Chapter Twenty Four
Everyone Has a Bad Reputation
“How do you want to narrow this down?” Sardius asked Jenna as she paced back and forth in front of the huge screen in her bedroom that she learned could become twenty mini-screens at the drop of a hat.
“Let’s see if we can begin by choosing someone locally. How many of the nominees live on Octavia Prime right now?”
“Three hundred and seventeen.”
“See? I’m crazy good at this. Seventy thousand to three hundred. Can you prioritize them by how many times they have been nominated? Most to least?”
Sardius merged all the fields and displayed the picture of one woman. She was very much like a human, except her frizzy hair was horizontally striped. It went from pink to white to pink to white. She also appeared to be in her mid-seventies, if she wasn’t even older than that.
“Who is this?”
“This is Dr. Excelyn Factic. She has been nominated for the position of an Octavian diplomat every single time a position was open for the last thirty years and she’s always ended up refusing. By now, the number of times she has been nominated is in the hundreds,” Sardius explained.
“Why does she refuse?”
“She’s an Octavian doctor and an environmentalist. She lives in a cave off the shore of Pinprick Cove where she treats wounded Octavians using a natural methodology they refuse to administer at other hospitals. She has a very poor reputation because patients die in her care more often than they live, though the survival rate often rides the 50/50 line. Whenever she comes close to accepting the nomination, there are protests and she ends up withdrawing.”
“Does everyone on this planet have a bad reputation?” Jenna moaned.
“Yes,” Sardius shot back. “Everyone has a bad reputation. The reason her patients die is because all of them would have died if not for her treatment. The vast majority of her patients are octopuses that were either refused treatment at the large hospitals or left the hospital because they were given a death sentence whether they stayed or not. All the individuals who have nominated her have been Octavians, not Adamis.”
Jenna’s eyes stayed deadpan as she looked at the screen. “Show me the next candidate.”
Jenna didn’t care to show her feelings on her face, but she had actually taken a very strong liking to Dr. Factic. While Sardius had been ranting, she had been reading facts about the doctor that were displayed on the side. The person with the next most nominations only had thirty-one nominations (hundreds fewer than Excelyn), and to be truthful, Jenna felt like taking that person and crowning them too, but she insisted internally that she needed to be careful and not jump to offer someone a life-long appointment. Not only that, but there were only two possible candidates out of the hundreds Sardius said were available on Octavia Prime. The next most nominated person only had twelve nominations and most of those had come in in the last week. Jenna was going to have to find another pool to pull from.
After looking at the third candidate Jenna said coldly, “Toss the rest. Show me the candidates on the moons. Are there many?”
“There are four hundred on the moons. Would you like me to arrange them according to the number of nominations as well?”
“Please do.”
Jenna sorted out five people from the moons and said, “That’s it. Let’s send invitations to candidates two and three from Octavia Prime and this pile of five candidates from the moons. I want to invite them for interviews.”
“You’re not going to invite Excelyn?’
“Not with the same batch,” Jenna explained briefly. “Hey, do we have a villa or a hotel the interviewees could stay at?”
“There’s a second floating palace nearby. It’s the Sand Palace. Shall I bring it closer for us to use as accommodations for the nominees?”
“We can order the palaces to bridge without getting anyone else involved?”
“Affirmative,” Sardius replied.
“Marvelous. I only want to use it for the time being, eventually it needs to be given to our final diplomat. Until then, I want it used to house our interviewees. Can you arrange for housekeepers and chefs and whatever we need to keep the candidates comfortable for a whole weekend?”
“Smoothie and Vash are more than capable of managing them. You are just one person and your needs scarcely keep them busy. Octavians don’t have weeks or weekends. How much time do you need for interviews?”
“I want half a day, two whole days, and another half day before we send them home.”
“Why so long? We could interview them all over the loudspeaker here without going through any of the trouble of bringing them here. It would be cheaper and probably more effective. I’m not sure I like the way you sorted these candidates.”
Jenna straightened her back and cleared her throat. “Sardius, I cannot disregard nominations. If they were nominated, I have a responsibility to offer them an interview. I don’t have to crown them, but I have to look at them. It’s the only thing that makes sense. I can’t show up here with no information, no connections, no friends, and start randomly choosing people. I have to start with people who came with recommendations. And I want them to come here,” she emphasized.
“Why?”
“I have a variety of reasons. There is a possibility I will not choose any of them. I know I should feel a crushing pressure to get a few diplomats crowned as quickly as possible, both for the Octavians/Adamis Council and for my own sake, because of the threat of instant death, but I don’t. I want to do this right, not quickly. Bring them. I want to see them and get a sense of what I’m up against. If they’re all lovely, we can crown them all and the council can get down to business. Can you come up with a list of three hundred to four hundred interview questions, Sardius?”
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“You’re going to ask them four hundred questions? That’s completely unnecessary. Most questions we have about them can be answered without bothering to speak to them. Most indiscretions and mistakes are on public record.”
“I know. Everyone has a bad reputation,” she chuckled. “Just make a list of questions. The more the better. I also want to put a thirty second forced time gap after each question, so they have to wait before answering the next question.”
“That sounds more like an interrogation than an interview,” Sardius remarked.
Jenna smirked. “Yeah, like sitting through diplomatic meetings isn’t torture. Look, we’re finding out more about them than what we’d learn from the answers to their questions.”
“It will also make the test take over three hours at a minimum.”
“Yes. I don’t want them breezing through it like idiots. Let’s get some questions.”
TWO HOURS LATER…
“All your interview questions suck, Sardius. Where’s the heart? Where’s the soul? Where’s the love for a little lost octopus who has lost his mother?”
Sardius was palpably strained as he answered. “A lot of octopus mothers starve themselves when they are looking after their eggs. By the time the babies are born, the mother is dead.”
“Exactly! And who is going to care for those babies?”
Jenna could almost hear Sardius’ eyebrow twitch over the speaker. “Octavians are not much like humans.”
“Fine, but these questions have no heart. They’re cold, sterile, and dead. Write me new ones. I want those nominees crying into a pancake by the end of their interviews.”
Sardius laughed. “Let’s try something different, Jenna. Let me try asking you some interview questions and see what you think of them? You seem like you want to know every last detail of their lives, so let’s hear you spill every last detail of your life.”
Jenna looked directly into the camera and gave it a flirty smile. “Go ahead and try.”
“Why do you want to be a diplomat for the Octavians?”
“The perks,” Jenna replied without hesitation. “I mean, I had friends and relatives try to set me up on dates when I was on Earth, but I never had them sort through trillions of men to find the perfect man. Even I have to admit, Armen should have been great. There’s more too. The palace, the food… Smoothie is a great cook, and I got something even better than a lover. I got you. I’m doing all this because if I quit, they’ll take you away from me,” she said, pouting her lower lip and fluttering her eyelashes at the camera lens. “I can’t have that.”
“What are you doing?” he asked,his voice stern.
“Answering your questions. What are you waiting for? Ask me another one.”
He said something, but it was blocked out by whatever censure was listening to him.
Jenna tapped her earpiece. Nothing happened. Since he had been blocked before, she just sat and waited for it to pass.
When he was back he said, “I should have sexually harassed you more.”
“Aren’t men supposed to say the other thing? That they should have stopped sexually harassing their boss?”
“Uh… apparently everything we just said was very interesting… to everyone… all of them…”
“And what do they think?”
“You’re too flippant. I’m too flippant. They have left the peace of their lands and oceans in the hands of morons.”
Jenna considered the ceiling. “Morons? Is that what they said? And who was it that said that?”
Sardius blanked out a second time.
When he came back, Jenna thought she could hear him leaning back in his chair with a squeak. “Jenna, the Octavians are all over me. They want me to discourage you from having any kind of a relationship with me. The one I report to is called Blackroom and he’s in charge of the orbital security team that monitors you. He’s relaying instructions that I need to be less friendly with you. That I need to talk like I’m a computer and not a real person because… you see… the council wants you to get together with a real man. They don’t want me to be your husband and they think that’s what you want after the council meeting the other night. They can’t imagine why you’d care if my side of the dialogue is monitored because it’s part of your security detail. They’re wildly opposed to me. They want to know why I’m not talking to you the same way I spoke to Arvantis. They’ve already started making a second list of men for you to choose from. I’ve seen some of their profiles. Some of them are really good. They don’t have a sordid history or…”
“A soft spot for a beautiful blond in danger,” Jenna finished, defining in one line the most threatening thing about her connection to Sardius. “They’re angry that we have any kind of rapport? Get Favel on the line. This is ridiculous. How am I supposed to enjoy my work if I can’t even have a little friendly banter with you?” Jenna stood up. “Give a person permission to marry eight people, and suddenly, not having a significant other is eight times the insult it was when you were single and only allowed one person. Do these people have any sense of how their gift insulted me, when I was raised in partial isolation, just so I could help them in an uncertain future? I didn’t know if they would ever need me. So they did, but I never asked them for a husband. And now they’re crawling down my throat because you’re flirting with me a little. It’s the rudest–”
“I’m so sorry!” a parrot voice squeaked.
“Oh… you got him on the line that quickly,” Jenna said with mild annoyance. “Thanks for coming so fast, Favel. I didn’t think you were on the line and I was blowing off some steam. You weren’t meant to hear that.”
“I’m glad I did hear it,” Favel said. “And normally, you would have been right. I wouldn’t have been able to attend a vocal conversation so quickly, but I expected you to be in touch.”
“Why? Is something going on?” Jenna asked cautiously.
“No. There’s no emergency. It’s just that you’re new and I thought you’d need more support. You should know that a lot of what has been communicated to Sardius about the way he’s talking to you originated from me.”
“So, you’re the one who doesn’t like our friendship?” she asked brittlely.
“When he was given to you, he was not given to you with the intention that he would have a relationship with you. He has a job to do, which is to keep you informed.”
“Do you have any complaints about the information he’s feeding me? You guys are monitoring him, recording him, keeping tabs on him. Is there anything wrong with the information he’s giving me or is it just the tone in which he’s using that’s annoying you?” Jenna wanted to know.
“It’s the tone, some of the words… it doesn’t feel professional,” Favel said with a hiss.
Jenna took a deep breath and then a few maddened steps around the room before she answered in a fit of wrath, “I love it. Back off. Surely if he and I are alone in a conference, we can say whatever we’d like to say to each other without having our work interrupted over his bloody tone. If he speaks to anyone else and his tone is off, feel free to censure him, but if I’m alone with him, I’d like him all to myself. We’re getting work done, making plans that are not even a little bit stupid, and he’s not reading me a novel while I lounge around in the bathtub. Could we set some boundaries that make sense? You guys let Arvantis beat his wife, but I’m getting attitude about a little flirting?” Jenna stopped her rant, wishing immediately that she had not mentioned Arvantis.
Favel waited a moment also, obviously thinking before he replied. “This is why the council interpreted your request to have him go unrecorded as a request to make Sardius your third husband. Only someone who has signed personal contracts with you can overwrite the contracts he already has with you as a political figure. If you want us to stop recording him, you’re going to have to overwrite his contracts with a marriage contract.”
“What about the security clearance? Didn’t we agree at the meeting that if I got a few more diplomats, you’d remove the recording devices?” Jenna asked.
“I’m afraid you’re going to need both if you want Sardius’ record feed to stop, but there is one thing I can do for you today. We can refrain from interfering in your meeting over something as minor as tone. If his speech crosses the line, we will talk to you about it during a scheduled meeting unless there is a security breach.”
“That sounds reasonable. Thank you.”
Favel hesitated to say goodbye. “I have to tell you one more time that I don’t like this.”
Jenna did not share his concern. “Thank you for that. I’ll give it some more thought. There’s plenty of time to make a decision.”