There were no workout rooms in our ambassadorial suite, so we did the best we could with body resistance exercises, then sparred. Evangelina showered first and got breakfast going by placing an order with the palace interface, so it was all set up and ready on the table by the time the rest of us were showered and dressed for the day.

  I’ll admit, the acting was kind of fun, as Evangelina threw herself at me constantly and continued to seduce the hell out of me. Despite satisfying them all an hour or so before, she was quite content and joyful getting on her knees for me when it became too distracting. Which was hot, as she worked so wickedly for my pleasure. But I missed our normal interactions, and while we talked freely enough it was about nothing too important. School and such. It was beginning to feel a little like our relationships were in limbo, because they couldn’t deepen through our act, not in any significant way at least.

  Save my wife, through the bond perhaps.

  It was also important, and no big deal to put up with for a few days to secure the Fellowship’s future. But it was worth noting in the account. The challenge of it all, staying in role, was also fun, just not important to us from a family perspective. Critical however, on the interstellar stage.

  The conference room had a similar square table, but the tabletop was as thin as a desk, maybe a yard in width, going around in a rectangle. We also sat in the same seats we did at dinner, with us across from the queen, the confederacy and alliance caddy corner to us. The empty part in the middle was taken up with a holographic projection system for presentations.

  Along the back wall was a short cabinet covered in bottles and snacks, as well as fresh coffee, tea, or water. There were two servants flanking it, who would presumably bring anything asked for over the palace system immediately. So we didn’t have to leave our seats, or get too close to each other, presumably.

  Lastly there were four guards, two by the door and two others in the far corners.

  Queen Allison started us off, “Good morning. As you’ve no doubt divined, the math, science, and theory that allows us access to tri-space is also responsible for the breakthrough in handling subspace energies safely, and it is what allowed us to put it to use in energy shields, missiles, and beams. As a result, we will be selling them all as a package, but that doesn’t lessen the value of any single application.

  “What we have in mind is a trade treaty, with each one of you. One that guarantees your governments will respect our patents, and they’ll pay a royalty for each instance of usage of this technology, as well as a minimum yearly sum for the fabrication rights to build the devices. We will also reserve the right to inspect these facilities, to ensure the treaty is being honored.

  “We’d love to fabricate and sell them, but we don’t have the infrastructure to do so for three interstellar governments of your size.”

  Traven replied, “Our government would prefer a single fee, for the plans, documentation, and science behind these new technologies. One without strings attached.”

  Allison nodded, “I expected one of you would bring that up, but it’s impossible. The technology is priceless and frankly you couldn’t afford to pay us what it’s worth. My chief economist tells me this is the best way to spread out the burden so as not to bankrupt any of you, while maximizing our profits in a reasonable way.

  “The fabrication right payment and royalty for each instance is non-negotiable.”

  Fiona asked, “What exactly are we negotiating then, or are you dictating to us?’

  Allison said, “Everything and anything within that framework. The royalty percentage, the yearly sum for fabrication rights. We will also not be sharing the science, just the data specs and the fabrication designs at the molecular level.”

  Admiral Green frowned, “That would limit the strength of our weapons and defenses to your design. While I hope that we go forward as trading partners and friends, that is something that the alliance’s sovereignty could not tolerate.”

  Allison nodded, “I understand. You would of course be free to reverse engineer it, but in the end we’re selling you a product. The science involved is currently still in its infancy, we would prefer not to give up that edge for the moment as more breakthroughs are on the horizon. Our intellectual property is not up for sale.”

  Fiona interjected, “What kind of time period are you suggesting for the patent?”

  Allison said, “The standard in all three of your own laws, as well as here on New Australia, is twenty years for technology patents.”

  I suppressed a grimace. None of us would wait for that patent to run out, or we’d risk the confederacy or alliance outbuilding us and invading. We had almost no choice but to upgrade our entire fleet, as well as our weapon production. More than that, I was getting the distinct impression this technology would be obsolete before that twenty years expired, and Allison would offer a new round of negotiations. I hated to agree with the admiral, but we needed that science.

  The arms race otherwise would be dictated by New Australia, and they’d be raking in all the profits from our three interstellar governments from our need to keep up with each other. I knew they’d try to rake us over the coals, but Allison was setting herself up to absorb all the profits of three interstellar governments for perhaps her lifetime.

  Fiona must’ve agreed, because she said, “I don’t begrudge your world a reasonable profit for the remarkable scientific breakthroughs, and I am willing to settle on a fabrication rights and royalties for the interim, but I would not leave the keys to the security of the Fellowship to even an ally. Admiral Green is correct, is there really no way to include the raw science and new mathematics in the deal. We’d still be behind you, we’d have to reverse engineer the designs and figure out how it all worked. It would take years to come up with equivalent designs, and years more to realize and develop other technologies. I won’t set up the Fellowship to fall under future debts as your scientists make this technology obsolete in ten years, or less.

  “Further, assuming the new technologies are dependent on the current design and theory we’d still owe you patents making our own versions or future applications. I urge you to reconsider your stance, take a reasonable profit, don’t set us up for a perpetuity of expenses, in what already looks to be a coming arms race between our three governments.”

  The admiral said, “I would agree to that too. You’ll make all kinds of crazy money, and your planet will be the most affluent among the human sphere. We honor our deals, but we cannot afford an endless arms race driven by a fourth party who profits from it endlessly.”

  The queen looked apologetic, “It’s not on the table, I’m afraid. Shall we get to discussing the treaty and attempt to set prices for the royalties and yearly fabrication rights?”

  Traven said, “You can’t really expect us to agree to this. You’re essentially blackmailing all three of our governments into an arms race.”

  Allison said, “You’re free to leave at any time. It is our science, our breakthrough, and our secrets are not for sale. I fear I am approaching rudeness, but you are not hearing me.”

  This meeting was getting nowhere and going in circles. Allison was all but forcing us to take a less savory approach to this problem. I was betting our scientists could reverse engineer it, and figure out the science from the device, but it’d likely take decades to do so. All the while we’d be firmly under their boot heel, and they’d still be two decades ahead of us in application and research.

  Fiona was right, they wanted to lead us by the nose into a never-ending arms race dictated and profited by them. Was the queen really that greedy, or were they confident that they had enough upgraded ships to take on all three interstellar governments?

  Allison shook her head as the silence dragged on, “It’s clear you all need time to absorb what’s on the table before we get anywhere. Perhaps tomorrow we can discuss the royalty and fabrication rights, and to get into the details of the treaty itself, when you come to terms with the reality of the situation.

  “Tonight, you are all invited to dine with me in the main hall, along with the rest of your staffs. I also hope you enjoy the tour and demonstration I arranged for you this afternoon. Tomorrow, we’ll resume negotiations.”

  Allison and her prime minister, Carlton, stood up and left the room, the four guards flanking them.

  What the hell just happened? It was like the queen was sabotaging her opportunity, and she wanted a confrontation of some kind. I couldn’t imagine why, which was worrying. I’d rather be missing something that made it reasonable, because the only thing I could think of was she wanted to raise tensions and push the edge of war, and our intel was wrong and she was ready for it.

  Traven looked after the queen in disgust, making sure we saw him do it, then got up and stormed out.

  We left a minute later, the admiral choosing to depart the room last.

  Well, at least Grace and Christy got to dress up and go to dinner tonight…

  Chapter Ten

  The atmosphere in the suite wasn’t the greatest. We couldn’t even talk about it because the queen was sure to check our responses in private, but based on my bond I was sure at least Fiona and I were on the same page about what a mess this was turning into. The admiral might hold back, but I honesty expected Traven to do something foolish any moment now.

  Fiona suddenly said, “I’m not in the mood to go on the tour. You and Eva check it out, I’ll trust your reports,” then she walked over to the bar and poured herself a glass of white wine.

  An innocent enough action with her announcement, but it was also a signal. We were to investigate and if possible, prepare a data hack. If she’d poured a red wine, that would’ve been the signal to actually steal the data, but she was prompting us to investigate and set things up. It was a safe enough signal to choose, because she never drank wine outside of a single glass matched to dinner.

  It was clear she didn’t want to resort to espionage yet, but she wanted us to verify the possibility was on the table. We’d also have no better time to investigate that possibility, at the factory and wherever the demonstration was.

  “Of course, sweetheart. I’m sure things will turn out fine.”

  Evangelina giggled, “I have the perfect dress in mind, for our private tour, Damien,” she winked at me then moved into her bedroom.

  Fiona smiled after her, “She’s really something.”

  I chuckled, and then took her into my arms.

  The factory floor had three demonstration models, and they were quite a bit bigger than I was imagining. The subspace energy beam for instance was the same size as a bank of four eighteen-inch lasers, which likely meant only two of them would fit on a light cruiser instead of eight. I wasn’t impressed, as that would degrade our point defense capabilities and force us to trust our shields a lot more.

  The shield emitters were rather large as well, but I thought it’d take a major refit to upgrade the hull to support them. At least the energy beam could take the place of our current banks.

  The missile was much larger as well, again requiring a refit, as the launchers would have to be redesigned, and the hull modified.

  Lastly was the tri-space drive. That too was about three times larger than the subspace transition drive, but that wasn’t a problem since it would sit in engineering. We’d just need to find the space. It was the emitters on the hull that again, would require major changes. So upgrading the ships in the fleets would take a major refit, it might not even be worth it, and could be cheaper to build a whole new fleet, and either mothball the old one or disarm them and sell them to the private sector.

  The factory itself was huge, with molecular level fabricators the size of a house, several of them for each item. Even the ones that made the emitters were that large, because they’d make enough emitters simultaneously to cover a scout ship, it’d take multiple runs to make enough for the larger ships. There were a handful of working fabricators, but most seemed to be unused and looked brand new, which backed up our data that New Australia was not ready for a fight, making the queen’s actions seem insane.

  The whole enterprise would drain the Fellowships coffers, to build a new fleet and pay what were sure to be absurd prices to New Australia for the honor. In ten years we might just have to do it over again. It would be a nightmare, trying to keep an eye on the other interstellar governments, and match their building pace, a razor’s edge walk that could go very wrong.

  As usual, Evangelina was brilliant, as she looked around with emptyheaded fascination, and even left my side long enough to stroke all the devices with her hand, as if awed by the power of the things. What she was really doing was releasing a swarm of nanites that would map out their molecular design for fabrication. The nanites would be extremely hard to find. Of course, if she ever triggered the data transfer their security would pick up the quantum transmission, so actually following through on that would be plan C. it also wouldn’t yield the control software.

  What we really needed was the data, the science, math, and software package, but if we had to, we could settle for the designs and reverse engineering them, even as we made them. It was the worst of our options, but better than nothing.

  Our next stop was a ride in a shuttle up to a space station in orbit. Evangelina was pressed against me, and so far the guards had completely disregarded all of her emptyheaded antics. Which told me our hosts at least, had completely bought her cover as my new arm candy that couldn’t keep her hands off me. I supposed I could live with the shallow reputation as a result.

  Our guide, a Colonel Gates, was a military scientist and senior engineer with New Australia’s fleet. He was thin and tall at six foot two, but had a calm and distracted manner to him, as if he was working in his mind on his projects while absentmindedly guiding us through the tour. He had dark brown hair, and brown eyes.

  He said to Evangelina, “Please don’t wander off, or touch anything like you did in the factory. The research laboratory space station can be a dangerous place. There’s also a lot of security to ensure the integrity of our intellectual property, the rooms we’ll be visiting are two in number, don’t try to enter a third.”

  It was a bit amusing. His tone wasn’t threatening or suspicious of espionage. It was more like an adult trying to explain how dangerous something was to a child. It also told us that all the data we need was up on that station, of course all we dared do was assess their security at the moment.

  Evangelina’s eyes went wide, “Of course, sir. I won’t leave my lord’s side.”

  Gates nodded, “Excellent,” he turned to me, “The first room is a holographic simulator which will allow us to display an event taking place past the FTL line. We have no choice but to do it on station, because we have it all on a separate and highly secured quantum data network. There’s no access to it anywhere else.”

  That was both good to know and it made our jobs much harder. Of course, a quantum network could be tapped from anywhere in the universe, what he meant was the station was the only one with the security key access, which was probably not hackable. The only real route to success in this case was to get a copy of the key through local access to the computer systems. Which would likely be the most secure part of the station and require a physical assault to secure. Something we wanted to avoid.

  Of course, I was djinn, and they were taking me onto that station. Getting back on would be a simple matter if it came down to a mission of espionage by force.

  “I understand, the second room?”

  Gates frowned and his eyes unfocused, “One second.”

  I wondered what that was about, when my implant was sent a data burst from our fleet escort. It appeared that Admiral Cora Green had just brought in a second fleet of ships. One that had to have been lurking close the whole time, to get here just two hours after our dismal first meeting.

  So far the two Markham Alliance fleets were standing fast at the FTL line, but it was a clear message to Queen Allison. That tomorrow’s negotiations had better be more reasonable, or else. Given what we knew about her, talk softly and carry a big stick, it seemed the most likely scenario to unfold. My gut told me they’d hold fast at least a couple of more days.

  I was a little surprised she’d raised the stakes before Traven James, but perhaps the councilor was restricted in what he could do, until he updated the rest of the council and they voted on whether or not to initiate hostilities. Perhaps just Fiona and the admiral were authorized to act unilaterally for their governments.

  Regardless, things were heating up, and not in a good way.

  Gates shook his head, “Sorry, Lord Damien. I couldn’t ignore that contact. The second room we’ll be visiting has a small-scale laboratory device, where you’ll be able to actually verify everything that we’ve shown you is true and not some elaborate hoax.”

  I smiled, “I’m not an engineer, I’m sure you could whip something up to fool me in person. On the good side, I don’t think this is a hoax at all.”

  Gates shook his head, “Subspace energy has a well-known and unique effect on normal matter. There’s no way to fake what you’re going to see.”

  I chuckled, “I’ll have to take your word for it.”

  Gates laughed, “I guess, but your scientists at home will recognize the truth of it, when they see the recordings from your implant. You’ll have the chance to handle the test object being bombarded, so you’ll also be able to verify it’s not just a holographic or virtual simulation.”

  I nodded, “True enough.”

  By then we were approaching the station itself which was about half the size of a military space station or civilian station. Which meant it was huge and there were a lot of experiments going on in it. A space lab didn’t have crews and ships coming through, nor a tourist trade, nor the need for large cargo spaces, so even at half the size of most it was huge for its nature.

  It was probable we’d be docking right next to both rooms, a similar security precaution as they’d arranged at the palace. They’d want to limit exposure of the station to foreigners and even dignitaries from the planet.