“Leader, I suggest focusing on locating the source of the problem, rather than building new weapons to scare people.”

  Taj had said it two days ago, and Lukai did not comment on it yet. They had an argument.

  Taj—he was the problem.

  Managing him was almost an impossible task. While Taj obeyed their arrangements, agreeing on something they both accepted was very difficult.

  There was also an additional issue with that. It wasn’t that Lukai didn’t trust Taj, being in Gates. It was more about convincing him to be willing to cooperate solely with him, the new Leader.

  “Only with me,” Lukai said out loud and sighed.

  How could he be certain that Taj was not projecting somewhere?

  How could he know with whom he talked?

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  How could he check if the data presented was real?

  How could he check it all?

  The problems were piling up.

  Taj had found out what Lukai was recently researching. The teams he appointed to work on new ways to fight, new weapons. Of course, he found out—he could track everything that went through Gates.

  The other team, researching energy waves, worked only on Planet One—never used Gates, and Lukai disconnected them from the net. This hadn’t been commented on by Taj.

  However, Lukai wanted him to find out and comment on it. He wanted to know how far Taj could reach, what he could see, and what was out of his sight.

  Lukai planned to set up a trap to know when Taj would check his private folders. He stored those very strange, old Clar recordings. Lukai was sure that Taj would ask why he had them or where he had found them. Or would Taj delete them?

  … Their argument was simple.

  Taj suggested trying to connect with Planet Three; he wanted to build and send a spaceship there. The people there didn’t have enough resources. Taj checked what they had taken there, and it would not be enough.

  They would certainly be hungry soon.

  Lukai, as the new Leader, could act there rather than experiment with energies and weapons. This was what Taj was insisting on. ‘Changing customs could be achieved differently than by using new weapons,’ he added in the summary.

  Lukai hadn’t answered yet.

  He partially agreed with what Taj was saying.

  However, he didn’t have time for this.