance.” Her eyes caught mine. “Don’t worry about it. Haven’t I already explained that there are no civilians on Icarius? Everyone who is here at the frontlines knows that they might lose their lives at any time. Possibly even permanently.”

“Still…” I turned to face the medical drone that was still standing in the doorway. “Can I go now and see my people?”

“Of course, I am sorry for my temporary replacement!” Iris got to her feet. “He is kind of anal about following procedures.”

She led me through half the ship and towards the medical ward where I found all the members of my delegation. Most seemed to be in a good shape, except for Miredin and Eleu.

Eleu had her hand inside a long, glowing tube. Dozens of small needles had punctuated the skin and were moving around subtly while one of the medical drones operated the machine. Meanwhile, the patient was decidedly not looking at the ongoing operation, her face stoic and tense.

Miredin was stretched out on his belly on a bed, with his upper torso inside a larger version of a similar device. Likewise, a number of needles were embedded along his spine, supposedly repairing the damage that his bad fall had caused.

“Eleu, you are fine?” I asked, having known nothing about her state.

“The machine says that it’s a minor injury, but I am not so sure of that after having seen the bone sticking out through my skin,” Eleu complained.

I sighed in relief after I took a second look at the people in the room, assuring myself that everyone was here.

“What happened?” Eleu asked.

“An attack, but it was repelled,” Iris explained and quickly reiterated what had happened. “… I am sorry, but I was knocked out right after I diverted the ship’s gravity projectors to keep the areas with Lmir in it as stable as possible.”

Eleu allowed her gaze to wander through the room. “I would call stable something different, but I also don’t want to know what it was like for you if you were knocked out by the gravity.”

Iris reflexively touched the wound on her forehead but lowered her hand quickly when she realized that everyone was looking. The gesture made her look like any other Lmir who was embarrassed and concerned about what had happened.

“In any case.” Iris took a deep sigh. “This means that we have to move our plans forward. I have already talked with Travil about what’s going on within Lmir space. Our high command wants you back with your people so that you can tell them what’s going to happen.”

Eleu and the others looked towards me with concerned expressions. Everyone knew that we had changed nothing with this diplomatic visit. From the Lmir’s point of view, it would be a gigantic failure.

Iris reached into her pocket and revealed a small, wooden box. “This is the token that I have told you about. Crush the marble inside it, and your civilisation will be able to join us.”

She smiled and handed me the box, which I took gingerly with both of my hands, carefully pressing it against my chest so that no harm would come to it.

“I wish all of you the best of luck,” Iris finished once the token was out of her hands.

“Does that mean that you won’t be joining us on the way back?” Eleu asked.

Iris shook her head. “It will be just a few more weeks until we will reach the outskirts of what’s regarded as Lmir space. The G.S. fleet won’t be able to ignore us any longer. At least not without making it look like they are using Lmir defensive installations to butter us up before they swoop in. I will be with my people for that.”

She coughed. “The ship will take you back automatically. There is nothing to worry about. And if you still have questions, you can call me any time.”

Iris reached once more into her pocket and revealed a small, golden box.

I had seen her playing with it from time to time but wasn’t exactly sure what it was supposed to do.

“I don’t know if you need it, but this is a little help. If you find yourselves on the fence of making the tough decision, just listen to it.” She handed me the golden box and nodded while looking into my eyes. Once we had shared a long moment of eye contact, she turned towards the room and gave my team a slight bow.

Then she left the room.

Once Iris was gone, I wasn’t sure what I felt. She had been a constant advisor to me over the past weeks. Maybe even a friend. Now she was gone so suddenly, supposedly never to be seen again.

I lowered my eyes to the golden box in my hand and inspected it. The mechanism wasn’t hard to grasp, so I flipped it open.

Upon being opened, the device began to play an eerie song that someone had given great effort to translate to Lmir. The tune was alien to Lmir ears, but it enthralled the entire room nonetheless.

Twinkle, twinkle, little star, How I wonder what you are.

Up above the world so high, Like a diamond in the sky

When the blazing sun is gone, When there nothing shines upon,

Then you show your little light, Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.

Then the traveller in the dark, Thanks you for your tiny spark.

He could not see which way to go, If you did not twinkle so.

When the blazing sun is gone, When the nothing shines upon,

Though I know not what you are, Twinkle, twinkle, little star.