Howdy. Got seasonally fired from work. Long story; longer than what I've written so far. Anywho, I've fixed some minor mistakes in chapter 2, and I've written another chapter. Yay.

Thomas Haden sat at the bar, with his fingers bridged. His chair was rotated away from the bar, however, and towards his old flatmate. The two had worked in D.C. together, years ago. One worked as a congressional page, while Thomas was interning for legal teams. When he'd gotten a text on his personal bug-out line to meet at 'the dive,' Thomas had no questions as to where it was. The dive had changed hands three times, each time resisting gentrification of the neighborhood around it. Smoke filled the air, violating local ordinances with a nice flourish of 'fuck you.'

"And you're sure?" he asked, quietly. The man across from him nodded quickly and tensely. Seeing Mark like this made the hairs on Thomas's neck stand on end. Mark was usually unflappable, professional, but he'd just downed the scotch like an Irishman at the end of a triathlon, and it was doing him no good.

"There's no doubt left in my mind. He actually specifically asked that...I give you this." The small disc-shaped device felt heavy in his hand. "He said he couldn't meet with you personally, there would not be enough time."

That took Thomas by surprise. "He asked for me by name? He knew of me?"

"No, not exactly. He asked for someone I could trust, someone who was in a position to do something."

Thomas pursed his lips. "What is it?" He asked, flipping it over in his hands under the table, and getting a feel for what it was, but keeping it deliberately out of sight. He tucked it into his jacket pocket, then folded the jacket in over itself.

"I have no idea, but he said he would activate it when he could. I was told that you should press that button when you are somewhere safe." He gulped. "Thomas, you know what this means. The Empire is not what they say they are. And if that's the case..."

"War," Thomas said. "Subjugation. Slavery. Tyranny. Impression into service. Extinction. God knows what they're hiding," he said. "You've attended meetings. What do their military capabilities look like?"

"They did a technology demonstration as part of discussion involving trade, but it was all civilian technology, at least where I was concerned. Holographic displays, personal droid assistants, engine technology, alloys..."

"That doesn't sound so bad. Do you think we could incorporate these into our military abilities? We went from Kitty Hawk to the moon landings on our own in less than a lifetime, and we did that on our own..."

"They have a lot more than that. What they want in turn looks like they're already looking to turn us into a colony of sorts."

Thomas breathed. "I'm not sure how bad that might be," he said. "We're remote. If we're a vacation village of sorts, that might not be so bad. Or we could be farmers, which again isn't the end of the Earth or our right to self-govern."

"Do you think he would have handed you that if that were their plan?"

"You are so Mister Sunshine," Thomas said grumpily. Thomas didn't want to accept the possibility that humanity- no, Earth was as helpless as Mark made it sound. He traded in secrets, yet for once, his side was not the one with the power to act upon what he knew. Previously, if he had good intel, his department was quick to act on it. He could be anywhere in the world in a day, and had the power and effectively the power to do something about whatever he learned. "So what do they want? You've met with them. I'm having the meeting transcripts analyzed and interviewing people who kiss ass professionally, but there's only so much you can garner from text and...well, no offense to our electorate, but I think they're a bit star struck. So to speak."

"They want crops. They want resources. What's more interesting is that they seem very...eager to take segments of the military. Only a few hundred, it's not like a culling, don't look at me like that. But I think they're very eager to see what we can do as a fighting force, if we can contribute militarily, and the governments are jumping at the chance. I haven't seen so much whipped up fervor since it looked like we were going to war with Syria those years ago. They also seem interested in the finer pieces of modern culture. They love books, wine, handcrafted oak furniture pieces, musical instruments, and art. Cars, bikes, and the like seem to really bore the crap out of them, though. I thought the poor imperials were going to fall asleep when we showed them a classic Ford Mustang. I have no idea who thought they would be impressed with something like that."

"Well, I mean, the mechanical tolerances...considering it runs on zero computers, maybe?" Thomas guessed. "They said they were impressed in the transcript."

"Oh come on, you know better than to believe everything you read in those. The guy was literally yawning as he said it. It's context, man. What makes me nervous is how interested they were in sniper rifles, howitzers, and other video displays we had. They're being given live demonstrations later this week out on the proving grounds."

"So, they've definitely got a hard-on for military capabilities."

"And that's not good, as far as this guy is concerned."

Mark nodded. The watered down whiskey seemed to be doing its part to calm him down some. The sweat on his brow was less prominent and talking details seemed to be helping.

"Look," Mark said. "I've got to get going. It's probably bad for us to be seen leaving together, so you're going to head out. I'll head to the bathroom, and take the rear exit. Get out, and act normal."

"Thanks Mark," Thomas said. "Like I said back in the day, the true heroes never get their faces plastered everywhere."

"Just the way I like it," Mark said with a smile. "Now, get moving. I have a feeling Earth is impatient to reach the stars, and if we can put the brakes on now, it might make all the difference to us."

Thomas stood up and put the jacket under his arm, feeling the object nestled securely between the crook of his elbow and the white dress shirt he wore underneath. Tonight, he thought.