[X] Argue that you should arm the Blues
<<There's one other thing we have to consider here,>> you say. <<The detonator I found earlier. It was a pretty advanced piece of work. Standard components but expert assembly..>>
<<Echo Chamber?>> Juketta asks. <<If they're directly arming the Purples? Maybe they know the Blues are connected to the Reds and the River?>>
<<No, I actually don't think so.>> Selko says. <<Echo Chamber and the Purples are not getting on at the negotiations. It could be performance but I get the feeling the Purples are deeply uncomfortable with the presence of the Mockmaids. Given their ideology it's hard to see what kind of deal could be done there. Selling out the species they're representing for a war that would result in many of them dying would destroy their reputation, and they might not even win the resulting war. The Nereidi have far more to offer the Chrysanthemum than the Mockmaids.>> She pauses, and sighs. <<You think it's Dandelion, don't you?>>
<< Who do you think was backing Menti and the Notables? Their whole plan was to drive you into a war with the Nereidi to prevent us asking them about the Diplomat. This is just a continuation of that. They want a monopoly over the Diplomat's data. They don't care if they have to back the government of the Notables or the Purples providing they can create enough conflict to stop communication.>>
<<It's that important to them is it? They'd be willing to start a war to back all this evil just to stop us from gaining the knowledge of the Diplomat?>>
<<The first thing they did was send Echo Chamber to secure the temple with the murals of them>>
<<People died! They were murdered and left. Some of them haven't even been returned to the river of the dead yet!>> She pauses, and Juketta texts you that she's conferring with the three of them, probably asking if you're telling the truth. Eternalists may lie sometimes, but it would be safe to say none of them would lie about someone like this.
<<If the group that corrupted the government of the Notables so thoroughly is now working to create a Neredi civil war then I am honour bound as an agent of the Committee to try to stop them. For their crimes against us if nothing else. I will authorise you to begin arming the Blues. But we also need to find the agent or agents of theirs down here and remove them from play.>>
<<The agent they have doing it is probably inside Echo Chamber.>> Reizay says. <<If you could get access to their informational systems we might be able to figure out who made it. Unless they have the private space fabs on board weapons unrestricted.>>
<<I'll need to talk to them anyway.>> It would still be useful to try to get them on side for this if you can do it without tipping your hand. That probably requires an in the flesh meeting, but while they have something of a bloody reputation, they probably won't break a parley that they agree to themselves. In their line of work you need to maintain a reputation for integrity or nobody will trust you enough to work with you. It's other people's parleys they don't respect.
<<Alright. Luyu, can you work with Second Level to get the arms transfer arranged?>>
<<Sure. Reizay, make sure we've got a clear line. We can't afford for this to leak.>>
Things speed up a bit after that. You consult Second Level on what's been agreed, and give her one of your own communications units to get in touch with Luyu. Then you return to the ship, listening to Luyu and second level hash out how to get production systems to them without it being detected, talking over the finer points of stealth delivery drones and quietly obtaining fabricator feedstock.
<<This takes me back.>> Luyu says as your transport worm arrives at the docking bay.
<<You've worked with a lot of aliens before?>>
<<Oh yeah. A lot of low tech or low territory species get indie conflict specialists like me. Governments and Committees prefer to have their own fighters do the work whenever they can. But aliens often can't do that. So they hire people like me. I've built up a bunch of resistance movements in my time.>>
<<What kind of things do they offer you?>>
<<Oh you know. Art usually. A lot of people will go nuts for alien art. Sometimes rare materials if they have them. There's a lot of interesting stuff in most ecologies, you just have to make sure that the natives are the one to exploit it rather than some throat cutting merchant coop.. But even just a testimonial is valuable. It looks really good when you can broadcast some cute fuzzy alien telling people how you saved them. Gets you lots of work.>>
<<Sounds a lot like what the Echos are doing really.>>
<<Yeah, that's exactly what they're doing. TBQH I imagine that trying to shoot an archeology video essayist didn't help much and they want to rebuild their rep.>>
You arrive at the bay and head inside. There's a large pavilion of gleaming grey synthetic cloth now set up around the side of the submarine, expanding its footprint and giving a more Gardenian style exterior. Mirareki waves as you arrive at the door where she's on guard a carbine hanging across her body and Luyu's drone gun at her feet.
"How was it out there?"
"Stressful." You step past her and into the comforting light of the antechamberand the low static hiss of decontamination nanomachines. You're kind of glad to be out of the Nereidi city. It's dark and damp and has no aesthetic that any human would choose. "How are things here?"
"Tense. Our sensors say that the Neredi neutral crests are checking out the entry to the bay every so often. That's why I'm out here."
"I'll come relieve you in a few hours."
"Nah. Just keep at it. I'm at a total loose end here. This is fine."
You nod and slip into the well lighted interior of the pavilion. It's a very Gardenian structure with its touches of plants and great screen views of rolling vistas. And it's warm, with none of the damp cold of the Nereidi stone. You find a couch, and a server robot brings you hot, spiced coffee, and then you settle down to call Echo Chamber. You create a virtual environment for the call, something a bit more private than an audio call but a bit more showy and formal than just calling her on your head link.
It doesn't take long for them to connect, and you find yourself looking at a woman in a Luyu tall combat body. She's dark skinned, as dark as you, but her hair is even darker rather than your own silver. Neatly groomed cat ears stick up through her hair. The base body is one of the Amazon series, but it's so mod you can't fully specify it. Assuming this is even an accurate representation of her body rather than a mask.
"Well now, if it isn't Stella Anastasius." She smiles "I'm surprised you'd call us given we were hired to kill you." She says 'hired' to shock, a deliberate flex towards the River's hated ideology.
"Diplomacy makes strange bedfellows." You shrug. "Besides. We were in that River complex too. We saw how brave your clients were."
She blinks a bit, and you see her face soften. But it doesn't last. She turns her voice brusque and businesslike. Like all high end conflict specialists, she has great control over her micro-expressions and a great ability to read them, but you don't think she's a social specialist specifically.
"I'm Raid Leader Scrape. I'm basically top of the chain down here. So why are you calling?"
You hold up the detonator and send her footage of it being found. She pauses, reviews it, and looks at you. "You could have faked this."
"Have your infowarriors scrutinise it if you like." You shrug. When you took the footage you made sure to watermark it with a set of embedded verification signals that show when it was done and that it really came from your eyes.
Scrape's ears twitch angrily. "Did you contact us just to make accusations?"
"I contacted you because I don't want a war that will result in tens of thousands of deaths among your brave clients. Are you aware that someone is trying to push the Blues and Purples into a war? A war the Blues will lose, leaving the Purples in control?"
"When you say someone, you're saying its one of my people."
"We both know that it's almost certainly an agent of Dandelion."
She looks at you, put out, then laughs. "I suppose there isn't any need for secrecy between us is there? Tell me, do the Communion know that you're hosting a shade of the Fire of Disorder in your head? I'll bet not."
You shrug, nonchalantly. "Is that the rumour they fed you? It's just an AI. It keeps my personality together. I wish it was some super famous posthuman."
She smiles a little, and sits forward. "Let me tell you a story, puppet. Some contacts of ours inside Firewatch came to us. They said 'Hey, you're the best and you can keep a secret, we need some freaky alien shit secured'. They're often a good time, and their name means a lot to many people in the underground. But you can't always trust them, so we went to the Chrysanthemum to check out the job, and they told us "sure." and so here we are, tasked to hunt you down like a dog." She smiles. "Only, then we get the Chrysanthemum's inspection division and the pink haired squirt on our asses, and find our contract is for some some entity that we've never heard of that might not even be in Firewatch at all. So we start to wonder, did we actually get the full story of the contract? And just what is Dandelion?"
"So what do you want from me?" You ask.
"I think a little trade. I want to know what you know about Dandelion. In return, we can deal from there."
"I'm not going to just tell you that, you could be their agent inside Echo Chamber."
She frowns. "So what do you want, and what do you offer?"
You think carefully. If you ask for too much and offer too little you're unlikely to stay onside.
Demand? (Tick One)
[ ] A chance to investigate them and find the mole
[ ] …and access to their fabricators to arm the blues (will be revealed only if she ends up not being the agent of Dandelion)
[ ] …and the information they've got on Dandelion
[ ] …and access to the mockmaids to ask them about the diplomat
Offer (Tick as many as you like. Whatever a majority votes for gets in)
[ ] The information you have on Dandelion if you find out she's clean.
[ ] Access to the Nereidi translation systems you have
[ ] Help getting the Communion on side for Mockmaid protection and independence
[ ] Help getting the Blues on side for Mockmaid protection and independence
[ ] Help getting the Communion on side with favourable protection contracts after the crisis.
[ ] Give them access to the massive fabricators on your deep ship
[ ] The information your Shalathri have on the Sky-One Weapon, presumably now in Echo Chamber's hands
