Kaleb's reflection sat half a second too long on the strategic display's classified partition.
Drew was at the SRD office's main door, arriving with two cups of coffee that he had picked up at the commissary because the coffee in his office was eight hours old and Kaleb had been waiting twenty minutes. The display was at standard configuration for an external visitor — public layers visible, classified partition rendered as a uniform dark band along the top quadrant. The dark band held no information. That was the point.
Kaleb was looking at it.
He had been looking at it long enough that the half second after Drew came through the door was the half second in which he turned his head toward the door and not toward the display. The half second was the tell. Drew had watched a man turn his head from a display twice this month. Both times the man had been counting partition lines.
"Director," Kaleb said.
"Sorry for the wait." Drew set the coffee on the conference table. "Hammond's morning brief ran long."
"It is no trouble." Kaleb was tall, lean in the Serrakin way that the SGC briefing materials had not quite captured, the human-Hebridan mix that read as human first and other-than-human second once you knew what to look for. His skin held a faint silver undertone in the office's overhead light. His robes were the muted Serrakin commercial register — neutral grey-green, no clan insignia, the diplomatic uniform of a man who was here to do business and not to represent his people.
He smiled. The smile reached his eyes. That was the part Drew kept getting caught on.
"Shall we go through the agenda," Kaleb said. "Or shall we go to the world."
"The world. The agenda can wait."
"I prefer this also."
They walked the corridor to the gate room. Kaleb's two engineers fell in behind them at the second checkpoint — a man and a woman, both younger than Kaleb, both carrying the small Serrakin field-survey kits that were a fraction of the size of the Earth equivalents and three times the cost. Walter was at the gate-room console. He did not look up as they entered. His left hand moved on the keyboard in a pattern Drew recognized as the running-log shorthand Walter used when he was recording something he did not want to record openly.
"P7X-445," Walter said. "Dialing."
The wormhole opened. Kaleb's engineers did not flinch. They had been through more gates than most Earth personnel.
"After you," Kaleb said.
Drew stepped through.
P7X-445 was a savanna world with a thin orange sky and a wind that smelled of dry grass and a mineral Drew did not have a word for. The MALP had been there for twelve days. The survey team had finished a perimeter sweep on day eight. The world was nominally uninhabited, formally unclaimed, and located at the intersection of three Serrakin trade vectors. It had been selected for the joint claim not because it was the best world available but because it was the one the Serrakin would notice the most if Earth chose to claim it alone.
The marker was already planted. It was the Serrakin marker. A meter of dark metal cast in a square section, the head shaped in the Hebridan triangular sigil, the body bare of inscription because the inscription was the part both parties signed.
Kaleb's engineer offered Drew a stylus and the marker's signature plate.
Drew took the stylus. He pressed the tip to the plate and signed his name. The plate accepted the signature in a faint silver line that flared once and held.
Kaleb signed beside him. His signature was a single Serrakin commercial glyph and his clan-mark. The glyph flared. Held.
"Joint claim," Kaleb said. "Earth observation, Serrakin observation, neutral status."
"Joint claim," Drew said.
He put his hand on the marker. The marker was warm in the orange sun. He held it for a count of three. The metal was denser than Earth steel and lighter than naquadah. AURORA-7's voice murmured at the back of his head.
Hebridan alloy. Ratio zero point eight five against Tok'ra standard.
He noted the ratio. He did not say it aloud.
He felt Kaleb's hand settle on the marker beside his. The two of them stood with their hands on the metal for the count of three that diplomatic protocol required.
[Territory Claimed: P7X-445 — Joint Observation Status — Serrakin Trade Corridor]
The notification came up at the corner of his vision. He did not blink.
"Done," Kaleb said.
"Done," Drew said.
They walked back to the gate together. The wind blew the dry grass against Drew's boots. The mineral smell stayed with him through the wormhole.
The trade room was the small conference space on Level 25 that was used for off-record discussions. Hammond had not insisted on a formal protocol meeting because Hammond and Drew had agreed that the joint claim itself was the formality. Whatever happened in the trade room was negotiation, which meant it was not yet a treaty, which meant Hammond did not have to be present.
Kaleb's engineers were not present either. Kaleb had asked, quietly, on the walk back, if Drew would accept a one-on-one for the next thirty minutes. Drew had said yes.
They sat across the small table. The coffee Drew had brought from the commissary was on the table between them. Neither of them had drunk it.
"You are reading the office," Kaleb said.
"I am."
"You read it well."
"You read mine."
"I read yours less well than I would like."
Drew turned the coffee cup a quarter turn on the table.
"Director," Kaleb said. "May I ask a question that is not on the agenda."
"You may ask."
"Your interface partner. The Ancient-generation consciousness that runs the layer beneath your strategic display. She has been operational for some months now."
"She has."
"Has she — in your time with her — encountered a propulsion schematic from the Lantean generation that Earth would consider exchangeable."
Drew did not answer immediately. He let the silence sit. He turned the cup another quarter.
"She has encountered many things," Drew said.
Kaleb laughed. It was a real laugh, three soft beats, and the laugh was at himself, not at Drew. He shook his head once.
"That is a very honest answer," Kaleb said.
"It is the only one I have."
"It is the only one you are willing to give. The two are different."
"Yes."
Kaleb picked up the coffee. He took a sip. He set it down.
"I will not ask twice," he said. "If you wish to offer, the door is open. If you do not, the door does not close. The Serrakin commercial council is patient. We are very patient."
"I will keep that in mind."
"I hope you will." He stood. The robes settled. "Director Ramsey. Thank you for the world."
"Thank you for the partnership."
They shook hands at the door, the human handshake Kaleb had practiced for Earth audiences, and Kaleb left.
Drew stood in the trade room for a count of ten after the door closed.
Then he went to find Walter.
He found Walter in the corridor outside the gate room. Walter was not on duty. Walter was at the corridor's coffee station, holding a paper cup that was not steaming because Walter had filled it three minutes ago and let it sit. Walter did this when Walter had something to say that was not in the running log.
Walter saw him coming. Walter let him reach the coffee station and turn the corner before he spoke.
"Sir."
"Walter."
"He asked about ATHENA-3."
Drew stopped. He had not told Walter about ATHENA-3. Walter had not been in the lab last night. The internal brief had not yet been cut.
"How."
"Three questions. The first one was about an unknown sensor signature thirty-six hours ago on a P5C survey relay. The second was about whether the SRD had updated its catalog of Ancient designations in the last week. The third was about whether the SRD office's strategic display had added a partition in the last forty-eight hours."
"All three were oblique."
"All three were precise."
Walter looked at the paper cup. He did not look up.
"The dimensions of his interest are wrong, sir."
It was six words. It was the longest sentence Walter had said in two days.
Drew did not answer. He put his hand on Walter's shoulder once, briefly, and let it drop.
He walked back toward his office. His phone vibrated in his pocket halfway down the corridor. He pulled it out.
It was Janet.
Cass picked the menu for Tuesday. I have not been allowed to look. Bring wine.
He read it twice.
He did not put the phone away. He stood in the corridor with the phone in his hand and the orange-grass smell still faintly on his sleeve and Walter's six words behind him and Kaleb's "many things" laugh in front of him and the joint-claim notification still pulsing at the corner of his vision.
His thumb moved against the side of his forefinger. Slow. Tight. Circular.
He stopped it.
He typed back.
What kind of wine.
The reply came back in eleven seconds.
Ask her.
He put the phone in his pocket and started walking again.
⚜ ━━━━ ROYAL PROCLAMATION ━━━━ ⚜
Read more chapters for free in the public library:
unwrittenrealm.com
⚜ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⚜
By order of the Crown.
The royal vault holds chapters the public throne room has yet to receive. Those who pledge fealty on Patreon may read ahead of the realm:
Noble — $7 — Twelve chapters ahead.
Royal — $11 — Nineteen chapters ahead.
Emperor — $17 — Twenty-six chapters ahead.
New chapters added weekly. Full schedule posted in the war room.
patreon.com/Kingdom1Building
Long live the Kingdom.