Silence.
On the bridge, a pin drop would have been audible.
Diplomat Qingliu's mouth hung slightly open, his eyes filled with shock and elation. As he gazed at the mysterious warship, ugly though it was, that had stepped forward at the critical moment, a thought struck him like lightning.
"It's them..." he murmured, his voice trembling with excitement. "It's the answer of the 'Greater Good'! Allies... drawn here by the guiding light!"
Commander Suisxing frowned deeply, his tactical eyepiece frantically analyzing what had just happened. "Impact angle... coincidence. Energy signature... chaotic, primitive. They were... out of control?!"
"That doesn't matter!" Qingliu seized Suisxing's arm in excitement. "Suisxing! The result! What matters is the result! They saved the Heart of Resolve! They're attacking our enemies! Whoever they are, wherever they came from, at this moment, they're our friends!"
Meanwhile, aboard the Lighthouse, Liu Zhipeng recovered from the violent shaking and immediately realized that a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity had smacked him in the face like a pie slathered in butter.
"Snot!" he roared.
A scrawny Gretchin wearing lenses as thick as the bottoms of oil bottles scrambled up to him. "Here, here, Big Boss!"
"Get me a comm link to those blue-skinned beanpoles! Use the clearest channel! Now!"
"But Big Boss, we don't know their frequency!"
"Then try every frequency! Broadcast at maximum power!"
Soon, a communication request laden with static reached the bridge of the T'au Empire's Dawn Messenger.
"An... unidentified transmission source," the operator reported hesitantly. "The signal is very weak."
"Put it through!" Qingliu ordered at once.
A flickering, extremely low-resolution hologram appeared in the center of the bridge. In the image stood a uniformed... Gretchin? Behind him was a dilapidated bridge, with sparks flying everywhere.
It was Liu Zhipeng. He had put away all his cunning and arrogance, his