The monarchy of Arorua was never exceedingly powerful; most power rested in
the hands of the Chancellor. As a result, the Aroruan kings that cared
enough to actually govern made sure the Chancellor was rather weak-willed.
King Gisp was an exceptionally powerful ruler, and he chose his Chancellor
well. However, Desir Elahte was no idiot, and, seeing which way the wind
was blowing, he was among the first to leap to the Zakavian side. As a
result, he now handled most of the day-to-day affairs for Arorua’s new ruler
Governor Malta Jjana.
Currently, the two, along with Captain-General Tvanir, leader of the
Aroruan Occupation Legion, were preparing to receive the latest orders from
Planet Gloom over the encrypted command channels.
Not surprisingly, the first message was for Tvanir from Central Command.
Elahte wordlessly handed her the printout without looking at it. She
grabbed it and looked at it. Like most members of the Zakavian Imperial
Military Aggregate, she disliked the messages from Central Command, mostly
because they were sent in all caps, which made it seem like they were
constantly shouting. One enterprising commander had assigned a computer
technician to write a short program to properly capitalize the orders,
although he had died soon after when the program mistook an acronym for a
regular word and he moved too close to an enemy ship.
She read it again, just to make sure they hadn’t accidentally sent an
old message. The dates checked out. She swore.
“What’s wrong?” asked Jjana, the amused look in his eyes saying he
already knew.
“They’re reducing the Legion. Again. For some reason, they think I
have more soldiers than are needed to control the planet,” she replied.
“I assure you, Captain-General,” Elahte began, “the chances of my people
revolting are—”
“‘Virtually nil’,” Tvanir finished. She’d heard that speech before. In
fact, she was getting rather tired of it. “Well, I certainly hope so. If
something does come up, neither of you will be losing your jobs.” She
turned to Jjana. “Anything else for me?” she asked.
He shook his head.
“Fine, I’ve got things to do,” she said. As she left the room, she was
already plotting.
To say Princess Elim of the House Ri’Tala, daughter of the late, lamented
King Gisp, was displeased with her sudden drop from “heir apparent” to “lady
we let live in the castle because she’s harmless” would be something of an
understatement. However, she knew that open rebellion against the Zakavians
was probably the fastest way to reduce her status even further, so she
tended to fume in private.
In contrast, her brother, Prince Boltar, had received the news with a
bland indifference. The way he saw it, time spent worrying over such things
as a loss of status was time that could be spent looking for fun things to
do. Looking for fun things to do was a popular activity among the Aroruans.
Despite that, few fun things to do were ever found. The more intelligent
Aroruans took that as a sign and typically went somewhere else. The rest
stayed home and wasted time cooking, eating, reading, sleeping, and so
forth.
Boltar had found a wooden paddle to which a small rubber ball was
attached by means of an elastic cord. He had discovered that he could
bounce the ball off the paddle, and was currently engaged in seeing how long
he could keep it up. Eventually, he figured, he would get very good and be
able to impress girls. Elim was, for the ninth time, considering telling
him to go paddle somewhere else when there was a knock on the door.
This had the immediate effect of throwing off Boltar’s rhythm, which
caused him no end of irritation. While he sat in his chair holding his
paddle, Elim stood up and answered the door.
She was one syllable into ‘hello’ when she saw who it was and stopped in
shock.
“Good evening, Your Highness,” began Tvanir, “might I speak with you a
moment?”
“Um, certainly, Captain-General,” replied Elim, who was racking her mind
trying to see why Tvanir would be visiting her.
Tvanir looked over at Boltar, who smiled blankly at her. “May I come
in?” she asked.
Elim jumped and moved out of the way, gesturing for Tvanir to enter.
“What brings you here?” she asked.
“Her feet, I assume,” Boltar replied.
The look Elim and Tvanir gave him was sufficient to send him elsewhere
to practice his paddleball.
Tvanir closed the door behind her and turned to Elim, “Now then, Your
Highness, I have come to talk about the rebellion.”
“Why?” asked Elim, quickly suppressing a spike of fear.
“Well, other than that first one, we haven’t had any.”
Elim waited, having gone from scared to confused rather quickly.
After a second, Tvanir continued. “I’m wondering if there’s going to be
another.”
“Do you think I would know?”
“Perhaps. You have never seemed that pleased about our presence here.
You may have connections in a rebellion movement. You might even have
founded one.”
“Is this an accusation?”
Tvanir laughed, startling Elim. “Not at all,” she said, “I have no
evidence you’re rebellious at all. I can’t even prove a rebellion exists.
… That’s my problem, you see?”
“Um… no?”
“Without rebellion, I have no reason to keep so many soldiers. Without
a large force to call my own, I’ll never be able to increase my status and
go somewhere in my career. What I’m saying is that a little bit of
rebellion would give me reason to keep what I have. Since this is good for
me, I’d then be inclined to go easier on your people.”
Elim stared for half a second. “So, if the people were more
rebellious they’d get better treatment?”
“That’s about the size of it.”
“That’s absurd!”
Tvanir’s eyes narrowed, which failed to make her look more threatening,
but rather gave the impression of someone walking into bright sunlight from
a dark room. “That’s all I came to say, Your Highness,” she growled, which
was more effective than the eye-narrowing.
“Good day, Captain-General,” Elim replied, opening the door and
startling Boltar again.
“Aww,” he said, “I was doing pretty good, too.”
“Good day, Your Highness,” Tvanir said, making ‘Your Highness’ sound
like a form of gum disease. She glanced at Boltar and then walked off.
“So what was that about?” Boltar asked Elim.
“Nothing important,” she lied. Already she was making plans. The few
possible rebels she had met would certainly be swayed by this bizarre turn
of events.