“What? They denied our request for conversation?” the Zelvora leader asked, his surprise felt by everyone in the ntal network.
“They didn’t deny us completely but said they would only get into a conversation with us if it was regarding our acceptance of their surrender demands and wouldn’t waste their ti on anything else,” the man who had been sent to initiate contact with the empire’s side regarding their cooperation said, relaying word-for-word what the empire’s response was.
“That then sets it in stone that they are aware of the possible ans to attack us and don’t really need us at the table, since they can already remove us from the equation at a mont’s notice if they set their sights on us,” Kasron, the Zelvora leader, said. His ntal body in the ntal network leaned back on the chair he was sitting on as he realized that for them to have any leg to stand on at the negotiation table, they needed to be on equal levels. Unfortunately, at the mont, they didn’t have anything close to what the empire had in hand as a weapon against them. It was a weapon that they didn’t have an imdiate solution for, while at the sa ti knowing that the empire was most definitely going to use it against them within the month at the latest.
It was a very difficult position to be in for any leader. The only consolation was that any decision he made could be fully understood by everyone in his civilization, so in the future, whether his decision was bad or good, they would understand where he ca from. They would know it was not deliberate, but the best one he could make with the tools he had on hand at the ti.
“If it is activated, how long will its effectiveness last? What I an is, what would happen to our descendants? Will they also be affected even if they are born after it is activated, or is it just for those currently present who already contain all the required things for the attack to work?” After a few minutes of silence, Kasron finally asked.
“We can’t say with full confidence that they would co out fine since we don’t know yet what other effects there will be once it is triggered. But what I can say with confidence is it would most likely be worse for newborns since their bodies will be growing along with the blockade effects they will be receiving from their mother through the placenta, which is looser compared to the blood-brain barrier that this bioweapon is already capable of going through. So they might be born without the ability to access the ntal connection permanently, even if we later find a solution to the bioweapon once it is activated,” the scientist said, feeling goosebumps at how the empire might alter the trajectory of their civilization’s evolutionary direction with a single move.
“And how long will it take before we have a viable vaccine or solution to it if we take the bite and continue fighting against the empire?”
“We don’t really know and won’t know the tiline until after the empire activates their bioweapon, when we can finally have the completed pieces and start coming up with a solution. It will mostly target that activation sequence, as that is the safest way to neutralize it without ending up creating a vaccine that attacks important chemicals in the body.”
“Even if the tiline is just a few months, it is too long for us to stand against the empire without our strongest capabilities, which everything around us is based upon. We might fall before even reaching halfway on the research,” another attendee of the eting said. He reminded them that if they decided to continue fighting against the empire after the bioweapon was activated, they would lose nearly all of their most powerful fighting abilities. All of their weapons had been made to either support or amplify their ntal abilities, aning they would be sitting ducks while relying on support from the remaining nine mbers, who were already being weakened left and right. They might even pull back their forces to reinforce so of their most important bases if things get worse for them. After all, who would really risk their civilization’s death while having their forces still supporting another civilization?
When everyone was reminded of that, most of their will to fight was thrown out the window. Just because the empire hadn’t genocided entire civilizations yet, it didn’t an they weren’t open to setting an example. And who better to make an example of than one of the strongest civilizations, which, if they later ca up with a vaccine, might beco their biggest problem in the internal turmoil of the post-war world.
The eting seed to be a big bang of bad news, as one after another kept coming, and everything was connected to how things would be possible to operate once the bioweapon was activated. Everything pointed to them not coming out on the other side of things as the victors.
“Please give so ti to think things through,” Kasron said, taking a break and cutting his connection to the ntal network.
.........
“Contact the empire and request a eting. I will be personally attending it,” Kasron said the mont the ntal network was reestablished.
He didn’t need to elaborate on his words further, since everyone already knew that the empire was only going to accept a single type of eting. But despite knowing what he ant for them, none of them even tried to stop him, as they all had access to his ntal reasoning, which he deliberately made available to everyone, and the sa reasoning that would be spread across their civilization-wide ntal network.
After a few minutes of silence, as the liaison had left to request another eting, he finally returned. “The emperor accepted. The eting is waiting for you in VR,” he said with a heavy tone, knowing that the matter was becoming a reality and he didn’t have any ans of stopping it.
“Looks like he still has enough respect for us to be attending the eting personally,” Kasron said with a bitter smile before he left the private ntal network.
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