The New Republic government was already aboard the space station when The Core Council arrived. The Council's luxury cruise ship was barely noticeable next to the gigantic warships of the Republic which surrounded the station. Whichever window you looked through, the stars were blocked by a mighty naval vessel. All this trouble was just to make it a little intimidating...
There was one important problem, however; the New Republic had never formed an actual government, since the entire state was basically a fleet of ships commanded by the ships' commanding officers. For the formalities, I had picked Professor Yamamari and Admiral Mei to come with me.
When The Council stepped into the station for the first time, both parties greeted each other formally before moving into the meeting room. The meeting room was a reasonably-sized deck, cleaned and rearranged for the specific requirements of this meeting. There was a long table in the middle of the room; one of the long sides was for The Council, and the other was for New Republic.
"Gentlemen..." I said, before turning to the only woman in the room, Admiral Mei. "...and m'lady, as you would all agree, we don't have much time discussing political or internal matters when there is a system-wide crisis at hand."
Councillors, with a lot of hesitation and uneasiness, looked at each other. A few of them nodded to agree with me. Among them, Professor Kukulkan was the only one so enthusiastic about this meeting.
"Great." I said. "Now, today, as you know, we are meeting here to unite two independent, sovereign states, as 'Terran Restoration Confederation'."
The Council got anxious, and a councilor wanted to speak.
"The Council thinks that it would better serve our cause if we came together as an alliance rather than a confederation." he said. "We do not require some sort of political merger to unite our material and mental powers to work for a common goal, and against a common enemy."
"The New Republic disagrees." said Professor Yamamari. "Political unity would allow us to greatly reduce the complexity of having to synchronize separate work groups belonging to different command schemes and work schedules. The better our organization is, the faster we can accomplish our missions."
The Council was unhappy with the explanation, but they didn't have enough excuses to argue. Their only chance at restoring The Order's sovereignty was slipping away from their hands, slowly.
"So, there are quite a lot of details we need to work out about the organization of The Confederation itself, but we shall not spend more than enough time on that." I continued my speech. "Both states will continue managing their internal matters via their current government systems, but The Confederation will have its own body for making decisions."
"Which, we hope, will include members from all member states?" asked a councilor.
"Of course." I said. "However, the ratio of members will be proportional to the member states' total GDP spent towards the common goal."
The Order of Salvation was in no position to challenge the New Republic in means of GDP - our total wealth, combined with our mineral extraction and energy production capabilities, were unmatched by the facilities on the dwarf planet. Naturally, The Council argued.
"This is unacceptable." said a councilor. "If we are to create a true democracy, we have to take total population into account, instead of total GDP!"
The Order, on the other hand, had more than ten times the population of our fleet state. If population was to be taken into account, we would be doomed.
"We are not pursuing the idea of a true democracy." I said, clenching my teeth. "We are trying to get things done... fast."
Everyone in the meeting room looked at me, with a slight shock visible on their faces. Everyone knew we were not going for a true democracy, but saying it out loud required some bravery. I knew I was looking like a tyrant, but I was not going to leave the control to some self-declared prophets.
"If parties can not come to an agreement for the duration of this single meeting, no changes will be done to the political status of the states. The New Republic will preserve its status as an independent republic, and The Order will preserve its autonomous region status." I stated. This could motivate The Council a bit.
The discussion for the formation of the confederation lasted about half an Earth day - extremely short in regular diplomacy standards, but much longer than what I had in mind. Fortunately, in the end, The Council accepted our offers. Terran Restoration Confederation was formed, and The Order, at least on paper, was now a sovereign state, equal to the New Republic. In practice, however, nothing had changed; The Confederation was ruled by the New Republic, so The Order was basically still an autonomous region. It was as if we had just changed the name of The Republic.
The Council, politically defeated, was the first to leave the orbital station. After their departure, Admiral Mei went to continue her task of commanding a mining fleet, while Professor Yamamari and I came back aboard Lodos. I then ordered the warships to move away from the station, and the orbital station continued its regular duties of serving spaceships in need of repair, maintenance or refilling.
Ships of The Fleet State was then decorated with the emblems of The Confederation, as well as the ships of The Order. At that point, The Council probably had some explaining to do to their citizens.
After we finally got the green light from The Core Council, I sent some cargo ships and personnel from The Fleet down to the surface of Makemake to initiate the work on mankind's first interstellar colony ship. Bright minds from The Order and The Republic introduced themselves before establishing the 'Interstellar Transports Design Bureau' - first direct product of The Confederation.
On paper, this bureau was responsible to neither The Order or The Republic, but to the governing body of The Confederation... so in turn, it was practically responsible to The Republic.
While I was thinking about it and enjoying the diplomatic superiority, Commander Tachibana disturbed me with a message.
'---NEW REPUBLIC NAVAL FORCES---
Commander Tachibana
Sir, I think I know the best way to bring down the AI colony ship. I request permission to come back aboard Lodos to continue the discussion.
---END OF DECRYPTED PACKAGE---'