"Visitors' Arrival: Book 3 of the LUNAR SERIES."

Even though Admiral Shan was already in Sol Governance’s headquarters it was no guarantee that the hundreds of other solar system-wide officials would be there to conveniently meet with her! Indeed, about half of the several hundreds of representatives of the Governance’s Erthen, lunar, and space station sovereigns were in their home-regions, tending to other businesses in other parts of the Sol system, or just plain old on vacation and it was pretty much impossible to find them!It made no matter.One of the cornerstone ordinances of the Governance was when there was an existential emergency, quorum-rules were superseded by that emergency!Whether members physically attended meetings or whether they met via virtual quorums, the existential emergency took precedence.

There were a few times in its 91 years of existence that the Sol Governance had to convene due to existential threats:one time was when an asteroid clipped one of the moons of Jupiter and caused a “shower” of meteors to pulverize nearby space stations and lunar settlements that, in total, represented approximately 10 million solar system citizens!Another time was entirely Human-made… when a nationalistic resurgence of an ancient lunar culture known as Tellmondo had sprung up throughout near-Erth space and those of ethnic Tellmondonian lineage had gone on some bombing sprees; killing tens of thousands of non-Tells.Indeed, some in the solar system had considered the military battles against the revived Tellmondonian movement as the Sol system’s first “Solar War!”

Since such upheavals, the Sol system had been relatively quiet.Until now…

“…Admiral Shan, I consider this a betrayal,” privateer real estate owner, Vornan Huntworth, scolded over the virtual link for the Governance emergency meeting.Admiral Shan had simply conducted the meeting from her personal quarters since it was of high-quality security and the lack of time for all of them to travel.The suite was hers, personally, and she paid for the higher cost for being in “the nice neighborhood” within the many halls of Governance headquarters.The meeting had been going on for approximately thirty minutes.“Everyone knows I own several space stations out by station Watcher 5…my people that work those space stations and the stations themselves are next in line of whatever this is that’s coming our way!You should have informed me the second you knew about this situation!”

Shan knew it was not logical, but she wanted to strike the tiny holographic image of the middle-aged man for being so narrow-minded at such a time.“Mr. Huntworth, I suggest that you focus on helping the Council find out what, exactly, it is that we’re even dealing with!Look, I told you I sent out a special operations team to get a handle on the events before we reacted—“

“And how’s that going for ya,” the wealthy real estate owner said sarcastically.

There was a thud in the virtual meeting from the Council’s chair, Xi Zehan; one of the Governance’s youngest chair, being in her 30s.“Members, please, we do not have time for this bickering…”Chair Xi’s holo-image turned to look upon Admiral Shan—from Shan’s point of view.“Admiral, I have to admit, Member Huntworth has a valid point.Had the Council been aware of these events, we would have been days in advanced on working with you on this problem…is there anything else you can tell us about the Justifier mission that might help us speed this along?”

The admiral was already shaking her head.“No more than what I’ve already told the Council…like I said, the last transmission we got fromJustifier’s crew was of them sending some kind of probe to an uncharted distance-marker that they, I guess, had some kind of suspicion about.”

The hundreds of holograms of the representatives, arranged in tight-rectangles in a grid-fashion with each respective Member in front of Shan as she sat at her desk, was all evenly projected as a wall of tiny faces with telemetry floating about.Each user of the virtual interfacer had the option of enlarging, highlighting, and other editing features of these meetings.The chair, whomever it was at any time, controlled who got to speak and they were known to simply cut any Member’s transmitted image if that Member went on too long, or became too hostile!

“A distance-marker,” Alexandr Tulman, the president of Israel and another younger Member, asked incredulously.

“I know, Member Tulman,” Admiral Shan acknowledged.“My people and I didn’t understand why they were so fixated on a space-marker when all these events were going on.But Captain Modune’s team kept referring to the Trojan Horse legend…”She shrugged as others in the meeting voiced concerns, questions, and criticisms.

Again, that ancient sound of a block of wood being struck by a wooden gavel.Chair Xi went on.“I think we should send special ops toevery marker in the solar system!”

Now, there was an uncomfortable silence until Member Veronica Peters, the CEO of Peters’ Bank—Sol, spoke up.“Every distance-marker, Chair Xi?In the whole of the Governance?Ma’am, do you know how many thousands of space-markers there are?”

Admiral Shan began rubbing her face out of frustration from the arguing in the meeting!She said nothing.

“I do,” Chair Xi responded.“And I know we have enough personnel to investigate each and every one of those markers!If it’s true what Admiral Shan said about Justifier’s crew believing a distance-marker as being some kind of decoy, then, what about the thousands of othermarkers in the Sol system?Or, at least, some pretending to be the Governance’s markers!”

By then, the virtual meeting erupted with jeers from most of the Members in the Council.And, again, the gavel was rapping against its block.

“Based on the timing of events, fellow Members,” Chair Xi informed the Council, “I move that I emplace emergency codifications of the Sol Governance’s Constitution and assume emergency powers…Guards,” she exclaimed as she summoned them, whom were out of visual range, “assemble my staff at my office—drag them there if you must.We are now officially under Existential Emergency Codification…you all must go through your constitutional procedures appropriately…”At that point, Chair Xi returned her gaze to her own holographic wall of representatives.“My fellow Members, we all know the procedures on our end.Some of you are new to your positions.I suggest that you consult your top staff and refer to your manuals.”

No one else in the virtual assembly said a word.Indeed, many of the Council’s Members were solemn or nearly at tears!Chair Xi Zehan looked directly at Admiral Reshma Shan; no emotion that Shan could see.

“Admiral…despite your poor judgement in delaying to contact the Council, I commend you for bringing this to our attention.”The admiral silently nodded back a ‘thank you.’Xi went on to say to the admiral, “You’ll have to send reinforcements to space station Watcher 5, Admiral.Coordinate with Director Nadeem and see what they all need out there.”

“Yes, Chair Xi.”

Chair Xi once again looked upon the hundreds of thumbnail-holos silently looking directly at her.“Alright, Members…So, now, we need to redeploy some of our forces to monitor any false space-markers we may have in the whole solar system!”