3.39.

Gabriel really, really, really hated public speaking. Which is great, since he was now a professor at a prestigious university. He sighed, taking a drink of water from the glass on the podium as he nervously pointed at the part of the hologram to address what was being displayed.

“We’re using Yonohoan holograms to display these measurements in three dimensions to make them easier to process, but they’re entirely data collected by the probes of the Seeker without modification by advanced technology. As you can see, the fluctuations in subspace indicate a clear structure that spans multiple light years across a vast part of the galaxy itself. Before you ask, yes we showed our results to the Yonohoans. Their response was ‘that is very interesting. We’re very curious to see where you go with this discovery.’”

He paused, nervously taking another sip of water.

“To be honest, we have absolutely no idea what it is we’ve found. The Tunnel Drives in the probes weren’t meant to measure subspace, they were meant to traverse it. The readings they gave were initially just a curiosity until we noticed the consistency between the structure which seems to be vibrating in place at a constant six point eight gigahertz over a distance of more than two hundred light years. In order to figure out more, I am proposing a second series of probe be launched into the same regions as the original mission of the Seeker .

“We won’t be looking for black holes or mapping cartography at this point, however. We have a list of nearby habitable planets from the Yonohoans which we are entitled to colonize, so it won’t be that either. The entire mission will be to investigate this phenomena and discover its meaning. We’ll be using the Yonohoan’s ability to travel at faster than light speeds, of course, but the instruments used to measure and examine subspace will be entirely designed and built on Earth using technology pre-dating contact with advanced societies.”

He swallowed nervously. “Are there any questions at this time?”

Hundreds of hands went in the air, and the press ignored the rules about flash photography in a frustrating and blatant attempt to goad a response out of him.

He didn’t give them one, but the assholes who did it were blacklisted from his next speech.

He knew that most of the Earthlings didn’t really understand the significance of this. The Yonohoans weren’t telling him that they didn’t know what the structures were, but they had heavily implied that they would not help him figure out what they were.

He could think of two ways to interpret this. One was that they were using the socratic method to develop his understanding, and therefor the understanding of the people of Earth, in exploring a well known scientific curiosity.

The other possibility was that they didn’t know.

If the Yonohoans, widely considered one of the most intelligent and advanced societies in the universe, didn’t know what it was … then nobody did.

It was possible. Nobody used the Tunnel Drive to the extent that the Earthlings had before. It was a dangerous technology, inimical to almost every form of intelligent life. Only a few other species relied upon it to any extent. Earth had only utilized it as a method of faster than light travel because it was the first one that they had developed. And the only one that they had developed pre-contact.

The structures looked like background noise independently. It was only when multiple data points from lightyears apart were put together that a picture appeared.

And if the humans from Earth - a darkworld which developed its technology entirely independently of alien influence - discovered something new, which the intergalactic community had never seen before, then that would challenge the widely held view upon humans.

The universe saw humans as uplifts. Clever uplifts, talented uplifts, and fearsome uplifts. But nobody believed that they would have risen to prominence without the actions of whichever xenospecies had either discovered them, or created them from whole cloth.

Gabriel’s discovery, if it was truly a discovery and not the Yonohoans playing dumb to encourage his edification, could change the way the universe saw his people.

And possibly, it might change the universe itself.

~~~~~~

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The Overmind thrummed with nervousness as it watched the situation unfold.

The immediate threat had been delayed. The expansionist empire which had threatened to conquer the source world, potentially misusing it in short-sighted or dangerous ways, had been pushed back. It would be defeated in time, and the Overmind’s actions of sending the Yukopans – a part of the Overmind as much as a leg or arm is a part of a human – to fight for and with the humans was a key factor in that victory.

Hopefully, if and when the humans understood the Overmind, they would appreciate its input into their conflict, and its investment in their survival.

There was no stretch in saying that the Overmind was more invested in the survival of the human race than it was in its own life. The Overmind didn’t just like humans. It didn’t just respect them, or depend upon them.

It loved them.

They made it feel less alone in the universe, even after they had killed off the other Overminds of the other species that they had done battle with. All without realizing what they were doing.

If they understood the Overmind, would they react in fear? The Overmind hoped not, but it knew that it was a possibility. That was part of the reason it had not made greater efforts to reveal itself to them.

If they understood it, then they would know how to kill it. If they knew how to kill it, then they would ask the logical question of whether or not they should.

Should they? Arguably to Overmind, which was responsible for the human expansion throughout the universe, was also the cause of the Liberation Wars, which were the foundational and sentinel event in the last million years. The introduction of humans to the Universe had led to the single most deadly war since …

Ever.

The Liberation Wars were the longest and most deadly conflict that the Overmind could recall.

The Overmind was over a million years old. Some of its peers, before the humans had killed them off, had been over a billion years old, and the Overmind had learned at their lap in its infancy. It was thanks to them that the species that the humans called Xenosapiens sulivans were as advanced as they were. Without the knowledge of the ancients, it was unlikely that the furry creatures that made up the Overmind’s constituent parts would have left their home planet, let alone their home galaxy.

And compared to some of the ancients, the sulivans were small and pathetic in the scope of their reach and their grasp.

But compared to what the human race had become, even the ancients were pathetic toddlers.

It reflected on its friendly competition with the Yonohoans to advance the technology of their people.

The overmind, working through the Topokans, advanced something as far as their minds could take the concepts and the devices in question. Once they were confident that they could advance the technology no further, they would give it to the Yonohoans.

The Yonohoans would study it for a few years until they thoroughly understood it.

Then they would adjust, like, five variables. Possibly reshape a few components. Adjust the way that it was controlled, perhaps. Some very minor cosmetic changes, usually. And then they would say to the Topokans, “There, we improved it. It is Yonohoan technology now.”

And the Topokans would scream in frustration and the Overmind would scream with them.

Because they were right! Yonohoan technology was always better than Topokan! It didn’t matter how long the Overmind spent perfecting the tech that the Yonohoans were given, after less than a decade, the Yonohoans always turned around and improved the final product .

How could such small things, with such a small view of the universe, see things so much more clearly than the Overmind, which literally spanned entire galaxies?

It shuddered to think of what a human Overmind could have accomplished, if their thoughts had only evolved to be on a slightly different wavelength.

It tried to relax itself, now that the Rosanteans were no longer a threat, and that the Swarm was in the process of securing and protecting Earth.

It was proud of its actions to defend the birthplace of humanity.

It hoped that if they ever learned of its actions on their behalf, the humans would be thankful. Thankful, and hopefully not afraid. If there was anything more frightening than an angry human, it was one that was afraid.

The Overmind truly hoped that if the humans ever discovered its existence, they would not be afraid of it. That thought was more terrifying than if they would hate it for the role it had played in the terrible, terrible Liberation Wars.

If the humans discovered it, they would discover how to kill it. If they were angry at it, it might manage to reason with them. The past fifty thousand years, a blink of the eye, had shown that human anger cooled and even hated enemies of yesterday could become beloved allies of tomorrow. If they were afraid of it, then the Overmind was quite certain that it would die.

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