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Carol Duresh sits in her desk and looks over the notes one last time before she does her announcement. Even with all of the insurances made that the thing has been rendered harmless she is very reluctant to touch the doll that was put on her desk for the message to everyone on the station. She easily could just as easily have someone else do this segment as well. In fact, one of the biggest advantages of her position as the one in charge of all communication within the station is that she doesn't have to do any of these if she doesn't want to. A lot of the time most races also prefer it if the person they're getting their news from is coming from someone of their own race. And considering the sheer size of the station there are even some areas which prefer someone that even is in their area of the station rather than just of their own species. Which she understands. It is far easier to read the expressions of your own kind than someone else's and makes the person giving the information seem more personable, even if still having to go through the standard translation issues.

But in this particular situation it is much better if she were the one giving the message. This is her decision on the matter. It is important to give a much more officious perception in order to properly convey the fact that the station has handled the problem and just how serious the situation is. She's given the signal that the recording is about to begin. Having tons of practice at the act she knows to not just say everything outright, but give time for translators to match out the words she says to their own languages. It does give the impression of a sort of verbal tick but it is also one that not only is often understood by anyone talking to a very large group but also one that she has trained all of her top subordinates to do so as well.

"Hello, this is Carol Duresh of the Foznetal station. There has been a recent development that the general public needs to be made aware of. In the past few days an act of terrorism had been attempted on the people of the station. The threat has been neutralized and the people responsible have been apprehended. However, as a general precaution we have decided to warn people of the form of the threat." Carol lifts up the doll and shows it to the camera. "If you see a doll that looks like this, report it to your nearest Guardian immediately. They are to be considered extremely dangerous and should not be handled by anyone not knowing what they are doing. The station will gladly refund any purchase made regarding these dolls. Further, we are also going to be putting a bounty on any and all information about anyone selling these dolls provided that we have definitive proof that that is the person selling one of the dolls. I would advise people not to take any action themselves. This is a very delicate situation and it is best if this is handled in a calm and rational manner. I repeat, if you see any of these dolls, report them to a Guardian immediately. Thank you all for your time," she says as the feed cuts out to return everyone to their ordinary programming. She very easily could have expanded upon it a bit more as she very carefully puts the doll back down and pushes it as far away from her as possible. But it got the message across. They'll naturally go about on a smaller scale and repeat the message a few times over the course of the next day, after which if any did get past them all it wouldn't matter anymore.

Carol didn't like the way the current situation felt. It just felt far too tidy to be solved so completely. And to top it off she didn't understand why the Head Orenshii was seeing to this particular threat so personally. Anon she understood. It was Anon's duty to protect the station and this would have fallen perfectly within her jurisdiction once it got to the station. But Riu, it just didn't fit and that bothered her. Even more than the fact that Ret was involved and there was no plausible reason why Ret gave the answer the way he did.

The next day, Richard knocks on the door to Eric's workshop as he's usually found for most of the hours when not in class or having gone home for the night. He hears a response from inside but doesn't know the language. But he had been here a few times and knows that it's usually the signal to enter. He steps in and sees Eric working on a smaller device of some sort, probably a commission for someone. Many people seemed to come to him to buy small illusions for one reason or another.

"Ah, Richard," Eric says as he looks up and since he's now in the range of the effect of Eric's Language of Intent device. "What can I help you with?"

"Have you ever heard about the game Clairvoyance?"

"I have. Did someone challenge you on it?"

"No, but I was asked to spectate one recently. And I figure you would know how much Con magic is involved in the game."

"Usually very little," Eric says with a shrug. "That isn't to say that people very skilled at Con magic aren't usually good at the activity. Both Clairvoyance and Con magic, especially mental illusions, are centered around being able to read other people. With Con magic the more you understand about psychology and how people perceive reality the more accurate and believable you can make an illusion. With Clairvoyance, it's much the same. Part of the game is usually cold reading your opponent, giving vague statements and reading their expressions and moves and adapting your statements based on how they react. But Con magic is not actually at all involved in it. It can help disguise your own reactions or to give false flags, but that is very rarely ever done. But alas I suspect there is a far greater issue on your mind than just whether or not Con magic is involved."

"Well," Richard says. "All this stuff happened on the station with the doll thing that the screens warned us about because I happened to oversee this game and just happened to blab it to someone I work with."

"Ah, you're concerned about the pressures that were placed on you from this trial. May I ask who it is that was engaging in this game?"

"A kitsune named Mige and a Jhereshii named Ret."

"Ah, Ret. That makes sense, then. With someone like Ret you really shouldn't worry yourself all that much about it. How far in advance did he give you in the message?"

"Um, a few days I think."

"Then consider this. If he knew well in advance that the ship was coming then he had several days to deliver the message in time. He might have been waiting for a few days specifically to find a moment of the two of you walking together to arrange for the match between the two of them. And then get you the message to be delivered. I've heard the name Ret quite a few times, he has a lot of influence amongst the people here. He gave you the message to see what you'd do with the information. And then if you did as you did no further action would have been required from him. If, however, you did not pass along the message and get the station put to alert, he'd likely still be able to get that information to the ones in charge. So, yes. He was most definitely using you to try and avert a massive problem, but there really was nothing truly at stake if you didn't. That you got his message and delivered that up the pecking order to handle the situation lets him know he can use you as another channel to pass along information in the future, nothing more. I imagine some of the Guardians will probably be watching to see if he contacts you again and if he does, I fully expect they'll demand to know what he told you. Such is life. Regardless, the crisis would have been averted even if you had done nothing or only asked others that didn't choose to escalate."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"If you want it to," Eric shrugs. "But you said you felt you were under a lot of pressure because you just happened to get information that saved a lot of lives. And I'm merely saying that that pressure you feel doesn't exist. Let's say that you never brought it up. You thought it was just a strange little game and never brought up the message to anyone that would have relayed it up. So you never got the message delivered. In that alternate sequence of events Ret would have still gotten the warning through and you would be still here right now, but instead talking about whether you should have brought it up with the Guardians and if you should have known that it was a coded message for you. Though depending on how cryptic the message was probably not even that, I suppose. The container would have still been found. All the culprits would still have been caught. The only difference between this timeline and our own is your own involvement in it. There was no pressure on you this time. That said, Ret now knows he can use you to discretely pass along information. Meaning you can likely expect to see him come find you again in the future with a vague, cryptic statement and when he does you should report it."

"Great, I can see why Mige doesn't like their kind."

"They aren't all that bad," Eric responds, leaning back in his chair. "Jhereshii don't think like you or I. When we are weighing our options we are considering what looks to be the best course of action at the time. We try to do our best to get the best result for the situation we're in. With Jhereshii, it's much different. They are an aquatic race that still managed to build ships capable of travelling to space. Just think about that a moment. A species that lives in the water not only figured out how to make fire but also create enough propulsion to escape their atmosphere. Meaning they had to build this stuff on what little ground their world had or even potentially build the land to build the rockets on. And why? Because they saw a massive advantage to not being tied to one world. They don't think short-term. There are some that even claim they are incapable of seeing what would be the short-term benefit. They think almost exclusively in the long-term. Jhereshii are more than willing to accept massive short-term loses if it means that it is in their best interest in the long-term. That's why they helped fund this station. They wouldn't get anything back from it immediately. But the presence of the station and everything it represents was seen as something that would benefit them far more than the money and resources used in its construction. When Ret gave you that message he wasn't thinking about this particular event. He's thinking about what is in his best interest ten to twenty years down the line. And many people don't like that they do this. But that's just how they are."

"I see," Richard says slowly.

"Probably not. And that's okay. There are some people who love to dance on the strings of fate and manipulate things to their benefit. And then there are some who are so much happier simply enjoying life. Think not on how you are being used but how is life treating you and how can you enjoy it more. I think you'll find that philosophy far more preferable in the end." Eric says with a nod. "Anything else?"

"No, I think that should be it," Richard says with a sigh as he turns to leave.

"Well happy to have been of help. Come again whenever you want."

Riu enters the interrogation room that had been set aside just for the person behind this last attack on the station. Ordinarily Riu would never bother with such things. Not only was he not all that skilled when it came questioning witnesses but it wasn't really his job in the first place. If any of the command staff should be interrogating someone it should be either Anon or Kinou, depending on how open they need to be. But then, this isn't the initial interrogation, but rather that this was a personal attack against him. And since the initial report is that the whole thing was because of him, Riu felt the need to see for himself what it was that caused someone to try and kill a few hundred people to take out some grudge against him and not simply go after him personally. When he enters the room the human looks at him in disgust and then spits in his general direction. Even still he does have some support. Anon and a few more investigative Guardians were in the next room over and he had a receiver in his ear so that if they needed him to say or do something they could. But that meant that they weren't going to use the Language of Intent spell in this room and instead have his orb already attuned and take advantage of the fact that he'll be paying attention to the orb rather than himself and thus shouldn't hear Anon speak in the same language he knows. And it should be set quietly enough that there is little concern that it'll end up not being picked up by his orb.

"So I hear you've been rather busy lately."

The human doesn't make any verbal response but rather just give a offensive gesture at him.

"And I've been told that one of the main reasons behind your actions was me specifically. Anything you want to tell me?"

"This is against my rights. I haven't hurt anyone. You have no right to hold me like this. You have violated my rights and I demand my lawyer."

"Well, technically true. No one was harmed yet as a result of your actions," Riu shrugs. "But not from lack of trying. And typically when someone orders a shipment of a bunch of doll-sized bombs with the intent of distributing them all to the general public, they kind of give up their rights to not be taken in by the Guardians. And per the by-laws of the station, we are authorized to use telepaths in the interest of gathering information on crimes and potential crimes when there is sufficient probable cause. We had reports of an incoming attack, and you had ordered a shipment that correlated with our evidence. And when we scanned your mind we found that you had ordered the exact shipment that we had found a shipment of small timebombs. And so if you want your lawyer, fine. We'll send for you to have a lawyer, and sure we'll even have a trial in the human fashion. But that means a trial by jury with your jurors being people from the station and our station allows for evidence obtained from a telepathic scan to be used for evidence, so I don't know what all your lawyer will really do for you beyond cost you money. But there was evidence that your reasoning to do this had to do with me personally. So is there anything you want to say to me?"

"Just sit down and wait," Anon whispers through the small transmitter into his ear. And he obeys, pulling out the chair opposite of the suspect and sits down. He then leans back and fans out his tails, letting them sit together in silence. He even goes so far to grab one of his tails and goes about picking at some of the fur on the tip, working around a theoretical split end, though he makes sure that he never has to deal with this normally unless he had to go through a very rough and dirty location for awhile.

"You want to know why I did it? You ever hear about what happened to the city of Desstor on Rhyza Three?"

"Well, yeah. That place was destroyed because they were making biological weapons. If we didn't destroy them then millions if not billions could have been killed as a result. We made sure to do it with as little collateral damage as possible."

"Well my parents were living on that city and let me tell you, there were no biological agents. We've combed through that city after it was cleared while looking for bodies. There was not a single trace of any biological agent, leastwise someone planning on making a weapon out of one. So you want to know why I did this? Because I know you were one of the people bombing that city and I wanted you to feel first-hand what I had to go through."

"So you were willing to kill a few hundred people on the station just to strike back at me?"

"I was," the human says defiantly.

"And so you were perfectly willing to spend a vast fortune not only having the dolls made but having the shipment smuggled onto the station as well?"

"Oh, I didn't spend a single dran on this myself other than booking my own ticket to here."

"If you didn't buy it then who did?"

"I don't know. Some guy. Didn't really ask my name. Didn't care to ask for it. He found me, gave me the means to enact my revenge and was willing to pay for the entire thing. Apparently didn't think things through well enough if lot managed stop it. Should have probably taken a much more direct route. Perhaps what I should have done is just hire an assassin against you or your family. Wouldn't have been as satisfying but at least it would have likely succeeded."

In all reality they already knew this information. The deep scan even got the general appearance of his contact, but that memory could easily have been faked or the contact using Con Magic, but it was still important to Riu to hear from it directly from him.

"I think you forget that there are multiple safeguards on the station to try and prevent something like that happening. Anyway, I think I have all I really want to know," Riu says before standing up, turning off the receiver in his ear. "If you hate me for what I did then that's your prerogative. But that doesn't give you the right to go after civilians that have had nothing to do with the situation. And even then it wasn't under my own decision that that facility was bombed. There was a legitimate threat and far more would have died if we did not act. And if that is not enough for you then so be it. I have not lost any sleep over preventing even more deaths if that agent got out. And just because you didn't find any doesn't mean it wasn't there. There was, after all, more than enough information that Admirals felt the need to put it down forcefully."

And with that said and the human spitting at him, Riu also turns off his translator so he doesn't have to deal with the issue of whatever words that the human decides to spill forth in retaliation. Another incident of someone paying someone else to go attack the station. It's far too unrealistic for him to conceive that the events aren't related. He'll have to go and make an official Shadow mission and ask Kinou to go leave the station to try and find the culprit. But for now he's done everything he really needs to do for now and intends on filing his report than returning back to his quarters to spend a bit more time with his familiar and Prime before they leave.