Eyeball had been at numerous important meetings before; several of which had determined the fate of the earth, or even the milky way galaxy, by the end. This one wasn't nearly so important; though he still didn't want things to go poorly.
The Duchess, of course, was at the head of the table, with a pair of bodyguards on either side, resplendent in a long, sleek white dress that did wonders for showing just how close to human her species was, and risked distracting him from the topic at hand. His helmet was telling him she was surrounded by some sort of energy field; something likely similar to what the Republic used to slow down speedsters like the Jernal, rather than an actual shield, since the light haze of mist in the air from the banks of humidifiers mounted nearby was still passing through it.
More of her own species; at least six ship captains; men and women with the blue skin, dark hair, and gills of a Shoork; and even a squid whose gender he couldn't identify but was a member of the non-humanoid branch of their people; were gathered around her. There were three Yogg, their spiny protrusions from their own more greyish-toned skin making them stand out; he'd seen them long enough to recognize them immediately. The rest of the captains; ranging from a pair of feathered, eight-limbed creatures perched on the table's edge to one that, like the squid, was resting in a tank of liquid, were unrecognizable; though he'd seen a few during his recruitment drive earlier.
Qaki nodded to the gathered captains as the last sat down; a grey-skinned creature with hundreds of tendrils; apparently prehensile; dangling down from its upper body. "My fellow captains. I bring you here today with an opportunity. One that could make a tremendous difference in our efforts against the Republic. Those of you whom are privateers, this could make you fabulously wealthy. Those of you whom are members of a confederate navy, this could bring you a fair amount of neutronium for use in ship-building, enough to help us tilt the balance against our adversary. And this opportunity has been brought to us by this man. Captain Eyeball. You have the floor."
Eyeball nodded; and pulled to his feet, gesturing at the table. The holographic display suddenly came to life; showing an image of a star, a Republic fleet, and a single round object. The caption at the top read 'Paradise'.
"A couple of weeks ago, I was incarcerated in a Republic prison; albeit a fairly nice one, in a system I'll be calling the Paradise system going forward; coordinates are being sent to you all when this is done. Inside this system was a chunk of incredibly valuable debris left over from a catastrophic battle; a massive chunk of neutronium. So big and heavy that transporting it was a problem."
The irregular orb suddenly came into focus; the strange, bulging shape, the hole in the side. "Enough neutronium to make every privateer in the system wealthy and give every confederate navy that calls this station home enough to work through years worth of ship production. Their plan was simple; hold it in place, protect it, and get a gate-ship there to take it to their shipyards."
An animated clip played; showing the events of weeks ago. Destroyed Republic escorts. The orb being launched into the sun. "I didn't want the Republic to get it. And I didn't have what I needed to fight them. So with the help of my Ascension allies, we hijacked a Republic scout-ship, launched the mass into the sun, and fled. This would keep them from getting it.... for now. However."
The display faded; and showed the star starting to shrink, as an expanding, nebulous cloud filled the display. "Ascension still has a presence in the system, giving us updates. And from what we have learned, the Gateship will arrive within the next two weeks. At that time... they will begin stripping the outer layer of the star away through a series of enormous venting devices, while preparing the equipment to retrieve the mass from the core. The project will take months. Probably between five and seven. When it's complete, the star system will be uninhabitable, its ruins in the midst of a nebula that was once the star's outermost layers and the neutronium will be carted out through the gate. They will initially have massive amounts of security in place; but withdraw it over time, as the work is done... since, with the system now buried in an enormous gas cloud, any attacker would be forced to come in at barely above lightspeed, giving them plenty of time to intercept."
"Tactically, it makes sense; the gate will have access to every Republic fleet, and can call in thousands of reinforcements in hours; while it would take days for the enemy to reach it from the edge of warp sensor range. Their method is sound, and should allow them to retrieve it, with minimal risk of interception; we would need either a fleet big enough to handle the entire Republic navy, or to arrive before the gateship and do the work of pulling the orb out ourselves to have any shot at it; and that would take weeks. The gateship; and its reinforcements; would be there by then."
"So. We have the possibility of a remarkable prize. One that, though it technically belongs to me, I'm willing to share with anyone willing to help fight the Republic; especially if they'll join me on this mission."
The Duchess stared at the display. "You... make it sound impossible. Would you have us what... creep in at slower-than-light speeds, reactors off, to pounce on them the moment the Neutronium is freed... and spend weeks struggling through the soup of the nebula to escape, hoping Republic forces don't catch us?"
Eyeball smiled. He'd actually programmed the translator to convey emotions, so hopefully the expressionless helmet wouldn't ruin the effect. "That is a possibility, yes. However. You're aware there are faster-than-light drives other than warp, and these gates?"
The captains all suddenly grew more attentive. Some leaning in closer. Others making subtle gestures or indications of anxiety, awareness. "Where I come from, we built what was called a 'Hyperdrive'. The vessel I owned which won the battle leaving that orb behind was equipped with such a thing; a drive which drops the vessel into a pseudo-reality that was discovered by some alien species thousands of years ago, and which my people called 'Hyperspace'. While it does have limits in terms of jumping into gravity wells like those of a planet or star, and a warp drive is faster in clear space, nebulas have no impact on it whatsoever, and it can handle far more mass... like a giant orb of super-dense rock. I can manufacture, demonstrate, and sell these drives to anyone interested in joining; and whether this works or not, you can, of course, keep them, and your nations can have the plans to build your own."
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
The image suddenly showed a fleet appearing in the space around the gate-ship; firing on it, and the defending fleet, ships swooping in to seize the orb; and then vanishing just as they'd arrived. "Ideally, I would recommend we start moving the neutronium out of the system, let the Republic call in every ship it wants for backup... then destroy the gate and leave. Suddenly, the Republic would have a giant mass of ships trapped there, weeks from any battlefront, unable to join the war elsewhere. With appropriate timing, we could coordinate this with other sectors of Confederate space that border these gates; and hit the systems the moment the defending fleets withdraw."
The level of excitement was growing. The Yogg captains were actually drooling, and his helmet warned him of a biological contaminant, filtering the air; something apparently was fragrant when excited. "Obviously, this won't be a one-two punch to kill the Republic. And those fleets would be a major threat here; the nebula surrounding the star will be a few light-weeks across by the time this happens, and expanding, which will take them a week or two to escape... but even if we damage them, that would be thousands of ships. So, alternately, we could just blow the gate the moment we arrive. I'd need the agreement of the local rulers before enacting a plan the strands a giant swarm of Republic ships a few weeks travel away."
The Duchess stared at the display, then at Eyeball. "...I thought you were going to be offering us this extradimensional space device, to help us carry more firepower into battle. This... If this drive functions as advertised, the Queen will want to enact her plans to create a barricade against the Republic by anti-matter bombing uninhabited systems along the border. We could strand a thousand ships here... and then render this entire sector of space virtually impassible to warp drives. How hard are they to make?"
"Substantially harder than a warp drive; though they require no neutronium. And when it comes to combat near a planet, your warp drives will be vastly superior; you can make short hops using the warp drive in places the hyperdrive is virtually nonfunctional; going at warp factor ten for six seconds to cover a light-minute and reach the enemy, for example. I would highly recommend, if possible, building ships with both."
The Duchess stared at the display for a moment, looking at the captains. "...We will be giving our friend Eyeball here a chance to demonstrate these hyperdrives, and I will be contacting the queen. But. If this performs as advertised... I anticipate her Majesty authorizing the plan. If any of you are interested... we can begin building and preparing now, and continue our normal anti-Republic operations... and be prepared in five months, waiting to strike within Republic space. I invite you to speak among yourselves about this., and review the materials... Eyeball, if I could speak with you privately."
***
Her bodyguards had stopped just outside the office, leaving the two of them alone as she stepped in, walking over to her desk; and bending over to pick up a tablet. The basic design varied from place to place, but a modest-sized display with a computer built into it seemed to be common to everyone who got advanced enough to make one; though the way the dress moved over her body as she reached for it was far, far less common.
She turned to him, giving the Shoork equivalent of a smile; showing far too many sharp teeth, destroying the illusion of her just being a human woman in makeup. "I do wish you'd gone over this plan privately. As much as the Queendom wishes to see the Republic at an end, should we ever get them on the back foot, the Confederacy would, of course, begin to dissolve. Should your plan work as intended... and my Queen react as I suspect she will... we can push the Republic out of this entire sector. We don't actually need these pirates, or other species, to enact this plan. Should your hyperdrive tests be shown to be failures, they'll lose interest... and they wouldn't need to know that they were deliberate, and we were the only ones with the real thing... the Queendom can make it very much worth your while to make us the exclusive owners of that device here in the sector."
Eyeball didn't even have time to respond before she started to move closer, and started speaking once more, still with that wide open, jagged smile. "And I can make it even more-so. Right now, you're an outsider; a homeless wanderer in our sector. I could make you one of my husbands; a Duke. Wealth, power, servants. The good of the Queendom would be the good of yourself. I can tell you're attracted to me as well; and lets just say I have a certain fondness for capable, powerful males, so it needn't be a strictly procedural marriage either. All you need to do is make sure only Her Majesty's ships get this new drive of yours."
The ideas of flat-out rejecting her, and accepting her proposal, both just felt... terrible. There was a part of him, of course, that was extremely tempted. He almost reached out for her... but stopped. "Don't get me wrong. You're right, in that I'm attracted to you. Both you specifically, and your entire species, are the most attractive of all the descendants I've encountered, and if I end up settling down after the war, this seems a likely place. But. I want to kill the Republic. And the Founders. Not just the ones in this sector. All of them. So I'll help you; and anyone else you'll let me here; and then move on. And since I might want to live here someday, I'll make sure I do right by your people as I kill the Founders."
Qaki blinked. "Kill the Founders? But... they left. Thousands of years ago. Barely speak even to their chosen children."
"According to Republic records, he last time the Purge went poorly for the Republic on a grand scale, they came back to help for a bit over a year, then left. If I screw the Marrick over badly enough, I might just be able to lure them into the light. If not... I'll go hunting. I'm immortal; I'll have time, I'm sure it'll take less time to find them than to fly to my home galaxy."
The Duchess sighed. "Fine, fine. If this plan works, strictly on my authority as Duchess, I can grant you a rank as a lesser noble, enough to own a small continent on a habitable world, or a moon. So long as you really do give us as much neutronium as you promised, that on its own will give us an enormous advantage."
"Honestly, I may have underestimated how much I can give you. So. We've got several months before we're going to be making a move; I can give you the plans for the hyperdrive now, but I'd like to go hurt the Republic in a few more places first. Do you have any intel on places where they've got a mid-sized fleet, say, less than three heavy capital ships? And, as odd as it might sound, I'd like to visit at least one place where the Republic has performed a few acts of genocide; I plan to make examples of everyone involved."