The Testimony of the Right Honorable Tubar Danak, Lord Chamberlain of the Skarsian Matriarchy
I was wakened suddenly from exhausted slumber by a voice shouting “YO!”
Instantly, my Lady Magdelaine was up, sword in hand, striking a battle pose on the bed. “You’re stepping on my ankle,” I moaned.
“NO NEED TO FREAK. IT’s me, Marty. There, I think I’ve got the volume adjusted.”
“Marty,” I moaned. “Did your people find out anything?”
“No, yes, and we’re working on it,” he said. “No, we didn’t get anything good on Gweseki because he doesn’t give a popped electron what anyone thinks of him. But yes, we’ve got dirt on the IndWorlds and the Alliance. Planetary tons of dirt. Your guys had better be ready to sift through it, though. Most Twist don’t understand good dirt. The subtleties of mammalian pair-bonding are really beyond us. With Twist, it’s either you bond or you don’t. It’s all about spin. But humans – we have no idea what the difference is between marriage, marriage of convenience, morganatic marriage, common law marriage, consort, concubine, girlfriend, boyfriend, friends with benefits, legal prostitutes, illegal hookers, escorts, mistresses, rentbois, toyboys…explain to me again why on Altesia it was a huge problem when they found out the governor was secretly married to a young man he’d met on Frangfrang, but the Prime Minister of Frangfrang has four husbands and three wives.”
“Because on Frangfrang, love is as liberal as it is on Dolparessa, but Altesians believe that homoeroticism is against nature. I can see why you might be a little confused. I’ll assign someone from SSOps to mine the data.”
“Even the Domha’vei has differing customs,” said Magdelaine. “Volparnians are somewhat homophobic, although it’s starting to loosen up. And Siderians practice monogamy, while it’s traditional for women of the Skarsian aristocratic class to have several consorts.”
“You’re not having a consort unless I get one,” I grumbled.
“Oh Tubby, I’d be a laughing stock if my husband had a consort.”
“Ahem” said Marty. “The “we’re-working-on-it” part is the Combine of Sentients. The latest word is that we’re having an emergency meeting on the Eer-gaaani homeworld.”
“They know that Lucius won’t be able to attend?”
There was a moment of silence.
“Oh, I forgot you couldn’t see that. I did half a rotation. It’s the equivalent of a nod. Anyway, it’s one of the items of discussion. Neliit is furious. That’s why she wanted to hold the meeting in Andromeda, so that it’s out of SongLuminant turf.”
“That makes sense. Well, carry on. Just get whatever information you can, and let us decide whether it’s blackmail material.”
“Don’t your people ever worry about whether something could be socially damaging?” Magdelaine asked.
“We don’t worry about much of anything. Life is too short…well, actually, life got a lot longer for some of us. And come to think of it, it is a recent fad to have an existential crisis. Should I be in a position or a momentum eigenstate? Oh, the uncertainty!”
“I never know when to take him seriously,” I murmured.
There’s a signal on my datapad – a message from Zosim. “Return message from President Gweseki of CenGov. As expected, he denies all knowledge of an invasion. In fact, he seemed genuinely relieved to find out where those ships had gone. Apparently, they had disappeared abruptly, and he feared an unknown enemy.”
“Or a mass desertion,” I added. “Although he’d never admit that thought went through his mind.”
“Also, you have a visitor.”
“At this hour? Is it really that important?”
The door opened. “I’m sorry, she insisted…” said the guardsman.
The visitor was a girlish woman in a silver jumpsuit. She had a beehive of white hair and her eyes were electric blue – Cu’enashti blue. Her lips and eyelids cycled from blue to silver over the course of every few minutes, so I know she was using microprojection drones to do her makeup. The drones were relatively common amongst the moneyed classes, but only bombbrgirls and Zero-G raver retros used them that obviously. Her Eminence loathed them – said that it was bad enough when the drugs made her feel like there were spiders crawling on her skin, let alone being surrounded by tiny gadflies for cosmetic maintenance. On media occasions when she had to look perfect, she was constantly swatting at them.
“It’s me, Danak,” she said. “I’m etch now.”
“etch?”
“Yeah, with a lower-case e. Apparently Thoughtful digs the space cowboy look. Lilith’s goth thing was Esau’s idea.” She held her hands in front of her, fingers spread. Her nails were bright purple, tipped in silver. “Lilith’s body is stronger,” she said. “Also, more inclined to depression. How weird is that?” etch smiled brightly. “I’m so happy right now.”
“Many thanks for immobilizing the Alliance fleet last night.”
“Oh, no sweat. Alchemy is easy. I and I had some fun rerouting the chip connections in their navigation databases. Whenever they tried to change course, they’d access a holographic chess program. Once one of the ships got checkmate, they couldn’t move anymore.”
Ashtara’s methods are considerably more direct. I wondered if anyone would notice the stylistic change? Perhaps not, as the crew was possessed by SongLuminants, and such subtleties of personality probably escape them.
“Anyway, I want to talk to my dad.”
“I’ll take you down to the beach,” I said, “but I doubt he’ll respond.”
*****
etch crouched near the comatose body of the Living God. “Geez, pops, you’ve changed,” she said. “Then again, so have I. And Ashkaman, too. He’s got a third emanation named William now. You know, it isn’t cool to be in stasis while your kids grow up without you.”
Ashtara’s eyes opened, looking up, staring intently at etch. Then they closed again.
“Be like that. Thoughtful wants to know what to do about the Combine meeting. Seeing that you’re here, and Tara is not around. Do you want to send a substitute, or assign Thoughtful a proxy?”
Without opening his eyes, the Living God whispers two words: “You,” and “Danak.”
“Are you capable of long-distance travel?” asks Thoughtful 45.
“Not without a second tree – and I’m not growing one. But couldn’t we use an android or something? You’ll be both there and here anyway. So why couldn’t I? You could just relay my responses to the android.”
“An interesting idea. Lord Danak, how long would it take for you to synthesize an android for my wife?”
“Not terribly long, if you don’t want anything customized beyond appearance. But am I to take it that His Holiness wants me to represent humanity to the combine?”
“It seems so. Considering that the SongLuminants have drawn humanity into their internal conflict, it’s important that you be represented as a species.”
I sighed deeply. We were supposed to have the fittings for the wedding attire next week. Magdelaine was not going to be happy.