NOVEL WEB Chapter 353: Syndicate Talks 2/2
The Prime Minister took off his glasses and wiped them carefully.
"Every day, we get a couple of them, usually between three and four. They come in and out as they please. Routine checks, I suppose."
"Okay. What does this have to do with me?"
"After we declared that the Tsero Crystal had been lost, the number of such Permits passing through our borders increased. In the ten days following the declaration, four hundred Intergalactic Federation-Issued Special Permits passed through."
"IFISPs, huh?"
"Usually, SPs."
"Special Permits." Cero nodded. "Or Syndicate Permits?"
"Either is fine."
"Again, what does this have to do with me? Or with us landing?"
The Prime Minister scratched his chin for a moment.
"Following your landing and the declaration of the retrieval of a Tsero Crystal, twenty-six hundred SPs passed through our borders."
"Oh, shit."
"Shit is right." The Prime Minister nodded.
The implication was obvious.
The Syndicate cared much, much more about the retrieval of a Tsero Crystal, than the loss of one.
'Even though the loss of it means the end of a civilization, while the retrieval means the survival of said civilization.' Cero thought. 'Good things annoy them more than bad things, huh? The Syndicate, one way or another, has a monopoly on Tsero Crystals…'
"It is likely that those twenty-six hundred SPs are here to determine how the Tsero Crystal was retrieved. It was an impossible feat."
"Not so impossible." Cero mumbled, looking away.
"The calculations and predictions run by the Syndicate must have been the same as ours. The success rate of the mission was pretty much 0%."
"But you still sent them on their way." Cero said coldly.
"I did." The Prime Minister nodded, his voice devoid of any emotion. "To put this plainly, the Syndicate doesn't care about Wor, or about us Worka. All that those SPs want to know is how come their calculations and predictions ended up proven wrong."
"And since I'm the reason they were proven wrong, one could say that those 2600 SPs are here to find me."
"That's right. It's the reason why your friend Aquamarine cannot come with-"
"Lith." Cero corrected. "Her name is Lith."
"I apologize. Through that televised incident, Lith has appeared alongside Elizabeth and Roka."
"So if Lith appears with Roka on Jin, it'll raise suspicions about her."
"Right. Now that doesn't mean that Lith would get in trouble. It's likely that all they want is to understand what made their predictions go wrong."
"So even if they turn towards Lith, that won't help them one bit."
"It should keep them busy for a while though." The Prime Minister muttered. "They have the right to pass through the borders, but investigating someone closely is beyond the privileges that the SPs bring. They will have to make formal demands to our government."
"Have they made any?"
"About one thousand demands were made regarding Lith."
"What are they demanding?"
"The right to follow, question, meet-"
"Do you have to comply?" Cero interrupted.
"Well, I will at some point." The Prime Minister smiled. "I'll let them squirm for a while. The more I fight their demands, the more sure they will be that I'm hiding something."
"This sounds dangerous."
"We're not barbarians, Cero. Everything will be perfectly safe and civil. The closest they will get is during interviews."
"They'll interview Lith, huh?"
"Elizabeth and my bodyguards will be present."
"Hm…" Cero scratched his chin. "I'm not sure about this… Using Lith to throw them off the trail."
"By the time that this is all done, you will have come back from Jin, and you will be on your merry way towards… Well, wherever."
"You're not gonna fuck me on this, are you?"
"I'm offended you think I might."
Cero stared for a moment.
"So you just want them to waste their time…" He sighed. "Really using us to stick it to them, huh?"
"Well, I suppose sticking it to them is a nice additional bonus."
Cero glanced at the folded uniform.
"Fine, I'll play along. But no one is getting close to Lith. No one apart from Liz, Raya, or Rea."
"That would be inviting trouble further down the line."
"I don't mind."
"We'll talk about this again some other time-"
"We won't." Cero interrupted. "No one is meeting, investigating, or interviewing Lith. That's final."
The Prime Minister stared for a moment.
"I suppose that's acceptable. You're planning on leaving Wor anyways, so that trouble will be following you."
"Let it." Cero shrugged.
Silence filled the room.
"There is still something you're not telling me."
"..." Cero stared. "You asked about the six months preceding our landing. Didn't you get all the information from Roka, Raya, and Rea?"
"I did get information from them. But 2600 SPs… That's too many for a wrong prediction."
"Oh." Cero hadn't expected the Prime Minister to change his tune so suddenly.
"As I said, the Syndicate doesn't care about Wor or about us Worka. A wrong prediction is worth a couple of hundred SPs… But it only gets to a thousand when the murder of an Ambassador is part of it."
"Ambassador? Is that how SP holders are called?"
"Cero, what is it that you're hiding from me?"
"How can you be sure that Tsero Crystals aren't worth sending 2600 SPs?"
"It very well might be worth it."
"Then?"
"I can smell it."
"Hm?"
"I can smell that something happened."
"Well, I'm not sure what to tell you." Cero shrugged. "Except if Syndicate Ambassadors have crystals growing out of their back, rocky skin, gray horns, or-"
"Ambassadors from the Syndicate do not look alike. The only thing they have in common is their SP."
"So the Ambassadors originate from different Planets and civilizations?"
"Correct."
"Hm…"
The Prime Minister wiped his glasses again.
"Let's drop the subject for now and talk about Jin instead."
In truth, Cero had come upon such permits before. He was familiar with the logo inscribed on them.
During those six months, they had come across that logo and those permits.
Just once, and it had ended in a bloodbath.