Marketplace, Zakabara Second

Mollikutta got recognized again. She'd been wearing makeup disguises out in public to avoid the shame and scorn of her people. This time, it was a trader selling salt who saw through it, and he was not staying quiet about it.

"Hey guys, look, it's the governor herself trying to do her shopping like the rest of us dirty Seconders here!"

There were some jeers and boos among his peers.

"Governor, I'm so sorry, we're all out of salt," he taunted, not even bothering to hide the bags of goods on the table of his booth.

Not wanting trouble, Mollikutta started to back away.

"Going so soon, governor? You sure you don't want to shop around more?"

A crowd was gathering, and they were pushing up against her from behind. One of the adjacent tools vendors was pulling out a dangerous looking tool from the back, and she absolutely did not want to find out what he planned on doing with it.

She dropped her basket of shopping goods and bolted, squeezing a hole through the crowd. They didn't expect her to just start running! Behind her, Mollikutta could hear some of them starting to chase her.

Flapping her wings to give her a bit of speed, she ran down the street like a mad-bird.

Only half a mile to the palace, she thought, I should be able to make this! From now on, there would be no more shopping alone without guards.

As she came up next to an alleyway, a blur suddenly came out of nowhere and snatched her up, dragging her unceremoniously into a nearby hut. Struggling uselessly against the strong appendages that held her, she got a better look at her attacker and her surroundings.

It was a human! And he'd brought her into an empty street level hut with nothing but a table and a stool.

"Shh… quiet, quiet, Governor, you don't want everyone to hear you, do you?" he asked, loosening his grip on her as she slowly complied.

"Who are you and what do you want with me?" she asked like any hostage does.

"My name is Mark, and I'm here to help," he said, with a dangerous grin on his face. He chuckled, "your people don't seem too happy with you. And that guy with the Bhak welder didn't look like he was messing around-"

"That's none of your business, alien kidnapper! I have it all handled!" Mollikutta replied, not convincing herself even a little. She wanted to scream at him, but didn't dare attract any undue attention to where she was.

"Alright, well, I don't want to keep you from your busy schedule, Governor," the human said, winking as he handed over a laminated rectangular piece of paper to her, "but here's my card for when you change your mind."

She looked out the window of the dark little hut to check to see if the angry mob was still chasing her. "How did you even get onto this planet with the military blockade in orbit anyway, human?"

Not getting an answer, Mollikutta looked back towards him.

He wasn't there anymore.

Two Months After McDonald's Grand Opening

Gophor Spaceport Space Traffic Control Tower

"Gophor Tower, T-three zero-four-six, request clearance for landing pad," came the voice in Grayin's headset.

It was N'har again. She knew the serial number of his new Terra Three by heart. He'd even taken her into outer space on it once. It was an exhilarating experience that did not diminish her desire to go to space again. On the contrary, it burned brighter.

"T-two one-four-eight, cleared to approach pad two," she transmitted back without a hint of recognition. Pad two was objectively the best landing pad open on the spaceport at the moment. Except for pad one, which was only used for emergencies. Pad two was the closest to the market and hangar, and every space trucker wanted it.

"Thanks Grayin! You're the best," came his cheeky voice back on the radio, "see you tonight?"

Blushing right to her ears, Grayin glanced around the traffic control tower furtively. Luckily, none of her colleagues seemed to be paying attention. She hoped that no one else was listening in on this completely open and unsecured channel.

"See you tonight."

Ironically, what became known to the galaxy as the Earther Dream was mostly not for the original residents of Earth. In fact, while many humans took it as a point of pride for their planet, its originator was alien, and most of the creatures who see it as a guiding ethos were not of Earth.

Earth's streets were lined with credits, beings around the galaxy would say. Humans would sometimes give out credits for creatures who did work for them, even if they didn't agree to it beforehand! They called it tipping. Oddly, even human research showed that its practice only has a small correlation to quality of service. Rather, other effects have much more of an influence on tipping amount, like the bust to waist ratio of a waitress.

It was an odd practice which arose out of a combination of habit and social conditioning on Earth. For the rest of the galaxy, it only enhanced the mythos that all humans must be incredibly rich and lived their lives without worry. A few of them even managed a ride to Earth to see it for themselves.

Of all the non-human creatures who made the pilgrimage to the origin planet of currency, some were disappointed by the reality: that humans were just as mortal and concerned about the future as they were. However, one thing that most had in common was that dipping their appendages into this pot of wealth was not enough. Many went home to their planets with dreams of their own.

On some planets back home, their neighbors were skeptical. What good were new factories or new ideas that could barely compete with those of the poorest areas on Earth? Inevitably, it often took humans to lead the way and blaze the trail for these to advance and be accepted.

In that way, Rey's simple restaurant on Gakrek opened up an entire galactic market. And her dream became the Earther Dream for many around the galaxy.

"Gophor Tower, Z-sixteen six-two-two, request clearance for landing pad," came the next request on Grayin's plate.

The designation seemed familiar, but she did not recognize its owner out of hand. Pulling out a tablet from underneath her seat, she punched the designation into a program and waited for its return.

"Kwoofer from Olgix," her tablet showed, and then added, "paid for priority access."

Ah, it's that Olg trader who brings in raw materials, she vaguely recalled. That last part of his data snippet was her own innovation. She had the bright idea of charging traders a little extra on the side to skip the line or get a good landing pad closer to the merchants.

Bribery. Corruption. Graft. These were some of the ugly names that humans had given for what she was doing. On Gakrek, it was known by its other name: business as usual.

It wasn't anything that other Gaks with any power weren't also doing. She knew for a fact that the spaceport managers weren't supposed to charge the vendors for doing business on the spaceports, but they did it anyway. And they skimmed a little off the top of her government salary too. It's a cost she was now passing onto the traders.

Soon after she started doing it, the other traffic controllers caught on pretty quickly. Rather than reporting her (there was no one to report her to), they cut themselves in on the lucrative deal. After all, everyone knew the traders were rich and had plenty of credits to spare for all of them.

Of course, increasing the cost of doing business to their spaceport was not great in the long run. But as long as everyone did it, except Earth, nobody noticed it.

"Z-sixteen six-two-two, cleared to approach pad six," she dispatched. Pad six wasn't bad. It wasn't the best, but it was good. Much better than being in the double digits; nobody who came to Gakrek wanted a pad in the double digits. The long walk of shame with their heavy goods sucked unless they had a forklift or some other labor saving device.

"Thank you, Tower," came Kwoofer's reply, "is there a line at the burger place?"

Grayin stood up and looked over at the golden arches on the other end of the spaceport. It was far, but there did appear to be a small line of locals and traders out the front. Rey's business was still doing really well, she marveled to herself, and then prepared herself to transmit a reply to a hungry Olg waiting in orbit.

"There's about a ten-minute line right outside. Do you wish to place your order with us to deliver straight to your spaceship when you land? There is a small surcharge of 5 credits," she offered with her sweetest voice. This was another one of her bright ideas. One and a half of those credits would go to an honest local kid who was already in line, just standing by for her to place the call.

This business was an absolute no-brainer. Each delivery she facilitated was almost equivalent to two days' worth of pay for a mid-level controller like her. She was providing a useful service, even if she knew that ultimately the restaurant itself would probably be able to do something similar and cut her out. That's if Rey found out that she and her colleagues were doing this.

"Yes, please," came the reply from space. She did a mental fist pump as he continued, "I'll have one double cheeseburger meal with extra salt, please. And the drink will be a medium Coca-Cola."

"We'll get right on it," she said as she started typing out the order to her waiting contact, "welcome to Gakrek, captain Kwoofer."

"They're doing what?" Rey asked, amused at what she thought she heard.

"Uber Eats, essentially," Enrico summarized, then frowned, asking, "should we cut out the middleman and do it ourselves? If we bulk our orders, we could probably do it for a third the cost and still make more per delivery."

Rey almost thought about it, then smiled and rejected it, "there's no way Corporate would even think about approving something like this. Besides, why bother them? We need those controllers on our good side. Get Grob to pass them some of our menus on the side and ask if they'd like to borrow our wheelbarrow."

Grayin never expected that she'd ever fall for an alien, but N'har was a different beast. If her dad were still alive, he would probably throw a fit. An alien?! She could already hear him screaming at her.

Then again, N'har is rich, so maybe not. In many agrarian societies like Gakrek, parents often wielded their children as financial instruments, whether they knew that's what they were. It was just a normal way of life. A father who didn't care about the possessions of his children's suitors would be the outlier to the rule, and they were certainly not looked up to as good examples.

Of course, the humans didn't think like that. Not all of them at least. But they were the exceptions to everything.

Her still-alive mother would be supportive, though. That's what mothers did. If Grayin told her about this…

And Grayin liked N'har not for his spaceship or credits, she told herself. He's charming, and funny, and handsome in his own way. One day, he would often say, he would take her to see the gorgeous mountains of Yis'Meh. It was a beautiful dream, and her favorite part was the idea of traveling through space in his spaceship again.

So, here she was walking into the only restaurant on the spaceport. Strange for humans to think this would be the food place for a date night, but it wasn't like they had an abundance of choices. Spotting him on the second floor, she walked right past the line and straight up to his table where he was wolfing down a box of fries.

"Good evening, beautiful," he said as she approached. N'har was not subtle.

Her face reddened as she giggled, and replied, "good evening to you too! How did your new trade route go?"

"Never better," he replied in between bites. Then he pushed over the tray containing her usual order, and continued, "the example of the Zakabaran blockade is causing some other planets to think about closing their ports too. There's lots of hoarding on those planets, so prices have gone through the roof. How's traffic control?"

"Pretty good today too," she said as she unwrapped her sandwich, "we got four deliveries through today. And we've got one more trader signed up for priority access."

"Ah…" N'har almost instinctively started to complain about the priority fees that spaceports had, but then remembered that he wasn't exactly a saint himself, profiting from a goods shortage. Instead, he said, "that's wonderful. Cheers!"

He clinked his plastic soda cup against hers, which she returned cheerfully.

Grayin did have something on her mind. She brought it up casually, "I'm thinking of leaving my job."

"What?" N'har stopped chugging his Sprite for a second to look up at her, as if trying to detect if this was a test of some kind.

"I want to start a business like this one with your help," she said, completely seriously. Grayin didn't have nearly enough credits to start a venture like this, but if he agreed and could lend her some credits here and there… it could be done. She added dreamily, "I've thought of a good business with a lot of credits to be made in it, and one day I'll make enough to go into space."

N'har sputtered, "but you can already go into space in my… our ship. We can make it our ship. Let's go tonight!"

"N'har," she said, not giving up, "I don't want your ship. Maybe eventually it'll be our ship. But I want to do this. I've been thinking about it for a while." She smiled and held his paw in hers, hoping he could see it from her view.

He did. When it's all said and done, N'har liked her a lot. And he did have plenty of credits.

"So… what's the plan?" N'har asked. He'd lived most of his life in space, so while he was very familiar with the space trade, he was completely lost on how to do anything on the ground. "Enrico mentioned that their most money consuming part was buying the equipment from their chain headquarters, and there's some complicated scheme with regard to the building."

"Yes, they must spend a lot of money maintaining their equipment and buying food stuff from McDonald's," she said. She'd done some research, so she knew a bit about what she was talking about. "But that's not what my idea is. We don't sell food."

"Don't sell food?" he asked, confused. He thought that she wanted to open a restaurant! "So what do we sell?"

"We sell to the people who will come here to sell food!" It took a bit for N'har to get it. His eyes widened and recognition set in as he did.

She wanted to start the first commercial development company on Gakrek.

After she explained the business model to him and showed him human figures on how successful such a venture could be, N'har said, "I see." He thought about it and then asked, "realistically, how much profit could we make per building here on Gakrek?"

"Actually I did some research and math on that. When I said sell, I don't actually mean we sell the buildings, just the right to use it," Grayin said, bringing out some sheets of paper filled with writing and business planning that she'd been doing since a year ago. "It's called rent, and it's legal even on Earth. We finish the exterior of the building, and then we call up one of their companies that wants to open up a chain. Then, we let them use the building every month for a fee."

N'har seemed skeptical. "Isn't that just a protection fee? How much would that make us in the long run?"

"It's not!" she contested, "it's more like a partnership with the business, and it's all above board. And I heard from someone at work that Grob was getting paid a hundred thousand credits every month for their building!"

"One hundred thousand credits!" he exclaimed, "there is no way that isn't an exaggeration!"

"Yeah," Grayin admitted it sounded far-fetched, "but if we get even a fraction of that, we'll cover our construction costs in a few months. We'll start calling them once we're almost finished building and get a better idea of how much they're willing to pay."

East Gophor Quarry

"How much are you offering us, again?" the fore-Gak asked skeptically.

"Three credits a day per worker," Grayin replied, "it's a brick two-story building, just like the one you built for the humans."

"That's less than Rey paid us!" he sniffed. It was still a lot of money, and certainly more than the miners were paying him, but a good Gak never works for less money when they could get more. "She paid us four credits a day! Each!"

"It's still more than you make now," she replied, "and we'll build more buildings. And in the future, you'll be the first one we go to." Grayin wasn't the best businessbeing, but she knew how to barter as well as any human.

N'har interjected, "and we'll pay you ten credits a day!" Looking around to make sure none of the others were listening to their conversation, he added, "just you, though. And you'd be responsible for making sure the other Gaks get on board. We want to get started as soon as possible."

The fore-Gak was torn. On one hand, skilled workers often felt a kinship and solidarity towards each other, and this felt somewhat like a betrayal of that. On the other hand, the offer would earn him more money in a day than he currently got in a week!

He reluctantly accepted. His twelfth child was just born. He needed the credits to send her to a school when she got older.

The fore-Gak justified it to himself: three credits a workday was still a lot for the other Gaks, and he was providing a valuable managerial service for Grayin and N'har, even if the others would probably be paid a little more if he had haggled more.

"Okay. Do we get weekends?"

"Of course."

Hangar Sixteen, Gophor Spaceport

They moved their secret business planning from the McDonald's to the hangar where N'har stored his spaceship. It didn't feel quite right discussing it all in Rey's restaurant. And there was always a slight risk that they could be overheard by the workers there.

That didn't mean they couldn't still order takeout from there, though. N'har paid again this time. Grayin thought it was mighty chivalrous of him. She didn't feel like she wasn't taking advantage of him though: he had more money and made several times more than she did on a Gakrek government salary.

Between mouthfuls of chicken burger, N'har asked, "so where are we going to build our first site? Rey and Enrico seemed to have gotten the best location."

"I've thought about that," Grayin said. She wiped her paws on some napkins, and then she carefully pulled out a high definition top-down photo of the spaceport from her bag. It showed everything, from the traffic control tower to the vendors, food tents, and the restaurant.

"Wow, that's a great picture of Gophor," N'har looked genuinely impressed, which brought a swell of pride to her chest. He asked, "where did you get that?"

"I paid a trader with a camera four credits to take it while he was landing," she said proudly, "I read that this was how they plan for new construction on Earth. They have an entire profession for it called urban planning."

Then she continued directing his attention to the various spots on the photo she marked. "Here's where we are," she pointed at the row of hangars. And then she pointed at a space slightly offset from the vendors, "and here's where we can build our first buildings."

N'har frowned as he looked at her plan, and commented, "that seems pretty close to Rey and Enrico's place. They're not gonna be happy with the competition, whatever business we let open up right next to them."

"You're probably right," she admitted, "but they can't have expected no one to copy their idea when it makes them so much money!"

"That's true," N'har said as he picked a sesame crumb off her snout, "I just don't want to get the humans mad at us. That's all."

"Well, maybe eventually they'll want to get in on this too. Meanwhile, we can just try to build as much as possible before they notice. I have plans for our first three. We just need to start early in the morning…"

He let her ramble on and talk about her plan excitedly. It involved gathering materials and assembling the frames in the hangar, and then moving them to the right spot for the final construction.

This project was bringing out a passionate side of Grayin that he didn't know he'd be so attracted to. She got so confident, and she knew exactly what she wanted. He could really get used to this, N'har thought as a goofy grin naturally came up on his face.

"… and what are you smiling at me about?" she asked suspiciously as she came to a natural end to her presentation.

"Nothing!" N'har said hurriedly, blushing hard as he snapped out of his daydream, "I can't wait to meet your family."

Grayin's heart fluttered, and she grabbed his warm paws in hers.

"I can't wait either."

Zakabara Second

Mobs often start with grievances. In some cases, they may even seem trivial. Unfavorable results for a high stakes soccer game. A security guard striking a poor widow selling contraband cigarettes. Acquittal of some police officers who severely beat a motorist on film. In this case, however, the ignition point was anything but trivial.

Seeing the astronomical prices for Earth goods on Zakabara Second, a trader decided to risk it for the biscuit. Using a series of daring maneuvers and relying on the aftermarket upgrades on her already fast sublight engines, she somehow managed to get through the Prime military blockade in orbit.

The excited Seconder spaceport closest to her offered a good landing zone, and news of her arrival quickly spread. As she came in to land, a large crowd gathered near it cheering for the arrival of fresh new goods from the galaxy.

Then, without warning, a space-to-ground missile from an orbital blockade ship broke through the clouds, instantly vaporized her ship, killed a dozen merchants waiting near the landing pad, and severely burnt many others.

Seconders were furious.

This was the final straw.

At dusk, the factory workers who had just finished their shift had heard about the incident. They gathered their tools, and headed to the streets.

The students at the nearby Industrial Institute of Second also heard about the atrocity as they got out of class for the day. They gathered their friends, and headed to the streets.

The nurses at the Second Medical Center saw it firsthand from the horrific burn victims who were being rolled in on improvised stretchers. They gathered their medical equipment and first aid kits, and headed to the streets.

When the crowd was small, they were simply angry. Angry at… someone. They didn't really know who was to blame for this disaster; after all, the people who had done this were sitting pretty in outer space. Or on another planet.

Then, some students began singing some song about angry people and something called drums. Whatever that meant. It was a catchy tune.

As the crowd got bigger, and they all started singing it, this lull in rage provided some much-needed clarity to the unofficial leaders. Even if they couldn't reach the stars, they remembered that the Primers did have representatives on their planet after all.

They started making their way towards the Governor's palace.

???, Zakabara Second

"It's starting," Mark reported without emotion.

His tablet digitized, encrypted, and then transmitted his voice to a stealth ship hidden in orbit, which bounced the signal through various FTL relays before it got to its intended recipient. Technically, it was very impressive security work.

Realistically, none of it was necessary. None of the Zakabarans on Prime were listening. If they were, they would have noticed what was happening on the ground months, if not years, before this happened. It was possible that remote Inuit villagers in Greenland knew more about what was happening on Second than Popptaw herself.

"Copy that, we're running this upstairs now," came the reply, "how is the Governor?"

"Mollikutta is surprisingly competent for a hereditary appointee, but her hands are tied within the system they've set up here. She's on a call with Prime right now," Mark said, glancing at his small crew of four diligently working at their tablets. He gave a signal to one of them to get ready to put the next phase into action. He chuckled, "I'm surprised she's even bothering. Unless my translator is broken, I think they've had this same conversation thrice this past week already. It ends the same way every time."

"I see," the controller replied, "you have all their comms feeds locally right?"

Mark confirmed, "we're tapping into all their frequencies. And just in case, I slipped a listening device into her wings when we grabbed her near the market last week."

"And she didn't notice that?" came the incredulous reply from Langley.

Mark chuckled and said, "according to a local bird, they don't have nerve endings under there. She wasn't exactly concerned about being bugged when I snatched her off the street. And fortunately for us, the governor hasn't been indulging in luxuries like taking showers and baths since this crisis started."

"Alright. Hold on a second…" The line went silent for a second, and then it came back, "we just got word. Operation Vulture is a go. Good luck." The connection terminated.

Mark looked out his tent at their unpacked helicopter spinning up outside, gathered his supplies, and commanded his unit, "pack up or burn everything. Let's get to work!"

Governor Palace, Zakabara Second

"Mollikutta, you know how these people are! Things like these come and go. Just tell them that the prices of food are still lower than before, and they'll go home!" Popptaw said. She had heard absolutely nothing Mollikutta had to say for the past few years, and she was determined not to change her obtuse mind in the course of this two-hour conversation either.

Popptaw was the type of dictator who thought that the problem with "let them eat cake" wasn't the tone deafness; to her, the problem would obviously be the nutritional quality. If she was queried on the subject, she would have preferred "let them eat oatmeal" instead.

"Popptaw, you don't understand. People here are done with Prime! Don't you get it? They were at their breaking point before, and killing a few of them hasn't made them more afraid. They're just more angry now," Mollikutta insisted, "we need to de-escalate the situation by promising actual change and showing that we've heard their concerns!"

"Dear, that's not how we do things. We must show them that you are truly in charge. I've sent you more internal security troops every time we talk. It's time you put them to use and they start earning their pay!"

Mollikutta was exasperated. Those troops were truly useless. At best, they either had family or knew someone on Second, and weren't about to enforce any of Popptaw's mandates too harshly. At worst, the way they acted towards the Seconders only made people dislike the Primers even more.

She insisted, "we need to calm the people and convince them that we're doing the best we can. After all, as the leaders and governments of our people, we must express the general will of the people because we derive our power and right to rule from the consent of the governed-"

Popptaw narrowed her beady eyes at that last sentence, and squawked suspiciously, "you've been reading those human books again, haven't you?"

"We had to! You directed us to read them-"

"Yes! So you can run your factories to produce more goods for us!" Popptaw shrieked angrily at this display of insolence from the governor, "not so you learn their wretched and primitive ideas about how to run our species. Or did you not get to the part in their history where they fought not one, but TWO, planetary wars among themselves? Control your people, or I'll find someone else to control them instead!"

Mollikutta was going to make a biting retort about how the stupid protectionist policies that the Primers were enforcing onto her people were the same ones that had partly caused one of those human planetary wars, but Popptaw had already hung up.

She looked out her window at the mob banging on the gates of the Governor estate, and then she looked at the portraits hanging on the walls in her office representing an unbroken streak of countless millennia of oppressive rule from the homeworld.

The phone rang. It was probably the gate guards calling for permission to deploy a lethal response.

She looked at the caller number and frowned. Her eyes widened as she realized that it matched the one written on the business card she'd memorized last week, before burning it.

Mollikutta made up her mind.