Two hours later, the Grimalkin dropped out of hyperspace only four hundred kilometers away from Binary Bloom, right into the crosshairs of its now extended quantum coherence cannon. The Xylar ship dropped a few hundred meters away from them at the same time.

„Now!“, Red was on the comms unit talking to the alien ship the second they left hyperspace, „Before you get any fancy ideas, I recommend you scan the space station that is aiming at you. Unless you can jump to hyperspace in“, she checked the display in front of her, „less than two milliseconds, let’s keep to our agreement and negotiate.“

The speakers came to life with the translated words of the Xylars: „We already agreed to negotiate. Our demands are: Handing over the hyperdrive core and the two Qyrl soldiers you have taken hostage.“

Red sat on the bridge, her head jerking back slightly in surprise. „Two what?“, she said to Twitch and Grubs, both of which shrugged.

As discussed half an hour ago, she had chosen a channel that Binary Bloom was also on. Nico had heard the conversation. He jumped in: „We have the prisoners. What do you offer in return? We have lost much over this core of yours, so make a reasonable offer.“

Red bit her lip and made a „what the?“ gesture. The channel was voice only so the Xylars would not see it. It was for her. „Nico“, she thought, „what are you doing? Don’t sabotage this. Our lives are a pretty reasonable offer, aren’t they?“

„We will withdraw without further hostilities. We will also make sure that the Qyrl forces withdraw.“

„Sweeten the deal a bit more for me.“, Nico responded, driving Red into another set of frantic expressions, „I need to rebuild a community. Information is a valuable commodity I can sell. Give me, say, ten technological or political insights of value.“

„Two“, the Xylars responded.

„Six“

There was silence for a few seconds. Then the Xylars answer came: „We understand you are engaging in a process called haggling. This is not how Xylars negotiate. Our offer stands at two. You can change your offer or demand other concessions. We will not change this number.“

„Oh really?“, Nico countered, „In that case, I demand you hand over that ship of yours. Or you can jump over your shadow and agree to four.“

Red was on the edge while listening to the conversation. She had to physically grab the edge of her seat in order to stop herself from jumping in. She knew Nico just a bit, just enough to understand he was doing what he was good at. She was a captain, not a negotiator or diplomat.

The silence again stretched into seconds. Ten, twenty. Nico let the silence sit on the channel and work for him. It drove Red nuts, but she kept her radio silence as well.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Finally, the Xylars came back: „Just this once we will change our counter-offer to three pieces of valuable information, details to be negotiated.“

Nico’s answer came immediately: „Deal. Let’s discuss the specifics.“

At the same time, a flashing light on the console let Red know that a text message from Nico was waiting for her. It asked a simple question: „What have you already learnt from them, so we don’t get the same knowledge again?“

Exactly seventeen minutes later, humans and Xylars had reached an agreement. The Xylars would transmit the blueprints for an improved gravity field system to Nico and Red. They would also give them a map of all colonized planets within fifty light years, for the purpose of establishing trade routes. And finally, they would divulge the importance of the hyperdrive core, but only after it had been handed over. Nico and Red agreed to trust them to hold up that part of the deal.

As agreed, the Grimalkin docked at Binary Bloom. This had been the toughest part of the discussion, as the Xylars worried that the humans would use the opportunity to let the core disappear into the bowls of the station. Finally, Red had agreed to be a hostage on the Xylars ship until the Rusty Bolt returned with the core in its cargo hold. She argued that she was the least needed crew member for a routine docking maneuver.

It also made her the first ever human to visit a Xylar spaceship. Not that she saw more than the airlock, but historic records rarely cared for such details.

It took Twitch and Grubs the better part of half an hour to dock, reload the cargo and return to space in their familiar ship. Red returned to them in space and the Rusty Bolt and the Xylar ship jumped off, away to the edge of the Junkstorm.

There, they dropped the core into space and, the guns of the Rusty Bolt aimed at it, retreated backwards. At the same time, Red called the Xylars: „Here is your core. Now for the final part of our deal. Why go to all this trouble? We know it’s a prototype, and you already confirmed that you are working with the Felindar. Why?“

„You are the one who stole it, correct?“, the counter question came, „And you do this often, yes?“

Red’s blood froze. Was this the moment of retribution? But the Xylars had been upright so far. She gave them the benefit of the doubt: „Yes. It is what we do. To you it is just a normal piece of equipment, but among humans it is valuable and we have made a business out of it.“

„These dimensional shears of yours.“, the Xylars continued, „With the modification to rip out a part of a ship. Have you ever considered the side-effects of those on higher-dimensional beings?“

Now Red was positively puzzled. „No“, she said, not having the slightest clue what the Xylars were going for.

„Anyone caught in the beam between your shear projector and your target receives a dimensional burn. We have hundreds of Xylars who have permanent scars from your thievery. And not just Xylars, many of the other races have suffered the same.“

Red was flabbergasted. No, she had indeed never thought that. She never knew just how the dimensional shears worked, only used them.

„It was enough“, the Xylars continued, and to the crew’s surprise honest to the word ‚insight‘ in the deal they had made, giving them not just minimal information but all that they needed to know to truly understand, „that seven races have joined forces to put an end to what you call piracy. Not through force, but by developing together a refined design that is no longer susceptible to you.“

And with that, the Xylar ship opened fire. Not on the Rusty Bolt, but on the hypercore swimming in space a short distance from them, instantly vaporizing it.

„We came not to get the hypercore back. We have other prototypes, closer even to a final design. We needed to make sure you humans do not have it, can not study it and will not find ways to circumvent its protection mechanism.“

The communication channel tore off and the Xylar ship disappeared into hyperspace.