“But it will be sufficient time for you to be presented with talking points for the next meeting.” The trogarian’s expression was slightly predatory.

  “Demands,” muttered one of the scientists, as the blank screen signaled an end to the communique.

  “Not the contact you were hoping for?” Earth’s representative asked, turning to the starman.

  His face showed regret.

  “No. I was hoping for someone else,” he said, and there was pain in his eyes. “I will retrieve the files you need and retire while you consider them.”

  “I think you should go with the Defense attaches,” the representative said. “They will find somewhere secure for you to wait, while we review the material.”

  The starman’s lips tightened, but he did not argue. The press was having the time of its life.

  Starman Imprisoned.

  Royal Imposter?

  Royal Refugee Hunted to the Moon.

  As it turned out, that last statement was almost true.

  “I am the last of the immediate line,” Barevarn said, in a recording dated to the beginning of mankind’s rise to civilization. “The war has brought our rule to an end, but we will not be forgiven for being born to what we were. The royal council has deemed that only those who had a voice in the decisions should be made to pay for them. To this end, they are scattering their descendants to the stars. We will find sanctuary among whatever people will take us, or we will find death. Either way, we will sleep. These are the sins for which our parents will answer.”

  And there followed a history, from the ruling point of view, footage of the royal life, of the lives of those less fortunate, information smuggled from the halls of alien corporations and families who believed they had an older claim, a civilization both at its pinnacle and in decay. It was a story humanity had seen repeated throughout its human past, but one that spanned planets. The world could only stare in wonder.

  And then the world noticed the time. Three and a half hours had passed.

  “We’ll need to make sure we have time to discuss what we’ve seen,” the Earth Representative had said. “We want to be in some position to be able to assess their ‘talking points’ when they present them.”

  “Set the timer for three-and-a-half hours from now. We can at least give them the same amount of time to present their case,” suggested his advisor.

  “Agreed.” The representative turned to the technician overseeing the conference room. “Can you do that?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  The next set of files came from the trogarian captain. They told a very different tale, although there were similar elements. A royalty that kept a choke hold on development until no advancements could be made without their blatant profiteering. Corporations imprisoned in the stagnant backwaters of old technology so they couldn’t compete. Lethal force visited on entire worlds for a single voice of dissidence. When the timer was struck for the start of discussion, they had reached a part of the history where nothing moved without being royally suppressed.

  “But, where then did they get the ability to rebel?” was the first question from one of the military advisors further down the table.

  “We would have found a way,” said another.

  “Who do we believe?” came another voice, one of the Earth council members.

  “Do we have to believe either of them?” the advisor countered.

  “We will be asked to choose a side,” the Earth representative reminded them.

  “You don’t think we could just ask them, very nicely, to leave?”

  That suggestion was met with pitying looks for the speaker. He spread his hands as if to say the question had needed to be asked, and the discussion continued.

  “What about the starman?” came the question from one of the press representatives. With communications to the outside world blocked for the duration of the meeting, the reporters were, for once, paying attention. None of them looked happy with what they had seen. The decision was not clear-cut.

  “Either of those presentations could have been created by our hearts-and-minds departments,” murmured through the ranks of politicians and press alike.

  “Well, it’s not like he’s in a position to rule, is it? I’d suggest we see if he is seeking asylum, or a temporary visa,” came from another Earth council representative, belying his seriousness with a smirk.

  “Senator! This is no laughing matter.” The primary Earth representative was outraged.

  “You have to admit, though, it is funny.” The councilman was unrepentant.

  “I have to admit no such thing.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  “Why don’t we go through the files again and see what correlates,” the advisor suggested.

  “It’s not like we can verify any of it,” one of the senators grumbled.

  “That is a problem, but I think we can overcome,” said the chief communications technician.

  “What do you mean?” Earth’s representative wanted to know.

  “I mean I’ve been monitoring the frequencies the starman has been using.”

  “And?”

  “Well, the signals travelled in only one direction.”

  “So?”

  “It was the same direction the ship came from.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Well, if he’s hiding from them, why is he sending broadband signals into their part of space?”

  “What do you mean broadband?”

  “I mean, those signals weren’t designed to avoid detection.”

  “You mean he might have deliberately called that ship in?”

  “I mean we have to consider the possibility that this is all an act.”

  “But that’s preposterous.”

  The technician subsided, but returned the Earth representative’s look with a raised eyebrow.

  “Is it?” The Earth council advisor picked up the thread.

  “I… it’s unbelievable.”

  “I think it’s entirely plausible. I think we should try re-transmitting that signal in every direction possible.”

  “But we’d never get away with it.”

  “What’s to get away with? We’re not under attack. We haven’t been forbidden to communicate with the rest of the universe. I don’t think we’ve got anything to lose.”

  “But won’t it annoy the trogarians?” The Earth representative asked the question that had crossed the minds of all those in attendance.

  “My guess is that they’re going to be annoyed at whatever we do. My guess is that they’re going to demand the delivery of the prince, and when they do, he’ll ask us for sanctuary, and if we give him sanctuary, then they’ll use that as an excuse to attack.” The advisor voiced another set of fears.

  “What if we don’t…er…grant him sanctuary, I mean.”

  “Then I think there’ll be another ship out there, one that will intervene, and we’ll discover he’s had allies all along, but, either way, I think we’ll face the same result.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Earth’s annexation.”

  Murmurs rose in agreement, pressmen reached for their communicators and then put them down in disgust when they saw they were still blocked.

  “But they can’t do that.” The Earth representative voiced what they all felt.

  “Sir, there’s a large technologically superior starship parked above us, one that we didn’t see coming in. I think you’ll find it is either more than capable of annexing our comparably backwards planet, or that it’s not alone. Either way, sir, I believe we are in dire need of some outside help, and that we should try to find it while we can.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, sir, that we can currently transmit, and that this might not be the case for too much longer.”

  The Earth representative looked around those gathered, and saw his own doubts on their faces. The advisor waited for him to decide what to do next. His task was over.

  “What do you think?” the Earth representative, finally, asked, and from the hubbub that followed, received the only direction that might save them.

  “Transmit,” he said, when the unanimous decision was returned.

  The comms chief left the conference room and, after a moment’s hesitation, they all followed.

  And so they were all in attendance when the trogarians noticed the signal and reacted.

  “What is the meaning of this?” the captain demanded.

  “We are trying an experiment,” the Earth representative told him.

  “On what grounds?”

  “On the grounds that we are human.”

  “What has that got to do with anything?”

  “We don’t believe we are alone in the universe.”

  “Since that much is clear, what makes you think you have to explore that idea any further?”

  “Since you have arrived, and we are curious to see who else is in the neighborhood.”

  “Are you trying to start a war?”

  “No, captain. Are you?”

  The trogarian’s face changed color, its humanoid features becoming less defined.

  “Is this a direct transmission?” the Earth representative asked, looking over at one of the technicians.

  “Yes, sir, but it appears to have an overlay.”

  “Can you remove it?”

  “I can hear what you are saying,” the captain interrupted.

  “Then perhaps you’d like to show us what you really look like?” the representative countered, looking at the on-screen relay.

  The trogarian stared at them for a long moment, and then glanced off-screen, its expression changing.

  “I believe we have reached the agreed time for us to set our talking points,” it said, and the screen wobbled.

  In the background, the Earth representative was aware of the chief communications officer speaking, low and urgent, and hoped he was transmitting a broadband cry for help. The screen wobbled again, and the trogarian captain’s face changed. None of those who saw it could suppress an exclamation of surprise.

  Not human, was obvious, and had been obvious from the dark gray tinge to the man’s very human-like features, but whatever the technician had stripped from the broadcast now showed a very different creature.

  “What are you?” the Earth representative asked, motioning for calm as alarm rippled through the seated press.

  “We are the arach,” the creature said, although how they could understand words from the clatters, chitters and hisses they were hearing was beyond them. The arach’s skin gleamed a dull dark red, and two sets of forelimbs were visible above the console.

  The Earth representatives chose to focus on something else, instead.

  “Arach… as in short-for arachnid?”

  That elicited a hiss of amusement tinged by scorn.

  “You could say that.”

  “And the starm…ehem…the prince?”

  “Is not.”

  They waited for the arach commander to elaborate. As they did, realization dawned.

  “If you are one race, and he is another, then…”

  “The footage we sent was slightly altered. Two species rose to dominance on our world.”

  “So what is he?”

  The door hissed open, and the starman entered, along with more press. They could tell he was the starman from the way he dressed, but little else was the same.

  Starman Descended from Extra-Terrestrial Dinosaurs! was immediately saved for later use.

  His reptilian features and patina of scales made the tail look almost normal. The starman did not waste time.

  “The messages were sent to the same quadrant because that is where both our races dwell.”

  “So you knew they would come.”

  Starman puts Earth at Risk.

  “They were coming, anyway. They’ve been seeking pod beacons for millennia. It is the only way for them to ensure our people have no rallying point.”

  “We’ve found most of the others.” The arach’s voice rendition was gloating.

  The newly arrived press, for once, were silent, having finally noticed the creature on the communications screen.

  “But not all,” the starman countered. “Some have outwitted you for longer than they needed.”

  He turned to Earth’s leading representative.

  “Your decision to broadband your plight was…unexpected.”

  “But?”

  “Effective. I should have thought of it myself.”

  One of the reporters recovered enough to ensure a headline, Earth Council Contacts ETs in Secret!, went into the saved folder.

  “And?”

  The starman turned to the arach commander.

  “Look to your sensors.”

  The arach glanced away. It was only for a moment, but they all saw the shudder that ran through his body. When he looked back, he was tense with anger.

  “You know this means war.”

  The starman was unruffled.

  “We were at war, anyway. Only the Earthers did not know it.”