ALTERNATE TALES OF THE STAR FORCE

STAR BLAZERS—THE ENTROPY WARS

By: Frederick P. Kopetz

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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: DON’T SHOOT ME, I’M ONLY THE PIANO PLAYER…

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I. TENDER MEETINGS…

The Beta Valentis System

September 13, 2231

1421 Hours, Earth Time

The Yamato was cruising through space, one day away from a rendezvous with elements of the Gamilon and Pellian Fleets.

Now, Admiral Wildstar’s attention was focused on a much smaller objective as Nova lay in Sickbay receiving a pre-natal exam.

Watched by Ariel, Trelaina, and Mark, Derek stood holding Nova’s hand as Doctor Bixley ran several scanners over her stomach.

Ariel was assisting Doctor Bixley during the exam.

“Well, this confirms our guess,” he said as Nova looked over her bare tummy and toes at a screen some distance away after the cover was pulled away from Nova. “The babies are now in a state of development close to twenty-seven weeks.”

“How the heck is that happening?” Derek said with awe as he looked at his wife’s nude body.

“The flow of energy into her has increased immensely,” Trelaina said as she carefully put her hands upon Nova’s bare chest and then stepped back. “Look at her wrists and ankles. The crucifixion scars are almost gone, along with the whip marks.”

“I wonder why this pregnancy has kicked into high gear like this?” Nova said.

“It’s possible the Matrix may know that time is running short for us,” Derek said.

“Remember that I said Earth must live on to fulfil its destiny?” Trelaina said.

“When did you say that?” asked Mark as he hugged Trelaina and rubbed her own slightly pregnant tummy.

“Years ago, when I brought you back to this very ship,” Trelaina replied as she kissed Mark and stood on tiptoe. To Mark, Trelaina looked adorable in her skin.

“So, I have only three more months to go with this pregnancy?” Nova said. “That can’t be right, can it? Please bring the monitor around and let me have a look…”

“Have a look, ma’am,” said Doctor Bixley. “Would you agree with me that these babies are at about week twenty-four or week twenty-five in growth?”

Nova looked, and nodded. “I’m six months along already in just a few weeks. So, geometrically, I have only a month and a half?”

“If that,” said Doctor Bixley. “If these babies continue to grow at this current rate, geometrically, you may give birth in six weeks…or maybe less,” he said. “I don’t know how long it will take. I’ve never seen anything like this before, ma’am.”

Nova then had a flash of insight as she grabbed Derek’s hand again; she saw herself on a bed on an island on Iscandar as a sharp salt tang came through the window. A calendar near the bed read: October 2, 2231.

And, in her flash ahead, Nova knew she was going to have the babies then.

“My God. Three weeks, maybe. Less than a month,” Nova murmured. “On Iscandar…if we survive. But, why there?”

For my claim to the Throne to legally succeed, I must be reborn on Iscandar, came Starsha’s voice in Nova’s mind as she looked down at the ultrasound image of the larger of the two babies in her womb.

“Reborn?” said Nova.

I have lived before, you know, Starsha’s voice said again in her mind. This shall be my fourth, and I sense, final, of many lives I have endured. Such has been my destiny; it is unique. And since I have known you as a friend and comrade and have seen you grow and mature into your station, it will be an honor to come from your beautiful loins, Your Majesty, my friend, my Mother…I can already foresee the weeks I will spend at your breasts as I quickly grow out of babyhood.

“Is our son Theodore as far advanced as Starsha?” Nova asked.

“He is,” said Doctor Bixley as he pointed at the boy’s picture on the ultrasound.

“That’s beautiful,” Nova said.

The scans were soon finished.

Doctor Bixley, Ariel, and Dawn Hardy washed Nova’s tummy clean and dried it.

Derek then picked up Nova as she threw her arms around his neck after pulling her uniform back on. As before when she had been pregnant, she had to adapt a little; she wore a loose male-patterned top, skirt, and sandals to accommodate the changes to her body and swollen ankles. Nova was also feeling a terrible appetite now for some gherkin pickles and Cherry Garcia ice cream; one of the bizarre treats she liked when she was expecting; something she hadn’t been for almost nineteen years now. 

“I love you,” Derek murmured to Nova.

“Likewise, Admiral,” she replied in a soft voice.

Trelaina looked at the scene, held Mark’s hands, and blushed.

Derek carried his bride back to their cabin in his arms as she kissed him, and he kissed her…

Trelaina held Mark’s hands and said, “He’s so sweet to her…so solicitous of her being pregnant…”

“He always has been,” said Mark. “God love her, Nova’s ended up expecting like that on some of our tours of duty. This will be the fourth time since 2207…”

“Will you be that kind to me, being pregnant?” asked Trelaina.

Mark kissed her. “Yes, I will be.”

“Even if I get angry and fight with you?”

“Yes,” said Mark. “Why do you ask?”

“I sense the Wildstars are having a bit of a fight...right now.”

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“What do you mean, Nova, that I’m being a royal pain?” Derek snapped a few minutes later in their cabin.

“Derek, I’m not crippled, damnit! You didn’t need to carry me all the way up here like that! I’m perfectly capable of walking! I’ve handled this better than you think, and I’m going to handle this pregnancy just as well!”

“Yesterday, you were telling me you felt like absolute crap warmed over!” Derek barked.

“I did! But that was yesterday, Derek!” Nova snapped back. “Today is today! I’m not totally helpless!”

“So, you’re getting mad at my trying to treat you like a Queen?” Derek barked back. “Peppermint, there are times when you are totally impossible and irrational!”

“I am not being irrational, and stop calling me Peppermint, damn you!” Nova yelled as she kicked off one of her shoes and threw it against the wall.

“Nova, you should understand why I’m being a bit overprotective of you!” Derek barked. “In case you’ve forgotten, you were as dead as Jacob Marley a few weeks ago, and it wasn’t that long ago that that lunatic Promecium had you nailed up onto a cross and you hadda go to R’Khell’eva and just walk into it! Is this pregnancy making you go off your tree again, Nova? Are you an estrogen victim or something??”

“That’s because Ekogaru had important intelligence for me to win this damned war!” Nova barked back. “Don’t you want to win this stupid war and provide a good home for us and our children, Fleet Admiral? And I used my prerogatives, Derek! I’m Federation President, even if I didn’t particularly ask for the job, and I’m also High Queen, and I didn’t ask for that bloody job either! If I had my druthers, we’d be at peace and I’d be back at Central Hospital running the place again! You know me better than that, and you can sense what I’m feeling right now, right? Unless you’re being a victim of your testosterone, Derek, wake up and smell the coffee!”

“There are days when your coffee stinks!”

“I thought you liked it, you idiot!” Nova barked back.

“You jerk-ass pregnancy case!!” Derek yelled.

“You jackass pilot who needs a haircut half the time!” Nova barked back. “Go flying in your damn Cosmo Zero for a while until I chill out!” she screamed with tears running down her cheeks.

Derek looked at Nova, shook his head, and began to laugh.

“What, are you laughing at me now, buddy?” Nova said through a half sob.

“Nova, may I hold your hands a minute?” Derek said as he looked like he was about to cry.

Nova snorted, and then let Derek take her hands even as she sensed his grief and guilt and her face softened.

“Nova, I request permission from you to apologize, Madame President. Sorry. I let my emotions get away from me…”

“So did I, Derek,” Nova said more softly as she hugged Derek. “I’m so sorry, dear. This pregnancy is going like crazy…these emotions are hitting me like crazy…maybe you should relieve me for the rest of the war, sir. After all, even though I’ve been a bossy know-it-all at times, I defer to you on how you run this ship, Derek. It’s your command…not mine.”

 “Relieve you…our ace in the hole in this insane war?” Derek said with a sad smile going across his face. “I’d sooner amputate my own arm.”

“Thank you, darling,” Nova said, holding him tight. Then, she kissed him.

“Is…is the window to our cabin closed?” Derek said when Nova let him catch his breath.

Nova raised her hand a little and worked the switch from across their cabin. The outer shield went down over the huge window, and Nova then winked and locked the cabin hatch from across the compartment.

“Good…now we’re alone,” Derek said. “Nova, what’s on your mind now?”

“Guess,” she said as she kissed him again.

And again.

And again…

At that, Derek turned down the lights…

In the meantime, in her Fortress, Promecium lay on her couch in bitterness and rage as she followed the Yamato to the locations of Terra and Pellias.

Those stupid Terrans and Pellians, she thought disdainfully as she shut her mechanical eyes and shook her head, reflecting upon her most unwelcome mental leering at the Wildstars’ fight and subsequent make-up. Those damn organics do nothing except give in to their hormones and impulses and then rut like mating animals. They disgust me; their whole breed does! Sickening!

“I command Count Mecca, Saint-Germain, and Teresa Forrester to appear before me now,” she snapped.

Count Mecca appeared, bowing as he saluted Promecium.

The twisted being known as Saint-Germain appeared in a black cloud, likewise bowing to Promecium.

Teri appeared last, now covered head to toe in dark blue-grey armor; her humanity hidden forever and almost non-existent.

“Your bidding, Mistress?” said Count Mecca.”

“You will control the Grand Fortress and line it up during the battle to destroy both planets while I fight the Yamato. Saint-Germain…you will be aboard my flagship and will reduce what remains of the enemy’s fleets to rubbish, save for the Yamato. Teresa, you shall stand with me and force the idiotic High Queen to watch the destruction of all she holds dear as I destroy Pellias and then Terra and then blow apart the Yamato and make her watch the death of all her friends except her idiotic Derek. I can’t believe their stupidity and insipid attitudes! They fight and insult each other and then they make up and kiss….”

At that, warped thoughts went through her mind as well as Teri’s.  

Promecium threw back her head and laughed a few minutes later. “Oh yes, St. Germain! Oh, yes, Teresa dearest! I’ll tame that little screaming blond shrew sooner or later. As for later, assist me by slaying her life mate before her eyes, and then, you will fight her and cut her head off and give it to me after we torment her here! When I am triumphant, I will mount her skull above my organ after plating it in platinum. Her dead skull will make a wonderful ornament as she, who will be the last remaining Terran and the last damned Pellian dies a bloody, suffering death before my eyes, with her arms and legs sliced off, and her chest cut open to reveal her beating heart as it beats its last. Once her whole race is dead, killing her will really be no worse than putting a whining little kitten to sleep!”

“An excellent plan, Lady,” said Terri as she knelt before her Mistress. Promecium smiled at her, not revealing the fact that she intended to kill Teri right as her daughter was dying, her usefulness finally at an end.

Promecium smiled to herself as her evil plans ran through her mind, and she thought, With my greatest foes gone, this Galaxy shall be mine. Those who live will submit and become my mechanical slaves…or they shall die…

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II. A CRY OF BATTLE…

Near Planets Pellias & Earth

September 15, 2231

1109 Hours, Earth Time

“WARP!” yelled Mark Venture at the Yamato’s helm.

The vessel burst into warp, followed by what remained of the Earth Defense Fleet, Desslok’s fleet, and Fleet Two of the Pellian Fleet, which was under the command of an Admiral Pleska, although Derek, as Grand Admiral of the EDF and Pellian Fleets, was his commander under Nova’s authority on the Yamato.

When the Yamato emerged from warp, Desslok and Admiral Pleska both reported in.

“Your will, sir?” said Pleska.

“I’ve briefed Desslok,” said Derek. “Our three fleets will split and confront the enemy forces that will be coming forth from the Grand Fortress. After we have destroyed those fleets, we will attack the Fortress from three corridors, sufficient to damage it until I can get my boarding party to occupied Earth and then to the Fortress. You and Talan will then withdraw.”

“Why do you stress General Talan, sir?” said Pleska as his dark beard bristled.

“Because I will accompany Wildstar, Nova and the attacking team on the Fortress, where we shall neutralize it,” Desslok said.

“Is this the will of the High Queen?” said Pleska.

“It is,” Nova said as she came out of the hatch beside Derek’s station at the starboard side of the Bridge. She was dressed in a striped shirt with black gaiters at the sleeves, black trousers, and boots. Beside her stood a figure with long blond hair wearing a blue EDF Midshipman’s uniform; Sasha Wakefield, the Queen of Iscandar, who had come here of her own accord.

“Majesty,” Desslok said as he bowed his head slightly. “Why did you leave Iscandar and come here, and why are you in a cadet uniform?”

“I came here to finally fight Promecium so Iscandar would have a witness,” she replied. “I have a cadet uniform on because it is blue and because this vessel’s systems have changed so much…I may as well be a midshipman again, for all intents and purposes. Nova will be assisting me from Analysis as agreed.”

Sasha then sat down at the radar, allowing Ariel to leave.

The rest of the Fleet, Terrans, Gamilons, Pellians, and other allies, such as the Rikashans and the small Iscandarian fleet that Sasha had brought with her, now that the danger to Gamilon and Iscandar was over with, warped in behind the Yamato as she passed over the moon, which had been moved with Terra into Planet Pellias’ embrace.

“I read twelve hundred vessels behind us,” Sasha said from her place at the radar. “The two major fleets are splitting behind us to flank the Terran fleet; the Rikashan and Iscandarian fleets are taking advance patrol positions to each side before us.”

“Roger that,” said Derek; it was as it had been arranged with Desslok, Sasha, Admiral Pleska, and Lord Cha’rif the previous day when they had met.

“Signal from the B’eoneraze,” said Homer.

Lord Anton Cha’rif, their one-time Rikashan foe and now long-time ally, smiled as he came on the Yamato’s main screen. “We anticipate good hunting today, my friends. My blood is hot for battle with the survivors of those who have oppressed us, and She would now wield Ekogaru’s whip over all of us. I have seen the shade of our former Dark Lord; he says he will be with you today and he will meet those who arrive in the Valhalla of the brave to be with him today. He said many brave warriors shall join him there.”

Anya felt a cold chill down her back at her post as Cha’rif said that.

“I’m not afraid,” she snapped.

“You need not be, if you are at peace with the Highest,” said Cha’rif. “Lady Nova; why the odd dress today?”

“A role I have to play in the battle, my friend. Is Lady Mikala well?”

“She died at my side in the last battle we fought with these demons before warping here,” he replied. “My mate had a good, long life, in the manner of our kind. They boarded us. She went out like a warrior grasping her scimitar to deal with he who slaughtered her by stabbing her in the back; some sick dandy calling himself Count Mecca. I wounded him and he ran like a scared rat. Would that I had killed him,” said Cha’rif. “Would that I have died now, too,” he said in a low voice. “They will die with me if that is my fate.”

“Lordship!” yelled one of Cha’rif’s men. “One hundred ships warping in to the starboard; they are turning about and…”

“Turn us forty-five!” yelled Lord Cha’rif as suddenly, the beams of many wave motion guns slammed into his fleet, including his flagship. “Shields up! I…”

Then, a blasting noise and white light came over the channel, and then the signal went dead.

“He’s gone,” said Sasha. “Along with his entire fleet.”

“First squadron, forty-five!” Derek snapped. “Ready wave motion guns! All vessels of Squadron Two, this vessel included; prepare wave motion guns!”

“A thousand vessels coming out of warp!” Sasha cried.

A Gamilon destroyer squadron flanked the Yamato as the enemy vessels fired right at the mighty space battleship.

The Gamilons fired back at the much larger enemy fleet and they drew blood as Anya smiled while preparing the wave motion gun for firing.

“Energy level, forty-nine percent!” said Anya from her post. “Using accelerated charging sequence; one minute to firing!”

“Strap yourself down!” Nova barked beside her as she secured her own restraints.

“I don’t need to; we’ll have those bastards down soon enough!” Anya said.

“Anya! It’s an order!” Derek said.

“Energy charge, eighty percent!” Anya snapped. “Sir, deal with me after we fire this off! Electric cross gauge up, intensity Eight! Enemy fleet, range, one thousand megameters. Prepare anti-flash defenses!” she yelled as she pulled down her goggles.

After this is over with, so help me, Anya, I’ll court-martial you myself! Derek thought as he pulled down his goggles as a sinking feeling hit his stomach.

“Missiles approaching!” Sasha yelled. “Fifty of them!”

“They have heavy hydrogen warheads!” Nova cried from her post.

“Venture!” Derek snapped.

“Using remaining maneuvering power,” said Mark.

“Firing in fifteen seconds!” Anya yelled as she worked; still not strapped down as Mark and Nova were. “Energy 120%! Ten…nine...eight…seven…six…”

 “Fleet ready to fire on your mark!” said Homer.

“Five…four…three...two…one…” Anya yelled.

Light formed at the muzzles of countless vessels behind the Yamato in the fleet.

“FIRE! ALL…WAVE MOTION GUNS!” Derek said.

Anya fired, along with four hundred other officers on many Terran, Gamilon, and Pellian capital ships,  including Desslok’s flagship; he fired himself as was his usual custom.

Four hundred deadly beams of blue, white, pink, and green tachyon energy blasted at the enemy fleet.

They blasted home, and Anya stood and screamed with joy as she watched the explosions.

Then, Sasha cried out, “Final missile…approaching the bridge tower!”

“Evading!” yelled Mark.

The Yamato began to tilt down, but the missile smashed home a moment later.

The forward bridge windows cracked, and then shattered.

Nova sat back and put a field of energy around herself, and she reached for Anya as atmosphere sucked out the windows to pull her daughter out into the battlefield.

With a scream, Anya was pulled up and out as a hunk of glass smashed into Mark’s neck, slashing an artery open. His blood and Anya’s were sucked out of the ship along with Anya as she was mangled and pulled out of the window, pinwheeling to her death in space as the smoking Yamato blasted towards Earth out of control as Derek gasped for breath just as his hat went into space while Sandor slammed the controls that lowered the outer metal shutters.

Nova then stood and tried to seal the wound in Mark’s neck with a rag and pressure and her power as she used a free foot to pry the helm up and then used a free hand to deploy the wings as the Yamato plunged into a nearly uncontrolled re-entry in Earth’s atmosphere. Derek ran up, helped her pull Mark out of his seat as he began to lose consciousness, and Derek sat down in the pilot’s seat himself, huffing and puffing as he worked the controls, assisted by Miarahl as he slowed the ship just enough so that she didn’t burn up like a meteor in the atmosphere. He then realized he was crying as it hit him his daughter was dead, floating behind them like jetsam in space. Her body would never be recovered.

Then, he looked down at Mark as Nova worked on him. “Are…we…safe?” he said as Trelaina came to his side, crying, and now visibly pregnant.

“You are,” she said. “Rest now. Nova and I are doing what we can for you.”

“What will you name…our daughter?” he gasped.

“Tresha? Is that a nice name?” Trelaina said.

“Yes,” said Mark as his eyes closed. “I love you, Trelaina. You too, Nova. I always…have…”

“Thank you, Mark,” Nova said as her eyes filled with tears. “Trelaina?”

“He is too badly damaged…even for me,” said Trelaina as Mark looked at her and kissed his second wife’s pregnant, naked stomach.

Then, he breathed his last, and his eyes went vacant.

“Goodbye…my dear, dear friend,” stammered Nova as she closed Mark’s vacant eyes.

“Mark, too?” said Derek after the Yamato hit the water not far from Japan.

Nova nodded. “He’s at peace, now…with Anya. He’s dead. Time of death…1147 Hours.”

Derek balled up his fists…and he just screamed with rage.

At the battlefront, Admiral Parsons of the Earth Defense Fleet had assumed command aboard his flagship, the Andromeda-class space battleship Alsace, as the remainder of Second Squadron reformed around his vessel after the Yamato had been forced to retire from the battlefront.

The Alsace, Dunkerque, Antares, Brasilia, Ecuador, Nevada, Courageous, Mikasa, Dingyuan, Gloucester, Hessen, and the Iscandarian New York-class space battleship Queen Celina crossed the “T” of the remnants of the enemy fleet, and they were pounding away at the enemy as Desslok changed the configuration of his battle carrier so that her flight deck was open, and he launched a squadron of dive bombers at the enemy.

Four Terran carriers and three Pellian carriers soon launched their planes to assist in the Gamilon onslaught on the remaining enemy ships, aiming at the carriers first.

The result was a massive slaughter.

The enemy vessels were left as burning wrecks two minutes later.

The space battleships of Second Squadron began to pound the enemy vessels like destroyers moving in for the kill.

It was a total victory for the Coalition Fleet as they soon cruised through a field of wreckage, debris, gas, and corpses.

A few Bolar vessels were left.

“Sir, should we wipe those ships out?” asked Lieutenant Harmon, the Alsace’s radar officer.

“Negative, make that a negative,” said the Communications Officer. “Those six ships are signaling that they’re damaged and that they wish to heave to and surrender.”

“Advise them that we accept their surrender,” said Admiral Parsons. “Have them heave to and follow us down to Earth. The battle’s over. I’ll meet with their commander and see if the remaining Bolar forces scattered throughout the system also desire to surrender. If so, I’ll negotiate that.”

“Sir, are we just ignoring that battle fortress behind them?” asked the Alsace’s XO, a tall, bearded man known as Commander Dussant. “With all respect, we have to neutralize that thing.”

“I’ve been advised by Admiral Wildstar that he has his own plan to deal with them.”

“But, where’s the Yamato? She took major damage.”

“I tracked her down to Japan,” said the radar officer. “She re-entered under control and she must be heading for a repair dock at Kure.”

“Communication from Desslok’s flagship!” said the comm officer.

“Put him up on video panel Number Four,” ordered Parsons.

Desslok’s image appeared a moment later. “Admiral, is the Grand Fortress moving?”

“Nor, sir. She’s keeping station.”

Desslok nodded. “We have only a short time to take action, but we have a plan ready to implement. I understand that you have been briefed on Operation Amaterasu?”

“Yes, we have,” said Parsons.

“Consider it now in effect. Admiral Wildstar orders you to retire and return to your home base at Marseille. Stand ready for action, but I expect that you should be briefed in twenty-four hours or less. In the meantime, please process those Bolar crewmen who will now be prisoners of war, and see to it their vessels are searched and mined carefully for information.”

“Yes, sir. But how did you know…?”

“I have my sources, Admiral,” Desslok said cryptically. “You have done your part. I expect that this war will soon be over. Enjoy your well-earned rest, Admiral.”

Desslok saluted and the screen went dark.

“Sir…his…sources?” said Dussant.

“She has her fingers and toes in more pies than we expect, I’d guess,” said Parsons. “Trelaina and Starsha are involved, too.”

“But…I understand Starsha is not even born yet.”

“Nevertheless, the Queen is involved, even in her mother’s womb. I wager it will go quite well for us.”

Later, in her cabin on the Yamato, Nova was carefully dressing in what resembled an old-time Western piano player’s outfit; a striped shirt with garters on the sleeves, black pants, and black boots. It was about 0400 in the morning on the next day. Crews were working on the Yamato repairing the damaged windows while Venture’s body lay in state in a casket on the starboard side observation deck.

Derek closed the snap on his Technomugar officers’ tunic and said, “You’re sure this crazy plan is going to work?”

“You didn’t call it crazy when you discussed it last night, dear,” Nova said with a smile. “As it is, I’ve already psychically sent Queen Promecium a mock surrender acceptance. She expects to have me naked and chained up to sign the surrender tomorrow morning. She will be rather mistaken, I think.”

“The whole point, of course, is so they’ll let down their guard and not attack us,” said Trelaina as she appeared in the room, where she threw on a black robe that resembled a monk’s cowl. “Then, we can get aboard her and do our jobs.”

A buzzer rang on one of Derek’s panels. “Yes?”

Homer’s voice was on the other end. “Sir, Desslok has just come aboard with Admiral Hallen, the Technomugar officer who defected.”

“Have them meet us in the main briefing room. Then, we’ll get this done.”

“Roger.”

“Trelaina, aren’t you wearing shoes?” Nova said as she saw Trelaina’s toes sticking out from under her cloak.

“I haven’t worn footwear in many years, Nova. I see no need to begin now.”

“I can agree. I’ll be glad to get these boots off later,” Nova said. “My ankles…ow…:”

 Derek kissed Nova and said. “It’ll be better soon.”

She nodded her head and kissed him back.

_____________________________________________________

III. ABOARD THE FORTRESS…

Near Planets Pellias & Earth

September 16, 2231

0725 Hours, Earth Time

“Shuttle Grand Union, requesting clearance to enter Fortress airspace,” Derek said with his Technomugar helmet and mask on over his face. Alex and Nova shivered at how utterly cold and emotionless he sounded as Trelaina sat nearby, cloaked, and hooded in black.

“Your cargo?” said a disinterested Technomugar voice on board the Fortress.

“Thirty reinforcements, a captured Pellian witch who desires to serve at the Victory celebration, and a captured Terran pianist.”

“Ah, the player who will be playing the Grand Instrument,” said the voice. “Grand Union, you are granted clearance and your code is recognized. We are sending the counter code and the course. Fly the designated course to Docking Bay Grashna Twenty-Five. Do not deviate from the course. Stand by.”

A course appeared on the screen below Derek’s controls.

Derek and the Technomugar Hallen who was aiding them nodded. “In we go,” said Derek.

“I wish we were not boarding that Abomination,” Trelaina whispered under her hood.

“The problem is…we need to,” said Astrena in her mask as, beside her, Desslok nodded.

“It’s been too long since I’ve actually fought hand to hand, Derek,” Desslok purred in his black disguise.

“Don’t be too eager,” Derek said.

“To gain revenge for the deaths of Starsha and Alex and for millions of my people?” Desslok said as he unlocked his weapon. “You should be more eager.”

“He is,” Nova said, interrupting her meditations as she sat there in the piano players’ clothes that Trisha had worn before she had died at Hallen’s side.

“How far is that control room from our docking bay?” young Alex asked as Stephen prepared some charges and tossed them to the younger Knox.

“Up three levels, and fifteen kilometers inward in the Central Spine,” Nova said. “There will be three small vehicles there for us to use.”

“Who’s guiding you; the Matrix?” asked Desslok.

Then, there was a shimmering beside Nova. To everyone’s shock, Ekogaru’s Ghost appeared in the seat beside Nova, looking far better and younger than he ever had.

“I am guiding you,” he said. “I know this place. It is what remains of the Fortress I built. Promecium still uses it, and that, to her doom,” he said with a smile.

“I am aware you have repented, but for all the evil you have caused, I’d love to slap you,” Desslok hissed.

“What about the all evil you have done, my friend?” Ekogaru snapped back. “We are both just as evil as the other, but we’re redeemed by God’s Grace.”

“Evil,” said Trelaina. “Maybe it takes a mind once steeped in evil to fight it.”

“I’m not a totally good person, either,” Nova said with her eyes closed. “I want vengeance on that bitch just as much as Desslok does. Ekogaru, I wish you understood the evil you set in motion.”

“I was made to for the last weeks of my life, and I saw the full sweep of it once I stepped into the Presence,” Ekogaru replied. “I quivered like a worm and wanted to cease existing then. But I was made to stand up. I’m here willingly to help reverse the madness I started. And that is what matters. Ending this. Not how dirty our hands are.”

Nova nodded.

A while later, they arrived at the Fortress’ Control Room and stood before the Great Instrument.

Nova began to walk towards it.

To her shock, a grey and black armored figure came out of the shadows. “You little whore,” she hissed in a cold electronic voice, “Did you think that we were blind to your games? You made us think you were going to surrender? You diseased little liar. You’ve always been a conniving little sneak, ever since you were in diapers.”

“Teri Forrester, once my mother,” Nova responded.

Teri nodded.

A whole platoon of Technomugar troops surrounded Derek, Desslok, Sasha, Miarahl, Trelaina, Alex, Hallen, and the others.

“You think you’ll stop us with those?” Desslok said as he removed his helmet.

“You murderer,” hissed Teri as she drew a weapon that looked like a sword with a pistol grip at the end. “This is a gravity saber, an invention of Promecium’s people. It can be fired as a blaster, and it has a sword with deadly energy impregnating it. A slash with it can cut you in half, you treasonous bitch. I stress treasonous because Promecium has made me Lady of Terra and Pellias and I am now your superior. Kneel to me and carry out your Goddamn surrender for real and maybe you can live. After I kill your husband, that is. The madman you never should have married.”

Derek fired his weapon at Teri with gritted teeth.

Teri deflected the beam so it would hit Nova.

The beam bounced off Nova, who still cried out as it burned one of her legs.

Teri began to laugh.

Nova drew her crystalline sword from the small dimension that surrounded her, and she advanced on her mother, firing energy from her sword.

The energy hit Teri, who was shocked by the onslaught, but who kept her wits enough to slash at her daughter.

Nova parried the slash and then she pressed her own attack with a speed and ferocity her mother thought was not possible.

She slashed off her mother’s left hand as the cyborg was switching her own weapon to her right hand. Teri fired the blaster part of her saber at Nova, who stopped the beam with her sword and sent it back at Teri.

The beam, with deadly effect, pierced Teri’s cold mechanical heart.

The cyborg fell with blood coming out of the hole in her mechanical chest. She looked confused as she looked at her daughter with cold, red, mechanical eyes.

“You are going to Hell,” Teri hissed as she fell to her knees, lightheaded. “You have…mortally wounded me.”

“Surrender to us and I can repair that,” Nova said. “I will show you mercy.”

“Like Hell you will,” said Teri as she pulled a final trick.

Teri made her own body explode. Nova screamed and protected Derek and Trelaina from the blast and flying debris. However, the bits of Teri’s form hit Hallen like knives. He collapsed and died.

Nova picked up Teri’s head and watched as the light in the cyborg’s eyes began to fade.

Nova felt into the Astral realm as she watched Teri’s soul falling into the Pit. It looked as withered and broken as the soul of her sister Yvona, who laughed at her as she rose up from the flames to embrace Teri.

Teri screamed and fell into Hell, and was dragged down by her insane, laughing sister Yvona. “Join me here, dear. We will burn and burn and burn together…”

“Nova!” screamed Teri. “Have mercy on your Mother!”

“It is not my call,” Nova said as she turned away, returned to the natural, and saw the light go out in her mother’s cyborg eyes as she threw down her metallic head.

She screamed bitterly as she wept. Derek embraced and held her.

Then, Trelaina, who had cast off her cloak, stood naked there and said, “You have a duty, Majesty. We have planned this.”

Nova nodded. She stood away from the Group and she sat down at the Great Instrument as Saint Germain appeared in a black cloud.

As she turned away from Derek and the group, she glanced at the group of seventy Technomugar that stood there and she dropped the guise about herself and appeared before them blazing with light, her slender, pregnant body clad in only a pink, translucent gown and her feet clad in white crystal sandals. Her hair became longer and lighter and it blew around her as she sat revealed as Her Majesty, flaming with light, grace, and power.

A murmur of awe came over the group as they saw the light in her eyes, and a fire kindled in them as she played the first note.

No one withstood her.

None of them could bear to withstand the High Queen in that hour.

Indeed, even Saint Germain, foul as he was, was forced to bow his head and genuflect as Nova played, since even he could not withstand the terrible light in Nova’s eyes. She did not speak or address the demon. She did not need to, since she blazed like an angel in his mind’s eye.

Derek and Desslok noticed that the demon lord would not attack their party.

Instead, Derek, Nova, and Trelaina perceived him praying to Promecium for immediate help.

Promecium appeared at once, and she looked aghast at Nova as she began to play the first notes of Bach’s Little Fugue in G Minor.

Derek and the others noticed Saint Germain bowing and then vanishing with a swish of his cape. He would not be seen again on this mortal plane for many, many decades. He had, at this point, abandoned Promecium and left her to her on devices.

Promecium shook as she felt her power halved.

As Nova played on, she perceived that the Entropy Cannon she had aimed at Earth had suddenly shut down. After Nova’s surrender, Promecium had intended her own act of perfidy as she had decided she would destroy Earth, even if it had surrendered to her.

“Restart the weapon!” she roared. “And why is Teri dead?”

“Teri fell in battle with the Queen! We cannot restart the device!” said the highest-ranking General there as he worked at a control panel.

“WHY NOT?” roared Promecium.

“She is in the circuitry, M’ Lady,” he said. “She has codes in her music that are shutting down the system! The First Dark Lord had them in the programming. We cannot override!”

Nova continued to play.

Then, after she finished, her song faltered.

Promecium attacked Nova, firing energy at her.

Derek yelled, “NOOO!” as Nova’s body appeared to fade.

A moment later, she solidified again, with her body still clad in only her filmy pink gown. What was the rest of that song? Nova thought, as her hair blew around her, and she vanished, into her own memories and past.

In her own past, Nova found herself, her own younger self, playing a keyboard on the ship then called the Argo, in around the year 2208. The older Nova remembered at once that this was herself in early February 2208, with the Argo docked in San Diego in a winter of discontent after Invidia had been defeated.

The younger Nova was trying to remain awake during a late watch as she played a tune.

The elder Nova reached out to her and touched her mind.

“What?” said the younger Nova. “Who are you? Trelaina?”

“I’m you,” the current-day Nova said. “Almost thirty years in the future.”

“Good God above,” the younger Nova said. “You’re burning with light like some angel, you’re…almost naked in that…gown…and you’re pregnant!”

“You have kids, and you know what it’s like,” the elder Nova said. “But that’s neither here nor there. Quick, what’s that weird song you’re playing? It sounds like honky-tonk.”

“Gershwin,” the younger Nova said. “The Rialto Ripples Rag, later stolen by Ernie Kovacs as Oriental Blues for the theme of his twentieth century TV show. Why is this important and why do I turn out like some…goddess?”

“You’ll find out after you die,” the elder Nova said. “Thanks for jogging our memory. Bye!”

The present-day Nova then reappeared as Desslok almost shot her by mistake as he shot at Promecium in rage.

“I’m fine!” Nova yelled. “Please watch your aim!”

“My apologies,” Desslok said.

Nova bowed, smiled at Derek, and began to flick some controls on the organ and then to play fast and furious as Gershwin’s rag came off her fingers with the organ now sounding like a piano, and she remembered this, the tune Ekogaru had programmed to destroy his own Fortress.

Promecium screamed as the Fortress went dark and began to shake. Pillars fell and part of the structure began to come apart, with bits of the obscene city-ship blasting away from the core and falling in flames towards Earth. Some of the ruined towers and spires smashed upright into the seas and remained there for centuries like obscene obelisks reaching miles into the sky and clouds.

Promecium covered her ears and screamed as she again fired a blast of energy at Nova.

The ball of fire hit Nova. Her gown burned away, leaving her totally naked before the group.

She jumped down from the organ stool and faced Promecium.

Nova fired energy back at Promecium, also benuding her own mechanical form.

“BITCH!” Promecium roared as her dress and boots burned off and her gravity saber hit the deck.

“Now everyone can see how ugly you really are,” Nova said.

Over the rumble of the Fortress, as Derek and the others watched, Nova and Promecium faced off, and their duel began as the pink-gowned High Queen faced off against the naked Mechanoid.

Promecium raised her hands and she began to sing.

Her song was low, deep, and terrible, like some mournful, horrid funeral dirge. Everyone who heard the bitter, wordless notes she sang was left standing as if in a cold breeze, filled with a pain and dread that both nauseated the listener and filled them with fear as sad, bleak, horrid notes and sounds came from Promecium’s once-living but now stone-cold dead cyborg throat.

The dirge hit them like cold, sharp shards of sleet in a bleak, dead wind. It filled the minds of those who heard it with bleak images of a growing darkness as flowers shriveled and died, following by grass turning yellow, then white, and shriveling and dying under ice. The Technomugar forces standing nearby chuckled as the bleak stone and iron pillars of the Fortress around them seemed to become darker and more indomitable as Sasha fell weeping to her knees, moaning in fear and pain as Nova tried to comfort her with a trembling hand. Desslok gave up and sat on the deck with his eyes closed. Miarahl began to whimper and shiver slightly as her fur stood on end.

Derek’s mind was filled with horrid images of death; dying small animals; kittens trembling as iron boots stomped on them, cute little bunnies screaming as they were run through by hunters’ bullets. Then came the memory of the planet bomb flattening his parents as tears came to his eyes as Nova gasped his arm.

He looked at her; tears burned in her eyes as well. But she was not silent as she began to murmur notes that drove the bleak images of Nova herself lying dead on a slab from his mind, even as he saw her body cast into the flames of a crematory furnace. As low, sad, bereft notes came from Promecium, notes, which as he noticed, were having a vile effect even upon Desslok as he gritted his teeth and then cried out, Nova’s voice sounded in his mind. Yes, here is death. But it is not forever. Indeed, death has been defeated, and its master condemned already. Hearken to my voice and my Light.

Nova’s voice came as Desslok was about to crawl to Promecium against his will and surrender his weapon to her.

Nova’s voice sang wordless notes as well, but hers were mellow and soft while Promecium’s were discordant and harsh.

Nova’s song brought an image of Light to its listeners. Light dappling off a pond in a lazy afternoon. Then, light filtered through the new leaves of living trees as the flowers and grass Promecium killed with her voice lived again and flourished.

Light awakened the dead kittens and caused them to perk up their little ears and mew at the sunrise. The dead bunnies stood up and began to nibble at flowers as daylight came over the meadow.

The children that Promecium’s voice had killed stood and lived anew in wonder as Nova seemed to arise like a phoenix from her ashes, beautiful and covered with Light.

Desslok took heart and stood up as Sasha began to sing her own song, smiling at her Aunt. The Technomugar guards looked confused and they staggered back while the views in the minds of Desslok and the others changed and those devoted to the High Queen’s side began to smile deadly smiles, their eyes filled with a terrible light of their own as, one by one, with no weapons being fired, with no assault save the song of Nova, Sasha, and now Miarahl and Trelaina, the guards began to abandon Promecium. Some ran to hide in dark places in the Fortress. Others fell to their knees, weeping with despair. Derek heard blaster shots in the distance as he saw some of them so affected by the new song that they stood back and shot themselves dead with their own weapons.

Promecium stood with a maniacal look on her face as her minions abandoned her even while she sang songs of cold, death, and the decomposition of the Grave, followed by a wordless dirge about life as the Machine, and the suffering of organics in Hell, even as some of her minions yelled, “you diseased woman, YOU are hell!”

The minions of Promecium surrendered and curled up in weeping balls as Nova’s song now drowned out Promecium’s. Her notes brought forth thoughts of starlight; the light of galaxies, nebulae, and quasars; the very vastness of the Sea of Stars.

Then, her song seemed to pass beyond the Cosmos into a realm filled with endless Light and glory. Untold billions of beings seemed to sing with her, singing a wordless anthem of adoration and praise for a great Light above all these lights.

Then, Nova sang alone, heartening all of them as her song sang of the Great Light, Greatest of All, filled with love in endless jewellike facets, wisdom older than the universe, power above that of the stars, a surging rage against evil, leavened with a loving grace and patience as they saw that in their minds the single Great Light was One, and yet Three, each of the Lights filled with the Glory and Power and Love of the others.

Promecium was alone as Nova’s voice invoked the One speaking the All into existence, saying, “LET THERE BE!”

Then, Nova went silent.

“Did you hear that, Promecium? You are doomed, yet not doomed. You are alone, but you do not have to be! Come, take my hand, and I shall teach you the Mercy of the One even as I taught Ekogaru, so long as you repent of your madness and plots. You are not the Creator. You never can be, but He can help you. Abandon this, and I shall protect you. What do you say?”

Promecium’s reply was an animalistic howl of rage as she picked up her sword and struck at Nova.

Her strike hit nothing as Nova blocked the attack with her own Light.

Nova then produced her crystal sword from nowhere again as she swung at the vile would-be Queen.

The battle that took place afterwards shook worlds as Nova parried Promecium’s blows. Not one of them touched her now; she was filled with a cold rage as she knocked one of Promecium’s cyborg hands off, and then turned on her toes, grasped her weapon like a pistol, and fired a venomous green blast of energy at Promecium.

The energy hit Promecium’s saber and vaporized it with a hiss of steam, and then it pierced her cyborg heart.

Promecium looked at Nova with a look of rage and shock in her eyes as she fell dead at last.

A black mist ripped from her body like a foul wind.

Nova ran to the organ and played an insane arpeggio, which was followed by screams from the speakers.

Then, she smiled, and began to play The Merry Go Round Broke Down, a sprightly tune from the 1930’s that was used in many cartoon shorts of the era.

The Fortress spun and shed more parts as Nova played her heart out. “Promecium is trapped in her own circuits now, and in fifteen minutes, the Fortress will execute a space warp to the Blackeye Galaxy, thanks to Trelaina. There, it will explode. This war is ended. We have won.”

Nova played a final chord, and stood up on her sandaled toes, shaking with the effort.

_____________________

IV. CATCHING A BREATH…

Near Planets Pellias & Earth

September 16, 2231

0915 Hours, Earth Time

_______________________

In less than two hours, Promecium had been utterly defeated.

At long last, as the Fortress shook around them, Derek helped Nova away from the carnage around the bodies of her mother and Promecium.

Nova staggered, and shook, and then she stumbled weakly into her husband’s arms in her violet gown.

Derek kissed her and picked her up. She was shaking, and tears ran down her face as she said, “Derek, I’ve done all I can…you and Desslok and Miarahl will have to get me out of here. I can’t even walk. I’m sorry, everyone, you seeing me pregnant like this… Derek, this time, please carry me! I won’t argue this time!”

“You look beautiful,” Derek said as he kissed her.

“Let’s go,” Miarahl said. “I’ll teleport all of you back to the Yamato. Admiral, when we are there, someone will have to warp the ship far away so that we can get away from the radius of the Grand Fortress when Trelaina sends it out of here.”

“Understood,” Derek said. “I’ll control the ship since Mark is still in Sickbay.”

“I feel horrible,” Nova said. “What a dark victory; I killed my own mother.”

“It had to be done,” Derek said. “And she refused your offer to be healed. Her death is on her own hands.”

“No. I still have her blood on my hands,” Nova said. “Now, Starsha and Theodore will never have grandparents.”

“They do,” Derek said. “My parents and your father are in Heaven, I am sure. Your mother…”

Nova sobbed again. “It was her own fault, Derek. She chose to dance with the Devil and she lost. She’s now with her sister Yvona. Just as I feared.”

Derek held her closer as he carried her away.

Then, thanks to Miarahl, they vanished and reappeared on the Yamato, heading straight to Sickbay so that Nova could be examined ASAP.

On the First Bridge, the rest of the bridge crew, under Sandor’s command since Venture was dead and since Derek and Nova were in Sickbay with Nova possibly in poor shape, watched as Trelaina, now again a beautiful, naked phantom of power, loomed over the burning ruins of the Grand Fortress.

She raised her hand, and the Fortress vanished in a space warp.

It reappeared at the heart of the Blackeye Galaxy a moment later, where it blew itself apart in a vast flash of light.

Nothing was left of the Fortress now. At least…nothing physical was left.

Only Promecium’s evil ghost was left, drifting over the surface of the stars at the cold galaxy’s core as she looked towards where the Milky Way and Andromeda were as she whispered, “Lonely…so...lonely…I could have been a goddess. Now, I am nothing. Why do I still live? Why am I not dead in the Pit?”

As the cold winds of nothingness blew around her ghost, she said, “Maybe this is my Hell. To be in Nothing. Nothing…forever. Curse you, Nova Wildstar, you bitch. O, Devil, my one prayer to you is that I will again have an Empire, and that I will live to see that bitch die at last. She should die. She should be dead with me, here in Nothing. Forever.”

Promecium got no answer. Save for silence.

TWO HOURS LATER…

As discipline was relaxed aboard the Yamato, and a sake-fueled victory celebration began, Nova was lying undressed on an examining table in Sickbay, now tranquil as Doctor Bixley took another ultrasound of her womb while Derek held her hand.

“I don’t know how the hell you managed this after fighting like a lunatic, but those babies are fine and have even grown a little more. God knows how you pulled this off, ma’am, but I’m wondering if you’re sane.

“I wonder the same thing at times,” Nova said.

“I prescribe bed rest for you. For at least the next forty-eight hours.”

“Can it be in my cabin where I have some privacy, please?”

“Sure, I…”

“Are we done with the exam?”

Bixley nodded.

“Then you have patients more important than me to tend to. Bye.”

Nova blew him a kiss and vanished with Derek.

“Did you know all along it would end like this?” Derek said as he locked their cabin and then sat on the bed and took his boots off.

“I was pretty sure, but not positive. Remember, Promecium had many strange powers. It could have easily gone the other way down there. I pretty much drained myself fighting her.” Nova curled her toes and said, “Luckily, I was able to get to her before she got to me, and…Derek? What are you doing?”

“Does this give you an idea?” Derek asked as he stripped off his Technomugar tunic and cast it aside. Only a few Technomugar were left alive now, and his tunic, from today onwards, would be considered an antique like an old Soviet uniform was considered a trendy antique after the fall of the USSR.

“You’re…incorrigible, sir,” Nova said with a smile as she again dimmed the lights…and they kissed.

--------------------------------------------------

After they were done, Derek and Nova cuddled against each other, spent but happy, with Derek stroking Nova’s hair and her tummy as she kissed him.

“We made it,” she whispered. “Thank God…we made it.”

“We sure did. Are you hungry? I can bring food up to you. You’re…eating for three now…”

“More like three and a half,” Nova joked. “OW!” she said as she felt one of the babies kicking. “Theodore, stop that! You’ll be out of there soon!”

“Let me put my hand there and see if he does it again,” Derek said. He did, and they both laughed. “He’s gonna be a bruiser.”

“Tell me about it,” Nova said.

At that, the two lovers fell asleep.

THREE HOURS LATER…

Trelaina was a forlorn figure as she knelt beside Mark’s open casket, crying and holding his cold hand.

“You weren’t supposed to leave me…not yet…” she said. “But now, our child will never know her father, and I will be raising her alone.”

Trelaina cried some more. The honor guard watched silently, their hearts going out to the naked, pregnant angelic figure as she held Mark’s cold hand and silently prayed.

“LORD of all,” she prayed. “This power you have within me…I’d sacrifice it all, now…if You’d only bring him back to me…if only we could grow old together…”

A thought came to her a moment later. Trelaina. Are you serious in this resolve?

“I am,” she said.

So be it, a thought came gently to her. I shall l do as you ask.

Trelaina then looked at herself and felt cold some of her power passed out of her into Mark. She shivered.

But Mark’s hand became warm. Very warm.

The honor guard yelled with fright as Admiral Mark Venture sat up and looked around. “Trelaina?” he said.

“Yes?”

“You would not believe where I’ve been…what I’ve seen…”

“I would my darling!” Trelaina cried as she wept.

One of the honor guards, a Pellian woman, cast off the light blue translucent gown she wore over an armored bikini bottom and sandals, and she clothed the shivering Trelaina in the gown. The other honor guard members helped Mark sit up and then stand up out of his casket.

Sandor ran into the room and said, “Trelaina…he’s alive?”

“He is. But I made quite a trade for getting him back. Do not ask if it was worth it. It is and was. If only to have him see our child…”

“I’m hungry,” Mark said.

“Well, let’s get you down to the mess hall.”

Down below, the crew was applauding as Nova came down to eat, holding hands with Derek. She obviously didn’t feel that she needed bed rest…she was walking around just fine. The High Queen was now in a fresh teal-colored gown, with a hand over her pregnant tummy.

Then, she and Derek stood there with their mouths open as Mark and Trelaina came into the mess hall holding hands.

“Mark…you weren’t dead?” Derek said.

“I was,” replied Venture. “I most certainly was dead. But Trelaina and some faith caused me to return. I owe you again, Trelaina.”

 “Don’t make me regret it,” she teased. “I gave you more of my life-force than I did last time. But it had to be done.”

“For your child?” Nova asked.

Trelaina nodded.

“Well, we have a celebration today in more ways than one!” Derek said. He grabbed some sake. “A toast to peace!”

“TO PEACE!” yelled back the Star Force.

They drank, and applauded.

A new life and new world were finally beginning.

And, it would be good.

It would be so good.

V. A GAME OF MONOPOLY

Space Battleship Yamato: Captain’s Quarters

Near Planets Pellias & Earth

September 16, 2231

1632 Hours, Earth Time

“This war,” said Mark Venture after he had another sip of sake, “…it was weird. I mean, it was sooo weird,” he said as he belched while sitting cross-legged on the deck in the Wildstars’ quarters at the top of the Yamato’s Bridge Tower. Derek’s sound system was on, and he was listening to Muss I Den on repeat as he sat on the deck passing the sake’ bottle back and forth with Mark. The middle-aged Admiral now in command of the Yamato remembered all too well that it had been one of Captain Avatar’s favorite songs, now a bit over thirty years ago. He was singing along in the original German as he drank his sake.

ARTWORK: “A GAME OF MONOPOLY” © 2021 by F.P. Kopetz and Huy Yuzo (Joint drawing)

Nova was sitting cross-legged near where the fold-down bunk used to be; a recent refit of the Captain’s Cabin had given them their own bedroom across from the head in their compartment, which was now a suite. Nova was still in the teal-colored alien gown she had changed into before. She was sipping at apple juice, having of course exempted herself from the sake’ bash because she was pregnant again, as both Derek and Mark knew. The evidence was obvious. Nova was getting quite a tummy on her now, for her first pregnancy in nearly twenty years. She was barefoot, sandals kicked off.

“We’re supposed to be arriving home soon, and I swear, you guys are going to get yourself totally blotto on that stuff,” Nova said with an enchanting laugh.

“Ah, I’m totally sober, shweetheart,” Derek said, smiling at his wife and trying a very bad Humphrey Bogart impression. “Great to have both of you back amongst the living. Nova, you were dead a few weeks ago…”

“For just two days until Divine Providence and the energy field of the Pellian Matrix, so similar to Iscandarian mysticism, because they were once the same people, well, this energy-field weapon or whatever got busy and I got the message on the Other Side that I had to come back and finish my unfinished business, and here I am; fifty-three and I look like I’m twenty-one all over again.”

“Resurrection will do that to a girl,” Derek said with a weird grin.

“Hey, you look like a kid again since you’re psychically bonded to her,” said Venture. “Now I’m the last old fart remaining of the three of us,” he said as he drank more sake. “I always wondered, Nova. In 2200, on our way home from Iscandar, were you dead or in a coma?”

“I’m not sure, actually,” said Nova after she curled her toes for a moment to consider the question. “I just remember passing out and then waking up in this guy’s arms,” she said as she patted Derek’s shoulder. “Maybe I was like Schrödinger’s Cat.”

“Schrödinger’s Cat?” said Venture. “What the hell is that? (hic)”

“A thought experiment,” Nova said as she put up her finger like she was teaching in school.

“Ah, the Earth President in Exile has to start teaching us,” said Venture. “Okay, teacher. What was Schrödinger’s Cat? Was she named Fluffy?”

“As I said, an experiment,” Nova said, sounding so irate for a moment that she sounded drunk, too. Except that she wasn’t. “In this clinical hypothetical,” she said, showing off both her Medical and Law degrees in one short phrase, “a strange situation arises that illustrates an apparent paradox of quantum superposition. In this thought experiment, a hypothetical cat may be considered simultaneously both alive and dead due to a result of being linked to a random subatomic event that may or may not occur…like rolling the dice in an RPG game…”

“Dear, are you speaking Terranglish, Japanese, or technobabble?” Derek said. Then, he hiccupped.

“Derek Wildstar, you know perfectly well what I’m talking about!” Nova snapped. “You’re not an idiot!”

“Just because Wildstar looks like an idiot and sounds like an idiot, probably means he is an idiot,” quipped Mark.

“Stop pickin’ on him, you chowderhead!” Nova said, lapsing into Japanese in a weird Osaka accent on purpose for a moment. “Okay, okay! Back to physics! This thought experiment was invented by the great Austrian-Irish physicist Erwin Schrödinger in 1935, in a discussion with Einstein to illustrate what Schrödinger saw as the problems of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics…”

“The Copenhagen Interpretation; sounds like a weird operation,” said Mark as he looked at Derek and they both laughed and belched.

“Mark, for a fifty-three-year-old Admiral, you’re acting like twenty again,” Nova said.

“Okay, I was dead, and I saw the tunnel, the Hereafter, the Big Guy, who told me I had to go back,” said Venture. “And, then, wouldn’t you know it, Trelaina, who was also dead until recently…”

“Was she?” said Derek. “Remember this Schrödinger’s Cat thing President Nova-Chan here is going on and on about? I sort of figured out what you meant, dear, and with Trelaina’s return, we know that she is, was, and is, a spirit who could…well…take shape again, and lo and behold, she has!”

“Like Sauron?” Nova teased.

“My wife is not Sauron, you bubblehead, and you know it!” snapped Mark.

“…One ring to rule them all…” Nova said portentously.

“SHUDDUP!” said Venture loudly.

“You’re gonna make me cry,” said Nova as she sniffed.

“Hey, we’ve all known each other for damn near close to thirty-five years,” said Derek, “So, let’s bury our differences in the Tiber.”

“We’re not near Rome, dear,” Nova sniffed.

“Let’s forget this philosophical crap and play some Monopoly,” Derek said. “Who’s up for a game?”

“Me,” said Venture.

“Me, too,” sighed Nova. “We’re not landing for a few hours, right? We won this war; Queen Promecium is either dead or drifting so far out there she’s impotent. Let’s play some Monopoly.”

TEN MINUTES LATER…

“I got a five!” said Venture. “One, two, three, four, five. I landed on New York Avenue. Trying to figure out if I want it or not.”

“Two hundred simoleons, shweetheart,” Nova said. She was the banker, probably because out of the three people in this compartment, she was the only one who was sober. Venture found out that Nova did an even worse impression of Bogie in her precise little voice than Derek did.

“What is this, friggin’ Humphrey Bogart week?” said Admiral Wildstar.

“You started it, Chuck,” said Nova with a cute smile as she batted her eyes at her husband.

“You’re going on and on, Peppermint Patty,” said Derek as Mark rolled up his eyes, He couldn’t remember when these two had begun calling each other by pet names related to Peanuts characters, but it sounded incredibly silly. “Pay the lady your two hundred bucks or we auction off the sucker.”

“Want me to do it in singles?” teased Venture.

“You do that, and I’ll pick up my shoe and I’ll brain you with it,” teased back Nova as she picked up and brandished one of the wood-soled doctors’ exercise sandals she was wearing off duty. “Pay me, Solomon,” she said as she put up her hand and began waving her fingers.

“Okay. You sure you’re not drunk?” said Mark as he handed Nova his money.

“Not unless my physiology changed and apple juice can make me drunk now,” Nova said as she got up and put on “Muss I Den” again, only more loudly than before.

“Doctor Sane has returned from the dead and he has reincarnated as an eccentric blonde,” joked Mark. “You need to get drunk, really! You’re funny when you’re drunk!”

“I can’t get drunk when I’m in a family way again, my friend,” Nova said with a shrug. “Sorry,” she sang.

“Sit down before you have a miscarriage, Vice-Admiral, Doctor, President, or whatever you are this week,” Derek said.

“Are we getting all like hyper-protective again?” Nova said.

“She must be drunk. She usually isn’t quite this weird,” Mark said.

“Roll the dice, or I’ll inflict…the penalty,” said Nova.

“What kind of house rule is that?” chuckled Venture.

“Just made it up,” Nova said with a wink at Derek.

“If you two are gonna get all gushy-romantic with each other, I’m leaving this compartment,” Mark said as he poured more sake.

“I’m rolling the dice to shut you the hell up,” Derek said. “Okay…this puts me on Chance.”

“Draw the card,” said Mark.

“I’m drawing the card,” said Admiral Wildstar. “It says…GO TO JAIL!”

“What did you do?” laughed Venture while Nova put her hands over her face, snorted and giggled. She was hiding her face because she knew it didn’t look very ladylike.

“You sound like you’re farting when you do that,” said Mark as Derek moved his piece to jail.

“SHUT UP!” Nova said as she made fists. Mark and Derek looked at each other and began to laugh even harder.

“Nothing like a gathering of old friends, huh?” Derek said after he stopped laughing.

“As I’ve said a thousand times,” said Nova as she smiled and stared earnestly at Derek and Mark. “I love both of you guys!”

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TO BE CONTINUED…