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They should have realized that Ramses!324, a.k.a Tok’ra’s responsibilities
and loyalties would remain with the people of New Welrios. Apparently, the
two factions there had managed to become one cohesive peoples since the rest
of Team Matic—including a different version of Ramses—was there. When they
sent Old!Bronach back to the Goldilocks Corridor to reclaim his throne, they
asked Team Kadiar to ask Tok’ra for his assistance in this matter. It would
be his job to make sure that Old!Bronach became a decent leader, and started
treating his people well. They never really found out how Tok’ra took it.
They didn’t even know how the crew of the Vellani Ambassador broached the
subject; whether it was more a command or more of a request. He apparently
accepted his new role out of some sense of guilt, which wasn’t what they
wanted. More recently, however, he put his foot down, and returned to his
roots on New Welrios.
They had become a powerhouse over the last century, armed with a plethora of
technologies that Tok’ra built for them. They were completely untouchable,
much in the same way that Vitalemus was. Even The Oaksent was reportedly
scared of getting near it, or even sending troops. Also like Vitalemus, they
had evidently stayed out of the politics, and were satisfied with being
independent and isolated. They were living proof that Oaksent’s hold on this
sector of the galaxy wasn’t as strong as they once believed. The movies made
it look easy, but it was probably pretty hard to keep control over so many
worlds. Things had only gotten harder since the team showed up. They hadn’t
realized how much of an impact they had had, but things were looking up.
Leona managed to convince the other parties to let the New Welriosians
speak. They didn’t want to be so distant anymore. They wanted to participate
in the community. The negotiations started back up again. Some of the
agreements they had come up with last year had to be scrapped or replaced,
but many weren’t rendered obsolete by this development. They pushed forward,
and were almost home free. All that was left were signatures of all parties
involved. It may have taken a long time, but they seemed to be able to agree
that they wanted peace. That wasn’t possible just a couple of years ago. It
was going to be a perpetual struggle, just as it was in the Sixth Key, but
they should be able to handle it.
There was just one more thing before the deal could be finalized, at least
according to everyone but Tok’ra, Dubra and Kivi, and Team Matic. The other
negotiators had evidently come up with a new demand during the interim
year, which they decided not to bring up until the New Welrios situation
could be resolved. Korali volunteered to be the one to speak for the group.
“We want slingdrive technology.” She smiled, thinking that she had them
right where they wanted them. “Nothing gets signed until we get it.”
Mateo stared over the table at her. “There are seven of us in total. We are
in this room for you. This is not to our benefit. If you fail to sign
these agreements, the VA will continue to ferry refugees to their new
rightful home on Castlebourne. And in the midst of all that, the rest of you
can fight it out all you bloody want. It’s sad, and we feel for the people
of the Goldilocks Corridor, whether they identify with the Exin Empire, or
otherwise. We won’t feel bad about our decision to bug out, however, because
we did everything we could. And again, there are only seven of us. No one
would blame us for failing to fix the whole universe. We will not let you
get your hands on this technology. There is no threat you could make to
change our minds. So sign it, don’t sign it; I don’t care anymore...our job
is done. You never had any leverage against us. We came to this world in
good faith to help, but we’ll only let that go so far before we hit our
breaking point.” He stood up. “Let’s get out of here, ladies, back to
Castlebourne.”
Bronach stood up as well. “If you leave, we can’t guarantee the safety of
your new homeworld. Even if we do sign this, nothing we agreed to in the
document bars us from attacking your region of the galaxy.”
“Do what you must,” Mateo responded. “We’ll take care of our people.” He
looked over at his old friend. “It was nice meeting you, Tok’ra.”
Tok’ra nodded back respectfully.
Mateo, Leona, Angela, and Romana disappeared in a flash of technicolors.
They found themselves floating in the middle of outerspace, rather than on a
planet, or even near one. Mateo laughed. “Slingdrive still slingin’.”
“That was a good speech you made, love,” Angela said to him. It was up to
Leona to figure out what was going on, and to see if they could determine
where they ended up, and they all knew it, so there was no point in
vocalizing the plan of action. They just let her do her thing.
“Do you mean it?” Mateo asked.
“You said what we were all thinking,” Romana noted.
“Constellations are the same,” Leona interjected.
“They use constellations here?” Angela questioned.
“Well, they’re not named constellations, like Taurus or Leo. It’s just a map
of the firmament as seen from our coordinates. We could be a couple light
years off course and still be in the right vicinity, but...I would also be
able to see the host star, which I can’t. The whole solar system is
missing.”
“Wait, I’m getting a message.” Mateo tapped on his wristband.
“So am I,” Romana confirmed.
They listened to the message together. “Friends. This is Ramses. I can’t tell you what it took to get Hrockas to
let me drop this buoy in the water for you to find. He hooked up with a
powerful time traveler, who agreed to literally move the star system. This
is to prevent any enemy from ever finding us. Ever. Depending on when you
return, we’re probably only five or ten light years away at this point.
Please retrieve the buoy, so no one else can find us. It includes an
onboard tracker, which will pinpoint our exact location. Don’t leave it
there, please. Rocky’ll have my ass.”
“I see where the beacon is,” Leona said. “It will only take us one normal
jump to get there.”
They all teleported away, and took hold of the buoy. Leona popped the access
panel open, and started working on the tracker. It wasn’t just there for
them to consult on the first screen. She had to log into the system using
her credentials, then go through this whole security system to prove her
identity. If she made one little mistake, the entire thing would apparently
self-destruct, so she had to be very careful and methodical.
“Do we have enough power for a second jump?” Romana asked. “It’s looking a
little low to me.”
“It’ll be pretty short compared to where we just came from,” Mateo said to
her. “I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
“We’ll wait several hours to be safe while our safety levels rise,” Leona
said as she was still working. “They will not have traveled very far at all
in that time.”
“Wait, what about the Vellani Ambassador?” Angela realized. “They need to
find Castlebourne’s new location too. In fact, if it’s constantly on the
move, they’ll need constant updates to keep up.”
Leona stopped and sighed. “That’s a good point. We can’t leave this here,
though. Hrockas will be mad. I’m sure he went to great lengths to hide. The
new coordinates cannot be allowed to fall into the wrong hands. But we have
no idea when Team Kadiar will come back too. We just left them behind, and
we cannot communicate with them from this distance.”
“We have to go back,” Romana urged.
“Correction,” Leona said. She tapped one more button, like it was the last
one she needed. “We’ll go back. You need to stay here to protect the
buoy. We don’t know what the VA’s quintessence levels are. They might not be
able to return until tomorrow. We also may not be able to find them at all,
so you can be our back-up messenger.”
“Leona, we’re not leaving my daughter here alone.”
“There’s a pocket dimension attached to this buoy. She can rest in stasis,
and wait for someone else to arrive.”
“What if that someone else is an enemy, who blows this thing out of the
sky?”
“They won’t be able to find it,” Leona reasoned. “I’m turning off the
beacon. Only we or the Ambassador will be able to reconnect with it.”
“It’s okay, dad, I can do this. I’m the only one who can turn off my
pattern.”
“I don’t like you to use that loophole all the time,” Mateo argued. “It’s
so...lonely. I was never lonely. I met Leona right away after I started
slipping time, and it wasn’t even two weeks before she joined my pattern.
You shouldn’t have to keep doing this for us. We shouldn’t keep putting you
in this position.”
“What’s the point of a loophole if we can’t use it to loop holes?” She
winced. “You know what I mean. I won’t really be alone, I’ll be asleep. And
I’ll only wake up if my sisters show up.”
He reached out and hugged her the best he could with their suits on. “Argh!”
She smiled at him, then receded her nanites so she was just wearing jeans
and a t-shirt. He did the same, so they could hug each other for real.
I love you, she mouthed.
I love you too, he mouthed back.
They each reengaged suit mode, then Romana had Leona help her access to
pocket dimension. They could still hear her in there through comms, so she
was able to promise that everything was okay. It was pitch black, but her
suit was equipped with everything she needed. She said her goodbyes, then
initiated stasis. Leona needed to watch her vitals, and run diagnostics on
her behalf, before they could leave her behind. Once she was satisfied that
Romana was going to be all right on her own, it still wasn’t time to leave
just yet, because their own slingdrives weren’t safe enough to make another
jump. Finally, though, after the waiting period, the three of them synced up
their tandem slingdrives, and jumped back to Vitalemus. They were floating
in orbit, though, not on the planet anymore, so hopefully no one would even
notice their return. It was kind of embarrassing, to make such a dramatic
exit, only to come back because they forgot their keys.
They tried to reach out to their friends, but no one was responding. After a
few tries, they shifted gears, and made a call to the version of Vitalie on
this planet, who informed them that the Vellanie Ambassador had already
left, but she didn’t know where they were going. Cool. So now they were
stuck in the Goldilocks Corridor with nothing to do, and no way to go back
home until their slingdrive came back online.
They just hung in orbit for a few minutes, having no better plans as of yet.
They certainly weren’t going to try to land back on the planet.
“Wanna make out?” Angela joked.
