Greatstar Lost (2181)

By B.B. Irvine

Greatstar Lost (2181): Captain Xiu-Li Chen would never have dreamt an assassination attempt at a Memorium Ceremony six months earlier was planned by the Qet leader herself. Despite later tactical analysis that concluded it must have been, the motive is still unknown, and humans cannot easily imagine one.
Now the Qet-Qeta is back at Deepstrike for meetings on PORTAL Plat, and JAGUAR is on site as well. Xiu-Li seeks a meeting with Qet-Lia Pathfinder, hoping to get some clarification of events.
A trade meeting is interrupted by an alert. Admiral Matisou invites the Qet-Qeta to the ops center, Commander Ecurba offers to escort her, and Captain Chen makes sure she goes with them.
After the GREATSTAR Class SAS FRANCIS BACON is rather graphically lost to an unknown alien fleet/force, the decision is made to undertake a “rescue recovery” mission. There are ways survivors could last for months if undetected by the enemy in undamaged areas.
The newly reconstructed COURIER Class SAS VICTORY arrives at Deepstrike and is given to the newly promoted Captain Ecurba for an assignment to “bring home the BACON.” Captain Ecurba has a “test bed ship” to learn, a new crew to command, and then the appearance of a dark black Tau Ceti Cat, one that can “talk” to him at certain moments. It is a “watch Cat,’ as the Niv call it.
Ecurba wonders if things are bad enough that he needs one.
Then his wife Qet-Sia Pathfinder appears, to join him on a permanent basis as a Qet Liasion. This is to protect her life from ambitious Qet politicals, and she has missed Ecurba as much or more than he has missed her. He didn’t expect to see her, so it is quite a shock, albeit pleasant.
Then he learns Qet-Qua Pactmaker is going along as well, as a Qet delegation of sorts to assist in this crisis.
Before he knows it, his wrist has been broken during a Defense of Qet Name he has been tricked into, and his powerful Qeti opponent is slowly choking Ecurba to death.
VICTORY meets FORT VALOR, a tactical shadow ship for SIR FRANCIS BACON. The actual events leading to BACON’s loss are reviewed, and the plan revealed is for VICTORY to serve as a first emergence target, so FORT VALOR will see any attackers the instant it emerges ten seconds later from realspace, and can counterattack.
After emerging into realspace the next morning, VICTORY is damaged by ordnance fired from a city-sized “Seamer Platform.” Escape from the target zone is because of Commander Pathfinder, who trained as a pilot of combat spacecraft (a Qet fighterpilot). Her actions save VICTORY from instant destruction, while FORT VALOR is attacked as it emerges into realspace and is quickly destroyed.
Then Niv shadow tactical ship NSS SHADOWCLAW appears, reports damage, and acts as a “fireship” to disrupt the city sized platform’s ability to attack. Its impact into the vast structure saves VICTORY from further immediate attack, and as VICTORY continues to exit the area it recovers E-mer Pods with Niv crew from SHADOWCLAW.
A stand-off occurs as VICTORY continues its exit vector and makes repairs. Ecurba is trying to figure out how to handle these alien “Seamers” – who were shocked by the “fireship” Captain Leonidas flew into them. It requires further tactical sacrifice and more damage to the Seamer city platform to stop their next attempt to destroy the fleeing VICTORY.
Ecurba has just arranged safe passage when the Assembly Of Sentients intervenes to punish this Seamer Platform, the device used for punishment so large that size of the damaged area in realspace is measured in light hours.
That explosion will consume VICTORY as well – unfortunate, really. The device arrives. Its blast wave will affect an area of space twenty light hours in area.
Just when it seems VICTORY will be destroyed, the Tau Ceti Cats have a say.

• Language: English
• Publisher: B.B. Irvine
• Release date: Oct 16, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301365203

B.B. Irvine

B.B. Irvine was born in New York City in 1959. He graduated from the High School of Music and Art N.Y. (1976 music), New York State University at Stony Brook (1980 B.A. liberal arts), and in 1982 received a certificate as a Physician Assistant from the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in North Carolina. He has worked in settings including emergency medicine, AIDS research, and addiction treatment in New York City where he lives. In 1994 he earned a second degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do from Grandmaster Richard Chun. His novels and screenplays evidence his knowledge of people and frequently weave medicine, science, history, romance, and martial arts into the action.

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GREATSTAR Lost (2181)

Spacer Series Book 07: Captain Ecurba

by B. B. Irvine

Copyright 2022 B. B. Irvine

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Chapter 01 - On Paying The Piper

PORTAL Platform

Deepstrike System, HD-19373 (Iota Persei)

20 April 2181 - Saturday

XIU-LI

The Platform was a bed of intrigue, and a short-sheeted one at that.

After her visit here six months earlier during Qet Contact, Captain Xiu-Li Chen had decided that she preferred system affairs and even the dangers of planet Deepstrike over anything concerning PORTAL Platform or the Space Alliance Systems administrators on it. Admiral A.W. Baptiste’s Staff Group operated from there, working physically alongside with Assemblyspeaker Braxton Thurgoode. He handled Human Sphere diplomacy with the Assembly Of Sentients, and the SAS ran Space Fleet operations (and were available for Thurgoode’s use in tactical situations.)

In actual practice, their working physically alongside each other was limited to breathing the same circulating air.

In the six months since Qet Contact and formal entry of the Human Sphere in the Assembly Of Sentients, JAGUAR had made a triumphal circuit to the Gem Isles (Procyon A/B) and Earth (Sol system). Xiu-Li was now a starship captain with nine months (three quarters) seasoning, and was back at Deepstrike on diplomatic duty again.

Nothing major had changed. Except –

Xiu-Li looked at PORTAL Plat’s security director, sitting across from her at their table overlooking the plants of the platform’s best greenspace Galapagos Garden. She ignored Commander Yasmin Sinclaro’s impatience (which made her dark eyes flash so very expressively) and sipped some coffee. Mmmm, this is excellent coffee, Commander Sinclaro.

Thank you, Captain Chen.

Now, as to your request – I can’t promise anything more than asking him.

Sinclaro scowled, looking hurt. What, is Ecurba hiding from me? Do I scare him?

Xiu-Li shrugged and smiled. You are so beautiful, you just might.

Sinclaro frowned. You are teasing with me, yes?

No. I don’t know you that well. But Ecurba is a sucker for lovely eyes, which yours are. And he admires the Warrior Goddess, so to speak. Xiu-Li smiled bitterly as she said the words, thinking how poorly this had usually paid off for Commander Ecurba, her first officer on SAS JAGUAR.

He felt himself fortunate that none of his loves had died during service operations (yet), but they had all still been spirited off into Fleet Intell Security Protective Services, or promoted away from him to another ship – or moved along by life. No real break ups, no deaths, just many separations and partings. This was standard issue for a Space Fleet career but still… Ecurba was a nice guy who deserved better. Even his political bond-link (marriage) ceremony to a female Qet six months ago was only a short honeymoon, a sharp firefight, and then his Qeta bond-link lady went back to the Qet Sphere.

Now the platform’s security director looked resigned. "A hero of the Battle at Deepstrike Beacon is hiding from me because he is afraid of my beauty? Sinclaro shook her head. Sounds like bullfekk."

Xiu-Li smiled serenely and shrugged with finality.

It was actually a mix of truths – Ecurba was afraid of Sinclaro (Because I don’t trust her, because she’s fekkin’ crazy, and she’s really pretty, he had said at dinner three nights ago. She made me dizzy every time I saw her last trip – rapid pulse, trouble breathing – I just think this time I’m staying on the ship until I have a reason to leave it that is work related. Just in case I still get that way.)

Brave Ecurba, armed with little more than some very sharp sticks and aggressive surprise, had taken on four Qeti soldiers in hand to hand combat, but he was hiding from Yasmin Sinclaro.

Xiu-Li had been making small jokes about it ever since he said it, because humor helped him cope, and she thought it was amusing.

It was also typically Ecurba, who certainly knew his limits and how to stay within them, and why that was usually the best course to take the next time (except when he fell in love). Limits or not, he had fallen hard for the young Qet woman, Qet-Sia Pathfinder, an actual sentient intelligent alien female who had returned to the Qet Sphere after the Qet bond-link ceremony with Ecurba six months ago.

Xiu-Li sipped more coffee. Ecurba had not stayed within his usual limits when he bond-linked with Qet-Sia Pathfinder six months ago, but he was still trying to be a faithful partner. Breaking some limits generally set new ones – nothing was truly limitless except the oddness of space. In this case, however, Ecurba would avoid this beautiful woman as much as he could, and Sinclaro had little chance of getting anything from him except maybe an autograph on a Soliton Rider item. Avoiding Sinclaro worked best for Ecurba, at least until time and more experiences with her cleared up Sinclaro’s trust problem; and if it was ever reliably reported Qet-Sia Pathfinder was dead, Ecurba would be back in this system at some point, and then, maybe...

In truth, neither of them were quite ready to trust Commander Yasmin Sinclaro yet (a lack of trust which Ecurba had said made Sinclaro much less attractive, not giving me the right sort of danger or excitement I’m looking for in a woman.) Xiu-Li would have preferred avoiding Sinclaro as well, but many bigger things were more important these days: Xiu-Li needed PORTAL Plat Security Director Commander Yasmin Sinclaro’s help to arrange a meeting with the Qet-Qeta, the leader of seventy eight billion Qet living across sixty seven Qet Stars (and counting) within the current Qet Sphere. The Qet-Qeta was on PORTAL Platform now for the first Assembly Of Sentients meeting of cyclical update, and Xiu-Li wanted a few minutes outside of official channels to talk with her.

It was sheer desperation to ask for aid from one of the persons who had helped Assemblyspeaker Thurgoode cover up an assassination attempt on the Qet-Qeta during her previous visit to PORTAL Plat six months ago in October 2180, when the Human Sphere had formally joined the Assembly Of Sentients. Captain Xiu-Li Chen and her first officer, Commander Ecurba, had stopped the attempt on PORTAL Plat, but it had left behind four dead Qeti (male Qet; the females were Qeta, and the larger culture a powerful matriarchy), and a bloody corridor. That corridor had been swiftly cleaned up by this Plat Security Director, acting on orders from Assemblyspeaker Thurgoode, who had offically interpreted the incident as a fatal confrontation between the four dead Qeti, and neither questioned the Qet or investigated any further. Until something Qet was worked out, the Qet-Qeta had requested and taken sanctuary on SAS JAGUAR with her daughter Qet-Sia and two loyal Qeti body guards.

After working something Qet out, another attempt to kill the Qet-Qeta was foiled by Xiu-Li and the Fleet, but things had become highly disjointed during the process. The Qet-Qeta left Deepstrike without speaking to Xiu-Li; with the departure of Qet-Sia Ecurba had more to grieve, but Xiu-Li had become friendly enough with the Qet-Qeta to have felt hurt when she left without saying anything…

Yasmin Sinclaro shook her head. What makes you think she will see you? she asked, returning to the original request of Xiu-Li’s, as though that was a factor in making the request – but she was just fishing. Sinclaro was a crafty ex-senior level intelligence officer from the Organization of Planetary Projects who had taken the Peace and joined the newly formed Space Alliance Systems Space Fleet. She usually expected that she would not be trusted, since the SAS was between two thirds to three quarters percent drawn from the ranks of the original InterWorld Group Space Fleet. This was the same IWG Space Fleet which the O.P.P. had called, the bootlappers of the IWG, at least once in every mediaNet release between January 1, 2175 and March 31, 2179 – fifty one months, with the final average number of mediaNet releases per week set at three point seventy one per InterWorld Group system.

Not surprisingly, many ex-O.P.P. officers found their acceptance in the new Space Alliance Systems Space Fleet was often a sluggish, mulish, surly acceptance by some ex-IWG personnel, and even then they were often never quite fully trusted – so far, at least. They were the latest sub-group to report discrimination episodes (while anti-Niv sentiments had never been lower). Commander Sinclaro, however, was exactly the right sort of new SAS officer needed at the moment by Assemblyspeaker Braxton Thurgoode as his security director on PORTAL Plat. She was very experienced in field operations (ground combat) and this gave her such confidence that she didn’t care if trust was reluctant, or even non-existent: she simply devised her plans, and requests, and gambits for information accordingly.

Sinclaro being ex-O.P.P. was actually not the problem here, though, it was her past interactions with the crew of JAGUAR which made current trust in her so uncertain. She had helped Thurgoode cover up an assassination attempt in which two JAGUAR officers were put at risk and one was injured. It was hard to determine what to trust her with.

The trick was in still waiting to see, not rushing to further judgment, without risking too much in advance – or in the event itself. Xiu-Li made sure to keep it all bland: I was at the Memorium Ceremony with her, so the Qet-Qeta might remember me. I just want to talk with her about some things from then, update each other. Nothing formal or fancy, a quick hello, chat, and go.

Sinclaro laughed. You don’t even trust me. Why should I help you?

So now it was time to play a misdirectional trump card. It’s concerns about Ecurba and his reaction to the separation from Qet-Sia, Xiu-Li said carefully, and very reluctantly. This was untrue, and Ecurba would be very angry if he heard of it, even if he later admired its use as a device to set up a meeting with the Qet-Qeta. Ecurba was known within the Fleet to have had very close contact with one of the Qeta at the negotiations, and there were system/Fleet rumors he had actually married her, although they call it a ‘bond-link ceremony’ on Qet. To most humans, that accurate rumor sure sounded like marriage (but more in the context of an exchanging of tribal connections, as the anthropologists, culturalists and historians from Science and Tactical Divisons quickly added). Then his Qeta bond-link (wife) left him, it was said (accurate again), going back to the Qet Sphere with other top Qet (of course), leaving a few Qet diplos behind. No one ever said Ecurba was depressed, and after the first two months he was at least back to his baseline normal all of the time again. But it was still a sensitive subject.

Sinclaro looked concerned, and excited. Xiu-Li had just confirmed Ecurba’s rumored alien lady friend, Qet-Sia, and suggested he was suffering because he was lonely after her exit from the Human Sphere. Sinclaro didn’t like hearing Ecurba was feeling badly (the concern), but it was also an opportunity for Sinclaro (excitement), since she was here at Deepstrike with Ecurba in system. His alien lady friend was – well, who knew where? Poor guy!

Xiu-Li got away quickly after that. She had not even promised Sinclaro a date for coffee with Ecurba, and yet news Ecurba was now here, alone, and hurting had been the clincher, since word that Sinclaro was helpful would surely get back to him. As Xiu-Li headed to her next diplomatic session she smiled, recalling Sinclaro’s face as her thoughts had changed it: Ecurba’s feeling bad? He’s ALONE here? Poor guy! – I know just the right things to make him feel better, too – I’d better help this Chen out, so she’ll tell him I did.

Xiu-Li wondered what kind of security director Sinclaro was if she was that easy to read, then reminded herself how quickly and quietly Sinclaro had gotten four dead Qeti cleaned out of the Portal Chamber Access Corridor last October. Just because she has some sort of crush on Ecurba doesn’t mean she’s not open to illegal influence or actions, she thought. Or not trying to kill us. But those were Xiu-Li’s wildest speculations. If orders to cooperate with the Qet were given by Thurgoode, and a clean-up in secret to preserve diplomatic decorum wasn’t itself illegal, then what was the problem? None. No humans had died. The Qet-Qeta had survived it all. Did anything else matter? Xiu-Li sighed. She loved the planet called Deepstrike, but hated everything else here, she decided. And now she had to wait for Commander Sinclaro’s help.

Heading to a briefing room seat for the next session on her schedule, she thought, Well, at least there’s one less jerk working here now. Staff Group Captain Jacques Gronez had been moved on and was no longer on PORTAL Plat.

Mediocre people don’t know they are mediocre; their passport to mediocrity is stamped with an inability to assess themselves correctly. They can be brilliant in a few areas and have technical success, but if in the long run there are problems in other areas – say human/public relationship skills are poorly developed, or even the reverse, in which a wonderful presentation can’t be backed up with technical skill and sustained success – at the end of the run, they are mediocre. Mediocre people don’t usually get starships, but there are always first times, always with technical explanations.

Captain Jacques Gronez was the most stunning example yet – he got a brand new, giant sized GREATSTAR Class starship, and an External Path mission to take it on. He had not served as anything higher than a lieutenant commander on a starship (IWG RAGNAROK, which was lost at Hellhole), and had been platform based on Staff service ever since his promotion to commander.

Gronez had survived the Battle of Hellhole (easily, in his section’s evacuation) and gone on to be the most instrumental analyst in tracing the billing networks used by profiteer Admiral Custer Beria, the former IWG Chief of Northern Ecliptic Command Division. Admiral Beria had used his connections and office to make lots of money from Conflict associated MiliPlex industries, so Gronez had made some enemies. There was also a crash landing requiring a rescue, and negative notes from Commodore Pierre Ribaud, who supervised SEYCHELLES Plat (and whose Platform Operations Coordinator, Captain C. D’Arial, wrote the final Inspector’s Report on the IWG VICTORY disaster and recovery). Captain Gronez was the Quartermaster Division Platform Group staff officer there when VICTORY had finally limped in for docking. Gronez had a Combat Stress Disorder breakdown just before a return transit to Earth, but quickly improved with treatment; he then served with merits on Admiral Baptiste’s PORTAL Platform staff in the Deepstrike HD-19373 (Iota Persei) system during Qet Contact in October 2180.

It was felt by persons with Fleet power that with all of his expertise in being a Staff Officer, Gronez could now handle the task of flying a GREATSTAR.

The bottleneck for GREATSTAR chairs meant a large pool of available captains and people due for promotion to captain in 2180 and 2181. There were still plenty of other major ships with flight chairs open or due to open, however, as many Space Fleet captains wanted to work closer to home than could be promised in the New Era. They had seen enough war and accidents and exotic ports of call systems to satisfy them – why not settle at one, like Jade or Cape Of Velvet, and work within their new home system as a pilot? Or just do something else altogether?

Space Alliance Systems Space Fleet found itself with a new top command structure as the corrupt profiteers in ex-Admiral Beria’s Berian Circle network were found and removed, and this meant questioning traditions and protocols which might have hidden the corruption (or had nothing to do with it, but were questioned anyway by one or two with something to prove). It also cracked the door on trying new innovations (new staff, new ideas), despite often ample objective historical evidence to back up again and again why the current system worked as it did, and how certain innovations had failed before.

Putting Staff officers with limited, dated deep space experience out in deep space to give everyone a fresh perspective was one of those innovations that were difficult to find a definitive objection to while being pelted with relentlessly upbeat reasons why it was such a good idea to try. These were rationalizations being used to frame the unknown in so many glowing ways that it soon became apparent money (and maybe lives) would have to be wasted in order to run the fresh perspectives experiment, and so once again prove that career rewards still needed good skills matching; sometimes an intuition to make a different match is sufficient to stop a mis-match from going forward.

Certain Staff officers refused a new ship. They felt they had found the best place for them to be, and were content to stay there – an outright demonstration of mediocrity, thought some, but also a surprising insight into self, one that saved the SAS a great deal, and gained many good static post Fleet officers. Platforms, StarYards, and major base systems were kept well staffed.

Captain Jacques Gronez felt he had been regularly screwed over for so long that he deserved a ship, but getting the GREATSTAR actually did humble him. It was so far beyond the responsibility he had thought he would be given that he had nothing to whine or complain about, so he didn’t. He wasn’t smug or presumptuous about it, and since people fell all over themselves for him the moment they saw his deep space ship uniform and GREATSTAR patches, he rarely had to ask for anything more than once.

He had always been so tight with resources and his command style that the massive waste generated in the publicity over preparation and launch seemed to shock him into a stunned version of Gronez which people found they didn’t mind as much. Very few actually liked him, but he was easier to be around and work with after he got his GREATSTAR. They hoped it was a permanent change, since his poor crew would otherwise come back with tales to rival both "Moby Dick and The Caine Mutiny."

Captain Xiu-Li Chen personally saw Gronez as an irregular asteroid with an inverted tumble – approach with caution, has hard points that can hurt if struck or contact is made during proximity. She didn’t begrudge him his GREATSTAR; Xiu-Li didn’t like the way the ship was designed and much preferred her own COURIER Class JAGUAR, which was a slightly larger ship than the IWG science ship she had first served on, JOHN A. WHEELER.

She thought JAGUAR was better sized for whatever she could think of using it for, and that the GREATSTAR really existed to answer the question, "What do we do with these huge troopships being built for planetary operations for a Conflict that no longer exists? One was given to Colony Operations for conversion, but this left four more in various late stages of construction, and two more half completed in the pipeline. She thought they looked like basketballs with sticks glued onto them. The spherical main hull did not offer any improvement at all over the old brick-meatloaf" designs (a design only the Niv had ever made look in any way sleek).

JAGUAR was a metal loaf-brick, and the big advantage was that such a commonly used design meant its components should be available in every system, while some spherical sections and units were specialized and unlikely to spread now (nobody needed troops or more than two or three colony ships, so the design run would end, and the pipeline ships would serve for replacement parts).

Xiu-Li didn’t think much of the GREATSTAR mission profile, either. In a practical sense, the distances between stars were so great that the old fashioned Paramont’s view of bouncing to a new planet every week was more like a three to six week minimum average of hyperflight travel to move between all twelve Human planets. The longest transit was almost fifty four light years, thirteen and a half weeks in hyperflight from Cape Of Velvet to Deepstrike, from deep South to the Northern Portal.

The GREATSTAR External Path missions were just arbitrary explorations into deep space, not even to a target star or system, simply a see what we can see mission which sounded a lot like a particularly flashy sort of shakedown Flight To Nowhere.

Xiu-Li was not opposed to going out looking, but she was keenly aware how much still had to be catalogued within the Human Sphere. Extending the Sphere by beacon, or even to another boundary star system (just to do so) made no practical sense. Neither did a long mission into empty deep space for several months, when now there were stars within the sixty light year bubble of the Human Sphere which needed catalogue missions – system surveys, just like IWG-SS JOHN A. WHEELER had gone on, before the Conflict. Not only were those great training missions for newbie crewpers, they provided data for later use.

The first visits to Deepstrike (star system HD-19373) in 2163 and 2173 were survey missions, and even if a star system for survey had no obviously habitable planets, no one knew what they might find instead – if they were looking at all, instead of going out into deep space for a long baseline change in viewing perspective, a deep look at nothing and everything.

And when it came to ship supplies, Xiu-Li had her private concerns over these bold jumps into the unknown. The rawest of materials were usually found at the outskirts of any given star (air and water, minerals, metals), but eventually planetary resources (food) would also be needed. The size of the GREATSTAR had more room for stores and things like the greensward and hydroponic farms which platship living had perfected, but it was still a mission about flying off to explore the complete unknown, and without any ocean below them that, while always dangerous, one might at least get fish from.

With so many unknowns much closer to home, and the A.O.S. catalogue to be done, was a long jump out into nowhere the best overall use of resources? Every Fleet ship on system station duty would now be doing survey work, but a GREATSTAR could concentrate a lot of resources into an effort which would be comprehensive enough to satisfy any report the first time out. Neither Jade or Heart were fully catalogued yet, nor was Deepstrike itself. Not fully exploring and recording everything about the systems which a sentient intelligent species had colonies living within was known to be thought of poorly in the Assembly Of Sentients. This was a persuasive argument, thought Xiu-Li.

On the other hand, Gronez was now out there on his External Path mission, heading forty light years straight out into the unknown of deep space, while Xiu-Li was sitting here at a table at a conference, listening to esoteric human lawyers talk on and on regarding music fees.

Xiu-Li blinked and stirred in her chair, bringing herself back to the Platform. The humans sought strict penalties for unauthorized copying, and the Qet were very offended at the concept of human penalties against them – especially as they had no cultural history of bootlegging, because the whole point of owning anything at all was paying for it. As Qet might kill for any significant dishonor, any Qet who stole from or defrauded other Qet was killed about eighty percent of the time.

They were arguing about a concept, with the humans not realizing the Qet wanted to pay full price for the genuine article, and special editions could go premium. No Qet would ever copy music or fake anything else, and could kill any Qet who defrauded them. In fact, as time passes, it will be humans selling fakes to the Qet who will be the problem, thought Xiu-Li.

The Qet negotiator looked puzzled. You speak of penalties if unoriginal copies are made by Qet. Are these penalties similar if non-Qet trading partners sell false copies?

The human music industry lawyers looked at each other. We believe that is for the Qet to pursue legally, should they think that happens to a Qet some day, said the older one. On a case by case basis. They weren’t going to get into the long human history of fakes, knock-offs, and bootlegging, and could argue they didn’t know Qet laws, as they were not Qet lawyers.

Xiu-Li tried not to laugh as she pictured dishonored, angry Qet showing up to legally pursue and hunt down human con artists making fakes – for which the penalty in the Qet Sphere could be death. How many examples would it take for it to stop, or to become so bloody that a Diplomatic Response was required? Would the Assembly Of Sentients think the human ability to defraud, connive, scheme, and hurt other humans for their own personal gain or power was a genetic quirk of the species (like the Qet propensity to kill for power) and allow it (consequences and all), or would they Have A Say?

The Qet looked at their human advisor. Can we negotiate individually with human artists and companies, or must we utilize this overall group? asked Qet-Tia Longtalker.

The music lawyers blanched.

The Qet human advisor shrugged. It may be judged to be breach of contract later, but many human artists might consider an offer for a new specific piece, project, or even direct sale of their music. Both old and new.

The older music lawyer was aghast.

Xiu-Li smiled. That’s one way to make sure it’s not fake.

Really? They would sell their music directly to their listeners? asked Qet-Tia.

Many do.

Excuse me a moment, please.

Xiu-Li watched the Qet confer and thought about what it was going to be like when she met Qet-Lia Pathfinder again – and whether her suspicions would be obvious as they spoke. The law advisers and lawyers on both sides were now talking in two huddles about things which Xiu-Li had been told were settled, in need of a witness at the final deal closing. No one had told her that she would be sitting around while negotiations continued after the humans had laid out the proposal, for acceptance.

She grinned. No one had told her, because they didn’t know. Xiu-Li had felt from the start that both the proposal and for acceptance were phraselets which were going to annoy the proud Qet, and delay the process while any petulant ruffledfeathers were smoothed out. Then her face blanked to parade neutral again, her thoughts going back to Qet-Lia Pathfinder, the Qet-Qeta, leader of seventy eight billion Qet across sixty seven Qet Stars to date. Had Qet-Lia really tried to assassinate herself six months earlier, right after the final A.O.S. negotiations creating the Human Sphere were concluded?

It had been an attack on a walkway running from Memorium Square to the nearby landing zone, after attending a Memorium Ceremony for the eight humans killed during the Qet Encounter on Deepstrike in 2173. It appeared that all of the Qet in the attacking force were not from either of two Qet ships previously on station: Ecurba had reported that, "a reliable Qet source indicated Qeti from Qet ship QS PUNCTURED LUNG were present." It had arrived at PORTAL Plat on the day before the attack, after thruster problems delayed any earlier system arrival. The ship was calling itself the Qet-Qeta’s Flag Ship, and data seemed to verify that. One or two of the dead Qeti