Illumination Towers
Illuminate Director’s Office
The Rrskee Pack: 90th floor
Outside the clouds were breaking up, for once the great gas giant Valaya could be seen in the sky, a deep blue gem against the darkness that hosted the myriad stars that filled the void. Ck’akk was taking a moment of peace and harmony to enjoy the view.
It had been 45 years since her pack had been elected to lead the Illuminate; they’d left the Nursery Tower here in the Illuminated District at the age of 24 and begun a life in public service. From Minor Diplomatic functionaries to diplomats to an Ambassador Pack to the Head of Foreign Affairs.
Then about forty eight years ago what the History Books called the “Great Independent Crisis” hit. Where an officious, awful, close-minded fool of an Admiral started pushing for the Illuminate to cut off any Independent Colonies and packs and classify them as “lesser” Avali. It was a huge disaster, the lower ranked packs in the Hierarchy, those who interacted with the Independents hated it. In fact most packs outside the core MIlitary Hierarchy hated it but the damage was done, the Commander in Chief of the fleet was very publicly pushing for this, rallying support, whipping up those who believed in it.
It had been a proper crisis, Independent packs had started turning their backs on the Illuminate, and other packs who were “Loyal” started to break away. Avali society was shaken to the core. Then the entire Civilian Wing of the Illuminate Council banded together as one unified voice and reminded the Military that they were but one branch of the Avali Government. That in itself had been a monumental shift in the political landscape, in the span of a week the Military had fallen from the most powerful branch of government to an uneasy equal footing with the rest of them. Centuries old pack hierarchy didn’t fade away overnight but it turned out if every civilian in the government told you no and withheld support; the fleet suddenly fell into disarray. Especially when lower ranked officers started walking out; emboldened by the Field Marshal of Nurseries publicly declaring the Admiralty was out of order and walking away. Having every nursery in Avali space slam its doors in your face and inform you that your eggs would not be welcome was pretty much the worst thing that could happen to an Avali.
The Field Marshal declared every member of the Admiralty board complicit in this new reprehensible policy and threw her support behind the civilian Directorates. She threatened that every Admiral complicit would be subject to the decree and no nursery in Illuminate space would welcome their eggs. It had sent a shock wave up the military hierarchy that shattered their grip on power. After that it had all fallen apart and centuries of the Military being top of the hierarchy had come crashing down. It had been a huge mess, several colonies had broken away but the core of the Illuminate had reforged itself around the new pack hierarchy.
After that crisis the Illuminate Director pack had retired and Ck’akk and her pack had been elected to lead the Illuminate.
For 45 years they had been slowly, methodically leading a shift in public opinion, attitudes and behaviour. The Avalonian Exploration Corps was still well respected, still honoured, but beside a few hold outs like Admiral Jerak and older, more conservative officers they no longer led the way on everything. Mining Packs now led mining colonies, Civilian Administrators ran factory colonies; in effect the Illuminate Council selected a pack to lead the local colony Hierarchy based on the colonies primary focus instead of all the civilians answering to Military Governors. The Elite Nursery Guards answered to their own chain of command outside the military and took orders from the Nursery Packs. It had taken time and work and a shift in attitudes but the last hold out had been foreign policy.
It had taken the longest to change, to shift impressions and control and with the Odyssey they had started the long wrong to prove that Civilian Diplomats should lead Diplomatic missions. Foreign governments liked it when an Embassy Ship led by a diplomat turned up as opposed to a squadron of military ships with a diplomat answering to the Military commander who outranked them in the Hierarchy. In the old structure the local Military leader had always been the highest ranking pack; so an Ambassador with instructions from the Foreign Office still had to listen to the local Military commander or as was often the case the Captain in charge of their military escort.
It was a perception and power thing, or as she had discovered lately an ego thing. Certain conservatives wanted to keep doing it the same way not because it was better but because not being top of the rankings was upsetting their ego. Sighing softly she smiled quietly to herself and sat up; it was working though, society was slowly changing.
“You ok sis?” a voice called out to her and the white and silver avali with a bronze stripe marking the banding in her feathers turned to the room and smiled at her pack.
“Ra’Lett, S’lakk, Kn’ark hello, did you bring everything we need?” She walked over and hugged her brother and two sisters. All four of them had the white base feathers and bronze stripe though each of them sported a different secondary main colour over the top of their heads, back and wings, “I am so glad you three are here, it’s been a bit of a morning.”
“Dare I ask what?” S’lakk asked as she settled down in a bean-bag, brushing a hand back through her thick green crest, “Was it Admiral Jerak again?”
“Oh yes,” the Director sighed, “He is becoming a big voice for the conservative officers who are rallying behind him. That is why I want those files on the Trail pack before our meeting with Captain Selenu.”
“I have them,” Kn’ark held out a file, “Are you sure you want to pick this fight, sis? It is going to be a loud one.”
“Oh yes,” Ck’akk chirped and looked at her pack, “That arsehole isn’t getting away with it. Our reputation has started to swing toward the positive amongst the Galactic community. I need to keep pressing onwards if we are going to reverse the bad press that Kyóurgawabadi has been shouting everywhere.
“Kyóurgawabadi? You mean the Horker King?”
“Who else? He has been shouting everywhere, Anyways, if Jerak is left unchecked, it will destroy all we’ve accomplished so far.”
“Well we got your back,” Ra’Lett said with a smile, “But you know Selenu and her pack, why their files?”
“Selenu and Seinu I know pretty well,” Ck’akk murmured, “But we need to get serious about training Seinu, pushing him out of the beginner comfort zone we’ve been steering him through and to do that I need to know all of them,” she turned back to look at her desk and the myriad holographic portals surrounding it, “One of my contacts informs me the Admiral is also going to be an arsehole over their education programme concerning the Vampire Bunnies, and I want to be up to date on all of them in case he tries to cause trouble for them.”
“Very well,” Ra’Lett stood up, “I’ll go prepare the meeting room,” he hugged his sisters and hurried off.
“We’ll be working on the new schedule for Diplomat Seinu,” Kn’ark said, “Any idea when we may hear when he is ready for active duty again?”
“Not yet,” Ck’akk looked at her sisters, “Put planning his itinerary on hold for now, I will review his training schedule myself but before that we need some additional information,” she called up a file and sent it to her sisters, “Doctor Rhaii has asked for this document, can you speak to the Oracle and see if it has the info we need? Otherwise we may have to send someone to speak to them, they don’t keep an ambassador here.”
“Sure,” S’lakk said and her sisters hurried off and Ck’akk ordered the window to be opaque, turning it into a large screen as she settled down in a bean bag and focussed on the files, bringing them up on screen. The first file was an image of the Odyssey, a kilometre long Avali hull, designed for deep space missions with plenty of space and a modular design so they could swap stuff out. Currently it was kitted out to support a deep-space Diplomat, including a full Avali nano-factory and a diplomatic wing allowing it to act as both an Embassy and Avali meeting space.
Avali Exploration Vessel Odyssey
Odyssey Class Exploration Vessel
Assigned to the Trail pack:
Crew
======
Selenu Trail-Guides-by-Wandering
Trail Pack-Leader
Captain of the AEV Odyssey
Seinu Trail-Voice-of-Settlement-and-Accord
Illuminate Diplomat
The Russet (Peace Bringer)
Firi Trail-Blazer-Master-of-Arms
Diplomatic Bodyguard
AEV Odyssey 1st Officer & Security Chief
Chantelle Trail-Locator-of-Worlds
Diplomatic Attache and Secretary
AEV Odyssey Exploration Chief
Ki Trail-Fixer-of-Gears
Diplomatic Machinery Advisor
AEV Odyssey Senior Mechanic
Taran Trail-Artificer-of-Synthetic-Life
Diplomatic Technical Advisor
AEV Odyssey Chief Engineer.
Cri & Cal
Civilians from Babupekkakerok
Vampire Bunnies
Information Pending.
Ifelse (Artificial Intelligence)
AI of the AEV Odyssey
==========
Base module: None
Knowledge nodes: base, nexus_base, nexus_ext1, nexus_tech, nexus_med, tts_adv, lang_val, lang_milky, lang_teras, lang_factor, lang_scr, lang_super
Gather data sampling: Yes
Virtualization: Yes
DSC_64: No.
Core handle: Complete
Security modules: [Reserved]
Arch_compat: 256-bit, 128-bit*, 64-bit, 48-bit, 32-bit, 16-bit, 12-bit, 8-bit
Version: 1.26.10.8 (manual)
Ck’akk finished looking over the images of each member of the Odyssey’s crew before turning to the general pack summary. It mostly just reinforced what she knew about the Trail pack, that they were a tight knit team doing a very good job at supporting one another. Ki’s addition and weaving into the fabric of the pack was complete and they also brought two vampire bunnies back with them from Babupekkakerok. They were a very good pack who did their job very well; their primary focus was supporting Seinu’s work yet they all had secondary skills to keep the Odyssey running.
Nodding to herself Ck’akk moved her hands across the controls, bringing up each Avali’s full file whilst making a note to learn more about the Vampire Bunnies they had brought back with them. She wasn’t entirely surprised some of them had left with the Odyssey: they clearly could feel and hear the “Call of the Void,” the romantic name for wanting to live in space. It’d be interesting to see if these two bunnies stayed or headed off to forge their own destiny.
She also then loaded the reports on the Odyssey’s last mission, the fact-finding journey to Babupekkakerok to learn about the local sapient species. Their brief had been to study their culture, their society and in the end they had opted to make changes and introduce new ideas like spear fighting to fend off predators, music and basic agriculture. While doing that hadn’t been part of the mission instructions, it was something they could do as long as they followed the proper protocols. In the end, it had been a very successful mission if a bit unorthodox, but it was exactly that unorthodox nature Ck’akk needed if she was to counter the harmless seeming charm offensive the enemies of the Avali were mounting against them.
Settling in to review the files the Avali elder started to formulate a plan for how to deal with this upcoming meeting between Selenu and the military, especially Admiral Jerak.
Ki was walking through the halls of the shipyard administration block looking for the others, having tried four rooms without success. Like every room on the station it was just one of the numerous identical white walled chambers labelled with a number and a letter. Each room could be configured to serve a variety of purposes with different furniture that could be deployed from the walls or floors as needed. Each one came with a sheet of transparent aerogel glass that looked out at the construction cradle where the Odyssey was docked.
The black, red and white Avali sighed, running a hand through his three prominent crest feathers as he gave in and used his visor to check the location of the rest of his pack. He tried to use his natural instincts from time to time but yeah he’d failed utterly at tracking them down just by guessing. He had hoped after this many months the instincts most Avali shared regarding their siblings would have bedded in but here on a strange station he wasn’t quite as in tune with them as he hoped.
He found Firi, his yellow and white feathered Avali sister, and the vampire bunny twins Cri and Cal in one of the rooms set to lounge mode. It had extruded a heavily padded semi-circular sofa out of the floor which Firi and Cri were sitting on. Firi was actually lying on her back idly picking dead down out of her feathers and dropping it onto the floor where a drone was waiting to suck the feather’s up. Cri was reading, slowly, methodically, his eyes scanning each line of text on the printed book he’d acquired. His proficiency at reading Avali core had leapt in leaps and bounds over the past few months, he devoured anything he could get his paws on and his reading age was advancing out of the young teenage Avali fantasy genre to non-fiction; facts, figures, galactic history; he loved it all.
Cal, however, hated reading or sitting still. The light grey and copper furred bunny was pressed up against the window watching the cargo transporters and drones zip back and forth. He was identical to his brother in every way except for two things, his personality, and the colour of his tail. When Ki had first met them their personalities hadn’t been too different. Now though, unrestrained by the need to forage for subsistence survival every day they were emerging as two very different individuals.
“Hello everyone,” Ki said, wandering over to the sofa and casually rolling over the back of it to lay atop Firi and accept hugs, it still amazed him, eight months ago the casual contact from another Avali would have been the worst thing ever. Now whilst he missed his previous family he could accept his new one and their affection with ease, “How is everyone?”
“Bored,” Cal complained as he turned away from the window, “Can’t we go out there and help? There has to be something we can do other than sit in here.”
Ki smiled and reached out with one foot to gently nudge Cri, he looked up from his book and smiled, “I am listening,” he said, “I can read and listen.”
“Well,” KI chuckled, “I like to check, I am never sure with you bunnies, if it was an Avali reading and listening would be easy but you guys have to focus sometimes.”
Cri chuckled, “Trust me we are always listening, always ready, nothing escapes our notice,” he closed his book and sat forward, "Even up here I'm hyper alert and ready for predators… I'm trying to damp down my natural urge to react to every single thing moving around us but it's hard."
He shifted closer to the Avali brushing a paw unconsciously through his neck ruff; he had discovered shampoo and conditioner since moving into space. Ki had noticed Cri was still fascinated by how smooth and silky his fur was compared to when it was a rough, unkempt frizz from years of bathing in mineral soaked water in his village pond.
Ki smiled and sat up, nudging his sister, “Well, we are off to the surface, I’ve arranged for you both to take your basic space-living competency test.”
“What, already?” Firi said in surprise, “Isn’t it a bit soon for that?”
“I don’t think so,” Ki glanced at both bunnies, “Up to now you have been our guests, once this is done you’ll officially be licenced to live in space and be part of the crew.”
“Yes, we know that,” Cal pumped a fuzzy copper furred fist into the air, “Finally, you know they say we can’t start learning to be proper bodyguards or any of that until we are certified.”
“I heard,” the black, and white Avali shook his head in amusement, “You were very vocal with Selenu about it before she went to Avalon.”
“I thought she was going to sort it out when she got back,” Cri said, “She said we had to wait for our Nursery competency scores.”
“I have them,” Ki said, using his bionic arm to input instructions to his back-pack computer and accessed a pair of files, projecting them from the rooms systems onto a screen embedded into the wall, “You both passed.”
Firi rolled over to look at the screen and chuckled affectionately, “Cri by a much larger margin then you Cal,” she grabbed the more rambunctious twin and noogied his head fur, “That score is barely a pass, but it is about as good as I got when I did these tests, so well done.”
Cri beamed happily and grinned at the others, “See,” he chirped at Cal in bunny song, "I knew you could do it,” he flopped against his brother, hugging him bunny style, “You did amazing!”
Cal was blushing and hugged everyone back, "It was hard," he chirped, "Like all those numbers and words you gotta learn and the reading n stuff. I'm not fast at it like Cri and the words and numbers swim together."
"You did it though," Firi encouraged the bunny, "It's the basic test all Avali take when we are becoming adults. Bunnies become adults by joining a foraging party, Avali become adults by graduating from this test," she pointed at the screen, "It's the basis of our education, the Nursery test. After this an Avali pack can start to specialise, to learn other things. I went to the military for a bit, Seinu went to Diplomat school, the test can also help the Oracle give you advice on what might be good for you to learn next."
"That sounds interesting," Cri said, "I'd love to hear what it suggests, but I guess we have to get to the surface?"
"Aye," Ki stood up, "Your test is in two hours down at the Colony admin centre, I know you both have been working on this with Firi, you got this."
The twins nodded and fell in with Firi following Ki toward the shuttle bay as they went. It was going to be another interesting day in dry-dock at Protion.
The Odyssey was in the orbital equivalent to dry dock, clamped into the shipyard construction bay by a series of support girders. Entire sections of the hull had been removed and a veritable army of drones and shipwright Avai were swarming over the vessel, drifting in and out of the holes in the hull or clustering around machinery or the engines as they did various technical things.
Ifelse had been complaining it was like having their body sliced open and poked around inside of. But Taran had quietly talked the AI around to stop grumbling. They were getting upgrades, improvements and maintenance, after over a year in service; the shipwrights, designers and tech heads had a lot of small quality of life improvements to install. Starting with a complete revamp of the atmospheric regulators to take the strain off the ships systems. As a Diplomatic ship and embassy the Odyssey had to put the best of Avali society forward, part of this meant simulating Avalon style snow and ice filled residential rooms. This wasn’t too hard, most Avali ships were kept to Avalonian temperatures as that is what the Avali liked. However, keeping some rooms ice cold whilst heating the diplomatic suites to different temperatures to make guests cosy puts a huge strain on the environmental system. So during the past year they had suffered innumerable breakdowns and glitches in the heating system; the design team now promised they had redesigned the system to fix them.
It wasn’t the only kind of upgrade, though, Taran watched as a large nexus crystal being manoeuvred through the shipyard from the observation and office dome protruding from the construction bays admin section Taran was surprised by the size, "That's a big one, I didn't realise we were getting one quite so big?"
Dern, a red and black Avali who ran the shipyard looked up from her screens and glanced outside at the crystal, "It's big, colony sized, apparently your boss wants you to have better bandwidth and a wider range of nexus connectivity. Reworking the crystal bay and nexus interface was finished last night so now we can install it."
She turned back to Taran and smiled, "You'd have known if you hadn't been so distracted this morning."
Taran's ears canted back as he blushed, "That was very much your fault," he murmured shyly, "I've finished compiling Ifelse's notes for you on how the waste and reclamation system deals with alien leavings, the feather filters don't like vampire bunny fur."
"Mmhmm," Dern chirped and took his hand, "I'll take a look, we'll have an alternative filter we can use," she kissed his fingers, "Now scoot, I'll see you at twenty six o'clock and we'll go down to the surface and have dinner, I've hired us a hotel tent near this really good alien steak place. Beef steaks from Earth are really good when seasoned Avali style."
Taran nuzzled her between the ears and chirped, "Twenty six o'clock, I'll meet you at the shuttle dock, later," he then left her office and started along the curving corridor towards one of the lounges. He hadn't been expecting anything when he started working with Dern. But they'd gone from working on the Odyssey to a couple of dates to spending all their downtime together visiting all the different restaurants, clubs and social spaces Protion had to offer. It was fun, though it had confused the twins no end that Dern and Taran were not going to settle down together now as mates. That wasn't the Avali way (pack first, work and fun second). Sure, they'd stay friends and hang out again maybe during their next visit but for them it was a cosy fun friendship whilst their packs were working together, not the start of a lifelong bonding.
Heading away from Dern's office Taran checked an incoming message from Firi, it was just a short note informing him that she and Ki were off to the surface with the twins. He sent a quick note back congratulating them on their test results before heading over to the airlock tube to board the Odyssey.
“Ifelse,” he called out as he arrived, “I am back, how are you doing?”
The small holographic avatar the AI enjoyed, the magenta feathered jakub scampered out of a wall and climbed Taran to cling to his shoulder, “I am grumpy! There are Avali prodding and poking around my AI core to install the new nexus crystal, it’s weird.”
“They’ll be done soon,” Taran promised as he stroked the hard-light hologram between the ears, “Why don’t we go run some tests on the new temperature regulators to take your mind off it?”
“Ok,” the AI grumbled, “That’d be good, it is all installed and ready for testing, I want to crank it down as low as it’ll go in the Avali residential rooms whilst turning it up all the way in the diplomatic guest suites, really test both extremes.”
“Ok,” Taran laughed, “Let’s do it,” he headed for the lift, “But you’ll excuse me if I don’t go into the hot rooms whilst we are testing that, I do not want to boil.”
Ifelse laughed and fed Taran directions to the new environmental control room so they could get to work, it was going to be interesting to see if these new systems could cope with the massive differences in temperatures.
Illumination Towers
The Directorate of International Affairs
Committee Room Alpha-Chime
Selenu left Chantelle outside with the rest of the aides and personal assistants and made her way across the room to stand before the wide, curving table. The room itself was like every other meeting room in the building, soft white walls, deep orange carpets and glowing white lighting strips near the ceiling. This one had a window that looked out across the snow covered slopes and majestic spire-like buildings of the Illuminate District, the heart of Avalon’s government.
What she hadn’t been expecting was the security rating for this meeting. Usually handing in a report like this wouldn’t rate the appearance of the Director but she’d clearly taken a personal interest in it. The only other Avali in the room were Director Ck’akk, her pack-brother Ra’lett and Admiral Jerak and some high ranking aide, a military avali dressed in a starched and impressive uniform.
All the usual aides, assistants, coffee-birds, secretaries and hangers on who would follow such high ranking Avali around had been left outside. So she took a moment to gather herself, checked the files inside her glasses and made her way over to the single seat that had been left on her side of the table.
“Welcome Captain Selenu,” Ck’akk greeted her, standing up to take one of her paws in both of hers, “Welcome home, I believe you know my brother Ra’lett?”
Selenu murmured a hello to the navy blue and white Avali, shaking his hand before turning to the Admiral. He remained seated and didn’t offer his hand in greeting which drew a frown from Ra’lett, even as the Director ignored the insult.
“This is Admiral Jerak who I believe you know and Major Yusarf,” Ck’akk introduced the stern looking Avali, “We thank you for coming all the way over from Protion for this, I am sure you have a hundred things that need doing during the Odyssey’s maintenance.”
“I left Taran in charge of maintenance,” Selenu replied as she sat down in a chair, “He can deal with anything that comes up whilst I am away.”
“I am surprised Diplomat Seinu isn’t here,” the major said with a frown, “Our questions would be better served by him surely?”
Selenu opened her mouth to reply but the Director beat her to it, “Diplomat Seinu is in the hospital, a minor medical issue his Doctor’s are assisting with, anything you need to know I am sure Captain Selenu can answer.”
Selenu sank back into her chair and nodded, “Yes, I can answer anything you need clarifying about our last mission, though my reports have already been accepted so I am not entirely clear what this meeting is about?”
“Two things,” the Admiral said gruffly, “Major Yusarf has some questions from the security council we would like answering and I have some queries about some of your behaviour on the trip to Babupekkakerok that seem erroneous to me, the Director may be happy with them but I want some answers.”
“Very well,” Selenu said softly, “I am here to answer any queries you have.”
“Thank you,” the Major said and allowed himself a brief smile, “I have reviewed your reports on the nexus about the Vampire Bunny species. They are fascinating but the Security Council had a couple of queries we’d like clearing up about your encounter with the Horker ship in orbit.”
“Ah that,” Selenu relaxed a bit, ignoring the way the Admiral was glowering at her, “It was certainly an interesting day.”
The Major nodded, “As we have determined, the abhorrent conversation your AI recorded is going to be very useful when we release it. We want to determine the nature of the hack on their systems.”
Selenu nodded and didn’t even need to review her notes for this, “That’s an interesting one, when the ship dropped out of warp it registered on our AIs systems as it was broadcasting a signal,” she touched her tablet and scrolled through several screens until she could deploy a hologram of a small mechanical device. It was a simple pyramid of black composite with three limpet-like magnetic clamps that deployed from the bottom, as the wire hologram filled in it blended into the surrounding hull-plates flawlessly, the only reason they could still see it was because Selenu’s tablet highlighted it.
“This device was transmitting a simple signal inviting anyone nearby to tune in, Ifelse didn’t even need to hack anything, this device was already broadcasting everything happening on their bridge.”
“Do we know who built it?” the Major asked as he looked over the details being printed by the tablet.
“We believe it is a Yartezni device,” Selenu said, “Unfortunately we don’t have any more details than this, but we were able to confirm that what it was broadcasting was genuine. Ifelse was able to spoof the same protocol the device was using to establish his own link with the Horker ship system, they really are not technologically savvy; their encryption was terrible.”
“Ugh the Yartezni,” Admiral Jerak muttered, “Pirate loving freebooters, are we really going to rely on anything those mongrels do?”
Director Ck’akk glanced at the Admiral and frowned, “The Yartezni may not operate how we like, they are too free in allowing any and all to dock at their ports to trade but that is their way. But any help against the Horker’s should be welcomed.”
“Thank you Captain,” Major Yusarf interrupted before the two older Avali could exchange more blows over the Yartezni’s trading alignment, “That’s just what I was hoping to hear, we have had several reports now about Yartezni devices broadcasting Horker ship communication channels, this will help us build a much clearer picture when we reveal what they have been up too,” he made a few notes on his tablet, “It also will help our units know what to look for, can we get a copy of the protocol your AI used to bypass their security?”
Selenu nodded, “Certainly Major, I will forward it to you now,” she drew the tablet in toward her and ordered it to share a copy of what they had learnt with the Major, “Was there anything else?”
“Nothing directly,” he said, “The massacre sites and archaeological data is important as well. It’s quite clear what they were doing, we just need to work out the best way and time to use this information.”
“It is heartbreaking when you see it in person, the sheer scale of murder it is unbelievable,” Selenu shuddered, “The cruelty, those utter ba…” she stopped herself, took a couple of deep breaths and waved a hand, wing feathers ruffling as she took a moment. Calmer, she looked around the table, meeting everyone’s eyes, “Everything they did to this kind, gentle species was, as you said, abhorrent.”
“It did not make for easy reading,” Director Ck’kak said softly, “The fact they seemed to go for their eggs first and make them watch,” she shook her head, “I can’t believe it, but thank you Selenu now I believe the Admiral has some questions for you?”
Jerak sat up, the older Avali glowered at the Diretor then turned to Selenu with a frown, “Whilst… I have been forced to concede that the Odyssey and her sister ships are much better received by our allies for being non-military ships. I have concerns that a civilian pack like yourself is ignoring protocol and the rules.”
He thumped one hand on the desk, “Diplomat Seinu’s work is exemplary, he is well received by our non-Avali allies and giving him a mobile embassy ship seems to have paid off but on Babupekkakerok you strayed so far from your mission brief it is unbelievable,” he glowered at the Director, “I can’t believe the Director here signed it off as acceptable and I am of a mind to raise it at a full Chorus.”
He smirked at Ck’kak, “I am sure everyone will be interested to hear about how your pet Diplomat breached all of our first contact rules.”
“That is not correct,” Selenu said, “To start with this wasn't First Contact, those protocols cover initial contact with a pre-spaceflight society. The Vampire Bunnies already knew about galactic society thanks to the Horker Massacre, our mission was covered by the Foreign Office Diplomatic Protocol."
"That is nonsense," Jerak chirped angrily, "This was clearly the first contact between the Avali and them."
"Not true," Ra'lett interrupted, "Bunnies have been seen in space, we have evidenced reports of several sightings across multiple stations and planets,” he pulled up a file and projected it across the wall, “Also there is a vampire bunny registered as part of the Ouakkia pack, our highest ranked mining pack stationed on Protion.”
“One bunny isn’t…” the Admiral started but the Director cut him off by raising a hand.
“One bunny, that bunny is the pack-leader of the music band Moumantai Motherfuckers, the Ouakkia’s sub-pack. That sub-pack contains one Avali, two vampire bunnies, and a guy from an Earth species known as “Deer” and a Sleriki.”
“A… A Sleriki…?” the Admiral stammered, his ears wilting back in shock and incredulity. Major Yusarf sat up and removed his visor, staring at the Director for a moment.
“Wait… wait. A sub-pack? there is an official sub-pack comprising these Vampire Bunnies and a damn Sleriki? They have a Sleriki, what the hell?” He grabbed his tablet and checked on something, then continued. “People would kill to have one on their team, and... they do!? What!?”
“It’s pretty impressive isn’t it?” Ra’lett murmured, “MMF lately has risen to become one of the most notorious music bands on this side of the universe, a music band that is attached officially to one of the Resource Directorates highest ranked packs, Director J’ask speaks highly of them and that pack has formally and legally adopted the leader of the sub-pack Sher Ouakkia.”
“How am I or anybody going to know that?” the Admiral growled, “I don’t watch popular nonsense like that, that’s the sort of stuff lesser packs watch.”
“Admiral!” Yusarf chirped in shock, “You cannot say stuff like that about other packs! I…. is that what we are to you? A lesser pack? My pack, including myself, likes MMF.”
The Admiral spluttered and tried to justify his outburst but it was clear he’d just lost the Major’s support and before he could get a proper apology out Ck’akk cut him off, “You need to stay abreast of what is popular, those ‘lesser’ Avali you are so rude about are the ones who’ll be doing our jobs and leading the Illuminate in a few years.”
“This is getting us off topic,” Ra’lett said firmly, “As Captain Selenu points out, first contact with space faring civilization happened when the Horker's invaded. This was a Diplomatic contact with a species with galactic awareness but technologically inferior."
"So they still strayed from their brief and the bounds of acceptable behaviour," the Admiral growled.
"We followed our brief from the Foreign Office to the letter, we explored and compiled reports on Vampire Bunny society, life and culture.”
“I… what!” the Admiral sat up, “Do you think I am blind Captain?” he sneered at her title, “You taught them how to use spears, agriculture, you fundamentally changed their society by introducing life changing alterations and new technological principals to their society.”
“Indeed we did,” Selenu said, “In accordance with Contact Protocol Vermillion-Seven,” she tapped her tablet, sending the relevant page of the regulation to everyone's devices, “Paragraph 19, Section C, Unexpected Galactic Contamination. Whereby the race in question has already suffered cultural contamination via contact with galactic civilisation the pack-leader in-charge in consultation with their pack specialist can treat and teach the society in question the basics they need to undo or begin to rectify the derailment of their societal development due to non-native interference.”
The Admiral sat up and glared, “This hardly counts in this situation!”
“I believe it does,” Selenu said quietly and firmly, “And the Director agrees, having your species, culture and society murdered by a Horker Invasion that turns you into cattle certainly counts as undue Galactic contamination in my book.”
She folded her hands on the table, “Our discussions over what and how far we could and should interfere actually resulted in a Disharmony.”
Yusarf sat up at that and interjected, “Pack Disharmony? You fell apart over this?”
“We did briefly, yes,” She met the Admiral’s eyes, “And believe it or not but it was Diplomat Seinu who was at odds with the rest of us. Once we had found Harmony again and were chirping in sync once more he was the one who set the rules of what we could teach them.”
She glanced at Ck’kakk who nodded her head so Selenu took a deep breath and carried on, “He made sure we did not introduce ideas that would overwhelm or derail their societal development. We did the bare minimum to get them back on their feet after the shock and trauma of the Horker massacre; basic agriculture, basic defence against the predators of their world, simple facts about nutrition and music. Nothing complex, nothing overtly dangerous that will change their society and behaviour, just enough to give them the tools to lift themselves out of the extinction spiral they were in.”
“Nonsense,” the Admiral growled, “They were at no risk of extinction and the dangers of their predators have clearly been over-exaggerated.”
Selenu bared her fangs at him, “They were going to go extinct if we had not interfered, and this isn’t just me speaking: This was independently verified by your own Exploration division, Admiral” she growled, “If you don’t like the answer sure, that's your problem, but it is the truth.”
The Admiral opened his mouth to say something but she kept going, “As for the dangers of Babupekkakerok, it is classified as a Death Planet for a reason. If you’d like, I will happily fly you out there and drop you in the countryside and we’ll see how long you last. My brother nearly died three times just because he went outside in a thunderstorm. So no, Admiral,” she filled her voice with all the scorn she could muster as she pronounced his title, “We did not overstep the rules or interfere beyond a reasonable measure. And if you think an Avali team are meant to be compassionless automata in the face of the horrors the Bunnies suffered and do nothing then you aren’t much of an Avali.”
The Admiral stood up, spluttered and then stormed out of the room, letting the doors swish shut behind him in a very definite, “Would slam it if he could” manner as he went. Selenu watched him go then turned back to the others. Major Yusarf shook his head and stood up, “Well that went about as well as I expected, thank you Captain,” he shook her hand, “It was a pleasure meeting you, if we have any more security questions about your Horker encounter we’ll be in touch.”
He saluted Ck’akk and her brother and headed out in a much more sedate fashion. Selenu let out a deep breath and sank back into her chair “Phew… what was that all about?”
“The Admiral is still very upset about the Odyssey program,” Ra’lett said with a sigh, closing down their holographic tablet.
“It isn’t that he doesn’t like it; he hates it,” Ck’kak said, sounding like a stern and exasperated nursery matron, “He is searching for any excuse to cause trouble,” she stood up and moved over to stare out the window, motioning for Selenu to come stand with her, “Sure, the Avalonian Exploration corps has always been under direct military control, but other races do not like it when the Avali military turn up for a diplomatic conference.”
Selenu glanced down, the view really was fantastic, they could see clear across the tower plaza and the entire Illuminate complex gave way to a small woodland of tall trees and fields of snow until the security cordon created a dividing wall between the heart of the Illuminate and the city beyond.
“I wanted to try something different,” Ck’kak said softly, “Rather than a small fleet of Avali frigates escorting my diplomats we'd send just one ship, a good ship, able to defend itself sure but one of our best on its own escorting our diplomat,” she turned to face Selenu and sighed, “The Admiral does not like it, they feel like they are losing power, but the results are plain as day, the rank and file like it: They aren’t playing babysitter or wasting resources escorting Diplomats and their staff to places.”
Shaking her head she turned away from the window, “In the end, it's all politics, but the Odyssey class of ships is proving to be a big success, but tell me how is Seinu?”
Selenu sighed and turned to the Director, “Still stuck as a Vampire Bunny, apparently they have an idea what has caused his shapeshifting to stick as it is and his operating systems to soft-lock him out of control, apparently they have had some sort of breakthrough.”
Ck’akk nodded and turned away from the view to face Selenu, “It is quite interesting, I was speaking to the Doctor earlier, they think the basis of Seinu’s issues comes back to this,” she accepted a tablet off her brother, holding her thumb-claw over the biometric scanner and turned the screen to Selenu as it unlocked, “It’s not noticeable at first but when you see it you’ll see why it may all be related.”
Selenu frowned at the information on the screen, it took her a moment to spot the discrepancy and she had to read it again, “That can’t be right?”
“Oh but it is,” Ck’kak said with a soft smile, “I believe now they have realised that they can start to make some progress. Now before I send you off to see your brother and take the rest of the day off, we need to talk about what happens next for the Odyssey.”
Selenu nodded still somewhat alarmed by the medical information about her brother, but she tried to put it out of her mind as she settled back in her seat as the Director took a moment to compose her thoughts, “As I said I am very happy with how the Odyssey is performing, with your pack, your mission and your behaviour,” the elderly Avali smiled, “You even stuck to our core principles of cooperation and camaraderie when teaching the Vampire Bunnies, but and I say this in the kindest way possible this has been training mode so far.” she looked into Selenu’s eyes, a serious expression on her muzzle, “We need to start moving both Seinu and your pack beyond the cosy assignments you’ve had so far and that means lifting your skill level.”
Selenu nodded, she had been expecting something like this, “I’ve felt for a long time that we are very young to be in charge of something like the Odyssey.”
“You are, but it was earned, Seinu’s behaviour during his first mission saw the Kasvane bestow the title Russet or Peacebringer in their language on him, no one expected a minor, easy mission between two of our allies to explode like that or drag in an Elder race,” she sat back and stared at the ceiling, “That got him noticed by the highest ranked packs, including ours, he handled it very well and was honoured by the Kasvane, not many of our people can claim that accolade, so I took a gamble in promoting you to the head of the line for the first Odyssey class ship ahead of older and more experienced diplomats.”
She glanced back at Selenu, “It has paid off, but so far your diplomatic missions, your anthropological visit to Babupekkakerok, those were training missions to let you adapt to the Odyssey,” she tapped a claw on the table, “Going forward we need to start bringing Seinu up to speed, he has the skill and the support of an amazing family but you are all going to have to up your game to support him on the upcoming training programme.”
Selenu nodded, “I expected as much, we really are too young and very inexperienced to be front-lining the Odyssey like this.”
Ck’akk shook her head, “You are young, and while you don’t have the massive amounts of experience others do, you have teachers and you have the gumption to do this. But once Seinu is out of the hospital his training will be harder and more difficult. He’s neither my most skilled Diplomat or the most famous, but in certain circles his name is being spoken, as the poster-child leading the charge with the Odyssey, in a new form of Avali diplomacy,” she smiled warmly at Selenu, “I’m pleased with you all but he’s still downy when it comes to the life knowledge and experience he needs to deal with wily diplomats from older races or even some of our allies and trading partners.”
“I am well aware,” Selenu replied, “But we are ready to step up too, to support him and the Odyssey’s mission.”
“Good,” Ck’akk smiled, “I mean it when I say ramp it up, I need him to cram a decade of experience, knowledge and understanding and we can only do this through a very intense and very hard core training programme involving augmented realities, real-life experience and academic knowledge”.
Selenu frowned, “You think we can do it?”
“Yes, and you are ready,” Ck’akk replied, “You proved that on Babupekkakerok, you stood by Avali values, you instilled the best of our society, cooperation, unified thinking and pack mentality into your mission when dealing with the Disharmony and subsequent teaching of an unenlightened race,” she smiled, “You showed us that you have the skill to operate away from Avalon, all you lack now is experience and that is something the Directorate can teach you, but it will not be easy.”
“We are up to the challenge.”
“Very well, Ra’lett will be in touch with the training material and plan, but for now go visit your brother in the hospital and take a well earned break before we throw you in the deep end.”
“Thank you,” Selenu gave a small bow, “I will speak to you soon” she then hurried out of the room, collecting Chantelle as she went. As they headed toward the elevator her thoughts drifted to what she’d just been told. She always knew they had been picked for the Odyssey because of how Seinu handled their first mission. It was good to hear it said out loud though and that Ck’akk believed in her pack. It sounded like they had impressed the Director or at least lived up to her expectations on their last mission. Now it was time to leave behind the cosy training missions and grow as a pack to fit the roles the Illuminate needed to propel the Odyssey to new heights.
Things were getting very interesting and they had only just got home, it’d be a great challenge, one they would excel at.
To be continued…