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A Star Captain wore many hats and among them was diplomat.

Brooks had always known that, he was good at the game.  But that didn’t mean he liked it.

Star-eyed people imagined that being a Captain meant travelling to exotic places and making snap decisions under pressure.  The cynical thought it was all bureaucratic work, while others thought it involved brokering treaties of peace between worlds.

All those things could happen.  But most of the time diplomacy was simply being a face to represent your people at a place you would never want to go.

It was good to remind the intergalactic community that your government existed.  To remind them that you were watching them when they were conniving in the dark, or to reassure your allies that you were still taking an interest in intergalactic affairs.

It meant you had to rub shoulders with your most implacable enemies and see what you could learn about them.  To be the eyes through which effective policy could be created.

Which meant he had to go to a party.

After all, The Legend of Ussa and Usser: A Tragedy of Ancient Earth was an intergalactic sensation among those who were interested in humanity.  Therefore, that an event to honor the writer who created it and the actors who brought it to life would be held was a given, and an important place to be seen.

The peak of Gohhi society would be there – including most of the Lord Executives.

Diplomatic revenues from the Qlerning, independent arts guilds, and even the Glorians would also be present.

He had been dreading this more than anything else he’d faced recently – even his trial.  The stakes were not directly as high, but . . .

Well, no getting around it, he thought, as a drone brought his dress uniform.

The standard Sapient Union uniform was a functional suit, which doubled as a light spacesuit in the event of decompression.  A hood, hidden in a pouch behind the neck, could unfurl automatically to cover the head, while each joint was reinforced with accordioned, air-tight fabric to protect prime leakage spots.  Dark blue, a color-coded stripe indicated the department – command was a silvery gray.  And like every outfit, it had distributed electronics that interfaced with one’s personal system, monitoring their condition while also providing a wide suite of extra functionality.

The ceremonial dress uniform, in contrast, was not a functional spacesuit and was far more limited in its computing ability, robbing it of most of its intrinsic value.

On top of that, he found it ostentatious.

Few agreed with him on that point; it was in its own way an impressive creation, made to a level of perfection that even most spacesuits didn’t get.  Stripeless, the pattern was more of an hourglass in the chest and stomach that mimicked the outline of a jacket and shirt.  The area was filled in with a dazzling silver that appeared like liquid mercury, the surface often taken for actual metal rather than impressively-tailored smartcloth.

Numerous loops of golden braiding came down from the short epaulettes on the shoulders, and a row for commendations crossed the chest.

After dressing and letting the drones pin his various awards, he looked at himself in the mirror. Donning his cap, he checked that everything was straight, and saw that the dressing drone scanned him as being within code.

He set forth, towards the Captain’s shuttle bay that was near to both his cabin and his study.  The shuttle docked there was slightly larger than most, a show piece in itself, displaying the emblem of the Sapient Union.

“Captain departing the vessel,” he messaged Jaya.

“Copy that, Captain.  Hope you survive,” Jaya replied.

He smiled, knowing she dreaded the idea of having to do such events if she ever chose to pursue a captaincy.

The trip took most of an hour in the shuttle.  Its delta-v was low, but fortunately the event was being held on Gohhi Main.  It was still a trip around the station, but the lanes were clear and well-guarded.

He knew he was particularly vulnerable, if anyone actually cared hard enough to try to get him.

But those who wanted to would lack the means to breach the security, he thought.  And those with the means would not see him as valuable enough to risk the potential fallout.

The external cameras warned him of other pods and shuttles dropping off famous guests.  Queued up automatically, he patiently waited until his own pod was able to dock.

As he exited into the airlock, a drone butler greeted him.

“Welcome, Captain-Mayor Ian Brooks,” it intoned in a warm voice.  “We are very pleased you could have made it.  Are you alone this evening?”

His invitation had said he could have brought another if he wished.  He had not wished to do so.

“That’s right.”

“Please, enter in and be introduced,” the drone said, leading him in.

As he passed through the main gate airlock, he saw that the room was like an ancient ballroom; every wall and surface was made in the most intricate style.  Real wood from Earth had been brought in, though worked in new styles and techniques that made them stand out.

Along each wall were paintings and sculptures, human and alien.  A section of sweeping Dessei sculptures stood next to replicas of some of the great human paintings, and beyond them the more surrealist Qlerning art, which sometimes he did not recognize immediately as even being art.

Pulling his eyes away from that and to the guests, he took stock of just who he would have to spend the evening with.

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