We spent the next hour discussing the steps needed to break ground on everything so that when we began building our capital city there wouldn't be anything holding us back. Mom was excited to speak with Kiv-mel and his team about using Warden tech to improve human devices; tv's, computers, game consoles, cameras, phones, the list she made with Carrie went on and on and even touched on areas that I wouldn't have thought of right away, like medical technologies to monitor patients and scan for irregularities in them. The two of them left before the hour was over so that Carrie could introduce her to Kiv-mel and really start discussing everything they needed to do before reaching out to the rest of the world with the tech we could sell without raising Earth's technological levels too far beyond what they were at. That was something I was firm about; Nephilim will not raise any race to a technological level comparable to ourselves. It wasn't paranoia, it was to make sure that everything the race in question had was completely understood and that no disaster happened because of what we gave them.

Father and Kyouka spent the time discussing the various lawsuits that were being leveled against the Nephilim Army and how they could be fought or have the punishments from them lessened. Father was also excited at the prospect of being able to represent an inter-galactic organization in court which I didn't understand. He and Kyouka were of the mind that the court that we would be pulled into would be overseen by a judge chosen from around the world at best or a tribunal formed from the various world governments at worst. Harry had some interesting additions to their conversation, but he seemed content to stay with Jen and his son. Eventually, Father and Kyouka left the room as well, so that Father could seek out any employees or other lawyers to pull into the new firm he seemed to be creating for the Nephilim to use on Earth.

I had spoken up a time or two during the planning that everyone was doing, but mostly I was fine with letting the others take the lead on those conversations. Kyouka was going to have eventual control of all Nephilim presence on Earth, or wherever we were if we lost the coming court cases badly enough. She needed to have an idea of how to interact with the humans that she'd be working with most, and if I'd guided the conversation too heavily then she might not have thought of certain ideas she'd had, like the one about allowing humans to live in Elysium and to use it as a place to train them for eventual immagration to undeveloped worlds that were good for humans to live on.

With everyone else gone, I turned toward Harry and Jen and asked them what I'd been waiting for this moment to ask.

"What's the argument about this time?" I asked.

"What argument?" Jen asked.

"Jen, I'm your little brother. I grew up with you. I know when someone says something that you don't like and Harry just did that. What's the argument about?" I said.

It was a moment before either of them spoke up and then Harry gave me my answer.

"I was telling Jenny that I wanted to sign up," he said. "To join the fight against the monsters."

"Absolutely not," I shot that idea down immediately.

"Thank you," Jen said.

"Why not?" Harry asked at the same time.

"I'm not going to bring my brother-in-law to a hostile planet and watch him die just to turn around and tell my sister that she and her son are never seeing him again," I told him. "You've got more responsibilities now than you did when I was taken. I can't let you throw them away to help others, just because you said that you wanted to help."

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

"You're letting children sign up," he pointed out. "Why wouldn't you want to have another adult in the fight?"

"Those children are all back on Rallypoint," I said. "I left them there to protect it and to grow more. Some of them haven't fought Scourge outside of hologram training, and that leaves them with the bare minimum of what they're capable of. I can't have children fighting Scourge and dying because I listened when they said they were ready. I have to judge them more harshly than I judge everyone else or I risk watching them all die. I don't want those nightmares."

"What about Carrie?" Harry demanded. "You said it yourself; she's only eighteen. Did you take her with you because she's the first Nephilim that signed on with you? Or did she manage to pass your little tests?"

"Carrie has passed everything I've put her up against," I told him. "She's fought Scourge without freezing or giving in to fear and she's lead others into the fight without doing something so stupid it gets everyone killed. If she hadn't done that then she would still be back on Rallypoint with the other children. You aren't signing on. That's final. This conversation is over."

"Then I'll go over your head," Harry said. "Someone's got more pull than you and I just have to find them."

"There is no one over me!" I told him. "There's no one to tell me when I'm making a mistake. There's no one to step in when I fail. The highest power in the Nephilim Army is me! I built it into what it is now and I'll build it into what it becomes. There was no one else that could do it when I started this, only me. The closest there is to a superior for me is my peers and counterparts in the Wardens of Life and they won't allow humans to join them or risk their civilians from rioting and ripping them apart from the inside."

"I have final say in this Harry," I said to him. "Me. Not Carrie, not Kyouka, me. I've told you that you're not signing up for this and I meant it. I won't be responsible for my sister's husband dying before his son is old enough to start school. You want to help? Then help Father with the lawsuits that are coming my way. There are more things I need to make this all work than having a new soldier. I need medical personell, engineers, farmers, teachers, scientists, laborers, judges, lawyers, and even politicians. I'm not starting a group of soldiers that are going to mercenary our way across the universe. I'm creating a race, one that will protect anyone who needs it, and to get to that point I need more than just people that swing swords and fire guns, I need people that can support one another and create homes."

"That all starts with people like you and Jennifer. People that don't join the fight but instead have children, build careers, grow old together. People that let us do our job of fighting and then let us have somewhere, someone, to go home to. You're doing more than I can tell you just by staying here and living your life. So stay out of the fight. Leave it to me and the others. We need Earth and every other planet we take back to have people like you on it, building more than just defenses and doing more than just surviving."

"He's right, Harry," Jen said. "He's said it before, Rick needs people here where we're safe, rather than out there fighting against those monsters. You don't have to fight with him to help; you can stay here and help plenty without leaving me."

I could see that Harry wanted to argue with us, to fight his case and make us relent, but I meant every word I'd said to him. I needed people to stay here. I needed civilians to support whatever army I built and I needed them to stay where they were safe. I also didn't want to face my sister and tell her that I'd been forced to bury him on an alien planet because Scourge got to him before I could help him. It didn't matter to me what he said, he wasn't joining this fight. I was already having trouble with the fathers and mothers that had already signed up, I didn't want to tell their children that they were gone because of my orders.

"Fine," Harry eventually said. "Fine. I won't try to sign up. I'll stay here and help with other things. But you're taking us to Jupiter or wherever we want to go for vacation. You hear me Rickshaw?"

"Yeah," I said, relief filling me. "I hear you."