Beecham and Meeker arrive late afternoon on a shuttle from Aelea. This is the first time Meeker’s been back since our return to Earth more than a year ago. I appreciate the level of awe that Meeker has and I definitely laugh as they both say “woah” as the shuttle door opens and they feel the wave of aether flow into the ship.
“Morning gentlemen! Welcome to Elysium. Meeker, this is Jenna DeGurgis, head of my personal guard and hand to hand trainer when I’m not engaged in dangerous bullshit.” I get both of them to chuckle at that. “Meeker here is a saber master and uses a type of tele-kinetic force to augment his saber technique. Beecham is an Elementalist and an Elemental Blacksmith.”
“Now that we’ve done introductions.” I smile and wrap Beecham in a big hug. “Have I told you how much I appreciate you lately?”
“My last shipbuilding bonus was nice, keep that coming.” He taps my back telling me that it’s time to let go.
“I can’t wait to see what you’ve done to the Galilei!” I start bouncing in excitement.
“Powerful Empress, still a massive nerd.” He smiles at me and offers me a hand to shake. “Good to see you under better circumstances.” I feel a pulse in my hand, which I immediately pull away from the greeting.
“Did you just inspect me?!” I wipe my hand off hoping to get the feeling off and it doesn’t work. “Don’t do that without their permission while we’re here. Ugh, that feels gross.”
“Most people can’t feel it. I’m surprised you can. The only thing I got from you is that you have more aether than I can fathom. I will ask those that wish training from me. It gives me a good appraisal of their abilities.”
“I have enough aether to make both you and Beecham sick. I don’t want to fight about something like this, but with more aether users coming about, I would like some restraint on invasion of privacies.”
“Interesting statement coming from the woman who sent a swarm on more than seven billion people.”
Jenna walks around me to stand next to Meeker, very close to him.
I shrug, “True. But everyone could have chosen to back out, and I’m sure some did. The difference here is that most people you meet won’t be strong enough to push back against your pulse. Tell me, Troy, you seem ready to fight, why are you here?”
He breathes deeply, looks up at Jenna then back at me. “There are a lot of rumors going around Earth about you, and none of them are good. Whereas people on Aelea don’t seem to know much about you, but what they do know is that you live in excess don’t use your wealth to benefit the people.”
I start laughing. Hard. “Don’t do anything for the people? Those entitled shitbags. Did they tell you they live in the city I built for free? Not even store operators pay rent. They don’t pay for basic food, and all I ask is for them to pay if they want to own the building or the land they live on. I expect them to pay taxes on business and personal profits so that I can build more city for the simply massive amount of people that want to travel here. I have other money-making interests that I put back into the Empire so that people don’t have to pay more.” I take a second to breathe.
“I’m trying to run this Empire with ten fucking people and with a Navy of a couple hundred. Now tell me what those ungrateful fuckers are complaining about so I can try to fix it or tell me where to send you money and get to fucking work!” I’m breathing heavy at this point, I didn’t know that I was insecure about how I was handling administration, but apparently I’ve got some things to handle once I’m through with this . . . whatever this greeting turned into.
Meeker has a shocked look on his face, and Beecham is looking at Meeker like he kicked a puppy. I take a second to tell the shuttle operator that they’re fine to take off. The bay begins to close and Meeker seriously considers leaping back on board.
“You’re going to finish this contract Meeker. You should do some actual research before you accuse people of shit. The majority of Humanity doesn’t appreciate what they are given. They learn to expect it and try to find a way to get more for free. I don’t give away money. Period. I expect to be paid back in products or services. Like training aether users to better themselves.”
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
Meeker doesn’t say anything as he walks away, stomps a little, but nothing more than an angry child would do.
“Sorry Admiral, he seemed so eager to help. I had no idea.”
“Not your fault, Chief. Though I’m pretty sure he was thinking about trying to kill me.”
“I saw it too. That’s why I moved between you.” She put a hand on my back and thumbs a stripe of comfort.
It makes sense that Meeker would try to be a warrior for justice, it’s just too bad that he’s gullible and doesn’t do research. Here I am trying to trust folk. Shame on me right?
Beecham excuses himself and trots after the would-be Jedi.
“What do you want me to do about this? I worry about fomenting rebellion.”
“Me too. Keep an eye out for any one on one convo’s he has outside of the training ring. I may need to be off planet during these six weeks, so either you stay or find someone to take your place. I hate that this changes my plans. Sometimes I just want to space everyone that pisses me off. Speaking of, how good are you at working through surprises?”
“I can do my Job, Penny.” Oh, well, I did not mean to offend her.
“Hey, no hon. I wasn’t trying to say you couldn’t.” I get close and whisper, “I can so some fairly gruesome teleport shenanigans.” And then I hug her, because she’s so close and the way Meeker was looking at me like the enemy, again, has me rattled a little.
After a rather indiscrete butt grab, Jenna leads me over to a training ring and tells me to pull out some knives. She shows me how to fight with one knife and drills the basics into me. Don’t defend with the knife unless you have two. Keep both arms up, stab and keep your hands inside your shoulders, and for Andromeda’s sake, don’t lunge, it’s not fencing.
She pulls out her EVA suit gloves on and spars with me a little while I have a knife in hand. I trust that she knows what she’s doing. She comes at me with a fist and a knife hand and jabs the shit out of my chest and ribs with her fingers while I try to stab my girlfriend. I think I see an opening, but Jenna blocks away with her fisted hand and buries a punch with the other right under my ribs. My feet lift from the ground a little before she lets me drop to the ground.
“That, right there is one of the goals of a knife fight. A stunning blow would give me enough time to finish you, disarm you, or run away. Choosing when and how to get hurt for your advantage is a valuable skill in every style of combat. There are very few circumstances where a single touch is fatal.”
I don’t remotely entertain replying. I have no food to throw up, but if I did. Wait, fuck. I vomit some aether on the ground. “I know I need this lesson, but hells, woman. That sucked.” I get to my feet with a wobble and a wince, thinking I could use some juice to wash down the aether-bile I just figured out I can vomit.
“Don’t even think about pumping for speed Penny. You need to learn this the right way, because the wrong way faster is still wrong.”
Over the next hour, I get a few touches on her gloves, but nowhere near her body. Jenna, however hits me everywhere but the face and I finally call it for lunch when she jackhammers my boob. For a moment, I want to stab her for real.
I scowl at her and teleport away without bringing her with. Petty vengeance. Heh, Penny vengeance. I scrub up and grab a clandestine nibble of Galaxy fruit to help fix my bruising. While I could use meds, my Body of Power is high enough to heal with sending aether to my wounds. Makes me wonder for a second why it hurts so much to get hit when it does comparatively little damage.
It’s because the Matrix still codifies you as human. You have human based pain observance with a mediocre pain suppression. If you were classified as a Golem with mediocre pain suppression, you would merely have been tickled.
I think it’s funny that the Matrix has lead me the golem route when my personal preference would have been fairy.
Faeries, whether real or not, are not a part of the Matrix. From the assimilation of your culture’s tales and histories, Faeries are essentially beings that were magically manifested by a quartet of Magically powerful Queens. Very little is known about how the Queens came to be. So until you are capable of manifesting a body, you’re stuck in between.
Holy cow, Tessa. Did we get our permissions relaxed again? ‘Cause that seems like a lot of inside knowledge.
Mmm, not as such. There’s a subset that I’m not allowed to discuss unless you ask about it. Like your notifications, Andromeda has decided to gate your knowledge through your ability to focus.
Well, shit. A hyper-intelligent, galaxy-spanning Matrix is teaching me a lesson. I am both flattered and annoyed. Andromeda, you’re a bitch, but I love you. I hear a ‘shoomp’ behind me, the characteristic noise of a delivery. I open the case and find a rolled up piece of papyrus? I unroll it and the grossest cackle of my life erupts from me until it overtakes me and I fall over laughing.
Dear Empress Astoria,
You are cordially invited to go fuck yourself.
--A.M.