章 24: We Never Thought They'd Actually Help

By -MH2-

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When we signed a little formal agreement, a nicety, decades ago, that's all we thought of it; a writ of words, promising some arbitrary assistance if the other was ever in distress.

We never counted on it being fruitful. We expected it to be a slight drain in time, but the diplomatic balancing was deemed acceptable.

So we were truly desperate when we actually acted on it. When we were bloodied, bruised, our enemy burning our worlds and butchering our young. The desperate scrambling of our kind as we sat on the edge of extinction, and arrived at this little nicety among hundreds of other forgotten archives.

We don't know what to say about what happened next.

We were terrified when we saw the ships approaching, entire armadas entering the gravity wells of our systems. Our financial systems flaring with entries, our communication channels filling to the brim.

When their capital ships entered the skies over our world, washing the enemy overhead in hellfire with ruthless brutality. When we received gifts not just from politicians, but even the slightest nobodies, even from their young.

Little slides of data with poetry, kind words, expressions of admiration at our valor, respect for our cause and fervor that left our people shaken at their kindness, considerateness, even as we watched the brutal efficiency with which their fleets dismantled the enemy that had been on the verge of sending us into the quiet night.

The gentle care of their aid workers as their soldiers moved like creatures of myth; one tending to our wounds, as the other scoured our foe from our homes.

When we could form words again, to answer, to thank for the help we received, we didn't truly know what to say. We could only express that we were glad, that we took the time to make a small nicety with these 'humans' years ago.