“Attention unidentified corvette. Identify yourself immediately or prepare to merge with whatever manifestation of the Infinite suits your gullibility.”
“This is Ambassador Carcinogennifer Honeyvenom, duly appointed representative plenipotentiary of the just and righteous government of Her Glorious Majesty Queen Catherine of Britannia, aboard the diplomatic vessel Cut N Run. I bear an important message for Admiral Pandora of the New Prussian Space Fleet.”
“Of course you do. I mean, you guys have to beg for mercy at some point or other. We just didn’t expect it quite so soon. We haven’t had time to bake your surrender cake yet.”
The Ambassador waits patiently for the avian chuckling to die down.
“Yes, quite. The NP Navy’s hospitality is legendary, et cetera. But my message bears more importance than your garden-variety cry of uncle.”
“I don’t see how it could. You planet is encircled. Your fleet, such as it is, is blockaded. I am told that the lamentation of your civilian spouses is nearly as loud as the cries of your freshly orphaned hatchlings. Where else could priorities lie in your neighborhood?”
“The conversation must begin with a discussion of your priorities.”
“Mine? My priorities, according to my orders, are to open fire in about seven seconds, so…”
“No, not yours personally, Space Budgie. Your Admiral’s.”
“…what did you call me?!”
“Look, I know why New Prussia is sending the better part of its not-all-that-huge spacefleet to invade a quaint but strategically inconvenient backwater on the arse end of Charybdis, and it’s not because a full-scale war with New Britannia is a particularly entertaining hobby. Is your ship named the Pyrrhus, after all? No, our planet is low on most inorganic raw materials, is poorly placed for strategic advancement, and tends toward a particularly feather-ruffling humidity during the lengthy rainy seasons. In short, it’s useless as an uninhabited planet. Therefore, there’s something about Weatherby that New Prussia desires enough to seize by force, and it requires the extant population and economies and infrastructure in order to retain its value. You aren’t going to level our cities and exterminate our population; you need them to stay more or less exactly as they are.”
“Did you think that up all by yourself, Lizard? I hope it didn’t overheat your brain. Maybe you should crawl back into the shade for a while.”
“You haven’t kept up with the local news, have you? Civil war was already at hand before your fleet arrived. The infrastructure is mined, booby-trapped at every key juncture. All you have succeeded in doing is uniting the Weatherbeans against you, just when they were about to tear each other apart and do your work for you. And the very next thing that will happen is that Weatherby’s Sea Pea freedom fighters will detonate all you sought to exploit from our humble planet the moment you enter the gravity well.”
“So why are you telling us this now?”
“To save my own skin, of course. I’m a Space Lizard. I have on my person the most current military plans of the Weatherbean government. Troop deployments, reserves, strategies, tactics… everything. And due to my connections at a certain luncheon club, I happen to be equally well-versed in the revolutionary movement’s disposition as well. All information that the Admiral would require to make his expedition remotely profitable, let alone successful.”
“So I guess you’ll need to pass that information through me.”
“I guess not, Star-Pigeon. I need to see the Admiral at once. In person. And alone.”
The comm goes quiet for a long few moments.
“No deal, Scales. The Boss doesn’t believe a syllable of it. And it’s exactly what he’d expect from a cold-blooded profiteer like you.”
“Then why are you still talking, Featherbrain? Why hasn’t he given you the order to wipe me off your screen yet?”
Another long, uncomfortable silence.
WHAT WILL THE ADMIRAL SAY? DOES AMBASSADOR HONEYVENOM LAND HER FACE-TO-BEAK INTERVIEW?
Well, let’s see which way the dice rolls.
