ALTERNATE
TALES OF THE STAR FORCE
STAR BLAZERS—THE
PRINCESS AND THE SURFER
Being the seventh part
of THE NEW COMET--- BY: Frederick P. Kopetz
This Act is being completed with the
Cooperation and Assistance of Derek A.C.
Wakefield (as usual)
Major Thanks to Michael C. Crump (aka “Max Damage”) for artwork contributed to this
chapter.
Thanks also to Gail Kopetz (Fluffy! My Wife!) and Ami Meitsu for
helping to inspire me….
Note: This chapter contains some mature
content…just wanted to warn you…
ACT SEVEN: QUEEN STARSHA
AND THE DUEL…
I.
A RUDE AWAKENING…
Planet
Iscandar
Part
of the Southern Coast of the Great Continent
Sunday
June 7, 2207: 0930 Hours Earth Space-Time
The environs of the sacred beach on Taniquitel were very pretty,
and the beach looked almost empty as a lone figure walked up through the sand
near the sea.
The sand was wet, and the walker was leaving footprints from her
bare feet in the sand as she looked for shells.
Here’s
a pretty one, she thought as she dug something that looked like
an iridescent conch shell out of the sand. She smiled, listened to the sound of
the sea on Iscandar in the shell, and then tossed it carefully into a shoulder
bag she was carrying over a bare shoulder.
The young lady playing beach bum was Nova Wildstar. She had on her
leis and a necklace made from shells over her otherwise bare breasts, and she
wore her pink fundoshi and a white
wide-brimmed ladies’ hat and sunglasses with pink-tinted lenses. She carried a
shoulder bag that held her shells, a beach towel, suntan lotion, and a commset
to call Derek back at the villa if needed.
Nova smiled as she put a foot into the surf as it raced up the
beach. Mmmm…that water’s warm, she
thought. If I go swimming, I’d better
watch the undertow, and strip so I’m not encumbered by anything. And maybe I’ll
find a shell or two in the water? Maybe even a shell with a pearl in it? Derek
would like that, now, wouldn’t he?
Nova walked up onto the dry sand and began to set down her bag to
pull out a beach towel so she could sun herself after her skinny dip. She was
beginning to pull down her fundoshi
and was thinking of being a romantic naked
Great,
someone’s here, she thought as she pulled her fundoshi back up all the way.
Nova gathered herself together, listened on the wind, and then she
began to run up the beach towards the sounds.
Not far away, maybe sixty meters from the spot where she had been
standing, Nova found them.
Deke and Sasha. Naked. On a beach towel, singing some kind of
weird song.
And, they were at it
again. Right in front of Nova!
Nova’s mouth went wide as she yelled, “Deke! Deke
“Oh, Deekeee,” said Sasha as she gasped. “Do me again, again,
again, again…”
Nova then saw
“Deeekkkee, you’re silly!” laughed Sasha.
“People!” cried Nova. “I don’t mind that you don’t have anything
on, it’s hot, but could you cut that out for a MINUTE!??”
“Saaaaaassssshhhaaa” said Deke.
“Deeeeekkkeeee,” she squeaked back.
Nova hesitantly knelt and then she shook them. “Deke! Sasha! Stop
doing the horizontal hula for a minute. Please?”
Sasha reached out a hand and grabbed Nova’s while she giggled,
“Deeeekeeee, stop tickling me! At least there!
Heee heee hee hee heee!”
“This is Aunt Nova!” snapped Nova. “NOT Deekee! Deekee is…well,
you know where he is.”
Nova then noticed Sasha’s eyes were very glassy. So were Deke’s.
She felt around in the sand and found two things thrown there. One
was a little vial from the Argo’s
Sickbay. The other was a little silver key to a storage locker.
“What is my medicine locker key doing here?” said Nova as she threw her key back in her bag. “And what
was in this vial?”
Nova ran her finger inside the vial as she tried to blot out the
sounds of the Wakefields…making whoopee…and then she sniffed at the result and
tasted her finger.
“Mushrooms,” she muttered as she recognized the taste and her head
went moderately funny for a moment. “Titan mushrooms, huh? How did you two
learn about these? I’d better be
careful about this, or I may be joining you two. In a threesome. I don’t want that to happen!”
Nova spread her beach towel out a decent distance away from the
blotto young couple and she sat down with her back turned so she wouldn’t have
to see what Deke was doing to Sasha. She had just seen enough.
Nova then got out her commset and called Derek.
The Commodore was washing dishes when the commset rang.
“Hello?” he said. “Or should that be moshi-moshi?”
“Derek, this is Nova. I’m sick.”
“What’s wrong with you? Nova?”
“I…was walking down the beach. I just found Mister Wakefield and
Sasha. In the sand…it’s so…”
“Nova, my God! Are they dead?”
“They’re worse than dead, Derek,” said Nova. “Remember the Titan
‘shrooms? Remember our experiment?”
“Yes, that was when….I think we thought we could hide it from
Sasha that time.”
“Little hard to hide anything on that, as we learned…” said Nova as she blushed with the memory. “I
have a memory of coming to up in a tree house…with splinters in my bottom…”
“And I had to take you back to Sickbay in just my shirt to get
them removed, and…”
“YES,” said Nova with a blush as she clenched her toes at the
memory. Was I still giggling then? Nova thought in embarrassment. Those mushrooms are worse for your
reputation than Doc Sane’s Spring Water!
“I…remember that,” said Derek. “Are Deke and Sasha…?”
“Yes,” said Nova.
“Are they aware you’re there?”
“No,” said Nova with a blush.
“Are they decent?”
“NO!” said Nova with a deeper blush.
“Are they in flagrante
delicto?”
“YES,” hissed Nova. “Listen!”
she said as she held the commset up.
Derek listened, feeling very uncomfortable as he heard Sasha
making little gasping noises and mewls from several kilometers away. He also
heard
It sounded to Wildstar like
“What do we do with
them?” sighed Wildstar. “They still do not have a waiver. And
“Only one thing to do,”
said Nova.
“What?”
“Wait here until it wears off. I will have to watch them
anyway…keep them under observation…then we take them to the villa and read them
the riot act.”
“Want me there, Nova?” said Derek.
“No offense, Derek,” she said. “I’m feeling too warm right now.
I’d love to, but what sort of example would we set if they come around and see us in our own horizontal hula? I’m not
wearing very much, it’s hot, and I miss you horribly,”
said Nova in a small voice as she fussed about with her leis. “That is usually
a good combination for mischief, and if no one was around but us…but, today…”
“Yeah,” sighed Derek.
“Not…that I mind the idea,” said Nova as she licked her lip.
“Hearing them is driving me bugs. In more ways…than one,” she whispered.
“Nova, are you?”
“Yesss,” said Nova in almost a purr. “For you, of course. Not
Dekesticks.”
“Rain check?” said Derek.
“For now,” said Nova. “Later on, after we get them dealt with and
we have time…I think there might be a very nice Gamilon out tonight…”
Derek made a kissing noise over the commset. “If we have time,
invitation accepted, Lieutenant Commander.”
“Thank you, Commodore,” said Nova sweetly. Sasha let out a
particularly loud squeak then that set her teeth on edge. “She’s noisy,” Nova
whispered with a giggle. “She might be howling next. You have a very bad little
niece.”
“I know that,” said Derek.
“How do you know?” said Nova as she lay on her stomach and kicked
up her foot, looking more like nineteen than twenty-nine at that moment.
“I was cornered once,” said Derek. “When you weren’t around.”
“Oh?” said Nova.
“I extricated myself from the situation, ma’am,” replied Derek.
“Gently, of course. A gentleman and samurai
tries not to make a thirteen-year old Iscandarian girl cry.”
“Cornered, hmmm?” said Nova.
“Are you mad?’ said Derek, worried.
“No,” said Nova with a smile.
“Why are you asking me that?”
“You have to show me, Derek,” said Nova.
“Why?”
“So I can corner you
like that sometime. Preferably after our children are born and asleep some
night, or with a babysitter for the weekend. Food for thought, Skipper!” said
Nova with a giggle. “Take care. I will call you when they come around.”
“Bye,” said Derek.
“Byyye,” sang Nova.
Then, she hung up, closing her eyes softly as another squeal came
down the wind. Nova shook her head and put her hands over her ears.
I
should have brought earmuffs, she thought as she pulled
her hat down over her ears and huffed.
THREE
HOURS LATER…
Later, much later, Nova sat on her beach towel on Taniquitel
watching over Deke and Sasha as they snored in each other’s arms. It wasn’t
cold for Nova in her minimal attire that warm afternoon, but, then again, she never
thought she’d be looking after patients while barely dressed.
“Hey, God,” Nova said in a half-sleepy voice. “Nova here.
This was not my day, except for being with Derek last night. At least thanks to
the commset, he knows I’m stuck here watching these two. Children. They’re
children, these two,” said Nova out loud with a wry smile as she watched the
snoring Deke and Sasha. “It’s funny. I’ve never been able to tell, and medical
science could never tell, either. Was I dead after I breathed in that gas at
the Cosmo-DNA? They wrote in my chart then that I was in a “persistent
vegetative state, probably moribund” and stuck my sleeping carcass off in the
morgue to finish dying while Doctor Sane tended to other patients. Was I dead?
Was I alive? And if I was dead, what brought me back when I woke up in Derek’s
arms? And if my brain had just stopped working and I was as good as dead, why
am I conscious, well, strong, and a little over six months’ pregnant and not in
a Veterans’ Ministry back ward someplace getting green soup in a tube and
getting my legs massaged while lying in a fetal position? Why am I here? Why
have I beaten the odds so many times? And why is my life so weird?” Nova
sighed.
Nova wasn’t sure what she wanted to do as she looked at Deke
and Sasha. They were moaning softly as they finally came to.
“Where…where are
we?” said Sasha. “Deeekee?”
“Uhhhh…” said
“Eeeeek!” she cried. She sat up and blushed. “Deekee! I’m naked!”
“Where’s our clothes?” he yelled.
“Right here,” said Nova as she handed them their discarded
clothing. “Deke! You were supposed to be resting on the Argo! Not running around making love to Princesses! You’re hurt,
“She’s my wife, ma’am,” said Deke.
“Yes, and you two did not have your waiver to be together
off-duty yet, you…”
“Are we in trouble?” said Sasha. “I…oh…no! We must be in
trouble!”
“You are in trouble,”
snapped Nova. “Oh, I know you needed the time alone…but there are regulations!”
“Nova, mother’s calling us! She’s nearby. On the villa to
the north!”
“How far is that?” asked Deke.
“A few kilometers up the beach, beyond those bluffs,” said
Nova as she made sure (wth a blush) that her leis were adjusted. “You’ll need
swimwear on. Come back to our villa after you get dressed. Derek and I will
dress you…”
“And?” sighed Deke.
“Give you a very good talking-to before we see Starsha,”
said Nova. “Come on!”
With heavy hearts, Deke and Sasha dressed while Nova turned
her back on them for privacy.
A FEW MINUTES LATER….
At Derek and Nova’s villa on the southern part of the beach,
Deke sat shirtless in his Black Tiger uniform as Commodore Wildstar yelled at
him. He wasn’t the only one getting it. Deke had been half-expecting Sasha to
get reamed out, too, which definitely happened. He hadn’t been expecting Derek
to chew Nova out for letting them get access to the Funky Fungi, too. It
appeared to Deke that Nova was, in fact, sharing the doghouse with both of
them.
“
“Sir, with all respect, we were both on liberty, and…”
Wildstar snarled. “That’s no damn excuse, and you damn well know it! As for being with Sasha,
listen,
“What is it, sir?” said Deke as Derek and Nova glared at him
and Sasha.
“The orders putting you two together in a cabin aboard
ship,” said Nova. “That was my surprise wedding gift to you two, and it would
have taken effect tomorrow!”
Deke and Sasha sat with their mouths open.
“But, you had to go and ruin it, didn’t you?” said Nova.
“Ma’am, maybe we don’t have the self-discipline to room
together,” said Sasha as her eyes filled with tears. “You can just…”
“We’re not forgetting it,” snapped Commodore Wildstar. “Nova
was up half the night the other night switching around room assignments to
accommodate you two! Off the record,
people, can’t you see that Nova is both pregnant and very tired lately?”
“I…I wanted to be nice to you two,” said Nova as she began
to sob. “But, you had to…to wreck it for me. Even sneaking off to the beach,
I’d understand, but…but…with those mushrooms getting loose…I have to account
for them,” sobbed Nova. “A loss from a drug cabinet is very serious! It was my
fault, losing that key in a moment of stupidity, Derek!”
“I said I won’t write you up for it, and you know it,” said
Derek. “Again, Lieutenant Commander, it was a stupid-ass mistake!” he barked as Nova bowed her head. “Losing that
key. But I know it’s not you or your normal style, so as far as we are
concerned…well, I’ve chewed you out for it already. It goes no further on the
Command level that that!”
“But Doctor Sane might!” Nova sobbed. “It would go in my
nursing folder! One mistake like that causes an inquiry. Either formal, where
it stays in your folder for two years, or informal, where it stays in your
folder for anywhere between one to six months. Two mistakes like that mean
automatic suspension of my RN license. Three mistakes means license revocation
and saying goodbye to medical school!”
“How many mistakes like that have you had?” said Derek.
“This is the first one,” Nova sobbed. “Even that might put a
cloud over my application to the Federal School of Medicine! You know how
selective they are!”
As Nova put her face in her hands and cried her eyes out,
Sasha suddenly felt very small. Very young. And very stupid. Auntie, I’d never get you in that kind of
trouble, she thought. But what kind
of trouble am I in for this?
“You should be written up, Sasha,” snapped Derek. “There
should be an Article Fourteen on you. It would only go that far because of the
small amount of the mushroom taken, and because it is a Schedule Y
“Experimental Drug Base” medication. Nova and I tried it once. Then, it was on
Schedule X “Experimental Food”, and Doctor Sane gave her clearance to
experiment on it. If it was on Schedule Z, “Controlled Substance”, like the
pain-relieving morphine locked up in that cabinet…if you two had touched that, there would have been a
court-martial, revocation of your commissions after said court-martial, and
work-camp time for you…”
“Like what we had to do to Ensign Sedgeley two and a half
years ago, Derek, right before they gave me the
“What did she do?” said
“She was at the morphine and that R’Khell drug we
captured…they call it “Sixer” and it is very
dangerous,” said Nova. “Doctor Sane and I caught her. She had a monkey on her
back and got court-martialed. Because she was my immediate inferior, at her
mustering-out ceremony, I had to rip her rank epaulets and medals off her
myself, slap her, and send her on the public Walk of Shame myself. She was my
friend. We shot pool together. I didn’t like doing it. But I had to. And she’s
still in the work camp in Provkiev, in
“Yessir,” said
“Good,” said Commodore Wildstar. “You two get your room
assignment tomorrow in the morning. In the meantime, go in the guest room. Nova
has laid out your swimwear. We have to change, too. We’re taking a walk down
the beach,” said Derek. He looked at Sasha. “You know why.”
“To see Mother,” said Sasha.
“Yes,” said Nova. “She wants to talk with both of you about
your recent behavior over the past few weeks, as she put it.
“We have to face the music,” sighed Sasha.
“Yes,” said Deke. “In more ways than one…”
II.
RUMORS…
The
Eritz Gatlantis
Princess
Invidia’s Palace
Sunday
June 7, 2207: 1200 Hours Earth Space-Time
Generals Dyre, Gorse, and Turpitz had all been called to an informal
conference in a lounge in Invidia’s Palace.
They had been ordered to come without weapons. They had no
idea what the conference was about.
When they got in there and found Invidia sitting on a couch
in a red and black dress and white boots, they guessed they were in some
trouble as the Princess sat there playing with her pointer.
Finally, Invidia said, “Let us get to the point. Why was
Katrina Savela executed this morning before I could personally interrogate
her?”
“The Pellian pilot was a threat, Princess,” said Turpitz in
a smooth voice. “After she was tortured in the Sphere of Joy last night by
Nevitz, we had word she might try to escape and steal her plane and return to
the Pellian ranks with intelligence on us. That was unforgivable, so I went to
see Dyre.”
“Since you were asleep, I thought, playing about with
another prisoner, I ordered her killed and thought you’d countersign it,” said
Dyre. “Her head’s in a jar now. Want to see it?”
“NO,” barked Invidia. “How convenient. Just as I found out
that the fact that her surname was ‘Savela’ and the fact that someone is
playing about with the Noble Family of the Savelas. I just found out, as a
matter of fact, based on genetic evidence…from…Katrina’s body…that Katrina’s
mother was my mother, Countess Eloise. Countess Eloise. My father’s favorite,
after Father captured her and treated her well…which was well before my birth
twenty-four years ago. My mother. Countess Eloise. Killed when I was twelve
right before Father’s great campaigns began in a crash I considered suspicious.
Which one of you was it?”
“Princess, I…” said Dyre.
Invidia smashed her pointer down hard on the table. “Which
one of you was talking with Radnar, even then, trying to spread rumors that I
was in an improper relationship with Father?” she snapped with tears in her
eyes. “I have played games with attractive prisoners, and teased some females
as my version of a joke when I was younger, but never would I bed females…most
of the time. Not really. If I hadn’t killed that pregnant Earthling Wildstar,
for one, I would have got her in here as a prisoner, scared her, then…served
her some juice, and talked with her. Maybe find out what makes the Earthlings
tick? Dancing with her would have been a game. A tease. A joke. Instead…”
“Princess,” said Gorse.
“Explain dis!” she
screamed as she threw tapes at them. “Radnar spreading vile rumours of me! Or
are you all in cahoots with him?”
“We have not been in contact with Radnar for some time,”
said Gorse, knowing he was lying through his teeth.
“We saw him on the homeworld, and that was it,” lied Dyre. He thought, How can we bring it to Invidia that we think
maybe she is no longer sane and that maybe we should see about accepting the
Grand Emperor’s offer..to talk…maybe retain our positions and power? Maybe get
him to fail to acknowledge Desslok as our new ruler and instead crown myself or
Radnar as Prince? How do we turn this to advantage?
“We spoke about this before, friend, before I came back from
the battlefront on this brief tour,” said Turpitz. “Invidia. Gamilon, Earth,
even Iscandar and Pellias, are building up greater defense forces. We know how
your mother came from the Pellians’ ranks years ago to be captured by us. The
Pellians were a great spacefaring race. They still are. Not even Astrena knows
yet how many of their warships escaped the Blackeye Galaxy to go on patrol
elsewhere. The Pellians, we all knew, were legendary shipbuilders and
scientists. And fighters. I heard tales of the Pellian Federation Border Legion
that would chill you, Invidia. Arishna help us if any of the Border Legion ever
came back.”
“Why?” said Invidia.
“Their esprit de corps,
spirit, and aggressiveness in battle were legendary,” said Dyre. “Imagine a
ship like the cursed Star Force. Right? Now imagine a whole FLEET like that.
That was the Border Legion of Pellias, at least in legend. I do not know how
Ekogaru ever defeated them. But apparently, he did.”
“Horrible,” said Invidia.
“The Pellians are dangerous,” said Dyre. “They are just beginning to share their secrets with
Desslok and with the Earthlings. Men, we thought we could crush Desslok’s and
the Terrans’
“That is why we must crush
them!” cried Invidia. “Skaldart will save us! Overwhelming force! Why is he not here now?”
“Delayed, Princess,” said Gorse. “He is in battle with
Radnar’s forces…”
“WHAT?” screamed Invidia. “Radnar, Radnar, all I hear about
is Radnar!”
“Sooner or later, Princess, Radnar will find the right time
and place to engage us,” Dyre “To engage our Fortress. To engage this city-ship!”
“We still have forces! Our Comet!” raged Invidia.
“You,” said
Turpitz as he got up and poked Invidia in the stomach with her own pointer.
“You, Princess, are causing us to lose them. Day by day. Hour by hour. I have
been to Iscandar and Gamilon several times. Desslok’s forces! The Iscandarians
and Pellians! The damned STAR FORCE!
They rally around that battered, patched old wreck of an Earth spaceship like a
banner! Now I understand why Desslok was so obsessed with destroying her once
upon a time! That damned ship has more lives than Arishna’s First Prophet Mudib! Mudib the Great! The Man They
Could Not Kill! Even now, fanatic Arishna-worshippers feel Mudib will someday
rise from the dead, unify our Houses like in the Great Time, and lead our
forces to victory! That accursed Wildstar lad looks like Mudib! Or have none of
you ever noticed because he is not green
like the Great Prince and Prophet was?”
“Are you some Arishnian fanatic?” screamed Invidia. “Have
you Seen the Light? Have you Seen the True Vision?”
“Enough,” said Dyre as he got up and grabbed the pointer
from Turpitz’s hands since Invidia looked like she was about to strike him.
“Princess. Mathematics and the latest projections done by the statisticians and
battle analysts in the Tower of Velduz College in the city indicate that the
mathematical certainty of a decisive win in the Sanzar System is only eighteen
percentems in our favor. The chance of an absolute victory by the enemy is
estimated at twenty-eight percentems. The highest probability, at fifty-four
percentems, is that of a rough draw, with both our sides badly bloodied, the
New Comet again damaged, and with millions dead on both sides and much
bitterness spread about for generations. We can win. But at what cost? If we
defeat them here, it will have to be genocide. Turpitz’s reports indicate they
will fight to the bitter end. If we attack again, even with their forces
defeated, if we do so, they would never surrender to us. And if we forced them
to submit, we would face possibly two or three hundred years worth of partisan
actions. The only way they stop fighting is when they die. If we can even bring
them to that point!”
“We need to win. Otherwise I will not keep my throne!” Invidia screamed. “Then…crush them we..”
“We asked them to calculate that, too,” said Gorse.
“Princess, there is only a nine-percentem chance…”
“Of what?” snapped Invidia.
“There is just a nine-percentem chance of you keeping your throne, Invidia,”
said Gorse coldly. “If that. Invidia, we are your friends. We have stood by you
through this. As friends, we counsel you; two things…”
“What?” said Invidia as tears again came to her eyes.
“Call off this attack. There is not that much chance we can
win. Then, abdicate,” said Dyre. “You
have brought us to the brink of the point we feared; disaster!”
“We swore to serve you,” said Gorse. “Step down and let us contact
Radnar. Or Desslok, for that matter. We need to negotiate again.”
“Never!” cried Invidia. “I will never listen to you! Next
time I see you, you are demoted,
Gorse! And I may consider a trial for treason!”
She snapped her pointer in half, threw the halves at Gorse’s
face with a vicious scream, and then she stalked off, smashing the doors with
her hands as they hissed open and she disappeared weeping angrily into the
Royal Apartments.
“I should smash in her teeth,” hissed Turpitz. “Gorse, are
you…?”
Gorse nodded as he bled. “Dyre. We need to kill her. Preferably in her sleep!”
“Not in her sleep,” hissed Turpitz.
“Men,” said Dyre. “I have something better in mind.”
“Which is?” said Turpitz.
“Listen,” said Dyre in a low voice.
Invidia cursed and ranted as she slapped a guard in the face
for no reason as she stalked into her suite.
Then, slamming down her hands on a table in her sitting
room, she tore a ceremonial dueling sabre that her father had once owned off
the wall and began to attack the red velvet curtains with it like a wild thing.
She screamed like a beast while doing so, and then, and only then, she started
to laugh.
Laughing like mad, she kicked off her boots, went barefoot,
and the Princess lost herself in a silent dance with no one.
“I need music,” she said.
Walking over to her computer, she ran through her musical
collection. Pellian music, no. Cometine music, no. Definitely not Gamilon
music. Melezartian music plundered from that dead world was too solemn, too beautiful.
She needed something with noise and a beat.
Invidia chortled when she saw her next contraband collection
of music. Why not? Invidia thought. Oh, I wish the barbarians knew I stole this
along with fleet plans my men hacked from their ships…
Invidia then flicked the following on her player:
ST’ILA: Barbarian/Terran
GENWA: Rock/Disco
DELA’TIST: Elton John
SEGE: I’m Still Standin’ (Yeah Yeah Yeah)
Invidia giggled as the music she had strictly banned in her
own Empire-City began to wash over her like illicit candy. As the first chords
of “I’m Still Standin’” began to blow
over her speakers, the barefoot Princess laughed like crazy, shutting her eyes
and squealing as she twirled around, watching her dress flip up, exposing the
slender legs she usually only let her various lovers see.
Enough of this! Invidia thought as
she danced and pumped her fists. I may
have to use people, I may have to use men, but only for a little while more!
Star Force? Minor annoyance now. Desslok? A plaything I can torment like a fly
pinned to a board if I ever capture him. Radnar? Next on my crap list! Turpitz?
You are a dead man! Gorse? Dead! DYRE, my oldest friend after Father? DEAD,
DEAD, DEAD!
Invidia danced like a wild animal as she sang along with the
lyrics in heavily accented Standard English! “And did you think this fool could never win?
Well look at me, I'm coming back again…”
Invidia screamed, and she took a drinking set that Dyre had given her.
She drank some of the wine like a crazy woman and then began to gleefully smash
the carafe’ and the goblets against the wall in a corner where she knew she
could not step on them.
Then, Invidia pumped her arms and screamed along with the lyrics…”Don't you know I'm still standing…better than I ever
did…Looking like a true survivor, feeling like a little kid…I'm still
standing…after all this time…picking up the pieces of my life without you on my
mind…”
Invidia then screamed and twirled around, and as the guitar
solo came up, she picked up a small table and smashed it through a portrait of
her own General Staff.
Then, she giggled and got a blaster and began shooting holes
in the picture. She then found a pen and drew a black moustache on Turpitz’s
part of the picture.
She opened a cabinet and found the well-cleaned skull of a
captive. She smashed it against the wall, screaming,
“WHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” as she did so.
Then, spent, Invidia calmed herself and called up some
Terran history on her computer. The name that came up was:
RUDOLPH
HESS
“Why not?”
Invidia chortled to herself. “I might be able to pull it off and sit there
beside Desslok, maybe in handcuffs, granted, while they come to a little trap I
set for them, if they have the courage to do so. Or, I could make things go my
way? My way! Yes! Spy out the place, see what it is really like, and come back
here with Skaldart, and then have a nice little purge. Kill them all! Maybe. If it is really as bad as zey say, I
can then quit while ahead. My way, my terms!”
Invidia’s
eyes filled with tears as she looked at a picture of Katrina Savela. “My
half-sister,” she said. “I never got to really sit down and talk with you.
Torture you? Yes. Talk like a sister? No. They said you were twenty-nine.
Thirty, maybe. Older than me. Older sister I never knew, and I let them kill
you!” sobbed Invidia. “Cursed wars! Cursed conquests and political crap!
Fleets? Yes! Crushing things, yes! Running around with generals, yes! Power,
yes! Love, no. Sex, yes! True love, no! It is time, for me to grow up and begin
finding what I want for once! Not what others expect of me!” she
screamed out loud.
“I am going
off to see how the war really goes. See if we can win or can’t win! Find my own
way through this! Then, if we can win, we win! If not, quit while ahead, game
over, end it my way and in my own time and manner! Find friends! Love! Maybe a
new sister? Crazy, aren’t I? Maybe. But, I do it!” screamed Invidia as she
gleefully smashed another table with a swipe of her sword.
Then,
Invidia found a bag she had been keeping. “Katrina’s uniform and boots,” she
said as she hugged it. The rest of Katrina’s body, save for her head, was gone,
cremated and vaporized already.
Invidia then found some hair dye and
some scissors. “For later, on the carrier Mikronja,”
said Invidia.
Invidia ran
into her bedroom and flipped open a cabinet. She threw some things out at
random until she found shoes she had seldom worn; pink sandals that matched the
bottom of her dress. She put them on and wriggled her toes for a bit.
She then had
another drink. A nice, slow one.
Invidia
sighed contentedly as the wine hit her stomach.
Good, she thought. I need this. I need…to relax…and think, and….
She needed
to be a little tipsy, she knew, if she was ever going to pull this move off.
I have to sound…what..cute? Yes,
cute, to get him to do my bidding? No power. Cute. And smile, Princess! Smile!
Then,
smiling, she sat down on a gold settee that she hadn’t trashed and called a
number on the Eritz Gatlantis.
“Captain Jena?” she purred into the phone. “Your Princess commands you, Val.
Have the technical crews ready the Pellian’s fighter plane and transport it to
the Mikronja. It is not far. No, no
need to report this to Gorse. Or Dyre. They need not even know I am leaving
yet. It is a personal mission. Recon mission. One ship is all we need. Yes.
Now. We leave tonight. And your proposition? The one I refused? It is accepted.
No, I have not lost my mind. Yes, I
think I have found it. Oh. Between you and I…my hair will look lighter. Much lighter. And I have different shoes
on. The ones you liked on the dancing girl last month. The barbarian ones that
show your feet. I will be quaint. Where we are going, we may even find some
holy man to marry us. No, I am not mad. Yes I am. Goodnight, Val. See you
soon…”
Invidia
hung up and giggled for the first time in ages. “I wonder,” she purred. “What
Iscandar is like this time of
year..?”
Then,
smiling, she began to write a note.
Invidia
thought carefully about the words, thinking that this had to be just right to make this work….
III.
MEETING WITH STARSHA
Planet
Iscandar
Part
of the Southern Coast of the Great Continent
Sunday
June 7, 2207: 1520 Hours Earth Space-Time
At last, after a walk a few kilometers northward up the beach, Derek,
Nova, Deke and Sasha finally reached Queen Starsha’s small beach villa near the
sacred beach.
This
is her place? Deke thought as he flexed his toes in the
powdery sand near the crystalline house. He, like all of the others, had
changed into swimwear for the walk up the beach.
Starsha’s beach house was mostly long, low, and shiny, having only
a small crystalline tower at one end with a diamond-like formation at the top.
Alex Wildstar came out to greet them. He looked casual enough; to
Deke’s shock, he was wearing a black surfers’ wetsuit trimmed in red that left
his arms and legs bare. He quickly hugged his sister-in-law Nova in greeting.
She now wore a pink bikini and a necklace made of small shells. Sasha, in her
blue bikini again, got a hug and a decorous kiss from her father.
“How’s my Princess?” he said as he hugged Sasha.
“Woozy,” she said with a wan laugh. “Deke and I did something
stupid. It was my dumb idea and I got a lot of people in trouble for it.”
“Your mother wants to talk to you about that,” said Alex in a low
voice. “But, she wants to meet Deke at last, and she’s actually far more upset
at your sister Astra right now.”
“Why?” said Sasha.
“On a whim, your sister…well, we’ll discuss that inside, Princess.
Hey, stupid,” he said jovially as he
laughed and gave his brother Derek a playful punch in the arm. “What kind of
stupid shirts is Nova buying for you?”
“This is an old rugby shirt from Saint Anselm’s, Alex,” said
Derek. “A little souvenir from the old days there. Some of my clothes from when
I was eighteen still fit me, like these Academy shorts I have on. The only
things I liked about that orphanage after our parents died were some of the
theology classes and being on the rugby team.”
“What about the girls, Derek?” teased Nova as she held his hand
and cuddled up to her husband’s shoulder while rubbing her toes over his in a
very feline, cute gesture.
“No girls there, Nova,” said Derek. “All-boys orphanage.”
“Good. They saved you for Diane and then for me.”
Deke ran his hands through his hair, and suddenly realized he was
going to be meeting Queen Starsha in a grungy t-shirt and flowered surf
baggies. I must look like a dork, he
thought.
“You’re my dork,” purred
Sasha as she kissed him.
“But…?” said Deke.
“You are transmitting,” said Sasha.