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Nellie and the Nanites - Bk5 - Ch.7
🕑 Added 2024-11-14 09:00:05 +0000 UTCChapter Seven
Complications
Things had gotten awkward for Nellie pretty quickly following the award of the platinum badge. For a start, everyone suddenly started to refer to her as ‘Sage; as opposed to her actual title.
At least the antagonism seemed to have stopped.
She was escorted into the ‘college,’ seeing it was much less a city and much more a collection of laboratories and private libraries.
“Allow me to present Junior Lecturer Hart, who is spending his days investigating a lost language discovered on a distant planet. I am told her finds it quite the fascinating enterprise,” Steward Mills, the de-facto speaker for her escort, told her. The building in question appeared to be a wooden cottage, complete with thatch. For the life of her, Nellie could not think of a single reason to use wood and thatch at the top of a space station—Dome or not.
“Is that real thatching on the roof?” Nellie asked.
“It is indeed,” Mills replied, his smile suggesting he mistook her sense of disbelief for one of wonder. “We encourage our professors to undertake their research in an area that makes them feel at home.”
Nellie was led to the next building along the path lined with potted plants.
“This is the research laboratory of a Senior Lecturer, note the size,” Mills said. The building did seem much larger than the previous plot, but this was a glass and steel work of art instead of a quaint cottage. “This Senior Lecturer is undertaking a prolonged study on the effects of concentrated doses of focused light spectrums on various metal alloys. She hopes to be able to move the science of Hull Design forward by decades when she gets the final results.”
That actually sounded quite interesting, and Nellie asked how long they expected to wait for the results.
“Oh, this project will not even enter the final phase of data collection for almost thirty years. So, maybe forty years?” Mills looked thoughtful. “Yes, that sounds about right.”
“Forty years?” Nellie asked flatly.
“One must not rush those who are gifted,” Mills repeated with a smile. “It is something the Sagacity has learned over our long and storied history.”
They moved on, passing everything from the labs she would have expected to see in a hospital to the kind of mad scientist’s workshop that Nellie imagined Paren might set up when she wanted a hobby.
Building after building, each plot separated by the same walkways lined with potted plants. As the minutes stretched into hours, Nellie began to map out the number of projects she considered interesting.
There were actually a fair number of them. One she was most interested in was found in a corner plot right at the edge of the dome. It was the abode of a Junior Lecturer named Hays, who was working on a new way to form data storage matrices. He was attempting to double the data stored within the same amount of space without significantly increasing the power draw or cost.
It was a fantastic project, but it was getting almost completely overlooked. Nellie lost the battle to hold back her curiosity.
“Why is this project not given greater resources?” Nellie asked Mills. “It seems like a fantastic idea that would greatly benefit the Sagacity.”
“He is just a silver,” Mills replied as if that was all that needed to be said. “Besides, it seemed to be a mostly academic pursuit. Who cares how small or fast a data storage is? If you need more, just allocate it more space.”
Nellie refrained from pointing out that his attitude was exactly why so little was getting done here, but only just.
The tour had left Nellie with a strange mix of feelings about the Sagacity. They were clearly doing something right because they had a lot of really talented people up here. If she was to guess, there were more researchers within the ‘College’ than Nellie had people in the Imperium unless she included the new planet.
And yet, the Imperium would run absolute rings around them because the Imperium worked together, and the Sagacity did not.
Hundreds of skilled minds working on random projects would never compete with her people and their laser focus on what they all needed. So, yeah, Nellie had mixed opinions.
Mills delivered Nellie to a suite of rooms where they said she and her guard could wait for an hour until the formal negotiations began.
Nellie used the time to check in with the Harbinger instead.
Everything was fine, although the constant attempts to get deep scans through the hull were starting to irritate Morton. They would fail, but still, the pinging was hard to ignore.
Berenice and Bryant were apparently taking bets on how long he would last before he opened a comm line and swore at the station control tower about it.
Nellie bet he would last at least another hour, but she did feel a little guilty about it.
A woman in grey came in, carrying a tray of tiny sandwiches and delicate pastries. Even as they entered the room, Nellie’s mouth watered.
“Sage,” the woman said, bowing and holding out the tray.
Nellie noticed the woman was not wearing a robe. Her grey clothes were just that—clothes. There was another difference about this woman that Nellie noticed right away. She was sick. Not in a significant way or anything particularly serious, but just a low-level thing. It was in the slight sheen of sweat and the grey pallor of her skin. It was a slight thinning of her hair, and how Nellie could see the receding gums when the woman offered a nervous smile.
“Hello,” Nellie said, “This is very nice, thank you.”
“Sage,” The woman bowed again and turned to go.
“Wait,” Nellie called.
“May I offer anything else, Sage?” The woman asked, trembling slightly.
“No, I’m fine. Can you answer a couple of questions for me?” Nellie asked.
“If I can, Sage, but I am only an Iron Badge. I have no wisdom to offer.”
Nellie tried not to make a face at the remark.
“Why are you not wearing a robe like the other people I have met here?” Nellie asked.
“Robes are for faculty, Sage. The Iron Badges only serve in the College.”
“I see, and do all Iron Badges serve like this?” Nellie asked.
“No, Sage. It is an honor given only to the sick. We are allowed to see the heights of knowledge before we pass.”
“Pass?” Nellie frowned. “You are not that sick.”
“My sickness is costly,” the woman replied, looking at the floor. “The cost of curing it exceeds the value I may bring to the Sagacity during my lifetime.”
“Ostie!” Nellie leaped to her feet, making the woman shy away. “That’s just evil!”
“It is as it is, Sage,” the woman said.
The doors opened before Nellie could say more, and the woman fled.
“Greetings, Sage.”
Nellie turned to look at the new arrival. He wore layered robes in several colors, including black. Small scars on the side of his face showed the signs of cosmetic surgery. Given the recent conversation with the Iron Badge, it pissed Nellie off even more than she had been before.
“I am Dean Fairleigh; it will be my honor to escort you to the negotiations for diplomatic ties between our peoples.” He inclined his head in a slight bow. “Perhaps you could follow me?”
“One moment,” Nellie said. “I have some questions about the woman who just served me.”
“Rest assured, her condition is not transmissible in any way,” The Dean again gestured towards the door. “Any questions you have may be addressed in the negotiations.”
“Very well,” Nellie clamped down on her anger. She was here to stop things from escalating, not make them worse. She repeated that to herself as she followed the overdressed prick through halls decorated with gold and lined with tech.
Okay, so she wasn’t doing a great job so far, but she was working on it.
Her instinct was to demand they change the rules or face her flagship at point-blank range, but that was not likely to be very effective in the long term.
The simple fact was that the Imperium could not simply attack everyone who did something she personally disagreed with.
Well, they could… but it wouldn’t end well for the Imperium.
Nellie had to remember that.
They arrived in an ornate room with vaulted ceilings and heavy drapes in rich colors. A large dais in the center of the room held a long stone table inlaid with an elaborate geometric pattern in black and white. Five chairs sat on one side of the table, four of them occupied, with the center one empty.
The Dean ushered her to the single chair and took his place on the other side.
“Shall we begin?” He smiled.
“Allow me to introduce Steward Wellesley,” He pointed out a smiling woman at the far left. She was doing her best to appear relaxed, but a slight flush was on her cheeks. It was all the more subtle because of her red hair, but nothing could hide from Nellie’s nanite-improved senses. “Bursar Hopkins,” The man beside Wellesley was thin, bald, and pale. Not in an unhealthy way, but more lean and hungry looking. “Librarian Oliviet,” the man on the far right was cheerful-looking and almost painfully bland. “And, of course, Administrator Pielman.” The woman looked like that one receptionist in the local doctor’s office would cancel your appointment if you were 0.5 seconds late but would cheerfully insist you would have to wait three hours when you did turn up. “Together, we make up the senior staff of the college. It will be our honor to speak to you today, Sage.”
“Pleased to meet you all,” Nellie said politely. “Shall we get started?”
“Of course,” Wellesley said, “I am sure you are most busy.”
“Such a lot to do after a prolonged battle,” Pielman added.
“Much to account for,” the Bursar nodded.
“Such a waste of a real intellect,” Librarian Oliviet said with a small smile. “Especially of a Sage’s intellect.”
“We can get to that in a moment,” Fairleigh glared at Oliviet before turning to Nellie with his well-practiced smile back in place. “This should be simple, Sage. All we request is that a couple of small items are agreed upon, and we can move forward in peace and cooperation.”
“I am listening,” Nellie replied, attempting to fix a smile on her face. It didn’t feel natural… this politics thing was going to take a little getting used to.
“Firstly, we would require formal recognition of the Sagacity’s sovereignty and the borders between our two peoples,” Fairleigh said.
“Naturally, that would include a clear understanding not to violate those borders,” Pielman noted. “And only to have military personnel and vehicles cross those borders when agreed upon mutually.”
“I have no objection to that, of course,” Nellie nodded. “But I would expect an exception to be made if we are once again attacked from within Sagacity space. In that occurrence, I would wish an agreement that my forces may enter and destroy the attackers while avoiding any damage to the Sagacity itself, of course.”
“We would be willing to consider that,” Fairleigh admitted with a nod. “In exchange, we would like permission to enter your space to detain criminals and return them to the Sagacity for punishment.”
“That would be difficult for me to accept,” Nellie said carefully. “While I would be happy to have the Marshalls detain criminals fleeing the Sagacity, they would have to have committed a crime that was also illegal within the Imperium. It would also have to be a crime we consider serious.”
“I scarcely see why your opinions of their crimes would matter,” Oliviet said.
“Because they are in my space,” Nellie replied dryly.
“And so we come to the first stumbling block,” Wellesley said. “Perhaps we can meet in the middle somewhere?”
They exchanged words for a few minutes, but Nellie was not willing to give very much on this point. For one thing, she suspected they were well aware Bryant and his people had gone to the Imperium, and for another, their list of crimes might include what Berenice and the Marshalls had done while rescuing the hostages. They had docked under false names, and so on.
Trying not to be aggressive with neighbors she disagreed with was one thing, but Nellie would never sell out her own people for an agreement.
“I can agree to consider each request on a case-by-case basis,” Nellie offered, “But I can not agree to anything more.”
I see,” Fairleigh nodded gravely. “In that case, we would have to do the same when it came to your military entering our space to pursue attackers.”
Nellie tapped her fingers on the table while she thought.
“Very well, but I have to admit that this might become a point of contention in the future should the Sagacity once again host an enemy fleet attacking our people.”
“We had no choice about accepting the Imperial Line’s actions,” The Dean said severely. “They have the ability to threaten more than just the three sectors involved in the dispute.”
“Or they did,” Wellesley muttered to herself.
The talks were much simpler after that, with most of it amounting to fine-tuning what they had already said in general terms. They agreed about exactly which jump points were considered the border or what counted as a Sagacity ship and what did not, the definition of what counted as a military action and what was a police action, and so on.
Truthfully, it was tedious in the extreme, but Nellie was able to keep herself entertained and engaged by spinning off parts of her mind to examine each of the senior staff members and their reactions in detail. This helped her catch their reactions a little more quickly and made sure she noted the things that mattered to them, as opposed to those that they only pretended to care about.
Things stalled out again once it came to the matter of trade.
“While we would be willing to allow traders from the Imperium to dock here and sell their wares, the Sagacity, at this time, would not be able to sell goods to them in return,” Bursar Hopkins said with fake regret, “Due to two outstanding issues.”
“And what are those?” Nellie asked.
“The first is the fact that we are due compensation for the items taken from our system after the recent unpleasantness ended. Your ships came and claimed salvage from within our borders.” He shook his head. “A great loss of resources for us.”
“We were the ones who destroyed those ships,” Nellie replied, her voice carefully flat to avoid any hint of a threat. “During a time of war.”
“Indeed,” the Bursar nodded. “I am referring to the time after the end of the blockade but before this meeting.”
“You could simply have signaled your interest in the salvage,” Nellie said. “We would have left it alone in that case. We were simply clearing up a mess that occurred as a result of our defending our people. Would you have preferred we leave unattended wreckage in your system?”
“Valuable wreckage,” Hopkins noted. “We did not yet know of your Sage status and could not have been expected to understand how reasonable you were likely to be about the matter.”
“As a gesture of goodwill, I would be happy to promise that should something like this happen again, we will not claim the salvage remaining after the threat has passed.” Nellie shrugged. “As for compensation, we could claim compensation ourselves for the Sagacity allowing the Line to attack from within your systems.”
“As we already covered, they were too big a threat for us to offer resistance,” Fairleigh said quickly.
“Which is why we have not pressed the matter of compensation ourselves.”
“Nevertheless,” Bursar Hopkins jumped in again. “We do feel a debt is owed.”
“And the other matter?” Nellie asked. She wanted to buy time for Berenice to calculate how much the Sagacity might reasonably expect in return for the scrap. Giving it back was out of the question. It had already been repurposed into Jump Rings, supplies for the new system, and more.
“Bad faith trading practice,” Hopkins said, his mouth turning down at the corners. “Trading under a false name and false registry. I hesitate to discuss such base matters, but it is a consideration I must make in my role as Bursar.”
“Not to mention obtaining Sagacity Training Modules under false pretenses,” Oliviet added.
“How were they false?” Nellie asked. “They were given to allow Crush to bring them back and use them to introduce learning to our people, and that is exactly what they will be used for.”
“That was when they were going to a neutral party.” Oliviet didn’t snap, but Nellie could tell she wanted to.
“Are we not, now, a neutral party?” Nellie asked. “Perhaps even moving towards a friendly relationship?”
“We do not consider it a friendly act to obtain our technology in that manner,” Oliviet snapped now, earning herself a glare from the Dean.
“Very well,” Nellie shrugged. “We will return them. One was stolen by the Line, but it was destroyed along with them. Recordings will be provided to certify that, of course. Other than that, they will be returned to you unused and unopened.”
“You will?” Oliviet looked surprised.
Nellie just smiled and nodded. They had already scanned the things down to the last detail, not to mention copied the information and programs contained in them. The actual units were just a bonus, really.
“Certainly, but the gesture was appreciated at the time,” Nellie nodded. “They appeared extremely useful.”
“Perhaps we could consider gifting a unit or two in the future,” Oliviet allowed.
“Once the other issue is dealt with,” the Bursar cut in. “We have calculated the estimated worth of the items removed.”
Nellie looked at the datapad he handed her, seeing an amount nearly double what Berenice had estimated.
“We had the cost at nearly half this amount.”
“I included a punitive cost,” Hopkins said. “As a gesture of goodwill from you to us.”
“Good will certainly seems to be lacking,” Nellie replied with a sigh. “You want your machines back and now want us to pay punitive damages.”
Everyone was quiet while she considered things for a moment, running various ideas through her head. When she didn’t speak for a full minute, the Dean stepped in.
“Things seem to have become unexpectedly difficult,” he said, “We were expecting you would offer to return the materials, perhaps with some additional materials as well.”
“The punitive amount could be decreased,” the Bursar added, “depending on the materials in question.”
“That is not possible,” Nellie said simply. “They have already been processed into the Imperium. They no longer exist.”
“Already?” Hopkins gaped. “How?”
“That is our matter,” Nellie replied flatly.
“In that case,” Hopkins said, shaking himself out of his shock, “we would consider the exchange of land within the Imperium for the cost.”
“You want me to give you some of my territory?” Nellie narrowed her eyes at the suggestion. She was still a little touchy about people trying to take shit from her.
“We are merely attempting to resolve the issue,” Dean Fairleigh said quickly. “We would not insist on it, of course.”
“In that case, let me make a counteroffer,” Nellie replied. “You can not afford to give medical support to your Iron Badges. Perhaps we can establish a free health depot on the Benediction?”
“Ah, you misunderstand,” Hopkins said. “We can afford it; we simply see it as a waste of resources.”
“A waste of resources,” Nellie repeated to herself while several thought processes devoted themselves to repeating the phrase ‘don’t kill him’ to try and keep herself calm.
“It is marginally cheaper to allow them to serve within the college,” Oliviet nodded. “Unless they have a physical disability, or course.”
“Do not think us heartless,” Fairleigh added. “We do heal any communicable diseases, and the cost of allowing them to live on until they die is considerable.”
“Barely offset by their service here,” Hopkins added.
“Then why not let me take them off your hands?” Nellie asked.
“What?” Fairleigh asked.
“Your sick Iron Badges,” Nellie said. “I will make them citizens of the Imperium and undertake their care. That would remove the considerable cost.”
“It would need to be an ongoing agreement,” Hopkins added quickly. “For, say, ten years?”
“We could then renew it if both parties are happy,” Nellie nodded. “I assume they would be willing to give up their Sagacity citizenship?”
“They would have it withdrawn,” Fairleigh said with a happy smile. “An ongoing agreement will be a fantastic step forward for our people.”
“A trade agreement would then be possible?” Nellie pressed.
“As soon as you collect the first group of Iron Badges,” Hopkins nodded.
“How many are there right now?” Nellie asked.
“Around seventy on this station,” Pielman said immediately.
“In that case, they can report to the Harbinger as soon as they are ready,” Nellie stood. “I brought the Learning Modules with me. I can return them at the same time. So, we have an agreement?”
“Indeed,” Fairleigh stood. “May this be the start of a long and positive relationship between our two great societies!”
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