Gooraroo beat his hands against the console. "Yes! The aliens are coming to meet us!"

"Dad, are you sure this is a good idea?" Grrmyip asked worriedly. His father's greed was legendary, but it was usually tempered with caution. This gambit felt reckless in the extreme.

The first aliens the Yirahyah have ever encountered—well, with reliable witnesses, anyway—and Dad is trading with them. The trading part was not surprising. The surprising and scary part was inviting a powerful alien spacecraft to meet them out here deep in the black, days away from any possible rescue, with no one else around to help if things went upwind.

"Pup, this is the greatest opportunity of my lifetime or yours!" Gooraroo nearly howled. "We could be the richest pack in the entire system if we place our bets right!"

"And if we don't?"

"We'll still come out ahead! Just the documentary rights will make up for the lost cargo!"

"I don't deny that there's massive opportunity, but we don't even know if their germs will kill us—or if they will." Grrmyip shook his head. Well, too late to back out now. The aliens are coming, and the entire system is going to be stirred up.

Gooraroo sobered and looked seriously at him. "Grrmyip, are you saying that you wouldn't make this deal?" Without waiting for an answer, he shook his head. "I failed to raise you right. You've got to balance risk and reward. Yes, the risk is enormous, of course it is, but the reward...The reward, son! You need to learn to take risks when a chance like this comes. Not that another opportunity will..."

Gooraroo felt silent, and got that crafty look in his eye. Then his gaze shifted, and he was staring at Grrmyip—evaluating, weighing him. What crazy thing is he going to do now?

"I was thinking of going myself, but it's better if you do it."

He stared at his father. "To meet the aliens?"

"No, of course not!" Grrmyip had barely started his sigh of relief before his father added, "You're going with them."

I cannot have heard that right. "Dad...?"

"You need some new experiences to shake you up. Apparently, I haven't been making you take enough risks. Besides, it's a few years yet before you're ready to take over the House. This will help get you ready."

"Are you crazy?"

"Pup, you will be swimming in opportunities. It's a perfect place to practice. Even if you only do a mediocre job, you'll still bring back enough wealth to make the pack set for life, if not the whole House. Meanwhile, I'll position the House to take full advantage of whatever you bring us."

"Why would they take me with them?"

"They need an ambassador. That's you."

"Didn't they say they couldn't guarantee my safety?"

"That's why you're taking both shuttles. You can live in them while the aliens sort out the details."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"How are you going to deliver the rest of the shipment without any shuttles?"

"I'll buy a new one when we reach Grrasa! That's pocket change, boy!"

Grrmyip stared. "You're really serious about this."

"I am. Son, your horizons are going to be wider than anyone else in the history of our worlds. I'm setting you up for greatness."

"You know I could die, right?"

Gooraroo's face grew somber. "I know. So don't, all right?" For the first time in ages, Grrmyip's father actually hugged him. "Come back to me," he ordered in a low growl.

When he pulled away, Grrmyip was shocked to see tears in his father's eyes. Reading his expression, the old man barked awkwardly and looked away. His voice was rough and he spoke a bit louder than necessary.

"I've invested a lot in you, pup. You know you're my pick of the litter. Don't embarrass the pack out there. I expect lucrative deals when you come back." He barked again. "Now. Get the crew to finish loading the Little Lady. At the speed those aliens can manage, they'll be here before we expect."

Grrmyip struggled to blink back tears of his own. He hadn't realized just how badly he had wanted, needed to see that his father really did care about him. "Yes, sir." What was a little fear of death, in the face of a chance to make Gooraroo openly proud of him?

* *

It was almost an eighth of a day before the alien ship drew near. Apparently, even aliens had to obey some laws of nature. Grrmyip noted how the aliens gave them a wide berth on approach, moving in slowly from the side once they had swept around onto a parallel course. The motions were smooth and precise. A change of crew doesn't seem to have hurt their ship-handling, he noted. Then he had a scary thought. Great Hunter, I hope they're not using AI for that!

Artificial Intelligence had almost destroyed civilization—not once, but twice. Any idiot who proposed using AI after the past century's disasters would probably get torn to pieces in the jaws of their own pack. Have the aliens found a way to control AI safely? Or have they banned it too?

Grrmyip shook away the thought. He reminded himself of one of his father's favorite sayings: "Don't borrow trouble—the interest alone is a killer."

The approach took long enough that Gooraroo had plenty of time to re-negotiate with their buyers on Grrasa. In fact, once the buyers knew what they had planned, they canceled the entire order. It was suggested that, depending on what procedures the first contact followed, the Lively Basket might not be allowed to dock at the moon at all. Gooraroo took it in stride.

"We'll make enough money to cover all this, don't you worry, Pup."

There was a call from the bridge. "Master Gooraroo, the aliens are close enough now for live communication."

"Thank you, Captain. Feel free to discuss maneuvers with them as needed. We'll be along shortly."

For the next while, they spoke with the aliens. Mostly, Grrmyip watched his father negotiate. They picked their way through language difficulties together as Gooraroo made request after request, trying to get a feel for what the aliens had to offer.

The aliens were understandably wary about trading any weapons. After some discussion, they offered one design, and Gooraroo immediately refused. Grrmyip was surprised, so his father explained.

"Pup, if we get designs for a weapon, someone will come steal them, and kill us so that we can't give them to anyone else. But if we get an actual weapon, even a broken one, then the people who come to steal it can leave us alive, because we won't know the secrets and won't be able to share anything with anyone else."

Grrmyip nodded his understanding. "We could protect ourselves by sharing the design with several different power blocs, but then we couldn't make any money from it. I get it, Dad."

In the end, they agreed to give all thirty verg of foodstuffs to the aliens in exchange for three broken pieces of machinery, a few intact spare parts, some oddly-shaped ingots of gold and silver, and a complete copy of all their star maps. They would sell off the parts with a system-wide lag-auction. as soon as they got to Grrasa.

They also established their wants for materials on both sides. The aliens wanted vanadium, samarium, and ytterbium. Naturally, they asked the aliens for platinum, iridium, and osmium. The aliens didn't have any to spare at the moment, but they would see how much they could come up with for their next trip.

The next challenge was getting Grrmyip aboard the alien vessel as an ambassador for the Yirahyah. That was going to be a whole lot more interesting. He was terrified...but he had to admit, he was also curious to see what opportunities he could find out there.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.