The Nature of Predators 2-48 (Patreon)

Memory Transcription Subject: Elias Meier, Former UN Secretary-General

Date [standardized human time]: August 11, 2160

When the Shield’s given coordinates led us to a vacant patch of space, distant from any inhabited systems and devoid of structures, I’d begun to have my doubts. Waiting in limbo, without anything to prove that this wasn’t a wild goose chase, didn’t leave a good feeling in my gut. Syba and I killed the time by watching episodes of Vynle’s show, while I also had a chance to catch up on the interplanetary cinema I’d missed over the past two decades. As pleasant as it was to have leisure time, my mind was occupied with improving the galaxy’s lasting scars and rifts—as well as bolstering humanity’s chances in the ongoing war. There was a certain sense of responsibility I felt to save Nishtal, knowing I’d, in essence, pulled the trigger on its first glassing. Those deaths were never the outcome I wanted.

I’ve been considering, “Who am I?” in great depth since this new life began. Syba shouldn’t think of me as a hero, or this idealistic diplomat icon the United Nations flaunts me as.

I remembered the white-hot rage I’d felt in the wake of Earth’s bombing, as something dark and unspeakable swelled in my heart—poisonous and filled with hatred. With only the Zurulians and the Venlil showing up to aid us (from the Federation, since the Arxur were the ones who’d truly saved us), there had been a snapshot in time where even I craved revenge. What did that say about who I was, and what I would do, when the chips were down? The policies of peace and diplomacy had been what my entire life was devoted toward, and what I pleaded for in my last moments. In that regard, witnessing us at the helm of the Sapient Coalition was my greatest joy. We were not just a part of the galactic community, but a central piece—living and working harmoniously with a vast multitude of allies. That had been my sincere hope, from the moment I learned of aliens’ existence.

“Mr. Elias!” Syba shouted, headbutting my elbow. I removed my headphones, pretending that I’d been engrossed in a movie. “A…massive ship just warped into the system. What do we do?”

I raised my eyebrows, considering that the Shield might be trying to capture us—or at least, intimidate us. The vessel that I saw through the shuttle viewport was an elongated octagonal prism, with glass windows on all sides of its rotating body. The extensions from the exterior appeared to be a mix of defensive weaponry, but most of the storage space looked like a hangar. They seemed more wary of us than hostile; their shields were up, but not their weapons. What if this was how they hosted their meetings, rather than a set-in-stone location? I hurried into the cockpit, finding the button to extend a hail.

“Shield spacecraft, this is the Sapient Coalition delegation. We’ve arrived at the specified location per your request, and have no ill intent. There are only two unarmed diplomats on board…one digitized human, and one Sulean,” I transmitted.

There was a brief pause, before a cold Ulven voice responded. “I can’t believe this, but my orders are to let you onboard—with all of our leaders. We don’t intend for you to be here long. Marking the hangar that’s been cordoned off for you.”

“We’re happy to be your guests for as long as you’ll have us. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. If I had my way, you’d be shot down, and there’s two less tainted sapients mucking up the galaxy—but our neutrality.”

“I’m sorry that you feel that way. I hope that you’ll come to see the value of that neutrality; we aren’t as bad as you imagine.”

“No. You’re worse.”

It was evident, despite the fact both of our factions had agreed to fight the Federation, species like the Ulven saw humanity as irredeemable monsters they had to put up with—at best. I’d gotten that impression from their representative back on Earth, with the snide comments that all but told me they liked me better dead. The Duerten were likely an exception because we’d saved Kalqua, but that didn’t change the fact that, according to what I’d read, they’d documented the Arxur showing up at the SC’s founding Summit. Isif’s rebellion was equally part of the reason that the gray avians survived, so his presence wasn’t as damning to them anymore. Still, the Osirs and the Bissems made us look a bit cozy with carnivores. As far as the Shield were concerned, the SC was heartily endorsing animal slaughter in our space.

Ambassador Korajan was right that we wouldn’t be welcome here, but that means there’s work that needs to be done. We convinced part of the Federation; what’s the Shield, by comparison?

The Shield’s meeting ship didn’t look very mobile, but it had slingshotted a ring of FTL disruptor buoys into its immediate vicinity; they didn’t want anyone warping in on our conference, which was sensible with enemy drones in Orion space. With nostalgia running amok in the lead up to the meeting, I thought about my shuttle ride with Tarva, when I first met Isif…and damned the Krakotl. The feeling of FTL disruptors throwing my senses into calamity was still something that made me shudder. Would that mind-numbing disorientation, from gravity tearing us out of subspace, still affect me in this form? I doubted Virnt had replicated it, though that aspect, I could live without the Tilfish scientist fixing. Then again, there was no telling how my haywire senses would handle something like that; a car had been enough to send me into a spiral.

What if the Shield saw me lose control or have a mental breakdown over the flawed sensory input? That would be proof of bloodlust tearing through my mainframe; I could set humanity’s hopes back decades, if the wrong environmental stimuli triggered my mind. Syba brayed with excitement as we landed, which didn’t match my growing anxiety at all. Wanting to better the United Nations’ standing with the Shield wouldn’t make it happen, and I didn’t trust my brain not to cripple me when it counted. I couldn’t afford to fail, and let…Syba, Kuemper, and humanity down again. The Sulean led the way out of the shuttle, while I followed her down the vacant, heavily barricaded hallway with timid steps. Her awestruck gaze widened as we reached the rotational chamber, which had different “floors” attuned to each of the central prism’s eight sides.

“Look at this place!” Taking her declaration to heart, I soaked in every detail for the UN’s records; regardless of how much I remembered, Virnt would be jotting it down now from my transcripts. This information could be diplomatically critical. Syba turned toward an uneasy circle of diplomats, eyes still shining. “We can’t waste a second, Mr. Elias. I don’t know when your speech is, but I vote we win as many hearts and minds as we can. Let’s go say hello?”

I tried to suck in a breath, but that self-soothing technique was never going to work again. “You go first, Syba. They’ll be more responsive to you. I’ll observe you, and scope out the landscape. Passivity won’t be what they expect. They can acclimate to my presence, and perhaps they will approach me.”

“I like the way you think! We can do this, Elias; we made it here. The hard part is done!”

I smiled, appreciating her enthusiasm. “You’re quite right. We are the first ones to be here, so it’s up to us to make a good impression on the SC’s behalf. As us predatory humans say…go get ‘em, tiger.”

“I’ve heard of tigers before, with the stripe comparisons. Hm, yeah, I think I follow the literal meaning. Don’t let the Shield hear you say that one.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

The Sulean scurried over to the crowd of diplomats, introducing herself in a loud voice. I noticed almost every gaze, outside of that now-distracted circle, was on me. Wiping the smile thoroughly off my face, I found a biped-friendly bench to sit down on. It wasn’t like my feet could get tired anymore, but it still felt more relaxed to have an inanimate object propping up my weight. The Shield attendees’ gazes shone with something beyond simple fear; it was more the look of a person who believed I’d done something horrible. All I could think of that would earn their ire was me being brought back, and the memory transcripts that could create a new type of sapient. What would I even say, if the Shield wanted me to defend my own existence? There were a myriad of ethical concerns that I shared with the doubters—that I wanted to provide at the eventual SC hearing about my technology.

“Welcome to our humble abode, Elias!” a familiar voice chirped.

My head snapped in the Duerten’s direction, grateful to find a friendly face. “It hardly looks humble, Korajan. In fact, it looks quite resplendent. The hanging lights up above seem to have wings, and are quite bejeweled. I find that exquisite.”

“Humans do share our fondness for shiny things; it makes it easy to send gifts to the UN. Regardless, I’m sure this venue is a bit surprising to you, but my government forbade me from telling you anything in advance. The Shield values its privacy and separation. To be honest, I wasn’t convinced they’d go through with this meeting until right now.” 

“Judging by the Ulven’s greeting, I take it you’ve had some resistance within the Shield.”

Korajan’s corn-colored beak parted coyly. “Why, no, I wouldn’t know anything about it. I wouldn’t have ever violated our outward neutrality, to inform human representatives that half of these species hate your guts!”

“So they don’t hate me because I’m a…machine?”

“There are some objections to your, ah, situation, but I wouldn’t say there’s a consensus. It’s as new to us as it is to you. I would say it’s mostly allowing humans to have a peek inside this here, The Sailer. This is a security breach, to many people.”

I pointed a finger toward the ceiling. “Well, now I know about the winged chandeliers. I’m not sure how you’ll ever recover.”

“You jest, but this place isn’t a permanent, stationary structure for a reason,” the Duerten chuckled. “The Shield sees this as a government bunker as much as a diplomatic reception venue. They don’t want any…predators to know its location, or much about its existence at all. The ship has thousands of permanent staff, and supplies to live off the grid for months, in theory.”

“That explains what the eight gravity orientations are for, when only this one seems to be for the Shield delegation. Maximizing space, dazzling with engineering. This is a floating city.”

“Yes, but I didn’t tell you that. If anyone asks, I merely told you the incredible diplomatic value of The Sailer. The Shield can host its meetings at various member planets, bringing a government directly to problems, unlike the cold SC who watches from afar.”

“Heard you loud and clear—I yield, Korajan. Clearly, the SC could never care about its worlds half as much as a government that does a galactic tour. I’m glad you’re here to show us the error in our ways.”

“Ah, I wouldn’t be here at all, except that species’ ambassadors to humanity are advising our proper Shield representatives. It was quite the trek from Earth, I’ll say. Made worse by needing to pick up several ambassadors before we brought the party to you.”

“That explains the delay. Really, thanks for…the help, and transparency.”

The Duerten waved a wing dismissively. “I may be skeptical of your odds here, but I do hope you succeed. Perhaps I could help with some introductions?”

“That would be wonderful, actually. Please, lead the way.”

Korajan hopped along on legs that looked like they belonged to a stick figure; he’d been a godsend for any matters involving the Shield, supporting our mission on a personal level. I surveyed Syba out of the corner of my eye, eavesdropping as we passed. The Sulean was sharing a boatload of information about the role her people had stepped into, and what she felt they’d gained from the Sapient Coalition. Given that the Shield diplomats were staring at her with a semblance of familiarity, rather than their closed-off body language from before, I imagined name-dropping Vynle had warmed them up to her. My own ears perked with a bit of curiosity, wondering if I could learn from her persuasion techniques with the wary herbivores. For all the ideas I’d tossed around, I still hadn’t decided what to say when my time came.

The Suleans are the experts at persuading neutral parties to lend a hand, and it’s important that I remember that. What matters is that the diplomats listen, not who they listen to.

“Project Chronicle has been a team effort, trying to cobble through millions of hours of data on every species! The sad part is, there was so much about our world that wasn’t documented by the Farsul, either because they didn’t care to record it, or because there was never time for us to discover it before they came,” Syba explained to the group. “The Sulean-Iftali Alliance focused on trying to do archaeology the right way. Wherever the facts lead.”

Leshee Ambassador Yali offered a quizzical croak. “What if those facts lead exactly back to what’s in the Archives? Digging among sapient remains for such little reward…”

“It helps us verify what was in the Archives. I don’t trust the Farsul one bit, no matter how meticulous they say they were at unraveling our cultures. All I want is to be wherever our allies focus on putting our cultures back together, not on sanitizing and altering them to fit their whims. The Federation were a threat to herbivores, so I don’t get how we can trust anything they say without looking into it ourselves.”

“Our ancestors were predated upon, and the Arxur happened. The Hunger happened, prions or not,” a Racad diplomat said, bowing his bovid head. “There are real, empirical threats. You act like there’s no basis at all…like we don’t think for ourselves!”

“That’s not what I mean. My dad put it best, when he was pretending to be a Farsul archivist. ‘Prey are peaceful, unless it’s the Venlil, the Yotul, or apparently anyone who lives near water; yep, water is a predator, it drowns people. Please don’t mind us, while we peacefully conquer you and your children!’”

I covered my mouth, trying to hold in laughter. “Syba is good, Korajan.”

“Yes, and she’s quite right. I’m sure she’ll be fine on her own,” the Duerten replied. “I have…a particularly hostile crowd in mind for you to speak to.”

“That doesn’t sound reassuring.”

“It’s not meant to be. But I say start with the most unpleasant order of business, then it all gets better from there. Plus, I figured you may want to…tailor your wider message to not be so hostile to the Federation.”

“And why is that?”

“Because the Federation remnants have permanent observers and diplomats on board The Sailer.”

“You’re kidding me. They got an audience before us?!”

“What do you humans say? Don’t shoot the messenger. A violent saying, might I add. We never closed relations with most of them…except for the Malti and the Drezjin. They helped attack Kalqua, which wasn’t appreciated.”

“But SC members knowing about The Sailer, and being involved in your meetings, is a bridge too far.”

“Precisely. If you choose to find a silver lining, this is your chance to improve relations with the new Federation. I believe you had it in mind to solicit their aid in the war as well.”

“Hmph. I guess it does save me an extra trip…to an audience that’d be even more hostile.”

“Indeed. Take it in stride, Elias, and do what you do best. I’ll be here to back you up.”

While I had done a thorough review of Shield species’ known governments, customs, and foreign policy in preparation for this conference, none of the United Nations’ strategy meetings accounted for the Federation remnants being present. I was completely on my own, without any briefings to fall back on. My gaze traveled past Korajan, spotting the group he was leading me toward. A few Fed observers mixed with a variety of Shield races that I recognized—notably the Tevin, which looked like a horse head that lacked a mane on a sheep’s wooly body. The Tevin stood out in my mind as a Shield member our intelligence expected to be hostile. They were essentially a species ruled by the military…except their military was the exterminators. 

The fact the Tevin diplomat was standing next to the Yulpa, of all species, backed up the conclusion that they’d be staunchly anti-predator. While I might’ve been literally dead for 24 years, the herbivores that grabbed everything with prehensile tongues and sacrificed predators to their deity…they were memorable, even among all the crazies in the Federation remnants. The Yulpa, like many who sided with the conspiracy, were ravaged by a human cyberattack; I had been a bit horrified to learn the scale of the civilian damage, with societies and governments pushed to a near total collapse. Softened up without supply lines, transit, and general electricity for months, the strike allowed a rejuvenated Terran military to force submissions with general ease. While it might’ve won the war of extinction, such methods were banned by the Treaty of Shanghai for a reason.

The damage of the Satellite Wars wasn’t contained to military targets, and so was the case with the cyberattacks on the Federation—with consequences that were far-reaching. I imagine the Yulpa and the rest of their bloc point to this to prove that we’re savages. Then again, if we can reach out despite attempted human sacrifices, maybe they can move on. It has been decades.

“Well, if it isn’t the bringers of death and destruction,” the Yulpa spat, stamping a striped hindleg. Syba’s pelt of the same coloration looked a lot more endearing to my eyes. “The highest tier of killing. It’s a shame you have no blood to spill to the Spirit of Life—you could buy a great deal of fortune, rather than cursing the Shield with your continued existence.”

“I’m not alive, and I’m not a killer.” Good to know they haven’t changed at all. “The people who are killers are going for three worlds, and have already left a trail of destruction. Innocent Sivkits lost their lives; we’re trying to stop more deaths from occurring.”

Korajan fluttered his wings. “Humanity did prevent deaths at Kalqua, so they aren’t incapable of standing against greater killers. They aren’t the top tier of killing. Set your sights higher, toward a deadlier enemy. Despite this robot’s unfortunate predator programming, the request to protect other worlds is a valid one. It aligns with prey values, and the Shield’s policies of protecting herbivores foremost.”

Korajan called me a robot. Ouch. Is that what “backup” looks like?

“If it believes it’s a predator, then it’s a threat,” the Tevin ambassador said.

I raised my hands, a taut expression crossing my face. “I don’t believe that I’m a predator. I believe that I’m a diplomat; someone who wants to save lives, and create a better galaxy than the one blighted by war and cruel calamities. You define predators as creatures that hunt, and eat meat, and…I don’t eat anything. From the memories that were passed onto me—Elias Meier never ‘hunted.’ If I’m a predator, then so is any computer that can simulate an animal’s behavior. I’m simple code.”

“Coded to be a predator, like any other human. It’s just wiring for you, not DNA.”

“That’s not true. I was made by a prey animal, not a predator. You think a Tilfish would recreate this fantastical bloodlust, as you call it, even if it existed? You believe it’s driven by chemicals and hunger—of which I have neither. You can’t have it both ways. Even the Farsul thought there were prey elements in us that they could save.”

“Yet the Farsul failed,” the Yulpa countered.

“The Farsul were trying to cure the very thing they were causing themselves. They stripped us of a compound that we need to maintain our brains…which remained perfectly in control until that point. Many herbivores have come to care for us. We passed empathy tests, so you know we aren’t uncaring creatures. I care about all of us surviving to see tomorrow.”

“Is that why you let civilians die on my world, killing them from afar—with a few lines of code? All of us didn’t survive, bot.”

Korajan cleared his throat. “The humans are dangerous when they’re at war, but this is why we should be on their side, if that’s what they want. It beats the alternative.”

I don’t want “help” that agrees with these…assumptions that we’re monsters, Korajan!

The Tevin seemed to weigh the Duerten’s words. “You do make a good point there. We weren’t with the Shield, until a recent membership expansion. We also remember the cyberattacks. The guild was the only thing that brought order to our home, and stopped wild predators from overrunning our fallen cities.”

“I’m sorry about the people that you lost, because of the United Nations,” I chimed in. “We all can try to…move on, and foster peace between us. I would agree that friendship is much better than the past alternatives. I’ll let you consider how you might be able to…stop the new attackers from killing innocent prey, something I’m sure you empathize with. Korajan, can I have a word? Privately?”

The avian tilted his head. “Very well. My ambassadorial duties can’t be forsaken at a time like this. Follow me.”

I tried to avoid curling my hands into fists, as Korajan led me over to a private corner. I’d felt a bit ambushed during that encounter, and was genuinely wounded by a friend calling me a robot, even as an act. Wasn’t the Duerten supposed to be supportive of my plan, which was to bolster humanity’s credibility and reputation with them? This wasn’t how we won more amicable relations with the Shield or the Federation remnants. Weighing my words carefully, I turned to confront the ambassador on his harsh approach. Our present company might’ve been hostile to humans, but what he’d just said had ensured it’d stay that way, with minute improvements. This was not the atmosphere that I’d come to The Sailer to facilitate.

A/N - Chapter 48! We see the meeting place of the Shield, a mobile octagonal ship called The Sailer, which doubles as a government bunker and a moving city; Syba is quite excited to take it all in, and tries to encourage Meier about the opportunity they have as the first diplomat to visit. Our narrator is worrying that a glitch in his software might sabotage the meeting, but he learns he has bigger concerns as Korajan tells him the Federation remnants are present…and chimes in with some harsh words during his chat with none other than the Yulpa and the Tevin.

What do you think of Korajan’s contributions to Meier’s persuasion attempts, and what we just learned about how cozy the Shield are with the Fed remnants? What will Meier say when it’s time to speak; can affable Syba also play a role winning hearts and minds, as a non-human? What’s the likelihood of changing the state of affairs with the Shield and/or Fed remnants?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting!