Thirty minutes later...
"is this seat taken?"
Elizabeth looked up from her messages. The rest of the Archon's christmas ball was still going, but she was doing remote work. The figure looming was a man she recognized.
Phelan Kell himself. Here.
"Suit yourself." she said, "there are extra chairs. I assume this is business, and you got here in a gawdawful hurry."
He sat. "you do not like me."
"I thought that was clear when you and your followers were seeking asylum." Liz said, "I don't like you."
"But you're...in a relationship with-"
"Do I have to explain this for the rest of the night?" she closed the laptop, "Yes, I'm hate-****** an enemy officer. the sex is fantastic, we're still enemies. On the battleaxe/slut scale, I picked slut, okay? Happy? Nathan and I have an understanding-we blow off steam and have fantastic sex, but it's not love."
Phelan's ears burned a little at her crude language and snippy tone. "Business then. You are permitting the construction of an Iron Womb facility and the beginnings of a Eugenics program."
"Oh. yeah, that. what would anyone do with fifteen eggheads dropped in their lap?" she shrugged, "you've never seen the University at Nha Tranh. it's not 'warrior enough' to be interesting to a Clanner. the dedication plaque should say it all."
He didn't react to the bait, instead, he dropped a hand to the table. "We have lost so much knowledge we no longer have names for what we have forgotten." He then lifted his glass, "This must never happen again. I do read the reports of my Watch officers."
"Good for you, How's your dad?" she asked quietly.
"Silently scandalized by your off-duty antics." Phelan said, "I do understand..more than he does."
"He's the reason I argued in favor of giving you asylum, Phelan Kell." she told him, "If your dad wasn't one of my brother Pat's heroes, if he wasn't one of the best customers in terms of paying his bills I've ever had and if he wasn't a decent guy, I would have screamed to have you left to your Wolf Buddies on the other side of the border." she nursed her beer, "Morgan Kell is one of the few members of the Peerage whose opinions I value, and he vouched you."
"i wish to have some of my scientists inspect your program." Phelan said.
"Campus is open to the public, even visitors." Liz told him, "one of the best ways to prevent the loss of knowledge, is to spread it, anyone can sign up for classes if they can show up and pay attention. Donations are accepted in the Registrar's office. Students are paying for the certification, not the classes."
"Anyone can attend?" Phelan asked.
"Anyone. The ****** Smoke Jaguars could send people and they can sit the classes. hell, I'd let known Pirates attend. It's one of those things I'm dead set on-we can't afford to stay in a dark age."
"And would they come?" he asked.
"Long as they understood they're only safe from arrest on the campus grounds." Liz said, "the University police handle disturbances, and they CAN kick someone out if they're making trouble, but they've got stricter rules of engagement than regular police, and the backing of heavy enough weapons to kill anyone who wants to make a body-count. There is no such thing as 'classified' on the Campus grounds, no secrets, so no room for secret police, and everything turned up by the science department gets published in the open. you want your Scientist-Caste to look at our program, great, send 'em. You can even send merchies and warriors and laborers to attend classes, and if you want them to collect degrees, the rates for credit-hours are in the registrar's office."
"you have a science department that is blocked from using basic secrecy, I imagine it is somewhat hampered by that." he speculated.
"We've got a copy of the Helm core, and we've been publishing everything in it." Liz said, "all of it, sending it out far and wide, some of the results have been pretty surprising. Patent filings for improvements throughout the Commonwealth are flowing in, and they reference UofK Nha Tranh in their citation lists. According to a buddy of mine in the Commonwealth Patent office, some applications are flowing in from the Free Worlds League and CapCon too. it's working. Like pouring nitromethane on a pilot light. Give it ten years, and we'll be past the Clanner tech advantages, Phelan, and without the bizarre social order devised by a nutjob."
Phelan took a stab, "but that is not your objective. Technology."
She shook her head. "no. not mine." she sipped her beer. "My family made a lot of money by knowing how to do things everybody else forgot. did it for generations. My target is bigger and longer ranged than just beating the Clans."
he took a sip, lowered his glass, "What is it, then?"
"There is an enemy out there who wants to see every human being extinct." Elizabeth stated, "I met him once. he's got a backup, so killing him wasn't going to work...this enemy must be destroyed, killing them isn't enough-they've mastered a technique to transfer consciousness between bodies, and they are masters of mass-production, and they absolutely want to make mankind extinct. that's extinction for Kowloonese, or Terrans, or Sphere natives or Clanners. they want us gone, and if we can't match them, beat them, they will succeed." She grabbed a salted cracker, and nibbled on it, then, "So we can't afford a comfortable dark-age of ignorance. Not with threats like that out there."
"how long have you...believed this?" He asked.
"I have known for five years." she said, "I have the evidence, I've met the enemy, looked into his eyes." she said, "They're real, they're out there, and every move I've made since that meeting has been, one way or another, a move to try and arm mankind to fight these things."
"Why?"
she laid her cracker on the plate, "Because god is on their side, not ours." she said, "and I have a beef with God."
