Chapter 135: Tense Negotiations Part 3

Restored Zone, Main Continent, Euronda, December 16th, 1999 (Earth Time)

Catra leaned back and stretched her arms over her head. The Eurondan Alliance delegation stared, as expected. But they were staring at everyone - well, almost everyone. That they would be staring at Adora was expected. Who wouldn't, whether she was She-Ra or not? But they were also staring - openly or with an attempt to be not obvious - at the others.

And something was odd.

Catra frowned a little, trying to spot the pattern.

"Do you have many civilians?" Sam suddenly asked. She was leaning forward and looked… annoyed, Catra noted. Which was a surprise.

Liou tilted his head at her. "Why do you ask?"

"You seem to be surprised by the presence of women at this meeting," Sam replied.

Oh! Catra rolled her eyes. That again!

"It's unusual for us," Liou told her. "Our circumstances must be very different, I suppose."

"Don't you have female soldiers?" Sam raised her eyebrows. Definitely annoyed.

Daniel blinked, then slowly nodded. He must have just got it as well.

And Adora was frowning.

"The idea to send women into war, risk their lives, is anathema to us," Liou said. His group looked pretty uncomfortable to Catra.

Sexist, then. Probably thought women couldn't fight, like some idiots on Earth. I wonder if they also have some stupid religion favouring men, Catra thought.

"Why?" Adora asked. "We can fight as well as any man."

"Better," Glimmer muttered under her breath. Louder, she added: "We've proven that in the war against the Horde."

"Yes!" Frosta added with a sharp nod and a scowl.

At least they haven't called her a kid, Catra thought. That would have set the princess off.

"As I said, our circumstances must be very different," Liou said with a polite smile that was about as sincere as Horde Prime.

"You don't have many women, do you?" Daniel asked.

Liou merely turned his head to face him, but the other three at the table visibly tensed. "What makes you say that?"

"Ah, it seems the most logical explanation," Daniel explained in his lecturing voice. At least he didn't raise a finger for each point. "You were fighting a war for your very survival, against a genocidal enemy. Usually, nations mobilise all resources for that. And since the war has been mostly fought in the air, with advanced aeroplanes, one would have expected you to recruit your women as well, so the most talented pilots could be used regardless of their gender. Even if you had strong traditions against such a move, the threat of genocide would likely have outweighed those - as happened to the Eurondan Nation when they made a deal with others not conforming to their ideals. And yet, you apparently didn't even think about this. So, there might not be enough women in your country to risk any in combat."

Liou's smile turned rueful, and he slowly nodded. "Your analysis is correct."

"Ah?" Daniel perked up but quickly schooled his features. "Sorry. I got a bit carried away."

"So, what - you don't have enough women to keep your population up?" Jack asked.

Oh. That was… Catra winced.

"You don't have artificial wombs?" Entrapta cocked her head at them before smiling widely. "We can help you out there!"

"'Artificial wombs'?" Liou looked intrigued.

The other Eurondans looked queasy, Catra noted.

"Well, there's also magic alternatives, but artificial wombs are the easiest way to have kids without a woman," Entrapta said.

"My dads used them," Bow added with a smile. "I've got twelve older siblings."

"Your dads had thirteen kids?" Akon shook his head. "That's… No wonder you risk women in combat if you can replenish your numbers so easily!"

"Ah… I'm the only soldier amongst them," Bow said, frowning a little. "They didn't have kids to 'replenish' our army."

"You shouldn't have children just to turn them into soldiers!" Adora blurted out.

"We were almost wiped out!" Akon protested. "The Eugenists struck at our civilians first, killing most of them!"

"They deliberately hit civilians over military targets?" Jack asked. He was almost as tense as the Eurondans had been.

"Yes," Akon said.

"Few civilians were able to reach a shelter when the poison was released," Liou said. "The military did what they could, but they could barely protect themselves - and had to defend against the Eugenists' attack at the same time. Civilian casualties were… crippling."

"What did you do? To deal with that?" Daniel asked a little hesitantly.

"We fought them however we could!" Akon said. "And slowly, with great sacrifices, we drove them back! And now that we are on the brink of final victory, you interfere!"

Daniel winced but didn't relent. "I meant, how did you handle your, ah, population crisis?"

"We ensured that most of the children conceived after the war had started were female," Liou said. He glanced at the two younger Lieutenants. "Young men are also rare in our country, though not as critical for our survival as women since they aren't required to be present - or alive - at conception."

Oh.

Catra wasn't the only one who winced at that.

The Eurondan Nation had started by going after the civilian population? Jack O'Neill winced. In hindsight, that should have been obvious. It was a logical move - for genocidal scumbags waging a war of extermination - and they already knew that the Space Nazis had poisoned the entire planet to get at their enemies. Still…. Sick.

Maybe we should let the Eurondan Alliance finish them off, he thought.

"I see," Daniel said. He looked shocked as well. "That's quite an extreme measure, although the circumstances were extreme as well."

The scientist, Liou, frowned. "It was a logical response to the loss of most of our civilian population."

"Most of your military was male, then?" Glimmer asked.

"Yes," Liou replied.

"That had always been the case," Akon added. "Why would we risk women in battle?"

"Because we can fight!" Frosta said.

Liou frowned at the man, Jack noted, if only long enough for the officer to notice and wince. "There were movements to recruit more women, before the war," he said. "Partially in response to the Eurondan Nation recruiting women. But after the war had started and we had lost so many people…" He shook his head. "Our leaders agreed that we could not afford to risk women in combat. Not if we wanted to survive as a people. Even so, many succumbed to hunger and sickness as lost medical infrastructure and food production took their toll, and we struggled to defend ourselves and build the means to sustain our lives in shelters."

Yeah, that would have been horrible. Losing most of their population and their food production? Jack didn't even want to imagine how bad things must have been if they had been caught unaware by such an attack without sufficient food in storage for the population. Every lost soldier probably was also a boon since that meant the food supply would last longer…

"So, the current absence of women in the ranks of our soldiers is a result of our situation in the past," Liou went on.

Jack suppressed a snort. Liou was smart, but his attempt to pander to the Alliance led by a woman was a bit too obvious. By now, Akon's attitude was probably entrenched amongst the entire Eurondan Alliance.

Catra didn't suppress her snort.

"Well, that's no longer necessary. We can supply you with artificial wombs, and you can recruit women into your army again!" Entrapta told them with a smile.

Jack winced again - she had completely misread the room.

"Anyway, you won't have to recruit more soldiers once the war's over - and it effectively is over," Adora said. "The Eurondan Nation can no longer wage war against you."

"So you say. And their last bunker did suffer obvious damage. Yet, even our most optimistic estimate of the extent of their defensive network puts their bunker as far too large that such damage would have annihilated their production capacity," Liou retorted. "Left alone, they will recover."

"And they'll renew their attacks on us!" Akon said. "We cannot let them threaten our people ever again - we have to wipe them out for good!"

"We do not condone genocide," Glimmer said with narrowed eyes.

"You obviously have never suffered as we have!" Akon spat. "Or you would not say this!"

"We have fought for our very lives as well!" Glimmer retorted. "But we didn't 'wipe out' our enemies when we won!"

"You don't have to destroy your enemy to be safe," Adora added. "They can't hurt you any more - we won't let them."

"As long as they are around, we'll be in danger. They see us as subhumans and claim our very existence threatens them," Liou pointed out. "You cannot trust them to keep the peace."

"They tried to exterminate us and almost succeeded. Our soldiers threw them back at great cost!" Akon almost yelled. "How can you expect us to let them live after all they did to us? They do not deserve any mercy!"

They weren't entirely wrong, Jack had to admit.

"All of them? Even their civilians?" Adora shook her head. "Their children? Those kept in stasis?"

"Stasis?" Liou leaned forward. "What do you mean?"

"They keep most of their civilians in stasis, cryogenic sleep," Entrapta explained. "They don't have the supplies for them."

"Ah, I see." Liou nodded. "That answers a few questions we had, thank you."

"You're welcome!"

Jack suppressed a sigh. At least it was intel about the Eurondan Nation and not about the Alliance.

"Anyway," Adora spoke up again, "We won't let you kill the Eurondan Nation. They cannot hurt you any more. And we'll ensure that they cannot hurt you in the future either."

"And how will you be doing this? Will you remove them from our world?" Liou asked, tilting his head again. "Will you take them to your own worlds?"

"That would be ethnic cleansing," Daniel pointed out with a frown. "It is frowned upon on Earth."

"So, you expect us to share our world with the very people who tried their hardest to ruin it only so they could murder us all?" Liou shook his head. "That is unacceptable. We have lived too long in fear of them. We have suffered too much to forgive them."

"One way or the other, they have to be removed from our world," Akon added.

Once again, Jack couldn't help thinking that they had a point.

Adora clenched her teeth. She understood the Eurondan Alliance's views. They had lost so much! Suffered for so long!

But they were still wrong. And she said so. "You're wrong." Akon and the two lieutenants openly glared at her. Liou was a bit less obvious, but he still frowned. Adora shook her head at all. "You can be safe without removing them." They were already safe - they just didn't accept it.

"No, we can't!" Akon disagreed. Vehemently. "You can't live under the same sky as those who murdered your family!"

"If you murder their families, does that make you any better than they were?" Adora asked.

"Yes! We didn't start the war! We didn't try to murder civilians!" Akon retorted.

"But that's what you are trying now," Daniel pointed out.

"What?" Akon spat.

Daniel pushed his glasses up. "You are trying to kill all of the Eurondan Nation's population. Most of them are held in stasis, helpless - civilians."

"They tried to kill us all! Our families! Our world!" Akon shook his head.

"And all of them went along with it!" Kel added. "They are all guilty!"

Pers nodded in obvious agreement, his lips pressed together.

"And we are not arguing for their deaths - merely for their removal from our world - the world they attempted to ruin to kill us all," Liou added in a - in Adora's opinion - deceptively mild voice.

"That is only an option because you now know about the Stargate," Glimmer retorted.

"And removing people from their homes is still ethnic cleansing," Daniel said. "Some consider it a form of genocide. But it is generally agreed that it is not lawful."

"A general agreement amongst your people, maybe," Liou retorted. "My people differ."

"We will never accept that those monsters remain on our world!" Akon said.

"We're here to discuss a truce," Sha're cut in. "We can discuss terms for a peace agreement with your leaders at a later date."

Right. Adora pressed her lips together and hoped she wasn't blushing. They were not talking to the leaders of the Eurondan Alliance. Just to their delegation sent to check if Adora and her friends were liars. Perhaps their leaders would be more reasonable. "Yes," she said. "You've seen that we told you the truth. Do you accept a truce?"

"A truce at this point would seriously hinder our efforts to end the war," Liou said.

"You've already suspended your attacks," Daniel pointed out.

Liou nodded. "Yes, we did. This was a decision that was not taken lightly and has, undoubtedly, allowed our enemies time to recover. Agreeing to a longer truce would compound this."

"Continuing your attacks will endanger our own people currently providing humanitarian help here," Daniel said.

"And we won't let you do that!" Frosta spat with a glare.

"You're helping our enemies!" Akon blurted out. "Do you expect us to ignore that?"

"We're helping everyone here," Adora corrected him. "We've restored a lot of your world already." She pointed at their surroundings.

"So you claim!" Pers retorted. "We haven't seen proof for that!"

"Do I need to create another statue?" Frosta asked, ice forming over her hands. "Maybe of you looking stupid?"

Catra snickered next to Adora.

Liou studied Frosta. "Perhaps not quite as big. But it would be illuminating."

"What?" Pers gaped.

But Frosta was already moving her hands, and a statue formed and grew right next to her. It was a passable portrait of the Lieutenant, in Adora's opinion. It also was forming inside the tent. Fortunately, Frosta stopped when it reached the ceiling.

"Intriguing." Liou peered at the ice.

"It's my magic power," Frosta told him with a smirk.

"Magic?" Akon scoffed.

"Yes, magic," Glimmer told him. "We've restored magic to your world as well. Those amongst you with the talent for it will be able to work magic."

"But we're here to focus on a truce," Adora reminded them. "This is just proof that we are already helping your world - all of your world."

"By introducing magic to the world?" Liou raised his eyebrows.

"By restoring what was destroyed during the war," Adora told him, narrowing her eyes a little. "We're here to help you - all of you." Why couldn't they see that?

"And yet you wish to protect our enemies. Enemies that conducted a genocide, which you claim not to condone. I think this is a slight contradiction," Liou retorted.

"We do not condone genocide," Glimmer told him. "No matter the victims."

"You would protect the murderers from the consequences of their own actions?" Akon scoffed.

"We'd also protect you from becoming murderers." Glimmer bared her teeth at him.

"Defending ourselves and avenging our deaths is not murder!" Akon mirrored her.

"That is a false equivalency. If your enemy is helpless and you keep attacking, you're no longer defending yourself," Daniel objected. "And vengeance is not justice."

"We will not allow them to endanger our people again!"

"They won't," Adora told him. "You don't have to murder them for that."

"After all they have done, we cannot trust them!" Akon shook his head almost violently.

"You ask a lot of us," Liou added.

"We just ask you to let us help," Adora told him.

"Yes." Liou nodded. "That requires trust - and it is hard to trust someone who seems more concerned with protecting our genocidal enemies than our own people."

Adora clenched her teeth. They did not understand! Why didn't they understand?

"Well, it's not just about trust," Catra said. "It's also about risks." She leaned forward. "Do you really want to risk waging a war against us? All that you've seen here?" She cocked her head at the statue. "The plants outside? She gestured at the tent entrance. "That's just a very small part. You haven't seen our spaceships. Or our armies."

"Do they fit through the Stargate?" Liou asked. His smile wasn't very smug, but a little was there.

"Some actually do," Jack said. "But that's beside the point."

"We're here to help you - we've restored a lot of your world already," Adora repeated herself. "We can offer even more help."

"Artificial wombs! And specially designed plants to finish the planet's restoration. For starters," Entrapta added.

"Yes." Adora nodded.

"Trust me, you don't want the Alliance as an enemy," Catra said with a smirk. "You really don't."

Liou glanced at the others. "I think this meeting has run its course. We have to inform our leaders about everything we've heard."

"Please do." Adora smiled. "And tell them that we would like to meet them."

They had to talk to their leaders to sort this out.

Liou nodded again.

Eurondan Nation, Euronda, December 17th, 1999 (Earth Time)

"Yes, I see it. Yes, I can change the plants to adapt to that - and filter out the poison. Maybe I should have them deposit the poison in some outgrowths for easier disposal? Then the rest of the plant could be used as feed or base for fertiliser…"

Samantha Carter nodded at the suggestion even though she didn't think Perfuma was talking to her right now. Watching the princess work with plants was still slightly unnerving - even more so after working with Loki in Alpha. Perfuma could alter a plant's genetic makeup with a thought. Drastically alter it - creating new plant species was child's play for her. What even a team of scientists with Ancient technology took weeks to months to achieve, she could do in seconds. Without any tools, just her magic power. And within her area of effect, fortunately limited, she could use her magic power to make the new plants grow as fast as Frosta could create ice.

Sam didn't want to imagine what Perfuma could do with the power of She-Ra at her disposal. She couldn't help doing it anyway, of course. And she was very grateful that Perfuma was such a nice person.

"Alright, I think that's it!" Perfuma turned and beamed at Sam. Next to her, green plants shot from the ground, wrapping around each other to form a trunk on top of which a slightly red fruit - or berry - formed, quickly growing. "The plants will spread out and focus all the poison into the fruits here. Once you remove the fruit, the plants will wither and turn to fertiliser! Same as when they run out of poison to filter."

"And the fruit?" Sam asked.

"Oh, that won't wither or decay. It will keep so you can collect them - which you should. They're very poisonous, after all." Perfuma frowned. "I tried to find a way for the plant to filter the poison out and turn it into something useful or at least inert, but I didn't manage." She bit her lower lip. "The poison is too powerful for that, sorry."

Sam was almost happy to hear that Perfuma had more limits. She didn't let that show, of course. "The Eurondan Nation is very skilled at creating poison," she said instead. "It's a great thing that you managed to create a plant that can handle it in the first place."

"Oh, that was nothing. Just some adaption of the plants I created for the Fright Zone. Once you have it worked out, you just have to adapt the biological filters for other substances." She nodded, then blinked. "Speaking of that… Have you heard anything about my proposal to create filtering plants for your oceans? They could deal with the plastic and pollution!"

"The United Nations are still discussing it," Sam said. And would likely keep doing that for some time.

"Ah." Perfuma nodded with a sigh. "I hope they'll accept my offer soon."

Sam managed not to wince. Even several of the members of the Alliance were loath to allow genetically engineered organisms into the wild, much less on such a scale. And other nations hated anything that was related to magic. Or just hated the Alliance and objected to any proposal supported by them on principle.

She changed the subject. "Did you look over the seed samples from the vaults?"

"Yes!" Perfuma perked up. "I can make them grow easily! Although it will take some time to figure out where each species would do best. I don't think we'll be able to recreate how things were before their war even if we had perfect records. With the loss of plants, the climate changed, and reintroducing plant life will cause new changes… adapting the restored plants will take some time."

"And that's not going to cover animals," Sam added. The Eurondans had kept genetic samples but hadn't been very thorough to begin with, and they lacked the technology to grow animals from those samples. And they had focused on livestock, not on all the species crucial for a balanced ecosystem. "We'll have to import several species from Earth."

"Yes. The filter plants can pollinate using wind, but other plants need insects. I could change them, but I think the Eurondans want their original plants back." Perfuma looked around. "Well, I think we're done here. The plants will spread from here to the rest of the contaminated zone on this continent but probably not to the other landmasses. We'll have to drop seeds there."

Sam nodded. She was done with her scans as well. And the sensors she had planted were working as planned - if the Eurondan Alliance sent aeroplanes this way, they'd get advance warning.

They walked back to the skiff, where Emily was waiting for them. The skiff would be overloaded with the two of them and the bot, but it was manageable. And Emily's shield generator made it worth it. Entrapta was planning to adapt similar generators to their skiffs for tomorrow's truce meeting but hadn't managed to finish in time for this trip. Sadly, the shield generators they had installed around the defence complex were too large for the skiffs.

Something they had missed when constructing the things - they fit NATO standards for transportation, but the Etherian skiffs didn't conform to those specs. Logistics wouldn't be pleased.

But that was their problem, not Sam's.

Restored Zone, Main Continent, Euronda, December 18th, 1999 (Earth Time)

"So… any bets on whether or not this is a trap?"

Catra rolled her eyes at Jack's question. If he really thought that this was a trap, he would have argued against everyone else coming along. Even though they should be able to spot a trap thanks to their scanners - and, between Emily's shield and Glimmer, could safely evacuate everyone. This was just small talk, Jack-style.

"I don't think it's a trap," Adora replied honestly. "They seemed to believe us - and they have seen more of what we're doing yesterday."

"Oh, they do believe us, or they wouldn't have stopped their bombing runs and stuck to recon flights," Jack said. "But they want to continue the war."

No surprise there, Catra thought. The Eurondan Nation had killed most of the Eurondan Alliance's civilians. And deliberately, not as collateral damage or something. Not that that made much of a difference for the dead. She clenched her teeth, remembering Thaynor. She had flattened the village as her first mission as Force Captain. She couldn't even tell herself that it had been a mission to root out Alliance soldiers hiding there or to draw out nearby Alliance forces to defend the village in order to engage them. Those were just excuses. They had struck the place with overwhelming forces right away. Well, overwhelming forces until She-Ra had appeared…

She shook her head, trying to force the memories of that confrontation away. She hadn't gone for murdering all civilians. Just let her troops run wild and looked away when needed. But 'not as bad as the people who ruined an entire planet and murdered most of its population' wasn't anything to be proud of - it was up there with 'not as bad as Horde Prime'.

Fuck it. Fuck herself.

She stepped out of the tent with a mumbled 'checking the perimeter'. The air outside was clean, according to the sensors, but she still smelt a hint of… something that reminded her of the Fright Zone. Or that was just her memories.

She stared at the horizon. Hilly country, there. No mountains - it wouldn't really stop armoured warfare, but it would slow down advances and channel thrusts, allowing defenders to use artillery from cover on choke points and kill zones. Would have to use air or aerospace forces to suppress the artillery and send in light troops to recon and screen the heavy armour. And to clear out any settlements of enemy infantry, of course…

She gasped when she felt an arm wrap around her shoulders. How had Adora snuck up on her without Catra noticing? Because she had been lost in her guilt.

"You're not like them."

Not any more, maybe, Catra added silently. Would she have gone for genocidal attacks like the Eurondans had? Deliberately trying to exterminate the entire population of the Princess Alliance? She hadn't done it. Not even when she had been at her lowest point. But if she had thought it was the only way to win, would she have done it? The Horde propaganda had claimed they were fighting against evil princesses to free the people, but everyone - except for Adora - had known that was a lie. A lie that had gotten some lip service in the field, at most. What if the Horde propaganda had been different? Made the enemy out to be all fanatical, treacherous foes who would never stop fighting and so must all be killed?

"I could have been like them," she whispered. She had risked the entire world to win, after all.

"But you weren't," Adora retorted.

She was so confident. Trusting. Loving.

Catra sighed and leaned into her lover a bit more. "I feel bad about telling the Eurondan Alliance to stop fighting their enemies." Selfish. Like a hypocrite.

"We're saving them from becoming as bad as their enemies," Adora said.

"They don't see it like that."

"They're wrong. No matter what was done to them, murdering people in return is wrong. Vengeance won't make anything right." Adora nodded firmly.

Catra sighed again. Vengeance might be wrong, but she knew how tempting it was to strike back at whoever hurt you - at whoever you thought had hurt you. To make them hurt in turn. To make them suffer. To make them pay.

She understood them.

"They won't thank us for this," she said in a low voice. The Eurondan Alliance might end up hating them. Easily. Catra understood that as well.

"I know. But we can't let them murder helpless people. That would be wrong."

And that was what it boiled down to, in the end.

Catra nodded. "We won't."

No matter what it took.

Another day, another meeting. That summed up Jack O'Neill's life as a general. Granted, it was a meeting under truce to negotiate an armistice, on an alien planet, and he was with his friends and not in Brussels meeting with fellow generals, politicians or contractors, and if things went wrong, they'd have to evacuate under fire and try to find a way to save this world and their lives. So, it felt more like a Stargate Command mission with SG-1.

But he still felt ill at ease. He wasn't a diplomat. He was a soldier. And he wanted to remain a soldier. He was good at soldiering. He wasn't that good at diplomacy.

And he really sucked at trying to protect Space Nazis from suffering the consequences of their actions.

He still smiled when the transport plane of the Eurondan Alliance touched down, and a larger group than last time got out. Those weren't the Space Nazis, after all - those were the people who had fought years, decades, against the Space Nazis. And this time, they were meeting their leaders.

Jack wasn't surprised to spot Liou amongst the delegation. Just from the way everyone else had deferred to him, It had been rather obvious that the man hadn't been a low-ranking, expendable scientist. But Jack focused on the new faces. All of them were in uniform, which was expected. All of them were men. That was kind of a surprise - he would have expected them to bring at least one woman with them now that they knew that the Alliance was represented by Adora and the other princesses. On the other hand, they might have realised that just bringing a token woman along would only highlight that the Eurondan Alliance was run by men - and by soldiers.

The apparent leader was in the centre, a step ahead of the rest. Old but still spry - he walked briskly and sure-footed - he was tall, thin and bald, with a wispy moustache, and reminded Jack of a Japanese veteran from the Pacific War whom he had met on leave in Japan when he had been a fresh-faced Lieutenant. Liou was on his right side. To his left walked another old man. This one was stockier, with a bushy mane of white hair, and looked more like someone from the Middle East. Two more middle-aged soldiers walked behind them, and Jack tagged them as officers. They had that vibe. Unlike the two middle-aged guards bringing up the rear.

"Hello!" Adora greeted them with a wide smile. "I'm She-Ra, Princess of Power, and I represent the Alliance against the Goa'uld." She gestured at the others and introduced them.

The Eurondans nodded, and Liou introduced the new people in turn. "Commander Lan, a senior member of our Council. General Faisa, member of our general staff. Majors Kele and Janis, their aides."

Or spooks posing as aides, Jack thought. Analysts, probably - they would be useful for the negotiations and for gathering general intel.

"Please step inside the tent. We've prepared more diverse food than last time," Adora told them.

Liou perked up at that, and his polite smile grew more genuine. Or that was what he wanted you to think - whether he was a politician or a spook in addition to a scientist, Jack didn't know, but he would have to be skilled at hiding his emotions either way. As a scientist as well, of course - the stories Daniel had of the academic scene sometimes made the Pentagon look like it was staffed by straight shooters, and Liou was a soldier and a scientist.

Adora was right about the food. They hadn't pulled out all the stops, but they had ordered this food from actual caterers. High-class caterers.

Jack smiled widely as he snatched some choice snacks for himself.

Lan nodded in apparent appreciation and smiled at Adora after his first snack, but that didn't mean anything in Jack's opinion. Faisa grunted, still looking stern. Liou appeared to enjoy himself - and commented about the new selection - and Kele and Janis seemed to spend as much time looking at the food as they spent actually tasting it.

Jack was leaning more strongly towards both of them being intel analysts. On Earth, those could be, and not too rarely were, former field agents. Euronda might not have had much use for recon and spying on the enemy with their atmosphere being poisoned to the point of rendering field ops impossible, but any country at war would have had spooks watching their own people - especially their soldiers.

Jack kept an eye on both. And the guards, of course. They had been betrayed and ambushed by one group of Eurondans before, and he'd be damned if he'd let it happen again.

As expected after their first meeting, the Eurondan delegation liked the food. They even made some small talk about the different dishes. And Adora didn't have to tell Catra not to hog all fish sandwiches. The Eurondan leaders were smiling - except for General Faisa, but he hadn't smiled at all so far, so he probably didn't count. All in all, they were off to a good start.

However, the real challenge was to get the Eurondan Alliance to agree to an armistice and then negotiate a peace treaty. Adora had no illusions that that would be easy. But they were talking, at least.

She cleared her throat when everyone seemed to have had their fill - with the exception of Catra, who just grabbed another salmon toast, and Jack, who probably thought he was sneaky by snatching bowls of dessert. "So… shall we start the talks?"

Everyone grew serious at once. Liou was the only one to keep smiling but switched to doing so politely rather than genuinely.

"Yes," Commander Lan said. "And first, I want to protest your interference with a matter limited to Euronda."

"Our intervention was a reaction to the Eurondans supplying weapons that were used to attack us," Adora retorted. "We could not ignore that."

"According to your own claims, you stopped that. So, there's no longer any reason to meddle in this conflict." Lan leaned forward. "You achieved your goals."

"Our goal is to protect civilians," Adora told him. Did he just try to use their own argument against them? "Any civilians."

"The Eurondan Nation has no civilians. All of them are soldiers."

"The majority of their population are in stasis, not fighting," Daniel cut in.

Adora nodded. They had gone over that already.

"That doesn't make them civilians - they are held in reserve," Faisa spoke up. "They're soldiers."

"Even the children?" Glimmer scoffed. "If you declare every potential recruit a soldier, that would make any civilian a valid target."

"They tried to murder all of our civilians," Lan said with narrowed eyes. "And they almost succeeded. We are merely retaliating in kind."

"That doesn't justify attacking helpless civilians," Adora objected. "Two wrongs don't make a right."

"Do you really want to stoop as low as your enemies?" Glimmer added. "That would make you no better than them."

"We didn't start this!" Lan protested with an open scowl. "We are just defending ourselves. As long as the Eurondan Nation exists, we're not safe. They will try to exterminate us again!"

"That's not true!" Adora shook her head, "People can change!"

"We have had similar conflicts in our past - on Earth - and the nation that waged a war of extermination did change profoundly. It happened within living memory." Daniel nodded at the Eurondans. "They were actually quite similar to your enemies in that they, too, had an ideology of racial purity. And they murdered millions of civilians."

"Damn Nazis," Jack muttered near Adora.

"But they changed," Adora said. The Germans were good friends now - and good allies. "Everyone can change."

"Not the Eugenists." Faisa shook his head. "They have done too much."

"And just because there's a potential for change doesn't mean that change will actually occur," Liou said. "When pressed and desperate, people can claim and promise anything, only to go back on their word once their situation improves."

"The Eugenists cannot be trusted." Lan nodded slowly. "Nor can they be forgiven."

Adora pressed her lips together. That attitude was wrong!

"Because they did something unforgivable, you will do something unforgivable to them?" Daniel pushed his glasses up.

"It's not the same. We need to do this so our people - those amongst them who survived - can be safe again," Lan insisted.

"Though we do not need to kill the remaining members of the Eurondan Nation," Liou added. "As I mentioned before, exile from our world might be enough, provided that they are deprived of any opportunity ever to return."

"As we mentioned before, that would be ethnic cleansing - something we do not condone on Earth," Daniel said.

"Euronda is not Earth," Faisa spat.

"On Earth, we consider human rights universal - applicable to any human and arguably any other sapient being, anywhere," Daniel retorted.

"That's your opinion, not ours," Lan said. "Are you going to attempt to force your laws on us?"

"We won't let you commit genocide," Glimmer told him.

Adora nodded.

"Would you protect murderers even if it meant fighting their victims?" Lan asked.

"We will do what we have to to protect civilians." Adora stared at him. He had to understand that they wouldn't let them murder the Eurondans. Or drive them from their homes. That would be wrong no matter what they had done.

"But we won't let them hurt you either," Daniel said. "You will be safe."

"So you say." Lan scoffed. "And we should trust you? Trust the safety, the lives of our people, to you?"

"Yes." Adora nodded firmly.

Daniel cleared his throat. "Not blindly. When our, ah, version of the Eurondan Nation was defeated, they were disarmed, and their country was occupied. A coalition of their enemies controlled their territory until they were deemed trustworthy again."

"You offer to let us occupy their territory? Which we would take anyway without your interference? How generous!" Faisa snorted.

"Without our 'interference', meaning, without us wrecking their base, you would have to struggle to take their territory," Jack cut in. "And without us, they might have found new resources to turn the tables on you before you managed to defeat them."

"That's speculation," Liou pointed out.

"They had already made deals with some of our rivals for the resources they needed," Jack retorted. "You'd have a costly war to fight in either case."

"We only have your word for that," Lan objected.

"You also have a crater in the Eurondan nation's base - and a restored continent," Glimmer said, rolling her eyes. "And we offered you artificial wombs to help you restore your population. What else do we have to do to make you trust us?" She leaned forward. "We don't want to fight you. We just want to protect the civilians."

"You've won the war," Daniel added. "And you will be safe from them. You can focus on rebuilding your world instead of on the war."

"For how long?" Lan shook his head. "We need more than your word to accept an end to the war without the complete destruction of our enemy. We need proof. Guarantees."

"And you'll get them," Adora said. "You can watch as their weapons are destroyed."

"And I guess we can send a squadron of frigates over," Catra commented with a shrug. "To keep everyone honest."

"Cheaper than an occupation force," Jack said.

Adora nodded. They could do that. They would have to protect the planet from the Goa'uld anyway.

"And we want those who attacked us and murdered our people," Lan said. "They aren't civilians. They have to pay for what they did to us."

"Our dead demand justice," Faisa growled.

Adora winced. That would complicate things.