The Unseen War

Chapter 8

Earth Year 3010, July 30th

Twenty-Nine Months after the Attack

Qhil had been trying to make contact with any human of status for the last month. So far the negotiations had been completely turned off. Every time that he managed to get someone to answer the call, it would only take them ten seconds to cut the transmission. I had tried to handle some of the calls but they would cut me off as well. As soon as we started to talk about needing to contact government officials, no one would let us continue.

It felt insane what we were trying to do. We had to stay close enough in range of Headliner Relays so the transmission latency wasn't too bad. But we also had to be sure about staying out of the paths of any human patrols. We would send a transmission after our Sibylline Core was recharged, and then when they would cut off the transmission we would make a Pass to keep ourselves safe. Our options were getting limited the more time we spent near the relays.

I hadn't understood why Qhil and the Regored were hiding until I flew the Proto Guardian. The power behind that machine had been world shattering for the ideas that I had on power in this war. People would definitely be willing to start a war for this kind of power. I had the feeling that the Mobile Guardian would be just as formidable as the Proto Guardian.

Qhil had recently mentioned a new project that he wouldn't tell me about. The only thing he would say was that it was going to be even bigger than the Proto Guardian. I hoped that he meant that figuratively, the Proto Guardian was quite sizable already.

I still wasn't sure why Qhil thought I would be a good ambassador. Whenever we managed to make contact, the conversations didn't last long enough for me to be of much use. I also wasn't important enough to make someone of a high enough ranking take notice. Even if I was that important, I wouldn't be able to put a stop to the aggression against the Taggon.

I had also been struggling with being unable to contact Sia. At this point, I was probably declared dead. Outside of sending a message straight to a strike force, there wasn't a way for me to contact her.

At the moment our position was closer to Qhil's planet, Sedronia. Qhil's hope was that would be able to sit near a Headliner Relay that wasn't going to force us to Pass after every contact. We had hoped that we would be able to contact earth and then go there to begin negotiations. If we were captured there were only two options, I would have to fight and kill human soldiers or we were going to have to destroy the Proto Guardian. Neither option was appealing. Qhil mentioned that the Proto Guardian and the Mobile Guardian were the only two working Guardians at the moment. That had to mean there were more issues with the technology than just driver issues, I just hoped they were fixed at this point. Either that or I might randomly explode while practicing. I had managed to cheat death a couple of times recently, but I doubt that I would survive exploding inside a Guardian armor.

Suddenly the intercom buzzed to life. "McMillan, come to the bridge." Qhil said. "We have someone willing to listen."

It was the first good news that I had heard in a while. I made my way to the bridge and walked in while Qhil was mid conversation.

"...the biggest issue is us having to come to earth, and the rumor is that Dilails have begun to attack Taggon ships that are near Elvara."

"How about I make my way to you?" A French accent came through the transmission. A display in front of Qhil showed who he was talking to. It was a man I had never met but had seen his face before. His name was William Faucheur, he was pretty high up the chain, he was French and part of the East Government.

Earth has two major governments at this time. The United States, Europe and Asia made up one side of the government while China, Russia and Africa made up the other side. Australia had been taken by Africa, South America had been taken by the United States. The northern half of Canada had been turned into nothing more than oil fields and production factories. Most of Europe had taken up residence in the southern half of Canada. Japan, India and the last of Australia had taken their residence in South America. The wars had been long and brutal but after two generations of fighting, mankind had divided into two major powers. China, Russia and Africa called themselves the East while the United States, Europe and Asia called themselves the West. A man named Malcolm Blackwood was the leader of the West while Alioth Winter was the leader of the East. When this most recent war had started, Malcolm Blackwood had offered to support Winter. Neither side had any grudges at this point, they were just two halves of the same planet. I had originally been from the West but had moved to the East after my family died.

"You want to come to Sedronia, to Qronia?" Qhil was asking.

"If you and your people are willing to allow a small ship in, maybe we can work something out." Faucheur said. "Or maybe we should set up a rendezvous point in neutral space. Then we don't have to worry so much about the politics of meeting with our enemies publicly."

Qhil seemed to be mulling it over. I understood his apprehension, sitting at a neutral point in space waiting for an 'enemy' to show up. "Where would you want to meet?" He asked after a moment of silence.

"What if we met at Dicury, the mining planet in the Higher Quadrant?" William had chosen a spot that would be hard to ambush. It was probably one of the closest planets that didn't have a large population. There were few normal routes from Dicury if you were to make a sudden Pass. Gathering a large force there would be noticeable.

"When would you wish to meet there?" Qhil asked.

"How would sixty hours from now work for you?" Maybe I was just being suspicious but it felt like there was a coldness to Faucheur. It was an irritating feeling in the back of my mind. Was this simply a trap? Qhil had said that one of the human governing forces had commissioned the original mining suit that had become the Guardians. Was it possible that Faucheur was involved? Probably not directly otherwise Qhil would have recognized him.

"Maybe we can do one hundred twenty hours?" Qhil's voice broke through my thoughts.

"Sounds perfect, in five days' time we will meet at Dicury to diplomatically discuss a possible cease fire." There was definitely something more behind Faucheurs voice, but I couldn't say it was betrayal for sure.

"Hopefully we can end this without anymore bloodshed, Mr. Faucheur." Qhil said. The transmission ended and Qhil turned to me. "What do you think?"

"I think you were crazy to double the amount of time that Faucheur had given. I'm pretty sure it's going to be a trap but it would have been a lot harder for them to set up a trap if they didn't have five days."

"The five days' time is for me. I believe that I will be able to finish my next project before then and I want you to be as ready as you can be." Qhil went silent for a moment. "Speaking of my next project, can you help me with some things today?"

I agreed to help him, it was either that or sit around worrying about the possible trap at Dicury. There was a pit in my stomach, something big was coming. I hoped that we would be able to get out of it alive.

. . .

Qhil had me testing out different designs on control sticks for the next couple of hours. Some of them even heated up while I was testing them, but most of them remained cold. He kept asking me how they felt and I gave my honest feedback and tried to suggest ways that might be more comfortable. I wasn't sure what we were doing but Qhil usually had a good reason for things I didn't understand. My training with the Proto Guardian had finished two weeks back but every once in a while I took it out to keep the feeling fresh in my mind. It was also nice to be able to, kind of, get out of the Regored ship every once and a while. Even though the Proto Guardian was more cramped than the Regored ship, it still felt a lot more freeing.

Qhil had given me the Proto Guardians weapons last week, one was a large laser rifle that had as much power as a combat spacecraft. The other was a blade as long as the Proto Guardians arm, allowing for close encounters with spacecraft.

Even with the feeling of power that the Proto Guardian gave me, the pit in my stomach was still there.