Chapter 93: Of Frogs and Men

Eno adjusted the dyna-brace now surrounding his abused knee and took some anti-inflammatories, a few mild painkillers, and a basic tissue accelerator.

He looked in the mirror and winced. Gloria had done a number on him. However, it was nowhere near as bad as it could have been.

For example, his knee had definitely seen better days, but Gloria could have shattered it with no real effort. She had been quite surgical in her quite justified abuse.

Even so, it would be a very uncomfortable week or so before everything was properly healed. He saw little need to dip into their limited stores of "good stuff" for minor injuries like these, especially since they weren't going into action anytime soon (hopefully).

Worst comes to worst, he could always slam a few auto-injectors if he needed to be at full speed. He reached for two and slipped them into his pocket, just in case.

He looked at the door to his quarters dubiously. He was NOT looking forward to today.

He opened the door and slunk into the hallway.

Snerk!

He flinched as he turned to see Jessie grinning at him.

"Good morning Eno!" Jessie chirped," Sleep well?"

Giggling, Jessie scampered away before he could respond.

He reluctantly made his way into the galley.

Snerk!

Jacob and Greg were stifling laughter as he entered.

"Morning!" Jacob exclaimed, grinning ear to ear.

Eno just sighed and went to the cabinet to select some breakfast.

"Sooooo..." Greg snickered as Eno walked over to the mini-cooker, "How was (snerk) your morning?"

" Nothing happened!" Eno exclaimed as he withdrew his synthetic omelet.

"What are you talking about?" Greg snickered, "I was just wishing you a good morning. Did something happen that I'm not aware of?"

"Oh, nothing that you aren't aware of," Eno grumbled as he poured himself a cup of real coffee and reluctantly sat down at a table.

Jacob and Greg burst into laughter as Eno fidgeted with embarrassment.

***

Sheloran lay on her bunk with the blankets over her head.

Oh, Prophet... she silently moaned.

Somebody knocked on her door.

There is no escape from this, she thought to herself as she reluctantly crawled out of her bed and opened the door.

"Good morning!" Gloria grinned.

" morning..."

"I just wanted to check on you after all of the bullshit that went down yesterday," Gloria said, her eyes big with concern…

…she then leaned in close, the eyes sparkling mischievously.

"Did you sleep ok?" she grinned wolfishly.

Sheloran just sighed.

"We didn't..." she stammered, "… do it. It's not even possible!"

"Oh, I know," Gloria grinned, "I just wanted to beat everyone to the punch!"

" You know?!?" Sheloran gasped.

"Bunny filled everybody in at the morning meeting," Gloria replied. "She's normally really good about keeping what goes on in the cabins to herself, but she decided to back Eno up when he insisted that you 'just slept' together."

Sheloran just groaned as her face "blushed" bright green.

"It's pretty impressive, isn't it?" Gloria laughed.

" You've seen it?!?"

"Froggy," Gloria snickered, "We've been a team for a few years now. Everybody's pretty much seen everybody at least once. I've never seen it hard, though. I hear it's huge. How big is it?"

"I'm not answering that," Sheloran said firmly. "You want to know, get it 'that way' yourself."

Gloria burst into laughter.

"I'm starting to like you," Gloria smiled. "You had breakfast yet?"

Sheloran shook her head.

***

Mark Guilderan, the Terran Secretary of State, looked at his monitor in disbelief.

It turned out that they didn't have the Plath after all.

She escaped. She escaped Tartarus!

He reviewed the other notes concerning the mysterious little amphibioid.

"Well, that explains the Kalent's interest in her," he quietly said to nobody in particular.

What did they know about her, about the Plath? More importantly, what did they not want the Republic to know?

He pulled up the latest reports concerning the Kalent's movements after they had left his office.

He smirked.

They had met with Sheloran the Plath's lawyer, another Kalent. Odds are, whatever was talking through that little box made the lawyer tell them everything that he knew, and that probably included the fact that Sheloran was in the wind.

It would explain why they had only returned to speak with him now, well after the point they said that they would return.

However, they returned without the Federation ambassador. That was interesting.

He rose from his desk and headed for the door.

***

"Sorry for the wait," Mark said as he entered the room where the Kalent were waiting.

It was empty, save for an ornate cube sitting on the coffee table.

"Think nothing of it," the cube replied pleasantly. "I was just taking care of some reports myself."

"This is an unusual meeting," Mark smiled as he sat next to the cube.

"I dismissed my attendants," the cube said simply. "We will likely discuss things they are not allowed to know."

"Allowed?"

"You do the same thing, no?" the cube replied, "I believe you call it 'clearance'? They are not 'cleared' to hear what you will foolishly insist on knowing."

"Well, I am a dumbass," Mark said ruefully, "I certainly can't deny that these days."

He was a dumbass, a huge one, and was going to answer for it. "Momma" Augustine had been very clear about that.

He cleared his head. What will be will be. Right now, he had a Kalent boom box sitting on the coffee table and some real possible gains for the Republic, a republic that he did, despite his recent actions, care about a great deal.

Might as well end my career on a high note, he thought.

"So," he said after a few seconds of silence, "Sheloran."

"Yes," the cube replied, "Sheloran."

"We don't have her," Mark said pleasantly. "She escaped."

"I'm surprised you would admit that so easily," the cube replied.

"I'm not one for wasting time these days," Mark replied, "The sooner I take care of this bullshit, the sooner I can go home to my wife, which is all I really care about now."

The cube made a surprised alien chortle.

"Besides," Mark said politely, "I won't insult your intelligence by pretending that you don't already know that."

"You are correct," the cube replied, "I am aware that Sheloran is free and in the company of Shelia Donovan's party of rogues, not an ideal situation for either of us… or the galaxy as a whole for that matter."

"Shelia fucking Donovan..." Mark muttered, "Of course. We were pretty sure that's where she wound up, but her lawyer confirmed it?"

"He did," the cube replied. "He was very forthcoming. I have a question. Why didn't you simply pressure him for information yourself?"

"We have a thing about attorney-client privilege," Mark said in a matter-of-fact tone, "and her legal case has been mishandled from the beginning. The last thing we wanted to do was make things worse, especially since things have gotten so public and so messy."

Mark smirked.

"And I'm not talking about just Sheloran's legal woes. This situation has gotten very delicate."

"Are you talking about Project Cerberus?" the cube inquired pleasantly.

"I am definitely NOT talking about Project Cerberus!" Mark snorted, "Good GOD, no!… Ahem…”

Mark took a deep breath.

"I will neither confirm nor deny the existence of Project Cerberus nor any other 'black project'," Mark said in a sing-song voice.

The cube laughed.

“But… yeah…” Mark laughed ruefully, "Let's just say that… Nah, let's not even say that."

"Probably wisest," the cube snickered.

"Besides," Mark shrugged, "we could simply trace him and see what he did or said. No need to get rough. Speaking of rough," Mark added, "I have NO idea who it was that paid him a visit last night, and trust me, there is more than one person who would love to find out."

"Is Baxlon harmed?" the cube asked with a surprising amount of concern.

"Nah," Mark chuckled, "He spent the night hiding in the corner of his tank clutching some sort of energy weapon in his mouth but only has minor bumps and scrapes. We don't know exactly what was said or done, but he's uninjured and suddenly very interested in reestablishing contact with Sheloran."

"Now that is interesting," the cube said. "He expressed the exact opposite desire quite recently."

"He even dropped her as a client..." Mark shrugged, "for precisely fifteen minutes before negotiating a sweet immunity deal for some of Sheloran's more notable transgressions post-escape."

Mark chuckled.

"She is pretty much free and clear," he said, "provided that she doesn't do something else."

"What about the initial homicides?"

"The Harkeen are classified as raiders now," Mark replied with a shrug, "The only thing a judge or jury will do now is buy her a drink. The only reason the case hasn't been officially dropped is that if we do, we would have to explain where she is… or, more precisely, isn't… We would also like to have a little sit down with her while we have some shred of leverage. We have just a few questions for her."

"If your questions concern any unusual technology or inexplicable abilities," the cube said, "I strongly advise not pursuing them. She probably can't explain it to your satisfaction… and that's the best result."

"And the worst?"

"That she can," the cube laughed, "Listen, if your people conveniently forget what you've stumbled upon and allow us to… repatriate... Sheloran, we will provide technology that you can actually understand and use safely, things that we should have already released to you and the Empire to aid in your defense against the Collective. I have some very interesting data that I can give you immediately upon Sheloran's repatriation, and that is just the beginning."

"By 'repatriation,' you mean..."

"Just that," the cube replied, "we will provide her a way that she can return voluntarily to the Federation, where we will host her in our home system. She will live out her days in the height of comfort, ease, and most importantly, peace and safety."

"Sure," Mark said dubiously.

"Oh, absolutely," the cube replied, "because we know what we are dealing with. Well, in all honesty, we don't absolutely know what we are dealing with, but we know enough to 'know' not to mess with her. She will be given a little farm exactly like one she would have on her homeworld, along with any plants she wants, and will be allowed to return to a peaceful quiet existence. We won't be trying to glean any 'secrets' from her. In fact, we will do everything in our power to ensure that whatever has awakened within her goes right back to sleep. We are reasonably sure that the offer will be very attractive to her."

"And if she refuses?"

"Then she's your problem!" the cube exclaimed with an alien chortle. "Try to take a feral Plath against their will? Are you insane?..."

The cube chortled again.

"You are a human, so that question has been unresolved for a long time," it laughed, "The important fact is that we are not! If Sheloran doesn't want to come with us, we won't make her or take any action against her. We are not keen to incur even a single feral Plath's wrath, or worse, play a part in awakening it fully. Just one Plath is all it takes."

"Ok," Mark said as he got up and poured himself a cup of tea," What is the deal with these Plath anyway?"

"I assumed you would insist on knowing more than is wise," the cube replied, "that is why I sent my attendants away."

"And what, exactly, are you?" Mark asked, "Don't insult my intelligence and say that you are a Kalent."

The cube started to glow, and above it floated a nightmarish serpentine creature with massive jaws and fangs, a glowing antenna, and ghostly white in color, with a long scar running along its side.

"Daaaaaaamnnn," Mark said after a few moments, "Well, that explains why the little shits bow."

"Forgive me," the abyssal lord said, "I cannot project myself at full size within the confines of this room."

"That's… ok."

"Technically," the abyssal lord said, "I am 'Kalent', but the Kalent is the name of our people, our culture, and not a specific species. There are more than one sapient species on our homeworld. The Kalent you know are simply the only ones that choose to show themselves. The rest of us prefer to remain out of sight."

"Amazing," Mark said quietly, his woes momentarily forgotten.

"I would appreciate it if you treated this and anything else I share with you at this point in the greatest confidence," the ancient fish said, its single antenna pulsing with blue light.

"Rest assured that we will treat your confidence with great care," Mark replied diplomatically. "Forgive me, but do you reside in the deep ocean?"

"Yes," the abyssal lord replied, "pretty much at the bottom."

"Fascinating!" Mark exclaimed, "And you formed a relationship with other species that lived in shallower water?"

"Over time," the ancient benthic terror replied, "yes, we did. We were aware of them for quite some time before we reached out. It's a rather long story, as is our history in general."

"And your species are their rulers?"

The fish let out a sigh.

"They seem to believe that to be the case," it replied. "After a while, we just stopped arguing about it. That is not what I am here to discuss, though."

"Oh, right," Mark said as he collected himself, "Sorry. I still get a kick out of learning about new species even after all this time."

"Then you will learn about the Plath," the abyssal lord said with an odd gleam in its eyes.

***

"Thanks, Gloria," Sheloran said as a bowl of hexagonal cereal was set before her, along with a brown paper bag.

Gloria sat beside her with her own bowl and a carton of poly-milk.

"Martian breakfast of champions right here!" Gloria said happily as she took the paper bag and poured a generous helping of mealworms and other assorted insects over their cereal.

"Ooo!" Sheloran said excitedly.

"The Crispycomb is nutritionally complete, at least for us, and the frosted mealmix makes it good," Gloria said as she poured the poly-milk over the unholy mixture. "Dig in."

Sheloran put a spoon in her mouth and gasped, her eyes gleaming.

"This is good!"

"Told ya," Gloria replied happily as she tucked into her bowl.

"I've never had insects like these!" Sheloran said with delight.

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"Another Martian specialty," Gloria said proudly. "We eat a lot of bugs as opposed to the rest of the Terrans and have been doing it for a lot longer. We've gotten rather good at it."

"Why?" Sheloran said as she munched away happily.

"When we threw off the yoke of Terra, they were not happy," Gloria replied, "After the shooting stopped, they broke off all trade and blockaded us for years expecting they could just starve us out. Thing is, we fully expected them to do that and had built up all the agricultural capacity we needed to be self-sufficient before we told them to go and fuck themselves."

She opened up a small poly bottle of orange juice.

"Plants were easy enough," Gloria continued, "we dug out massive underground greenhouses, and every spare square foot we could grab was turned into gardens."

"Really?"

"Yep," Gloria replied proudly, "All of the habs are still like that. Everywhere you turn, there's something growing."

"Sounds wonderful!"

"It is," Gloria smiled wistfully, "It really is. Anyway, plants were easy. Livestock was not. Meat is terribly expensive when it comes to space and resources, two things that Mars never has enough of. Bugs, however, are not expensive to produce. For years, things like mealworms, crickets, grasshoppers, ants, termites, grubs, and stuff like that were the only "meat" we could get. Even after relations were restored with the rest of the solar system, we still ate our creepy crawlies. For one thing, you couldn't beat the price. A bag of bugs was about the same price as a bag of anything else. Meat, even the cheap shit, isn't cheap. Of course, after the Sol Wars, all Terrans eat bugs, but we do it best… like we do everything else, for that matter."

Gloria elbowed Sheloran gently.

"Y'know," she said, "gardens and bugs… You'd fit in pretty well on Mars. On the outside chance this all works out, I could hook you up. It's nearly impossible for an outsider to get into one of the habs, but I might know a few people."

"Why is it hard for outsiders?" Sheloran asked.

"There is an old Terran saying," Gloria replied, "'There is no such thing as a free lunch.' On Mars, it counts triple. Not only is there not a free lunch, but also no free water or air. 'Rent' can get really high really quick. If you aren't rich, the only way to be able to live on Mars is to be employed by the Consortium. If you work for them, then your water and life support are covered, and your housing allotment covers basic accommodation but good luck getting on with them. You pretty much have to be born into it. It's a great deal if you can get it, though."

"What happens if someone can't pay?"

"Then they are loaded onto a ship and dumped on Terra," Gloria replied. "The Consortium usually forgives any debts when they evict someone, though. Not worth the hassle."

"So, not a lot of xenos then?"

"Not many," Gloria said with a shrug, "There are a few well-heeled fugitives hiding out in the habs, and now we are starting to see more and more Z'uush showing up. Some of the mining companies that hired them are Consortium outfits, so their families are starting to show up in the habs from what I hear."

"Huh," Sheloran said as she munched away.

"Hey," Gloria said as she sipped her real orange juice, a pricey luxury. "I just gotta know. When you said that it was impossible for you and Eno to do it, what did you mean?"

Sheloran snorted.

"Just what I said," Sheloran replied, "We don't do… it… the same way you humans do."

"How do you do it then?" Gloria asked curiously.

"We're egg layers," Sheloran said as she sipped some of the poly-milk from her bowl, "The woman makes an egg, and then the man fertilizes it."

"Sounds like what we do," Gloria chuckled.

"He fertilizes it after it's been laid," Sheloran replied.

"Well, that sounds like no fun at all," Gloria snarked.

"Oh, it's wonderful," Sheloran sighed. "And it takes place over days, not just a few seconds like you grunt-humpers."

Gloria snorted.

"Grunt-humpers!" Gloria exclaimed with delight. "I love it!"

"I made it up myself," Sheloran grinned. "Based upon my accidental observations."

"Well, I'm stealing it!" Gloria chortled.

“Feel free… grunt-humper,” Sheloran snerked.

"HA!" Gloria laughed, "So… how do you little freaky frogs get your freak on?"

"Well," Sheloran sighed wistfully, "when a Plath couple gets… close… and start 'spending time together'..."

" Spending time, huh?" Gloria grinned, "what exactly does that entail?"

"… stuff..." Sheloran said evasively. “They will do… stuff… together… you know… making out..."

"Details, woman!" Gloria exclaimed.

Sheloran blushed.

"um… we kiss..." Sheloran said.

"And?"

"We… um… touch each other in… places..."

"Like your gills?"

Sheloran flushed almost teal.

"I'm NOT getting into this with you!" Sheloran exclaimed as she fidgeted. “Anyway, if a couple do enough… stuff… and… um… get excited enough… The woman starts to make an egg, and the man starts to make a sperm… It's really romantic!"

"If you say so..."

" It IS!" Sheloran exclaimed, still a bit teal. "You both get really sick and—"

"Ooo! Sexy!"

“Oh be quiet, grunt-humper!” Sheloran snapped, "You both get really 'sick' as your bodies make the egg and the sperm, and you lie up together and cuddle and kiss and feed and take care of each other… and it feels really good!"

Sheloran sighed again.

"It's wonderful…"

She looked down.

"Or so they say..."

" Or so they say?" Gloria asked with a wolfish grin, "You mean you don't know?"

Sheloran crossed her arms and looked down in a nearly universal expression of discomfort.

"… no..."

"Oh my God!" Gloria exclaimed, "You're a virgin?!?"

"We don't just run around grunting and humping anything with a pulse like you animals!" Sheloran huffed. "And I have been on a couple of dates."

"Did 'ya do it?" Gloria grinned.

"I've done… stuff..." Sheloran said defensively. "I mean… I've made out… a little… kinda..."

"Mmm hmm..."

" I have!" Sheloran exclaimed in a way that dispelled any doubt that she was, in all practical ways, as pure as the driven snow and not by choice.

She looked down.

" It's not my fault that I'm ugly..."

Gloria winced. She loved being a bitch but only when she intended to be.

"Hey!" Gloria said, nudging Sheloran's shoulder. "You aren't ugly."

"How would you know?" Sheloran asked glumly. "… Thanks for the breakfast, Gloria. It was really tasty."

She got up and walked out of the galley, leaving her meal half-eaten.

"Smooth, Gloria," Bunny snarked over the speaker, "Really smooth."

"Shut up," Gloria grumbled.

"Do you have ANY idea how badly I wanted to hear about the Plath reproductive cycle?" Bunny said with a very annoyed tone of voice. "We have absolutely NO idea how it works!"

"What do you mean?" Gloria replied.

"Some friends and I have been chewing on her scans ever since we got them," Bunny answered, "and they make absolutely NO sense. I mean, out of all of the freaks out there in the galaxy, the Plath are the freakiest. It's like they aren't even real or something."

"What?"

"Based on what we know about biology, xenology, or whatever else you want to bring into it," Bunny said, "there is pretty much no way that a Plath just 'happened'."

"Well, they clearly did," Gloria said as she started eating Sheloran's cereal (no sense letting it go to waste).

"Oh, they exist, alright," Bunny replied, "But they didn't 'happen', not like you meatbags. They are too 'well made' to be an accident, and don't even get me started on data density."

"Data density?"

"Yeah," Bunny said, "you know your genome, what makes a human a human?"

"Not by heart," Gloria snarked.

"Do you know how 'big' it is?"

"Nope."

"The weight of the human genome is around six point five picograms. Your mitochondria's genome is almost negligible at around zero point zero two femtograms for one mitochondrion. You have a bit of cytoplasmic inheritance floating around as well, but even the entire human ovum is less than five-thousandths of a milligram for the entire egg, the vast majority of which is not 'data' so to speak."

"Wow," Gloria said, "that's it?"

"Yep," Bunny said, "you meaties aren't much at all, and a lot of that data is garbage code, stuff you don't even use. Do you have any idea how much 'DNA' Sheloran is packing?"

"I guess more than us?"

"Over four kilograms," Bunny replied. "Over four kilograms of nonrepeating encoded data spread across several 'glands' and that 'DNA'… It's… amazing. It is much better than those little spaghetti shoelaces you call genes. It is much more compact and much more stable. It's… better… than our best drives… maybe… we don't know for sure… It's a truly stupid amount of information and could quite easily explain how she 'knows' what she does. Who knows how much raw data is inside her or what it is."

"That's insane!" Gloria exclaimed.

"You don't know the half of it," Bunny said.

"What do you mean?" Gloria asked dubiously.

***

"The Plath are how old?!?" Mark Guilderan spluttered.

"The Kalent civilization is well over two million years old," the abyssal lord said calmly, "My particular species has records that stretch further still. My particular race has had civilization and recorded history for well over five million… maybe… our accounting of time was murky back in the day, but based on the lineages, five million years is a very conservative estimate."

The ancient fish looked into Mark's eyes.

"The Plath visited our people several times across our ancient history," the coiling fish said evenly, "and they were old even then. They were sailing the stars back when my race's greatest achievement was making board games. They are ancient, from a time best forgotten."

"What do you mean?" Mark asked.

"Do you think this is the first interstellar civilization," the abyssal lord asked, "or the second?"

"I take it the answer is no?"

"Correct," the abyssal lord replied. "There have been at least two before us. There are very few survivors of the second great civilization. Out of them, only the Tolo and the Ykeen have any contact with the greater galaxy. Most have either walled off their systems or simply disappeared."

"And the Plath?" Mark asked.

"We aren't entirely sure," the abyssal lord replied, "but if what little we do know is accurate, they may be the only surviving member of the first galactic empire. Well, technically, we Kalent are as well, but our civilization was not technological, and we simply lived quiet piscine lives back then, blissfully removed from the events of those terrible days."

"Terrible?"

"Oh, yes," the ancient creature replied, "Do you think we were the ones who invented war? From what little we know, wars on a scale we can't even imagine raged across the entire galaxy for tens of thousands of years, resulting in the only galaxy-wide empire ever recorded… maybe."

"That's a big maybe."

"What little remains of those days is very fragmented, and there isn't a handy translation guide. We have recovered a few galactic maps that show what we believe to be inhabited systems across the entire spiral, as well as boundaries and battle lines. Again, a lot of this is myth, legend, conjecture, and most likely ancient propaganda as well, but the implications are quite compelling, don't you agree?"

"And you believe the Plath to be a part of all that?"

"A very large part, actually," the ancient terror replied with a flicker of his single antenna. "They chose to be simple farmers, Mr. Guilderan. What they were built for was something else entirely."

"And what was that?"

"We believe that there is a high probability that the simple Plath were used as the warriors and enforcers of the species that ultimately won, or at least as one of their warrior races. They bear entirely too great a similarity to figures that show up on cave walls, obelisks, clay tablets, and the like across most archaeological sites."

"Clay tablets?" Mark asked with a raised eyebrow, "Cave walls?... Obelisks?"

"Yes."

"I thought this was some super advanced galactic civilization."

"It was," the fish replied, "and in the end, the only thing that survived were scratchings in the dirt and not many of those. That first civilization was utterly destroyed. Nothing remains of a species that once spanned the entire galaxy… well… as far as we know, anyway. Every trace of them was erased. No technology survived. In fact, we don't even know what they looked like."

"How could something like that happen?" Mark asked, "Surely something must have survived."

"A great many races have looked for a very long time, Mark," the fish replied, "and nothing has ever been found. All we have is data that was inscribed on basic materials using the lowest technology possible, and all of that was by other species who lived during those times, not the Progenitors or their servitors. After the collapse of the Progenitors, interstellar civilization imploded as their servants, very advanced elder races in their own right, warred among themselves, each trying to replace their masters. Total war raged once again, and the galaxy burned, quite literally, in some areas. What little that might have survived whatever it was that happened certainly did not survive what followed. From what we can gather, it was your 'Sol Wars' on a galactic scale."

"And the Plath were a part of that, too?"

"From what we gather, they were the ones who eventually won but soon fell to whatever claimed their masters, perhaps as a result of whatever they had to do in order to prevail. For whatever reason, once the Plath disappeared, that first empire truly ended, and the Galaxy entered a dark age."

The ancient terror looked deeply into Mark's eyes, causing him to suppress a shudder.

"Your people have the concept of a 'Great Filter', correct?"

"Yeah," Mark replied.

"According to what we have recovered, including accounts from those who spoke to the ancient Plath of that era, there is still one left, one that nobody has survived intact. There is a line or lines that must not be crossed, else it spells utter destruction for whatever culture is foolish enough to overstep."

"Do we know what it is?"

"Not exactly," the abyssal lord replied, "However, the ancient Plath and others like them did leave behind warnings. One surviving elder race, The Veiled Ones, spent a great deal of time with a small enclave of ancient 'Plakoth' who claimed to have been waiting for them. Among other information, details of 'the line that must not be crossed' was communicated."

"And what is that line?"

"Oh, no!" the ancient fish laughed, "the absolute last thing I am going to do is tell a human not to fuck with something. That's the best way I know of to ensure that it is disturbed! We weren't even going to warn you about the Plath girl except that disturbing things are starting to happen that we wish to nip in the bud. Don't worry. If you start to approach a line, we will reach out. Until then, we believe it safest not to give you assholes any hints."

"Is this why you fuckers are so tight with your tech?" Mark asked.

"Part of the reason, yes," the abyssal lord chuckled, "The rest of the reason is exactly what you all claim it to be. We like having an advantage over creatures as dangerous as you. However, as much as we enjoy our advantage, our suppression of technology past a certain point is motivated by keeping those around us from even getting close to triggering that Great Filter. If what little we have salvaged is correct, the consequences don't necessarily limit themselves to the offending race. You don't want to be anywhere near whatever it is that actually happens. Entire solar systems disappeared without a trace."

"Interesting," Mark mused. "I have a question. If Sheloran is as dangerous as you make her out to be, and you want to 'nip this in the bud', why not just have her killed? I know you have your own covert operations group. Even if you didn't, you have the cash to just pay any of a million humans who would happily do the job."

"A very human solution," the old abyssal lord replied, "And one that would make a lot of sense save for two very important facts. The first fact is that we would have to be absolutely sure that we would actually succeed before we made the attempt. If she is truly 'reverting,' then her exact abilities are unknown, and a failed assassination attempt would only make the situation far, far worse. I trust you have seen the footage of her in action?"

Mark smirked.

"That might not be the limit of her ability. There are also certain… additional factors… that could come into play when it comes to arranging for her demise, things that defy simple logic and planning. The second and perhaps greatest reason deals with those… intangibles..."

"Say what now?"

"Are you a religious man, Mark?"

"What does that have anything to do with anything?"

The ancient lord smirked.

"I'm about to tell you a little story," the old fish said with a glowing pulse of his antenna, "I request that you withhold comment or judgment until it is complete."

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