“It is good to see you again, Prince. If it is not too bold of me to ask, when might I have the honor of having you as a patient?” Tanoya Kasia bowed and addressed him with a particularly formal sounding lilt in her voice as she had last time he’d come down to her office to pick up Neya. She had the same blue fur as Carbon’s mother, and dressed like she did physical work - a largely unadorned green vest rather than the decorated jackets Alex was used to seeing on a lot of folks who were in contact with nobility.
“I hadn’t, uh, really thought about it. Probably not.” It sounded more like a question when he said it, which hadn’t been intentional but he wasn’t sure why she asked him that. Seemed like it was earnest, at least. “Thank you for inquiring, though.”
“If you do change your mind, I will find time for someone so prestigious.” She bowed, and returned to her office.
“That’s weird.” He said mostly to himself as he and Neya departed the currently empty waiting room. Carbon had been dropping Neya off at her appointments, and in turn he had picked her up. They trusted her to actually go to them, but it was more about the act of actually being there as support, the time taken from their day specifically for her. Making good on their promises.
“Is it?” Neya sounded absolutely incredulous as the door closed behind them, turning towards the maglev.
“Yeah?” Why would he need to talk to a therapist? Things were a little rough, but the last week had quieted down a lot. Those seven days had been almost idyllic. Of course there was new work to be done - he was dressed in a portion of the military uniform that had been fitted to him right now, as a matter of fact. He had a PT session with his squad after Neya was dropped off. Gray pants with nearly as many pockets as the CPP flight uniform, and plain black boots that were far more comfortable than the dress pair that had tried to destroy his legs.
They’d even gotten him a t-shirt made of something with an absurd moisture wicking capability, almost too cold to wear while not physically active. “I mean, I guess I am kind of having a hard time with the whole nobility thing. All the titles and stuff.”
“Are you serious? That is it? Oh, these titles are difficult?” She turned to look at him, violet eyes wide with disbelief as she continued with a distinctly sarcastic tone. “Not something more like: I have almost died a lot in the last year, once to a violent assault, immediately after a different violent assault? The other to when the ship I was piloting was shot down and I had large portions of my body burnt off?”
“Oh.” Had he actually forgotten about those? No, it was easier to just put it out of his mind so he didn’t have to deal with it, pretend that all of that never happened and nothing bad could come of it. Not even the shootdown and the weeks he spent having a lot of his body rebuilt had come to mind, and that was how his relationship with Carbon actually started. Upon even a moment's reflection, it didn’t seem particularly healthy. “When you bring that up, that uhm... Yeah maybe.”
The discussion about his probably dangerous coping mechanism in the face of violence and situations he couldn’t control fell to the side as they approached the station, rather personal things that no one else seemed to discuss when riding the maglev. Not that many other people had assassination attempts to talk about. Neya switched to his schedule. “You have your training session after this, but you seem to be prepared for that already.” Their timing was impeccable today, a train pulling in just as they did.
“Yep, ready to go. If the time looks good I might just jog over to the gym, get a little warm up. That’s not too weird, right? Pretty sure the path doesn’t lead through any of the public areas.” He had been issued a squad, which was twelve soldiers total for the Empire’s military. They would be filling a role as his personal security detail rather than be expected to deploy as an actual fighting force. He had only met them yesterday and forgotten pretty much all their names except for the one he was already familiar with - Specialist Amalu had been attached to the team due to previous experience with Humans.
“Everything you do will be weird because it is a Human doing it, but I do not think it is excessively strange in this case. You will be dressed appropriately for such things, this is a military vessel.” She stepped aboard, standing beside him as the train departed. “As long as you are not jogging through command areas, it will likely be ignored.”
“I can avoid those.” He hadn’t been to the bridge yet, or Eleya’s war room, or even the flight command deck. He had toured a lot of the support operations though, the most boring day-to-day stuff that they could muster up so Intel had copious amounts of real ARGUS data they could splice with the fake data they were manufacturing. There had been a full two hour long visit to the hatchery where they grew all the bugs that the Tsla’o liked eating.
Forest spiders were surprisingly docile if you were careful with them, rather more like coconut crabs without the claws than actual spiders. With a gentle touch, you could just pick them up and stick them to pretty much any surface - walls, arms, top of the head - and they’d stay out there without a fuss.
He desperately hoped someone reviewing the files would be arachnophobic. It was mean, but also fuck them.
They rode the rest of the way in silence - this was pretty standard on the maglev, the polite thing to do was not chat when it was underway, or to do so very quietly if you must, and Alex waited until they were back out of the station before he spoke again. “So yeah, guess I’ll be talking to Tanoya too. She’s going to have a hat trick.”
Neya gave him a sidelong glance, that faint hint of annoyance that Carbon got when he used a particularly impenetrable Human idiom echoed in her features. “I will set up the appointment.”
“Thank you.” She hadn’t handled too much for him in the way of getting appointments and what have you set up yet - he was railroaded into most everything by Imperial Intelligence right now - but the fact he could just ask her to do something and she would was so unreasonably handy that he was worried he’d end up dependent on it.
“Of course.” She leaned into the scanner on the door and waited for it to retract, the short walk from the station done already. She bowed, a little smirk hidden on the corner of her mouth as she stepped into the foyer. “Be well, Alex. Do not enjoy your training too much.”
“Hah, right. I suspect I won’t.” He gave her a very short bow back, as was appropriate in the situation despite that little dig. The last outing to get himself back into the swing of physical exercise had felt a bit brutal after a long period of not having done any significant training, and he had complained about it all day afterwards. It was his stupid idea that doing training would help with unit cohesion, so Alex couldn’t even blame someone else. He had bristled at the idea that he’d have soldiers and just enjoy an easy life while they were expected to die for him, particularly as someone who didn’t have the same cachet as Carbon. Putting in some effort while he got to know these folks felt appropriate.
Alex waited until the door was closed, shook his limbs out, and turned the ARGUS back on. Now recording the whole world around him, he popped the little Tsla’o communicator out of his pocket, turned his visual translation on, and figured out the path to the forward ‘athletic center’ and started his jog. It was 30 minutes away, by Tsla’o reckoning, but the map assumed you would be walking casually with your great grandparents.
He knocked it out in twenty, and wasn’t even gassed when he shut the ARGUS off and scanned into the gym. Early, but better to be punctual with the military. The entryway split off into a variety of directions, the main door being the equipment room where they kept all the exercise machines. The co-ed locker room off to the right, some other aerobic and physio related stuff down a hallway to the left.
Zenshen was there already, which was convenient, and dressed in the same manner as Alex. Though she wore a more traditional looking tank top in place of his t-shirt. “Hey sarge, what do we have on the program for today?”
“Prince.” She addressed him in English with a nod, whipping out a larger tablet. “You’ll be doing the physical intake assessment, so we know where you are. Takes an hour and some. Bonus, you have a sparring session with Master Tenaha after that. Probably the most experienced hand-to-hand fighter on board, he was actually very interested in seeing what Human martial arts look like.”
“He knows I’m not really a martial artist though, right? I just trained with a version of the MACS.” The Confed’s Military Arms Combined Style was a hybrid of who knows how many martial arts, for when you were in punching range of somebody that you did not want to be a threat anymore. They had pared it down to empty fist and improvised weapons for non-military Pilots such as himself, not bothering with specific knife or gun training because they shouldn’t have had them on the ship... not that Carbon had been notified. The half a year he’d spent training to box as a teen likely didn’t count anymore. “Technically I’m second Dan in it, but I have no idea how that would translate.”
“The first spar is always to allow the master to determine where the student’s skill level lies, so it will be determined then.” She shrugged and gestured for him to follow her into the main equipment room. The two story tall area had the strongest AC on the ship, giving the room a gentle cold breeze. It was mostly empty at the moment save for a couple of treadmills in use and one guy doing squats. “You want to get started now or wait for team one to show up? Two hasn’t officially been transferred yet, so it’s just them.”
There were two rows of pretty standard cardio exercise equipment, just scaled to fit Tsla’o physiology. The back wall was entirely weights and their related systems. It was still a surprise how much of this equipment he recognized right off the bat, like the treadmill and ellipticals, recumbent bikes, cage systems and what was clearly a Smith machine. Convergence in one of the places he had least expected it. “Hell, might as well get started. What’s first?”
“Opening run is twenty five ke- It’s about... five kilometers. Twenty five trips around the running track, or an equal amount on one of the machines.” She fished a small device out of her pocket and tapped it to the tablet in her hand, then stuck it on his shirt over his heart. “Not sure if the vitals scan will work on a Human, but it’ll still track times. Tap once to start, once to mark the lap, and hold down till it beeps to finish. This isn’t a speed thing, it’s about finding out where you are in regards to endurance and consistency. Pick a pace you can maintain, don’t overdo it.”
He should have taken the maglev. “Track is next floor up, right?” Alex had never tolerated stationary running unless there was something to watch, and he didn’t really have anything right now. Being a military qualification he expected that would be forbidden anyway.
“Yup. I’ll keep the crew in here for now, find me when you’re done.”
He gave her a nod and traipsed up the stairs. The track was empty, lined for five lanes and a sort of red dirt color, the walls covered in a sort of generic pastoral mural. The track material was a little springy under foot as he stepped up to the starting line and tapped the timer stuck to his chest. It beeped quietly and off he went.
He didn’t really push it, keeping what Stana had said in mind about this being more about consistency than speed. It checked out for him - soldiers had to get around, and there was no guarantee they’d have vehicles or boosted armor to do so. He did increase the pace from the light jog on the way over, though..
The mural gave him something to look at as he circled the track, and the subtle alien-ness of it started to sink in. Grasses were a mix of green and blue, with the occasional orange stalk shooting up, and purple-red trees in the distance made it clear this was Schon, back before the cataclysm. The sky was still blue, the snow on the mountains in the far background still white. It would have been a nice place to visit, to see sights like that.
He set that depressing thought aside and focused on his run, and then on other tasks to keep his mind from wandering back. Pondered the next report for ONI. Alex had actually been doing the ONI job he officially knew about. Wrote up a nice, fairly accurate report about some of the more surface level ins and outs of Tsla’o society, and sent it along to the Admiral like a dutiful employee who was totally unaware of what they did to him.
Maybe the next one would be about food traditions. He’d been learning a lot about them over dinner recently, which was more padding for ARGUS. They were going to learn so much about Tsla’o condiments, and most of it would be real. He was going to tell the story about how he drank the eketa like it was a beverage so many times.
The thought was funny, yes, but he was already starting to feel the familiar burn of exertion in his muscles and smirked at that thought briefly. Only twelve laps to go.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
He was actually pretty worn out when he finished, stomping down the stairs slowly and drenched in sweat. His shirt was positively chilly, though. Didn’t take long to spot his team, down at the end of the row pumping iron. The Sergeant, Amalau, the woman whose name isn’t Kenneth but sounded like it, and... and the rest. He’d get there. He had a roster, he would practice them all tonight.
Right now all he was getting was salutes. It was easy to spot him. “At ease, carry on.” Half of them were wearing wireless to translate. Everyone figured it out quickly and they all went back to what they were doing, except Sergeant Zenshen, who started running him through the rest of the intake assessment.
The main takeaway was that he wasn’t too out of shape but actually had been skipping leg day. Pull ups were all right, same with sit-ups. Various lifts with a bar weighted to around 20 kilos was a little taxing, yes. Dragging a load to simulate moving an injured soldier - in this case they had made Not-Kenneth be the weight as she was the tallest of them - that one worked muscles he wasn’t exactly aware of. Squats, which were a form of divine punishment, box jumps, and then pushups rounded things out.
Then he got to cap it off with another run. Same distance, same intent, but his body was already feeling all that other exertion now.
“Okay. Whoev- Whoever came up with this was a sadist.” Alex’s heart pounded in his chest, lungs burning, icy dread clutching at his mind as each breath felt like it wasn’t bringing in enough air. He rested his hands on his knees, panting and dripping sweat onto the track before leaning against the wall and sliding down to sit. He had adapted to it pretty well, but the doctor who installed his translator had been right: exercise was more difficult with implants crowding his organs.
The Sergeant bounded up the stairs a minute later, a little bit of worry in her voice. “You all right? Sensor said you stopped moving.”
“Yeh, jus fine.” He waved her away, still very much out of breath but not exactly needing medical help.
“Alright.” She pulled up the tablet and checked his time. “Huh. You actually beat the first run. By fifteen seconds, but you beat it.”
“Fuckin... Hell yeah.” He pushed himself up and wiped the stinging sweat from his eyes. He hadn’t intended to do that. Being worn out before starting might have helped in that he wasn’t focused on anything at all except just pushing through to finish it.
Zenshen gave an affirmative grunt as she signed the file with a fingertip. “Can’t wait to see how you do in a combat load.”
He managed a weak laugh and pushed off the way, walking a little to keep his legs from cramping. He plucked the sensor off his shirt and handed it back to the Sergeant. “Oh, that sounds fun.”
She took it delicately with two fingers, the little device still wet with sweat, and crammed it into the pocket furthest down her pants. “Armorer should have your first line finished in a couple of days.” That was the load bearing and armor layer of personal equipment for them. You could wear just about anything under it.
When he had first learned they were making him a set of combat gear in addition to the royal formal armor, he had earnestly considered popping into the ship’s armory and telling them to take all the time they needed getting that custom armor finished up. Want to make sure the regulars are all properly equipped before he is. Wink, nod. Of course reality set in a few seconds later to ruin that plan: everyone else would be able to use off the shelf equipment. “How long do I have until the appointment with Tenaha for sparring?”
“About fifteen minutes.” She tossed him a towel and a pod of water from a nook by the stairs and started down. “He’s already in the first fighting court, over past the ball courts.”
He chugged the water and tossed the weirdly rounded pod into the recycler before drying his head off as they walked down the stairs. “Level with me about this guy. Is he a real fighter or is this more like a character building martial art? He’s not going to hit me with pretend energy blasts and expect me to fall down, right?” Alex had seen all three, though the last one had only been in videos online.
“Master Tenaha is a practitioner of Tsheno. He has won several tournaments, and is at least the most experienced, if not the best fighter alive right now. It is a real martial art, there is physical contact though sparring with a novice is not done at full speed. If you can keep up with him... I will be surprised.” She watched him and shrugged, lips pursed. She didn’t mean to offend, he was just a much more accomplished fighter than Alex. “But you are here to learn.”
“That I am.” First squad was down on the equipment floor, still way in the back toiling away at what appeared to be leg day forever. Well, this was supposed to be a bonding experience or something, and he’d mostly been doing his own thing the whole time. “Hey! You guys want to come watch me get my ass kicked? I’m gonna be sparring with a Tsheno master so he’s probably going to wipe the floor with me.”
The six of them conferred with each other for a moment, looking a bit wary of how he had phrased that before Amalu shouted back, “yes. We will put the equipment up first.”
“We will be in sparring court 1.” Sergeant Zenshen yelled down at them in Tsla before switching back to English as she headed to the door. “Shouldn’t take them long.”
He followed her out. “Gotta say, I am a little surprised they agreed.”
“Everybody likes watching their boss get tossed around.” She said with a laugh, turning down the left hallway. “Hasn’t been an exhibition match in awhile, and I know a lot of our guys are curious about what Human martial arts look like, not just Tenaha.
“Shoot, all right.” He mentally reviewed his MACS training, and reflected on footwork he learned from boxing. He was fine at it, but it should at least be interesting for someone with different legs. Even if he was getting his ass kicked.
They walked down past a lot of other doors, even turned down a side hall before Stana hit the controls and they stepped inside. It wasn’t a particularly big room, but it was long. At least thirty meters deep, but only ten meters wide and half as tall. There were three rings painted on the floor, with one light source over the middle of each one illuminating just the space for sparring. She stuck to the shadows and he followed her, noting that there was also seating along both walls, a few rows of elevated benches.
In the furthest ring sat one very old Tsla’o.
Alex assumed this was Master Tenaha. His head and arms were nearly solid silver, only a few patches of dark blue still showing and he seemed to almost be swallowed up by his training uniform. He was motionless, hands folded in his lap and eyes closed. Meditating, or asleep? Either way, Alex was reasonably sure he had never seen another Tsla’o that old, or in this case, elderly. He leaned over to Zenshen and dropped his voice. “Is that him?”
“Yes.” She glanced over at the master and spoke quietly to Alex. “I do need to warn you to be careful.”
“Right, I’ve seen this movie before. I go ‘hur-dur old man, better watch out!’ and then he smashes me into the ground with his pinky.” He hooked his little finger in the air and flipped his hand over to demonstrate what was about to happen to his face.
“No.” She shook her head, then reconsidered. “Eh, yes, that as well. What I was going to warn you about is that he sprained his left ankle last week and you should avoid striking it. Exploiting an injury may be acceptable while fighting in competition, and preferred when fighting for your life, but in training it is detestable.”
“Oh, all right. That’s fair.” He tossed her the towel and stretched arms briefly, loosening them up for the beating he was about to take.
“Stand at the edge of the ring, introduce yourself, thank him for sparring with you. He’ll reply in the affirmative and then you step in. Starting position is halfway between the bounds and the center.” She dumped his towel directly into a recycler before taking a seat at the top row, sprawling out over one of the benches and setting back to work on her tablet.
Alex’s grasp of Tsla had improved, but only in a general sense. He knew three ways to order tea now. So he formulated a very formal sounding greeting and read the results back in a slow, almost passable Tsla to make it look like he was slightly more competent. “Master Tenaha?”
He stirred, eyes opening and regarding Alex. He nodded and stood, limbs unfolding with a spry grace that belied his age.
“I am Crown Prince Alex Sorenson. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to spar with you.” This would someday get him in trouble, but he just didn’t want to look stupid.
“Please, take your position.” He gestured to the green mat in front of him, a thin line marking where opponents stood.
Alex stepped up and toed the line, mirroring Tenaha’s relaxed posture. The master bowed back to Alex, who matched that motion as well. When he returned to standing, he leaned over, looking past Alex, eyebrows creased with annoyance as footsteps jogged towards them.
“Oh, that’s-” He started in English, catching himself and prepping a ridiculously short phrase in Tsla. “My soldiers.”
“There. That one.” It was an older female voice he didn’t know, commanding. Not one of his soldiers. Someone grabbed his shirt at the shoulder and yanked him around before he could actually look, a fist making contact with his cheek. Alex grunted and adrenaline spiked in his system. The blow was more surprising than painful. It hadn’t been a very good punch, no real follow through. Still, the inside of his cheek was cut on his teeth, the coppery taste of blood coating his tongue.
This kind of made sense. The ability to engage an unexpected attacker was important. Clever that they’d just throw him into it, too.
He leaned into his MACS training. With his height advantage, it was easy to sweep his elbow over his attacker’s arm as he continued rotating the direction he had been pulled, making solid contact with his attacker’s face. Alex threaded his hand down, pulling his assailant’s arm against his ribcage and locking it there. He found himself face to face with someone who was definitely not a soldier. He was clad in an ornate red jacket, and a bit out of shape - it was the first time he’d seen a Tsla’o with jowls.
This guy was pissed, though. The anger on his face was unmistakable, hate burning in his eyes.
Alex took a second to reassess the situation. Going by the cut and decoration of his clothing, he was fairly important. He had brought friends, too, a couple more people moving towards them in the shadows. That’s when he got punched in the jaw again. This wasn’t part of his training.
He was ready for a fight this time. MACS training was for dealing with hostile humans, learning how to beat the living shit out of people as quickly and brutally as possible to dissuade them from wanting to continue. There were a number of differences between the two races, but there were lots of things he could count on being the same.
Alex feinted and twisted away, a quick jab aimed at his assailants throat. This guy had no idea what he was doing, had no guard and was off his balance already. So it was very easy for Alex to grab his head and knee him in the face a few times. Something in there gave way with a dull wet crack.
The male collapsed with a keening whine, cradling his face. Alex was about to stomp on him a few times to ensure he stayed down, but there was a bigger problem right now, a gleaming silver streak smashing into the side of his face.
There was a moment of time gone here. A fraction of a second that no longer existed where he had fallen to his knees, his mouth now filled with shattered teeth and copious amounts of blood. A lot of shouting had started going on around him, and Alex got his arms up just in time to block the second blow that came a moment later, what was clearly a cane being used as a mace, the heavy metal head crushing the muscle and cracking the bone in his left arm. Alex lined himself up with the old male wielding it and spit in his face, as much to clear his mouth as to throw his attacker off.
It worked. The older Tsla’o was horrified by the sudden gift of blood and teeth, taking a step back rather than keeping himself concerned with the fight he was part of. He never saw Tenaha coming, the elderly male stepping up and decking him with what looked a lot like a right cross.
That seemed to work well enough as the second assailant bounced once and laid still. Sergeant Zenshen was up, a pistol out and shouting at the rest of the group that these two had come from to stand down. Where the Sargent had gotten the gun from, he didn’t know. She wasn’t even wearing a belt.
Tenaha offered him a hand up. Still reeling from that blow to his jaw, Alex accepted. He retrieved the cane, its faceted metal handle glittering under the bright light. It really did look like a mace, and felt heavy enough for that likeness to be intentional. He surveyed the group, two more males and a female... No, a Zeshen. The same pale violet fur as Neya, the same amethyst irises.
The similarities ended there. She was much more lean and there was no gentleness in her eyes. The jacket she wore was cut nearly as low as the ones Alex was supposed to wear, in a very rich shade of red... The dense brocade cloth belonged to someone roughly as important as him. Alex stepped towards them, the cane dangling loosely from his hand like the mace it had been used as.
“Alex. What are you doing?” The Sergeant clearly did not want him to get that close.
“I got this...” He was distracted by the sigil this one wore, ignoring the total disdain in her gaze. No, no. He was playing their games right now. The jacket said it was his gaze, so it would be. The Zeshen straightened up as Alex stopped in front of him to investigate the symbol, stooping a little and dripping blood onto the mats. A sword hidden in the sunrise over a planet, surrounded by a gear-star. Alex had seen this before and he knew who the Zeshen was representing.
“You know.” If that’s really how he wanted things to be, Alex would play along. His lips twisted into a malign, bloody grin, adrenaline in his system still muting the pain he was going to be feeling as he met the Zeshen’s gaze. “I had really hoped we’d meet under more pleasant circumstances, dad.”