“Birkdale didn’t just stumble across the Tylas, no fucking chance. Ask anyone else from mission and they’ll shut up and stick to the official story. But I won’t. Can’t bribe the truth outta me. So, here’s what they won’t tell you - there was another ship that found us. Big, armed to the teeth. Looked like a clan warship but clearly had that living Cambiar shit all over it – gold and blue. ID Code was scrambled, but it sent us a data packet and a recording of a dude cackling his ass off – nothing else. Weeks after that, after a bit of decoding, we get some coordinates, and suddenly we’re neck deep in Tylas territory with half a flotilla of ships pointing their beam cannons at us. I’m telling you, someone else found the Tylas first and just let us deal with that shit show of a first contact. Someone, no fucking clue who, but someone knew what was going to happen.”– Randal Dearson, Maintenance Consultant for the Galant Corporation Exploration Department, 2263. ‘The Tylas First Contact – Accident or Setup?’ from Xeno News Monthly.

  Elias rested against a workbench just on the edge of the laboratory’s chalk border, loudly humming as he read through a translated Tylas research paper. With every page turn, no matter how dull or unimportant the information, he gave a conspicuous gasp or false ‘ooh’ of understanding. It had only been a few days since his arrival at Nucleus Two, and he had already made good progress in wearing down his lab partner. Chel-Lin had initially ignored his every action, aside from the single time he purposely stepped over the border to look in one of the cupboards on her side which had earned him a silent glare. Truth be told, she had the patience of a saint – no one else Elias had worked with in the past would have lasted a day of his efforts, and she had stone walled him so far.

  But his efforts were paying off. He exaggeratedly licked a finger, flapped the page about repeatedly, and gave a loud hum of appreciation before finally turning it over.

  “Whoa,” Elias said in mock shock at rereading a bland passage discussing the effects of blue-shifted light when using the Tylas form of faster than light travel. Using a bubble of altered physics to simply move at speeds higher than C was a simple idea in theory, but one only the Tylas had been able to put into practice. It would have been interesting had Elias not read the same article years before.

  “What is your problem, Ith-San-Sha?” Chel-Lin said, rushing over to the chalk line that separated them as fast as she could glide.

  “What was that?” Elias looked up. “I think your translator is faulty.”

  “I meant what I said. It means ‘dirt-dragging-animal.”

  “Oh? And what problem is this ‘dirt-dragging-animal’ causing exactly, jellyfish?” he said as aloofly as possible.

  “Your incessant humming and hawing. Why do you seek to annoy me with everything you do?”

  “Oh, my dear lab partner, I didn’t mean any offense! I am so, so sorry.”

  Elias smirked as he leaned back in the stool, refusing to give an ounce of sincerely. The alien looked him over for a second, the trademark squinting of her slitted eyes of light a clear sign of her attempts to understand him.

  After a few moments, she spoke a single word, “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why? Why do you continue to frustrate me beyond all reason? I don’t want to share this space any more than you do, but I am forced into this situation. And yet, despite my best efforts to ignore you, for us both to go about our work, you continue to test my patience. Why?”

  Ah, that was what he wanted to hear. Now, Elias could make the deal.

  “It’s simple,” he said. “If we’re going to be working in the same lab, I want an assurance from you – if I keep to my side and stay quiet, you don’t even think of looking at my work. If I even think you’re stealing ideas or data from me, then I will make both of our lives hell. Of course, the opposite applies. So, from here on, you don’t look my way, I don’t look at yours. Capiche?”

  Well, Elias had needed to lie on the motivation of this deal. He didn’t give a shit if Chel-Lin took some scientific inspiration from his tests, not that someone of her level would be able to do anything with his exceptional work. No, he wanted to make certain he could start his real project without the need for secrecy. By the time his plan reached prototyping, she would be too far in to whistleblow him without any blowback. If all it took was Elias appearing overly protective of his work, he could live with that. He had lived with a worse reputation for far longer.

  “If it stops you from making those incessant, disgusting noises, then I agree.” Chel-Lin said. “Not that I would ever want your useless attempts at science in the first place.”

  Before she could drift away to the higher sections of the facility, where she had spent most of her time so far, Elias straightened up and approached the border. With his shoes just touching the line, he extended a hand over its edge. Earlier, he had refused to meet those disdainful eyes of hers. Now, he was the one making the deal.

  It took Chel-Lin a moment to realize what he was doing before she cautiously approached. A light hum emanated from her, though the translator remained silent. The whistling, ghostly sound rippled out for a moment before a single strap detached from her inner body. Slipping off from her outer cloak, it was paper thin and was coloured the same yellow and black pattern as the rest of her body. Coiling in the air, it carefully approached his hand before wrapping around his palm. Immediately, Elias felt an icy, tingling sensation across his hand, as if he had gripped an electrified spread of cloth. The soft texture was not what he had expected, his initial studies giving him cause to think the inorganic material that made up a Tylas physical body was closer to some form of extremely malleable and soft silicate. Instead, it was like he was shaking hands with that of a length of nylon. The grip was soft, far lighter than that of a regular handshake.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Just as the feeling of pins and needles across his hand began to grow painful, the grip was released and she retracted the appendage back onto her body. Elias resisted the urge to shake feeling back into his digits as he stepped back, forcing his usual hunched posture once more.

  “There, done,” Chel-Lin said. “And a bit of your thermal energy to seal the deal. Are we in agreement?”

  “Of course,” Elias said, turning away and beginning to shuffle towards the bench filled with the Tylasian studies he had already read over a dozen times back into its folder. “Besides, getting you to finally touch such a primitive species as mine made it all the more worth it.”

  With a scoff and a buzz from her translator, she left to her activities. Elias moved to his blackboard and flipped it to the opposite site, an electronic screen that would be far quieter when used for writing. As he hurriedly began dumping the ideas he had been bottling up since his arrival, he felt his foot uncontrollably tapped away in excitement. Some hours passed, in which Elias had filled up his initial set of usual planning documents dozens of times over. Unabated, and hopefully able to work in secret, he felt the relief of his built-up stress roll away. Hiding his face behind a data tablet, the first step to his overall plan was about to present itself.

  Elias watched Chel-Lin preparing equipment within a sealed glass box to the side of the laboratory, almost like a miniature airlock. The space filled with noble gas and he saw the Tylas raise her cape to fit a harness around her cylindrical body. It almost seemed to resemble a hiking backpack, with straps that fitted around the front. From the back side a number of thin, multi-jointed armatures extended outwards. These limbs were made from metal and each was fitted with different heads and tools. Some were clearly made for heavy lifting with thicker armatures and claws, and others with tips and blades so delicate and precise Elias could barely make them out.

  Based on the basic information he knew of Tylas, it was common to see the lower classes of the Baraldian Heralds using these mechanical harnesses for work. Though the Tylas were incredibly hardy, their outer skin able to absorb most forms of energy and highly resistant to damage, their physical strength was lacking. However, one interesting factor of their physiology became apparent as Elias closer examined the device fitted around Chel-Lin. It used no electrical devices, no wires and no battery, instead being manipulated by other means. The Tylas, through manipulation of the shape of their inner gases, could manipulate the magnetic fields close to the body with surgical precision, but only in a limited range. Elias observed Chel-Lin begin moving the limbs about, moving and replacing monitoring equipment within the sealed chamber. Claws snapped and tools whirred as she refitted the room with a number of unusual apparatuses.

  It was then that Elias confirmed the ‘cover’ project he intended to use. If his work at Nucleus was to be truly impactful, he would need the time to bring it to fruition. The IGS was months away, and there were some required check-ins from his supervisors until then. To disguise his actual plan, he needed to bring something to the table capable of distracting people like Lucian and Rannos. The ‘fake’ project, some invention that would still be useable once finished but hardly groundbreaking, would be enough to shield any suspicion about whatever he truly wanted to make.

  It was as he spied Chel-Lin that he knew what to do - with some adjustments, basic calculations and a little testing, Elias figured he could produce a new type of mobile harness, much like the one the alien was using to fit a new camera into the corner of her chamber.

  Needing to fit it into the IGS, Elias considered what changes he could make to improve on the design? Mountable guns? No, Lucian would probably see the idea of developing weaponry as a bit much. Extra shielding? Nah, the Tylas hardly needed more protection. The only thing naturally occurring that could harm a Tylas were freezing weathers and the strongest of animals – not exactly threats to the advanced species.

  Resisting the urge to snap his fingers, Elias had it! In spirit of the whole ‘interspecies’ aspect, he considered the prosect of adjusting the mechanical harness’s design to work not just with the Tylas, but humans and Cambiar as well.

  Perhaps with the addition of that modified Juhgler Trian fusion engine blueprint he had played around with once, a design that he had already estimated could be scaled down for personal use, he could have it rely on electrical power. It would need a neural link to interface with humans, possibly just a biochemical signaller for the Cambiar, as they were a fan of biological designs in their work. Nevertheless, it could be done.

  Earthshattering? No, hardly. Yet, it was something relatively simple and good enough to please the crowds at the Symposium. As for whether some mashed together studies and prototypes from the scientists at Nucleus would actually help diplomacy with the Baraldian Heralds… Elias wasn’t sure. At best, he predicted the CCH and the Baraldian Heralds would enter an unsteady trade agreement before staying away from each other as much as possible. As for what any of the far smaller scatterings of colonies, or the upstart confederacy of the Out-Han Alliance would get out of the event, he had no clue.

  There was something innate about the existence of humanity that seemed to put the Tylas on edge. It didn’t seem to be out of security; the Tylas had powerful beam weaponry for their ships and strong borders along where their space met humanity’s. Socially, there was little means for humanity to infiltrate their social strata – their xenophobic views and reliance on internal social support to ascend up their hierarchy would stop any attempts at political integration dead.

  So why else did they seem to despise humanity? Their religion? Who knew. Elias shook the thought away. The reasoning didn’t matter. Tylas were living beings, and people like Chel-Lin didn’t need an excuse to act the way they did - it was just in their nature.

  Forcing his mind back to the diagrams he had idly drawn whilst thinking, he was left with the void of what real project he would try. That would take a far more effort, information, and the retrieval of some special equipment for what early plans he had.

  Getting that gear, however, would be easier said than done.