LF Friends, Will Travel

A diplomatic rush job

"Well I can bring this up to parliament, your offer, then we can decide whether to ally with you after considering it carefully."

Claire shook her head, a more frantic desperate look appearing in her eyes.

"Trust me, we don't have the time. Normally we don't do this, we'd like to do this properly: Wine and dine you, make sure everyone is happy, and do the whole diplomatic shebang. But, as soon as I stop talking with you, your ex-masters will be allowed to strong-arm you again they're going to say some scary things and you might end up slipping back into a bad situation."

Once again she pointed up, leading my view to once again focus on the heads of the Ion Technoratti. They seemed to be angrily shouting at each other, occasionally gesturing in our direction. I returned my focus back to the strange Terran as she continued to speak.

"We gotta act quick because if they realize that's happening, that your species is about to join us, they'll start trying to hide the members of your species they already have under debt bondage. That's why you need to get those laws passed within the hour, then we can sign the agreement. After that, I'll file the request for extradition of all Terran Alliance members from Technoratti space, which at that point will also include every Schuvva currently under the 'care' of the Technoratti."

Claire looked at me for a moment, voice turning from the bubbly happy self to a more serious look as she mentioned our people's predicament, before handing me yet another item, a datapad.

"That's everything to know about the races in our alliance, our history, the exact details of the agreement. You can leave at any time, but we can at the very least fix your slavery problem".

My head was a blur, my ears swivelling frantically as the whiplash of the situation kicked in. One moment I had been worrying about being at the mercy of the Estorians, but now I was being... Offered a way out?

Not that I believed it, we had quickly learned there is no such thing as charity in the galaxy, everyone wants something.

"What would the tithe be, what is the cost to ally with the Terrans?"

A stern grimace appeared on her face, a finger outstretched as if chiding a pup instead of talking with a diplomat.

"Firstly, you wouldn't be allying with the Terrans, you would be part of an alliance of over 425 species. We are not the ones in charge, the Terran Alliance isn't even its official name. Nobody could decide what to call it and the unofficial name kinda stuck. We are not the leaders or masters of our members, no matter what some others might say"

There was a pause as Claire seemed to take a breath, their grimace being removed by a more neutral happy expression, returning to the more 'natural' energetic state that permeated this person.

"As for costs... You'd need to change the laws I gave you to be eligible to join. There's a set of core laws which can be summed up as 'Don't be a murdering slaving fuckface'. We'd expect you to pay for half the HyperLane we're going to build to connect you up to the rest of the alliance for trade and military movement, and membership costs 0.1% of your GDP for general admin costs, although this is reduced at 0.05% for the probationary year. There are a few more restrictions, you can't declare war on people, there's a handful of other empires we have agreements not to interact with, that kind of thing."

I shook my head. None of this could be real. I must have passed out while screaming at the Technoratti head and I was now dreaming. A supposed alliance of protection and cooperation. It was the kind of tale we wrote about before we reached the stars: A myth you told to pups to keep them happy.

"What's the catch?"

Claire shook her head for a moment, before pulling out her GalNet connector and passing it to me.

"That really is everything, there's no catch. Look, you might understand it better if you look at this. I may have 'leaked' a video of you screaming at the Technoratti. Mostly in order to speed up the process on our end."

There, on the device in front of me, was a video of myself: stood up straight on the table, screaming my lungs off at the insulting offer I'd been given. The video had the title "Angry Bunny" and seemingly had over 2 billion views in a mere 15 minutes.

The real shock was the comments.

⇢ MalachitePyrrhuloxia posted: Holy shit it's adorable.

⇢ AridRayne posted: It's so fluffy I'm going to die!

⇢ KnucklesMacKellough posted: So it's basically a large bunny made out of a cloud. I love it.

⇢ Certain_Song5377 posted: I want one.

↳ Intrebute replied: It's a person, you can't own people asshole

↳↳ Certain_Song5377 replied: Fine I want to be its friend

↳↳↳ Intrebute replied: Better.

⇢ Certain_Song5377 posted: I looked them up. It's a Schuvva. They're under a weird slavery for protection deal.

↳ CobaltPyramid replied: Wait someone is slaving these things?! Fuck that!

↳ Alfonze423 replied: Group trip with some spacecraft and weapons to free em?

↳↳ newyorkxity replied: I'm in, I got an old Great Colony Rebellions fighter with updated weapons

↳↳↳ butterscoxh replied: Road trip to free the cloud bunnies!

Claire seemed to look slightly concerned as I read, giving a small tired sigh.

"Yea... I'm going to have to keep an eye on that. There is a fifty-fifty chance that they actually will turn up with weapons in Technoratti space, which would be a huge diplomatic incident."

I couldn't understand what was happening. I hadn't even met a Terran before, but now random people that I had never met, from a species I had no connection to, were all making plans to invade a powerful nation for us. Because of a single video of me shouting.

"What would you want of us?"

With that Claire gave another sigh, a sadness creeping into her eyes once again.

"Look, I know your entry into the galaxy wasn't the best, but this really is everything we want, there's no hidden motives here. Though if I was you I'd start planning for a huge tourism influx, since as soon as it's possible, other Terrans are going to want to visit the planet of 'Cloud bunnies'".

Could this be as simple as it was being advertised as?

"But why?"

That question caused Claire to laugh.

"Terrans are weird, we will literally bond with anything, especially if that thing is fluffy. Any moron can be a conqueror or force others to be a protectorate through threats of violence."

"We'd much rather be friends."