Chapter 28

"Well that was boring," Thomas said after they left the presentation of a Monarchy.

"What did you expect? Old costumes, crowns, and weird English?" Ember laughed.

"I did not expect a marketing campaign…" he said.

"I have to agree with Thomas, it was soooo boring," Norr added.

"Thank you, Norr,"

"You are reading that Mat?" Swen nudged Mat, who was walking while reading his WW.

"Yeah, there are contacts for other societies, I might contact them about some questions I have,"

"Oho! Now you are brazen!" Suzy laughed.

"Well, when I am going to anger Lucas, might as well get everything from it. The societies work from Earth's perspective just like private corporations, just with better PR. There are a few hundreds of them and I searched through them a lot, but there is just too much worthless information about them and… "

"Oh no, make him stop!" Thomas jokes.

"Haha, We are here anyway," Norr laughs and opens the door to the scientific discussion.

"We are pretty early," Ember said happily and picked a seat in the front row.

"You are really excited for this one," Swen pointed out.

"Well yeah, it is about planets….that is kind of the whole point of my club, remember?" she said sarcastically, but Swen laughed.

"Your other members don't look as hyped as you," he said and showed how Thomas and Norr were talking with each other and Mat was still reading.

"Well, this is not why they joined," Ember waved her hand.

"Why else?"

"Don't forget the club name is two words, planetary, and exploration. Norr loves exploration and the other two…well in time,"

"Sure, sure," Swen nodded and let her prepare her WW for recording the talk. A few minutes before the start Suzy takes a seat next to them.

"You made it!"

"Yeah, they were very eager to talk to me, I got a private contact with them for the article,"

"Well, it is free publicity,"

"I will not be nice to them," Suzy said bluntly, but before they could talk about it, the speaker came to the stage and began their presentation. It was an elderly woman in her sixties with short gray hair and a dark burgundy dress.

She used two big holographic projectors as great tools for explaining the specific problems with dealing with tidily-locked planets. The presentation however quickly delved into actual practical experiences and more human-specific problems. When she stopped the presentation and allowed questions from the audience it was Ember whose WW first lighted up green to be noticed. So naturally, she was allowed to speak while WW raised her voice.

"You talked about planets locked with their star, how about moon locked with their planets? I know you mentioned Ulysses, but could you perhaps mention more about the possible specific type of tectonic activity on those moons?" Ember asked with a clear voice.

"Thank! Yes, this is a very good question, however, there was simply not enough time to talk about that can of worms. I did a presentation about that topic about two years ago in Peking, you might check it out. If you want more information come…" the woman was walking towards Ember while talking but stopped at the edge.

"Eghm, come to me after the talk. If I may, the young lad sitting next to you, are you perhaps the one lucky boy who won a planet?" the woman asked. Ember looked at him with surprise and worry, just like others apart from Suzy who smirked.

"Yes I am," Mat said, with a less but still clear voice. While he was nervous, he did manage to not make an annoyed face.

"It is nice to see you at my presentation, but don't tell me you won a tidily locked planet, that would be some terrible luck then,"

"No, I was just interested. My planet is not tidily locked, it is similar to Earth in climate, as far as I can tell,"

"Well still! Talk to me after the talk with your friend, maybe we can arrange some collaboration," the woman smiled and he nodded…but then as she was about to pick another question.

"I will think about it," he said loudly. The woman was working for an Earth research institute and ambushed him, he did not feel any sympathy for playing hard to get. However, the woman just nodded and continued with the questions.

"What are you doing? That could be a nice opportunity!"Ember said surprised.

"You will go there anyway, no? Just give me her contact later! It is not like we could do some research right now!"

"Your stubbornness is really annoying," Thomas whispered.

"Shut it! I am annoyed to be suddenly put in the spotlight in front of who knows how many people!"

"There are about two hundred people watching on the Internet," Suzy pointed out.

"Fine! Just a minute ago you were all about getting everything I can get from it!" Ember crossed her hands.

"Talking with an Earth-based research group is the last thing Lucas would be mad about, trust me, he is going to be madder about denying her,"

"I thought you don't want to annoy him…" Norr wondered.

"This was worth it!" Mat said.

"Why?"

"It felt good!"

"That little pushback?" Swen laughed silently.