The Universal Order of Nations

You know the name.

Samarys, even to the untrained eye, was obviously new. From its low population to its partially-unfinished infrastructure, its dubiously-shiny buildings and empty roadways, and its fields that were in many cases more dirt than grass, Samarys presented itself as a Dominion without a people, and a project without an end date. Indeed, those few who made Samarys home were mostly unwilling residents, always comparing their bleak surroundings to places far away and lost to time, hoping still, even now, to one day return to those parts of Honorias that had been the pride of their ancestors until, with a finality Honorias had never quite matched since, they had been destroyed – by the Vapor of Sharpness Everlasting, perhaps, or by the unhurried death squads of the Ash Banner.

The Colonies of Inanius, once a glorious attempt to create a corporate fiefdom in newly-claimed space, had mostly been given over to the image of a permanent refugee camp, and nowhere was this more apparent than Samarys, the very edge of Honorian influence in the Orion Spur, beyond even the Lawgiver’s usually-comprehensive itinerary. Here was a habitat pressed into service long before its intended opening, without facilities, offices, bureaus, governing structures, or authoritative staff who might otherwise have filled those offices, bureaus, and departments. Into this place, against their will, came migrants on a permanently-paused journey, defeated and embittered, uncivilized in their despair and uninterested in whatever authority might call on them to move on from it. Living amongst the relics of a project intended for the rich and powerful – gleaming office buildings, state-of-the-art docking facilities, impossibly-wide boulevards cut deep into Samarys’s urban center stretching from one end of the city to the other – they were given all the more reason to submit to anger at their lot, to see but never to have, and to mourn but never to reclaim. They were, in short, corruptible… and not only by their natural feelings.

Those who had fled the shadow of the March did not always cleanly escape the cloud that glowered over their flight. Those who had come to rest upon Samarys, willingly or no, did not always appreciate the supposed blessings of Sharpness Everlasting’s divine aid. And Vapor always, always had blessings to give.

All of these things together explained why a white-furred Sadrithian topping out at twelve feet tall, complete with a withered tentacle trailing down his right-front leg, was brandishing a pistol and an oversized hammer in a dark corner of the habitat’s central control bunker, glaring at the only other person in the room as though the sight of his lightweight armor and mask, decked out in yellow and red, were a personal affront. <You are a blundering child, Enesa Jeopardy,> the albino declared, his tail blade cracking in the air above his head even as he waved his hammer about with the intensity of his anger. <Your vaunted Captain should have taught you: This place has been plundered already. Why would I be here, unless to trap you where no one will ever think to look for you again?>

Enesa Jeopardy glared from behind his mask, tail blade ready but not, admittedly, very steady as he faced down the very dangerous weapons in a very dangerous man’s hands. <The Captain knows exactly where to find me,> he asserted. <Not that I need to wait for him to have a handle on you. You make a threatening case, Devourer, but you’re not going to add to the colony’s death totals today any more than you were going to yesterday when you robbed the irrigation offices and left everyone there alive and healthy. You don’t want official attention on this colony any more than anyone else does, and you’re not going to do anything that will threaten that.>

(Left unmentioned was the reason that an office building associated with the habitat’s irrigation control should have enough money on hand to warrant a robbery in the first place. In those places where necessary infrastructure was incomplete, particularly in terms of automation, the embittered and often-desperate residents of Samarys often had no qualms about privatizing whatever public services they could acquire by trickery or force. Irrigation might have been irregular in some parts of Samarys, but those prepared to pay hefty fees tended to have the greenest fields of the colony.)

<I have always avoided bloodshed among my fellow colonists,> the so-called Devourer answered easily. <But you are not a colonist, are you? You are nameless, faceless… and without an identity, your death will mean nothing to anyone outside this colony. Perhaps the Captain will mourn you – but you should have learned by now that you are not the first to call yourself Jeopardy, and he will surely find another to take your place when you fall. Enesa, Enesa, what a lie for those of us with memories longer than the past six months…>

<There is only ever one Jeopardy, Devourer, and I am him today,> Enesa Jeopardy hit back, though he was clearly stung by the implication. <Surrender your weapons now, or answer to the Captain when he arrives.>

The Devourer replied by snapping his tail blade forward, prompting Enesa Jeopardy to block it clumsily with his own. The strength of the blow alone was enough to make Jeopardy stumble, but even then it had been naught but a feint: The Devourer’s hammer came up like a thunderclap, and Jeopardy fell to the ground with a snap of bone, his arm limp and flailing. The Devourer slammed his front hoof onto the floor in front of the stunned Jeopardy’s nose, taunting his downed opponent, before his tail blade came crashing down –

A personal shield snapped into being around Jeopardy’s prone body, sparing his life. The Devourer immediately backed away, his eyestalks sweeping the darkened room for another intruder even as he leveled his gun at his downed opponent. <Your tricks won’t withstand a sustained barrage, Captain,> he snarled. <Reveal yourself, or I’ll put a few bullets into your comrade that you’ll have a hard time explaining to whatever family he has left.>

<No need to be threatening,> replied Captain Sam as he emerged from the shadow of a nearby doorway, darkness clinging to him and his own deep-red armor as he stepped fully into the control room. <Whether you believe it or not, I guarantee already that Enesa Jeopardy would be missed without delay, even if neither you nor I cared to report on it. He is a colonist, rest assured, and so is every member of his family he cares to claim. You will do well not to antagonize the people of Samarys so blindly.>

The Devourer swept his gun away from the fallen Jeopardy toward the Captain, sending shots flying toward his more senior opponent. Captain Sam dodged quickly to the side, ducking behind a control console that already showed signs of extreme abuse from previous scavengers, so that it didn’t even bother to spark as bullets perforated its exterior shell. Before the Devourer could shoot again, the Captain sprang up from behind another console entirely and rushed toward him from the rear; the albino caught sight of him immediately, but with the shadows clinging to his form it was impossible to aim a blow accurately, and the Devourer’s tail blade soared through empty space. Captain Sam responded by tossing a miniature flare toward the Devourer as he galloped forward, forcing the larger man to turn all of his eyes away to avoid the blinding flash. Recognizing the tactic for what it was, knowing that he could no longer see the Captain’s approach, the Devourer galloped hard in his turn, trying to put space between himself and the colony’s best enforcer – and Captain Sam appeared in front of him, emerging from the long shadows created by the bright flash of light to bar the Devourer’s way, another shield shimmering into place to keep his target contained. The Devourer swung his hammer, hopeful that he could break through the barrier with brute force, only to stumble as he was rebuffed.

Then another tail blade crashed against the distracted brute’s back, driving the Devourer to his knees. Behind him, still cradling his damaged arm, Enesa Jeopardy had gotten back to his feet, glaring at his downed opponent as he stepped forward. One eyestalk rose to meet Captain Sam’s gaze. <Thanks for the save.>

<You wouldn’t have needed it if you had taken the time to think, Enesa,> the Captain grumped, stepping forward through the now-flickering shield and kicking the Devourer’s dropped gun away. His own tail blade came down with a bang on the stunned giant’s head, knocking him out cold; like his sidekick, he struck only with the flat of his blade, unwilling to kill even a deadly enemy for fear of closer outside attention. <We’ve been up here two times already. You know there’s nothing up here worth a criminal’s time!>

Jeopardy looked askance at his partner. <What about that stash of The West’s Best Equisians videos we dug up last time?>

<You know perfectly well those weren’t real Equisians,> Sam snapped back. <Those videos wouldn’t have made ten Isaurian sherds on the open market and you know it. No, you fell into an obvious trap for the second time this week, and once again I had to abandon a lead on the Ranger case in order to rush here to rescue you. Do I have to stuff your sister into that costume to see if she’d figure the job out more quickly?>

<Hey, don’t bring my sister into this,> snapped Jeopardy, pointing a threatening finger at the Captain even as his other arm hung limp. <I’m ten times the man she’ll ever be…> The ridiculousness of that statement hung between the two for a moment before Jeopardy added, <She’ll drive you insane before the end of your first investigation and you know it.>

Captain Sam held his younger partner’s gaze for a long moment, prepared to argue, before he blinked and replied, <Yeah, I can’t argue with that.> He shook his head. <Whatever. We’re safe, we’re done here, and we can get the Devourer back to jail before he wakes up and decides to get cranky again – >

Both partners’ eyestalks glanced down at the floor below them… which was conspicuously empty of a giant albino Sadrithian with a vestigial tentacle limb and a bad attitude. Their main eyes, still looking at one another, widened in horror. <He’s gone!> they exclaimed simultaneously.

<Quick, the elevator!> began Jeopardy, already turning to sprint away from the control room.

Captain Sam was already gone. <Already ahead of you!> he replied as the sound of hoofbeats pounded down the corridor in the distance. <I think I see him moving to the second floor…>

Another day passed in Samarys, the newest and least-remembered Colony of Inanius. Its people, bitter and yearning, lived in the polluted remnants of someone else’s industrial dreams. Some took their circumstances poorly. Others made it their mission to protect the many from the superpowered tantrums of the few. Through it all, the golden rule was only this: that nothing be done to attract the eyes of Congress, Command, or the nation as a whole.

For that, the good and the bad alike had reason to thank Captain Sam and his young partner in justice, Enesa Jeopardy.

You flashed your colors at me way prematurely…

The day before the election, as excited pundits both on and off the Lawgiver looked forward to a long day of electoral returns and vote counting, the capital ship’s crew considered their own preparations for the upcoming (potential) transfer of power. The newly-elected would be expected to board the Lawgiver within a week of their victory, while those ousted from their positions needed to be shown the exit within the day; with Congress consisting of hundreds of representatives, the range from minimal change to government purge was a vast one, and the Lawgiver had to be ready for either extreme and every possible variation of in-between. Clearances had to be produced for every newly-elected official and rescinded from every former representative – and the respective staff of each – all of whom had to be ferried to and from the most important and secure warship in Honorias. Elections, in short, were a headache for the Lawgiver’s crew, usually tempered by a small shot of vindictive pleasure when it came for their own turn to cast a vote… while possessing much more intimate knowledge of the incumbent candidates than almost anyone else in Honorias could claim. There was a reason that the Lawgiver’s crew, and servicemen within the Capital Fleet more generally, voted in prodigiously-high numbers to replace the status quo with new faces year after year after year.

They would surely get their wish this year. The electorate was furious at the unflinching perfidy of Congress’s representatives, brought to power by promises they never even pretended to keep, and happy to demonstrate their authority over everyone and everything except their paymasters in the Western March – where such authority was needed the most, of course. Opinion polls throughout Honorias were thorough in their denouncement of Congress’s current course and general behavior, to the point that one local publication from Hairan jokingly added an option declaring, I’d Rather Vote for Al-Esh, only for surveyed citizens to select that option enough times to attract threats of a government investigation on the Chamber floor. Several veteran representatives had already resorted to flamboyant displays of dissent against the prevailing political direction, seemingly to no avail. President Valley Shadow, powerless in his position of ultimate authority, had already resigned himself to the end of his once-promising career. Bureaucrats, separate from but inextricably linked with the politicians of Congress, struggled to erase their names from every record of policy implementation over the course of the past year, fearful that associating themselves with unpopular policies would destroy their livelihoods while equally frightened that future historians might discover some less-than-enthusiastic implementation of Congress’s declared policy and call the bureaucracy’s impartiality into question. Aides for all of these people rushed to and fro throughout the ship, seeking last-minute agreements from their counterparts in other government offices for one last day of debate in Congress before the powers of their masters dissolved and disappeared. And, to the side, the media, the crew, and the few honored visitors to the Lawgiver watched on with fascination and no small amount of glee, knowing that this blatant pack of fraudsters was soon to get its long-awaited reward for a year of disservice.

The crew, drilled to perfection by the long-serving Captain Long Tail, did its duty regardless of the circumstances. Nothing, either disaster or heightened anticipation, could be allowed to interrupt the daily functions of the Lawgiver, the first and finest ship of Honorias. Thus, even as tension built and eyes turned to the distant Dominions – as if paying them greater attention would bring news of their votes a whole day early – the ship and its crew continued with their daily tasks, altering their course only as the necessity of the election required. Of course there would be enhanced attention on the Lawgiver during this process; of course there would be a massive increase in the workload; and of course there would be the usual last hurrah instigated by a collection of egotistical fools whose time of power was now tangibly coming to an end. The crew had seen it all before, and the ship had withstood it all time and again since its inauguration.

Each election day, as well as the hectic days preceding and following on from it, had idiosyncrasies, of course. Veteran crew members still claimed to shudder at the memory of a year in which not a single representative was sent away by the public’s vote, which supposedly prompted such an outrage among a fellowship of defeated candidates that they attempted to smuggle themselves aboard the Lawgiver to stage a disruptive protest; the stories of just what trouble these would-be politicians caused for the ship’s crew as they were rooted out before they could interrupt the business of Congress, or the smooth operation of an active warship for that matter, were so outlandish that newer crew members had come to regard them as fancy and embellishment, as opposed to an accurate retelling. There were multiple years in which security protocols had to be adjusted to account for the election of representatives with previous criminal records, who had been sent to the Lawgiver as either a protest against the law or a statement of trust in their rehabilitation – or, most usually, as a demonstration of national ignorance regarding the nature of the candidates on offer. Compared to these strange frustrations, even the predicted purge of Congress’s incumbent representatives would be a simple affair, made simpler by the evident disinterest of those same representatives in maintaining their offices of power (at least if their lackluster reelection campaigns were any indication). There would surely be more traffic, at first going as the old representatives departed, and then coming as the newly-elected politicians arrived to begin their terms, but that was well within the ability of the Lawgiver’s crew to manage. Indeed, the unexpected request of a chartered passenger liner for clearance to dock with the capital ship and disembark a full complement of angry (but peaceful, law-abiding!) protesters, intent on mocking the departure of their hated representatives for all the nation’s press to see, only solidified the crew’s general opinion that this year’s election would be more entertaining than troublesome overall.

The assigned civilian hangar was unsurprisingly filled with members of the media when the liner, appropriately (and likely intentionally) named People’s Witness, set down with a fanfare of horns and pre-recorded orchestral accompaniment. Officers kept watch as the disembarkation began, ostensibly as part of their duties as opposed to any curiosity or smug sense of justice – they were, after all, strictly impartial – casting their eyes and sensory instruments over the crowd as men and women largely hailing from Berandas, a known quantity of anti-Marcher sentiment ever since its new colonists had arrived to discover just what Sharpness Everlasting had done to the Dominion’s previous population, organized themselves into an orderly line, rolled out their banners and lifted their signs, and struck up a semi-respectable tune with which to march throughout the public areas of the Lawgiver, particularly those surrounding the Chamber of Congress, according to a path that had been provided to their leaders by Captain Long Tail in accordance with long-standing policies on non-essential access. Even ignoring the earlier-referenced attempt by disgruntled candidates to smuggle themselves onto the Lawgiver, the super dreadnought had played host to legitimate protests and demonstrations before; this was an unusual case and an unusual cause, but not an unusual event in and of itself.

The captain and most of his officers went back to their business, while the media kept their cameras on the protesters as they began their rounds of the capital ship. They began with the main corridors leading away from the hangars, populated mainly by security officers and on-call assault forces that enforced Long Tail’s prescribed march route, but likewise traveled by several of the political aides whose scurrying had taken them too far from the safety of the representatives’ private chambers and offices. Held in place by the mass of newcomers flowing down the corridor, these aides were made to wait until the whole parade had passed them by, at which point the head of the march was already in sight of the ship’s central plaza. This large open space, designed in the style of a Sadrithian city square in the heart of an active warship, was bounded by the fashionable facades of civilian apartment complexes, markets and entertainments to service them, and the public entrance to the political spaces of the Lawgiver, a door that opened directly into the antechamber of the Chamber of Congress. By Captain Long Tail’s instructions, the protest march was not permitted to get any closer to the Chamber than this – there was not enough room in the antechamber for so many people at once, and furthermore it was unlawful to disrupt the business of Congress while it was in session, as such a gathering outside of the sealed doors of the Chamber would surely and intentionally do. But the plaza was spacious enough to allow for some delay in the march’s progression, as its leaders focused their attention on the doors leading to the antechamber and to the representatives doubtlessly hiding in the sealed Chamber beyond, calling for reforms, demanding satisfaction, and accusing the elected officials of Honorias of betraying their oaths and their nation for their personal gain.

Long minutes later, as the last few stragglers of the march shoved their way into the now-packed plaza to add their clamoring hooves and beating drums to the cacophony that was already driving the observing reporters mad, the doors to the political antechamber suddenly and unexpectedly opened. The leading group of protesters faltered in surprise as President Valley Shadow, accompanied by a quartet of guards, stepped out through the doorway into the open air, meeting the eyes of as many front-rank protesters as he could as he came to a stop just out of their reach. Quickly enough, the protesters pushed aside their shock, helped in large part by the noise and energy of the marchers behind them who could not see, or else simply had not noticed, the President’s arrival; demands went up, almost incomprehensible considering the number of complainants presenting their widely-varied grievances to Valley Shadow at the same moment. The President looked on without reply, taking in the crowd and the noise as stoically as he could before bowing his head and letting the accusations and demands crash over him.

It was a victory for the protesters, seen and recorded by the accompanying media frenzy, and more than a few newcomers erupted into celebrations as they took in Valley Shadow’s defeated countenance. But to accept these accusations of ineptitude was Valley Shadow’s only reaction; without any other interaction, what were the protesters to do now? Their leaders, purposely marching beside the loudest drummers for just this reason, signaled to their partners, and the chaotic banging, stomping, and screeching of instruments farther back were overcome with a regular cascade of booms, drawing all attention to the front of the march and, importantly, to the demands of the protesters’ organizers and spokesmen. The echoes of the drums faded into the corridors and hallways of the capital ship. The reporters and onlookers, as well as many of the protesters, recovered their wits and turned their eyes back to the President and his opponents. And the foremost marcher stepped forward, dangerously close to the scowling guards in front of him, and demanded, <Where are the traitors who abandoned their oaths and promises to the people of Honorias?>

President Valley Shadow replied simply, <They are going home.>

_ _ _ _ _ _

As the echoes of drums faded in the corridors behind them, Summer Gust and Illustrious Descent let their eyestalks wander across the almost-abandoned hangar one last time. Being the primary civilian port of entry into the capital, it was, while not sumptuous, certainly impressive in its style and elegance; this was the first glimpse given to those lucky enough to visit the seat of Honorian government, and it was built to give a good account of itself to those who would likely never see the Lawgiver again. It was also almost never this empty: Eyes were understandably on the angry mob marching through the center of the most important ship in Honorias, and it was only a small gathering, not including the crew of the People’s Witness, that looked on in disbelief as the representatives of Congress stole away aboard the very ship that had been brought to the Lawgiver to condemn them.

As the last of their colleagues got aboard the waiting liner, chartered for this purpose no matter what the political activists had been led to believe, Summer Gust finally sighed and turned an eyestalk toward his colleague. <This was not how I imagined that my political career would end,> he admitted.

<How many of us imagined that we would get into politics at all?> Illustrious Descent responded. <I was a business executive before they brought me in to organize protest marches. I didn’t realize that working on the side like that was going to take over my actual career – until they instructed me to run for office, anyway.>

Summer Gust nodded slowly. <I never meant to leave Sadrith,> he agreed. <And once I was forced to leave in the war anyway, I decided that I would never leave Inanius. I wanted to ensure that there would never be another war, and that the West and the East could go their separate ways in peace. I’m not surprised that they liked my opinion, but I am surprised that they knew anything about it before they came to me in the first place.> The representative threw a brief and undeserved glare at the People’s Witness as he added, <Now that I leave my home once again, perhaps I will ask them how they came to know of me when we arrive in Dagon.>

<It is not a bad home,> Illustrious Descent promised. <At least, Holamayan has never been a bad home. If Dagon is not the same… you will be welcome in my Dominion, Summer Gust. I’m sure they’ll take care of us, one way or another.>

<They have so far.>

The two were not always friends, and indeed their shared time in Congress had seen plenty of debates between them – particularly where Summer Gust’s pragmatism and Illustrious Descent’s zeal came into conflict, often enough when they backed the same general policy. But they were partners in a strange time, seeking power to defend the document that had returned their nation to peace even as their fellow citizens demanded that document’s dissolution; and so it was that they had joined with their colleagues to defy their whole people, for the benefit of the nation, and of course for personal benefits to themselves. Generations of Honorians would vilify their actions, but, no matter their regrets, Summer Gust and Illustrious Descent felt no little pride in their accomplishments. The March was as secure as a year’s delay could make it. Command was well-funded and – importantly – turned toward foreign threats, engaged in keeping Honorias safe rather than turning their guns against fellow Honorians. Those who might have threatened Honorian independence were neutered. Those who sought Honorias’s safety were counted as friends to the nation. No matter who won the election the following day, this Congress had done its part to defend the rule of law at home and the defense of Honorias abroad, and the abrogation of those policies by any following legislature would be nothing short of treasonous. The representatives of Honorias, their duty done, could depart the Lawgiver with clear consciences.

And as the People’s Witness, now observed by so few curious eyes save for the attentive records-men of the Lawgiver’s bridge and the cold gaze of Captain Long Tail, rose from the hangar deck one last time, the representatives of Congress (for one day more, at least) relaxed at long last. The capital had been their residence for a year, but it had never been their home. Now, at long last, they were free – well-rewarded and free.

Protest all you like before the empty Chamber, Summer Gust thought to himself, an eyestalk trained on the Lawgiver’s dwindling thruster flares. Your children will thank us, even if you will not.

And now I know what you’re up to, and it feels so good.

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.*

Dagon bustled as it so often did in the mid-afternoon of the colony cylinder, its roadways filled with the traffic of industry and business. Precious few had the time or the inclination for recreation in these trying times, their attention taken by their work and their masters whether willingly or not. Only the magnates gave heed to leisure, and even then rarely, for fear that their distraction might afford some rival an advantage otherwise denied. For the rest, and for the Dominion, pleasure was a distant memory, subsumed like a river valley as the dam rises at its mouth by the dread of tomorrow and the torment of today.

It was perhaps not the glorious rule that First Senses had imagined for himself, in those heady days of laying his plots and positioning his people to affect the freedom of the Western March. Now, far from clandestine meetings and the passage of secrets that the Lawgiver was never meant to know, the Sadrithian executive was beset by administrative minutiae, bureaucratic forms and domestic disgruntlement combining to sap First Senses’ time, energy, and enthusiasm for the task he had undermined the entire democratic process to acquire for himself. Added to this burden was the knowledge of the coming storm: Honorias had cast off its cancerous leadership, the weight placed there by First Senses’ plotting, only to replace it with a strong bulwark of decisive and militant action. All of First Senses’ preparations for the inevitable conflict were soon to be put to the test… and for all his confidence, the would-be master of the March almost dreaded the days of victory, and the decay of his euphoria by means of paperwork and further, increased, and extended administrative drudgery.

Sometimes, in the dark of the night, First Senses almost wanted to see his modest empire crumble before the guns of the Honorian fleet, if only to relieve him of the prospect of further unprofitable work – if only it wouldn’t cost him his life. But then in the light of day, looking out at the industry of Dagon trundling on without the interference of ignorant politicians and an angry public, First Senses remembered why he had chosen this path, and took pride in his accomplishments even as he suffered the indignity of bureaucratic nonsense and the tedium of multi-Dominion oversight.

And sometimes, on a rare occasion and for a very brief time, First Senses did allow himself a short break, to relax and enjoy the world he was building for himself. It was frustrating, tedious, and laborious – but it was his, and it was obscenely profitable besides. It was an empire of his own making, in its way more impressive than the established state that had preceded his efforts, and he was duly proud of it. And, in those rare moments of relaxation, First Senses saw no reason not to show his people just how proud he was of the place he had made, in which they persisted in their miserable lives.

Sometimes First Senses even made an event of it… which, if nothing else, tended to disrupt the productivity of the rest of the Dominion, to the detriment of whatever rivals of industry might otherwise have taken advantage of his inattention.

At the height of the mid-afternoon rush, with streets and avenues clogged with the trucks and vans of two thousand deliveries, a massive airship equipped with bright lights and holographic displays lit up the skies, all but blinding the city below and illuminating the clouds for any observers on the cylinder’s opposite side. Blaring music split the peace of the countryside and the busy preoccupation of the city worker alike, causing eyes throughout Dagon to rise in surprise and consternation, and then to wince at the blinding glare they encountered. Practically every noise emanating from the surface, from radio music to the sirens of emergency vehicles, subsided under the overwhelming volume of the airship’s stated intent, to draw the attention of the whole Dominion unto itself. And after a long moment, having accomplished this goal without doubt, as the traffic of Dagon City came to a halt and the grasses of the farmland glittered under the light of a new sun, the colors and displays surrounding the airship resolved themselves into identifiable shapes, a face in the sky gazing down at the multitude, his sense of superiority so obviously etched into his expression that even a blind man could have seen it. The music, too, finally faded into the background, reduced to the role of accompaniment as a new sound rose from the airship’s speakers: a voice, Isaurian based on the accent, speaking the words of the would-be master of the Western March for as long as no one dared to oppose him.

“Greetings to my people,” boomed the voice from above, as the holographic face of First Senses was marred by a written transcript of the words appearing under its chin. “You who live and work under my watch, my fellow Dagonites, pay heed to these words of First Senses, who channels your efforts for the betterment of our Dominion and the freedom of our March.” The image enlarged to show First Senses’ torso in addition to his head, allowing him to reach out to embrace his captive audience below. “Your labors are long and difficult, and for this past year you have been unsure if they would ever be rewarded as they deserved. Now the time of discovery is upon us! Let there be no uncertainty: The people of Honorias, our erstwhile brethren, have declared themselves our enemies, choosing for their masters the military authorities who have vowed to crush our hard-won freedoms and drag us back into the crushing grip of far-off tyrants. Such a fate was barely avoided only a year ago, owing to our combined efforts and a plan of my own devising. Now a year’s preparation defends us against this enraged mob, maddened by imagined slights made real by their own ignorant missteps.

“Yet you ask me: ‘What preparation?’” First Senses’ expression grew increasingly smug. “Fear not, my people, for I have not been idle. The Western March is beset by the anger of its parent, it is true, but we are defended by forces no less potent or numerous than the vessels of Honorian Command. We, too, possess and maintain a dedicated force of soldiery, against which hardened foes will stumble. We have invited many friends to assist us in our quest to protect our deserved and hitherto-unassailable freedoms, who share my vision for the Western March and will fight beside us to defend it. We have entangled our erstwhile masters in diverse conflicts abroad, inconsequential to the survival of the state and yet impossible to simply leave behind, lest the reputation of Honorias be stained by the implication of cowardice in the eyes of its hard-won allies. And we have reminded the people and the representatives of Honorias of the real dangers arrayed against their nation, quite apart from the terror they feel at the very thought of our rightful and legally-bound autonomy, and have urged and compelled them to confront these actual threats before Honorias itself comes to harm, consequently reducing Command’s ability to attack the March with the intent to enslave. Through these efforts, I have guaranteed the security of the Western March for a generation, and I intend to continue my work until generations beyond counting enjoy the same guarantee. Thus have I manifested in reality that which was a mere dream only a short year ago.”

First Senses bowed his head, imitating the humility expected of Honorian leaders’ public personae. “In your service,” his hired voice declared, “I have set the Lawgiver against its people and the military against the common good. By these efforts, Honorian Command will be powerless to strike against the people or the administration of the Western March for a long time to come – and any attempt, no matter how ill advised, will be met with a strong and deadly response. There can be no doubt, either among our friends or our opponents and enemies: The March is free, the March is open for business, and the March will never surrender its people or its way of life to those who would erase either or both. For you, my fellow Dagonites, I have made a new state, a new nation, whose prosperity can and will never be questioned. We all have great reason to celebrate.”

On cue, the airship’s light displays flashed with intense color, while hundreds of fireworks were launched to coincide with the executive’s smug declaration. Once again, as if to combat the sudden booming in the sky, the music rose to a new crescendo, drowning out sound and thought from almost anyone else in Dagon. The fanfare came to its triumphant conclusion; the last fireworks exploded; the lights, at long last, finally came down. And the airship, now blanketed by firework smoke and convenient cloud cover, disappeared entirely from view, as though secreting the Dominion’s undisputed master well out of the common man’s reach, never to be seen except for when he chose to reveal himself next.

While for all any observer knew the man himself might not have even been aboard the airship bearing his likeness, First Senses was in fact present to personally deliver this performance to the people of Dagon, if only so that he could see with his own eyes how the residents of his Dominion reacted to his appearance. As he had intended, and as his ego had demanded, his work was wholly disruptive to daily labor: Traffic stood still, while pedestrians stared in consternation at the sky, and the factories and dockyards paused in their everlasting grind at First Senses’ little whim. Even after his airship sank into enveloping clouds and smoke, First Senses observed through thermal imagers and prepositioned cameras as it took another long minute for the people of Dagon, stuffed in the crowds and out in the fields alike, to resume their labors, still shaking off the shock of their leader’s surreal arrival and departure. If nothing else, the executive’s ego was appeased for the time being, having been rewarded for another long week of labor.

As he turned away from the holo-cameras and the main viewscreen, First Senses eyed the two airship stewards who had accompanied him to the specially-designed recording gallery. <Have a bowl of Farallonian sake delivered to the cockpit,> he ordered. <I will converse with the captain about this job well done.>

The stewards bowed and turned to leave, but First Senses wasn’t done. <Mister On the Left, stay a while with me,> he ordered. Both stewards paused for a brief moment, parsing the executive’s thoughts to determine which man he actually wanted to hold back, before the extraneous steward continued on his way. The remaining man, so-dubbed On the Left, turned back to First Senses as the tycoon added, <Send instructions to my driver to have my latest gift from Holamayan ready upon our return. Inform him we’ll be another hour in the sky.>

The steward, fully aware that his craft’s original flight plan had been for no more than forty minutes, took First Senses’ demands in stride. <I will relay that message, sir,> he replied. <Will there be anything else?>

<That is all,> First Senses answered, already walking through the door to leave the recording gallery. The steward emerged behind the executive onto a wide-windowed promenade, instinctively fighting his vertigo as he had done for his entire twelve-year career while he kept an eye on his vessel’s newest client in case First Senses was unable to manage the same. In the event, First Senses was perfectly at home at the edge of a high drop, so that the steward allowed himself a moment of reassurance before turning away toward the other end of the ship, where the private communications room could be accessed. He focused all four of his eyes forward – the best way, in his opinion, to avoid airsickness on a moving craft – and began his trek… and then he heard the thump behind him.

The steward turned to investigate, only to find himself facing the open barrel of a rifle. The man holding it did not appear impressed. <Just so that you know, we secured the captain and his flight crew ten minutes ago,> he declared. <They are safe for as long as they obey our instructions. I hope this knowledge eases your mind, and makes you more willing to do the same.>

The steward slowly nodded, his customer service training almost instinctively coming to the fore. <How may I help you?> he asked as politely as he could manage.

The armed intruder nodded. <You are a quick learner,> he commented. <Good. Why don’t you lead me to the guest dining hall? I’ve been informed that the rest of the service crew is currently being held there under guard, and I would hate for them to miss out on your company. Do as I tell you and you will all land alive and safe. Do not, and I’ll throw you out of the nearest hatch to float until some piece of ground comes up to meet you. Does this satisfy your sense of self-preservation?>

The steward nodded again. <Absolutely, sir,> he replied. <I will lead you there now.> He motioned slowly to indicate the direction behind his captor, back toward the recording gallery and the access point to the bridge. <May I?>

<You may, of course,> the armed man answered, stepping aside to let his captive move ahead of him along the promenade. The steward stepped forward carefully until he was in front of the armed man, maintaining his eyestalks’ forward gaze now largely to avoid provoking his captor behind as the two of them began moving.

On the deck before them, paying no attention to their approach, another three armed men – two Isaurians and a Sadrithian whose luxurious gold-cloth robes told a tale all by themselves – dragged an unresponsive body back through the door to the recording gallery. There was enough movement in First Senses’ chest to suggest that he was still breathing, but the steward didn’t dare to hesitate long enough to see more; with a last glance at the would-be master of the Western March, the man carried on toward the dining hall, leaving the executive to his fate.

______

For the second time in an hour, traffic in the streets of Dagon sometimes literally screeched to a sudden and violent halt. Booming rockets and blinding lights in the sky drew the entire Dominion’s attention, where the airship responsible for interrupting everyone’s productive day once already was now wreathed in holoprojections depicting an entirely new scene: First Senses, once reveling in his superiority over his fellow Marchers, now brought to his knees before the thick robes and inscribed rifle of a military officer devoted to the worship of Boeth. The same Isaurian voice that had declared Dagon to be safe under his care now repeated the jumbled thoughts of a man begging for his life for all to hear. “I don’t understand – I paid your fee, I repaired your ships, I have more wealth than you could imagine – I command you to free me – I beg you to free me – why are you here, threatening me, when Congress will send the Honorian fleet against us all?”

“You are here to be judged by those you have wronged,” declared another Isaurian voice, obviously intended to represent the thoughts of First Senses’ imposing captor. “You sought us out and brought us in from exile, for which we have thanked you appropriately, but in all that time we have long thought it a shame that you sought our assistance without submitting fully to the authority of Boeth All-Seeing. We accepted your heresy as a matter for which you would answer in the fullness of time. But we do not accept your active persecution of our goddess’s people, from whom you ask so much, and against whom you now send your assassins to curry their favor at our, and our goddess’s, expense.”

First Senses was already shaking his head, and his Isaurian interpreter quickly took up the chant as soon as the other voice was done: “– never assassinated anyone important, I never curried favor with your enemies, I only ever tried to strengthen the March – we all want that, the March is for all of us, I’ve never denied anyone a home here, and neither did Phthalo Green, neither did Sharpness Everlasting –”

“There is no room in our hearts for those who seek our destruction or enslavement, First Senses,” interrupted the second voice, as a quick motion from the robed officer’s gun prompted his captive to flinch. “And there is no room in the Western March, nor in all of Honorias, for any such creature to exist, let alone flourish. Your excuses are facades laid bare by the harsh winds of judgment. Your time is up.”

First Senses flailed, his tail blade waving impotently under the weight of heavy chains even as his arms rose in supplication, or else to protect his face from the looming threat of his executioner. But his hired voice, now revealed to be an enemy he had not seen in his midst, spoke no more; whatever pleas babbled in the executive’s mind went unheeded, meaningless to their recipients and thus unnecessary to express to the watching world below. The robed officer’s tail blade was not stopped by silent pleas or raised hands. It cleaved that which was impervious to words. It wrote in First Senses’ blood a new history for the March – or else a return to the old.

Honorias wrote:

poggers

And the sign flashed out its warning, in the words that it was forming…

Representative Soft Hoofbeat has the floor. Representative Soft Hoofbeat has the floor.

As Glorious Advance relaxed on his cushions on the President’s dais, one of his least favorite subordinate officers got to his hooves to deliver his address to Congress. Soft Hoofbeat’s electoral victory had been a surprise to most of his senior admiral colleagues, most especially Glorious Advance, whose campaign program for his fellow officers had not included Soft Hoofbeat at all. In the time since he had been appointed to Command, Soft Hoofbeat had proven himself to be a constant worrier, a prevaricator, a hesitator, and an obstacle to more action-oriented officers such as Glorious Advance. Soft Hoofbeat’s behavior had become especially exasperating as Command concerned itself with planning an enforcement – or a punitive – expedition to bring the Western March into line, the prospect of which apparently caused Soft Hoofbeat deep moral concern. As such, when Senior Admiral Glorious Advance formulated his strategy to elect the officers of Command to Congress, Senior Admiral Soft Hoofbeat was specifically excluded from his published list of allies, which he had painstakingly circulated among the Dominions to encourage a more uniform election result across Honorias among those who agreed with Command’s general platform. Yet Soft Hoofbeat was elected regardless – not so much a blow as a slight disappointment, given the general success of Glorious Advance’s electoral strategy and the ease by which any minor objections could be swept away in debate by his allies. It was therefore with mild curiosity that Glorious Advance considered the image of his unfortunate subordinate, wondering just what kind of obstacle Soft Hoofbeat meant to introduce to delay or confound Congress.

The representative had been rather… different as of late, Glorious Advance had to admit. He was sullen, or perhaps preoccupied; nervous was not the right word, but he had clearly been in deep thought over the past several days, upset or perhaps frustrated. He was as deliberative as he had always been, deeply concerned – one might even claim he was paranoid – about problems and pitfalls in government as well as military policy, but in recent days his obsessive focus had been laid squarely on the unfolding disaster of the Western March. It was a problem that Congress had been elected to solve for the second year in succession, worse now than it had ever been before, and Glorious Advance was as focused on the trouble as anyone else as per his mandate. But, according to the President’s representative allies, Soft Hoofbeat had taken part in no legislative conversation in the last week and a half that did not revolve around the March, the man who had usurped its authority throughout the past year, and the Boethian nightmare that had wrested power from the cold grip of his corpse. It was a matter that held Congress’s attention, requiring Glorious Advance to establish a committee earlier in the week to investigate whether or not the Boethians were likely to continue ignoring Honorian law or to seek reintegration with Congress as per their post-war agreements with President Yellow Ochre. That committee was still at work, but Soft Hoofbeat, investigating the matter himself, had clearly made his own determination.

<President Glorious Hoofbeat, forgive my elaboration,> the representative began; immediately the President resisted the urge to roll his eyes. <I have long been concerned with the policy of the Honorian government and, to a great extent, the opinion of the Honorian people toward the Honorian Western March. I have thought our preoccupation with military domination over a civil society to be barbaric, or at least ill conceived; I have expressed as much in the past to this Chamber, and to other officers of Honorias.> A general sense of exasperated agreement from a multitude of other representatives immediately followed this observation. <I ask that this Chamber does not consider my present proposal to be a change of heart.>

That caught Glorious Advance’s attention. The Chamber collectively leaned forward – even Tower’s Voice focused more acutely from his place near the doors – as Soft Hoofbeat acknowledged his colleagues’ sentiments with an irritated wave. <Matters have changed,> he declared. <Civil society no longer rules in the March. We have all seen the video for ourselves: The Boethians have returned, not as guests but as masters. The Zafirbel Peace is now dissolved – by their instigation.>

The computer chimed as someone registered an objection; Glorious Advance ignored it for the moment, more interested in Soft Hoofbeat’s strange departure from the norm than in some Marcher (Boethian?) sympathizer’s rhetorical interjection. Recognizing the President’s tacit approval, Soft Hoofbeat continued seamlessly, ignoring the unhappy expressions of several colleagues and the tense body language of Tower’s Voice on the President’s dais. <We have learned the Boethian method of rule,> he declared. <When this Republic suffered from their assault, the only fortune of our people fell upon the civilian population of the March, who remained free in all things save their own defense. The Western March under Sharpness Everlasting was a place of peaceful business, whose profits nonetheless fueled his fleet’s monstrous rampage throughout Honorias Proper. When the Boethians departed by the terms of the Peace, they left the March unharmed, even untouched. So I believe they shall again, preserving the people on whose money they rely so that they may strike at us without fearing retaliation at their backside.> Soft Hoofbeat motioned to his own chest. <Should we strike first, against the hard military targets that they surely possess while the Dominions remain free, we have this one and singular chance to eradicate the usurpers, prevent the inevitable attack against the rest of Honorias, and all the while preserve the lives and livelihoods of all the people of the Western March!>

More colleagues demanded the floor, the computer’s notification chime drowning out the audible murmuring from those few representatives with voices to do so, and drawing a grimace from Tower’s Voice as he stood beside the ever-dinging display. President Glorious Advance rose from his cushions to address Congress’s collective unease, interrupting Soft Hoofbeat in the process. <I remind the representative that this Chamber has already voted to establish a committee to investigate the viability of the course of action he proposes,> the President pointed out. <Representative Soft Hoofbeat, do you have anything to add that is not already under consideration?>

Soft Hoofbeat, who had returned to his cushions with a visible scowl, rose to his feet again with a sharp nod. <Only this,> he replied. <While we investigate, our time is inevitably wasted; while we consider, our certain enemies already move. My proposal is not merely to declare our intentions, but to establish the strategy by which we will accomplish our aims. To that end, President Glorious Advance, I request that this session be closed.>

The computer’s chiming became cacophonic as four representatives almost leapt to their feet in objection. Glorious Advance ignored it all, holding his attention firmly on Soft Hoofbeat for one long moment before swiveling an eyestalk toward Tower’s Voice at the Chamber doors. <We will have a closed session,> he decided. <The doors are hereby sealed! Representatives are reminded that breaking the seal of secrecy surrounding this session will result in criminal penalties.>

Tower’s Voice nodded sharply and turned his attention to the doors, observing the secondary locks as the President’s instruction from his console activated the physical representation of the session’s new seal. Just as it was visible to the representatives of Congress, many of whom were still in a state of outrage, it was likewise obvious to observers outside the Chamber, including the standard mob of reporters and their battery of cameras; and while it was illegal for anyone present in the Chamber to reveal the details of a closed session, it was not illegal for any member of the media to ask. Already Glorious Advance had begun crafting a statement that would allay unwanted public concern when he was inevitably accosted at the end of the session, but most of his focus remained on Soft Hoofbeat.

The representative awaited the computer’s signal that the closed session protocols were complete. Once he was satisfied, he laid out his assessment: <The beating heart of the Western March has always been the Dominion of Dagon. Yet its thinking brain is now elsewhere, apart from the economic center. The Boethians rule from their strongholds: Tower Vahhopayya, Tower Rhiannon, and whatever fortresses they have crafted in their exile. We can only truly evaluate matters within the March itself; beyond pushing the Boethians from our borders, we can have no real goal at present. And to do that, we must surely strike in overwhelming force to recapture the Towers of the March, and to eliminate the leaders of the Boethians who reside there.> Soft Hoofbeat swept his gaze across the Chamber as he added, <I emphasize that I wish to direct our attack against the military fortresses of the Western March, not against any civilian target, no matter how seemingly valuable we or our enemies might find it. Dagon and Holamayan, so often the subject of our national shame in the eyes of former leaders, are nonetheless the homes of thousands of Honorian citizens and many foreign residents besides, and should not be put to the guns of our fleet for the sake of expediency. While the Boethians are their masters, they obey the demand for funds and fuel; but remove the Cult, and the March’s peace is returned. Our enemies are theirs. Our fortunes are harmoniously tied. Should we forget this, and instead offer the people of the March the kind of violence we have threatened in the past, the Boethians’ usurpation of the March will be complete, and all our citizens shall bleed for it. Should we remember it, the Boethians’ rule will end at the earliest possible opportunity – at the hands of the very people they claim to rule.>

Glorious Advance raised his hand to interrupt: <Enough political posturing, Senior Admiral. You desired to lay out a battle plan in lieu of waiting for our committee; why are you campaigning like a politician?>

Other representatives, including several other senior admirals of Command, glanced at one another with deep unease. While the President of Honorias was the moderator of debate and the chief interpreter of law within the Chamber, he was legally permitted to interrupt a representative on the floor specifically when that representative contravened Congress’s existing regulations on debate, as programmed into the computer for the sake of the President’s occasional reminder. There had been several objections to proceedings already registered with the computer thus far, many of which could have given Glorious Advance a reason to interrupt if need be, but those objections had been ignored – only for the President to interrupt for his own purposes, not only ignoring legal precedent but actually contravening the laws of debate by demanding that Soft Hoofbeat curtail his political expression in favor of changing the discussion for Glorious Advance’s purposes. Glorious Advance, by his terminology as well as by his actions, had demonstrated his disdain for the democratic process and his intention to run Congress as an extension of Command (over which he held equally-firm control) whenever he pleased.

Glorious Advance himself was fully aware of his overstep. His glare to many of the obvious worriers made it clear that he couldn’t be bothered to care about it, and was in no mood to entertain an objection to it at present.

Meanwhile, Soft Hoofbeat took a moment to recover himself after the President’s unexpected interruption, his consternation obvious but his determination to make his point still strong. <President, the only way to prevent the Boethians from attacking Honorias Proper is to eliminate their ability to wage war before they can ready themselves for the attempt,> he stated firmly. <We must take or destroy Tower Vahhopayya at once, while we have some little hope of finding the Boethians unready. Once that task is done, we can focus on the siege of Tower Rhiannon – doubtlessly a long and costly campaign, as our enemies will have had ample time to prepare, but as long as we are chipping away at Tower Rhiannon, the Boethians are not obliterating Nabia, Aruhn, or Desele. To manage this before our enemies come across to us will require a speed far beyond any committee’s capability, and the commitment of the vast majority of our forces with the certainty of great loss. Yet for the sake of the Dominions, I urge Congress to approve of this basic plan and submit it to Command immediately.>

Soft Hoofbeat held the President’s gaze, even as Glorious Advance glared down on him from his dais. After a moment’s awkward pause, however, the representative looked down, bowed his head, and returned to his cushions, tapping his console to alert the computer that he had given way.

Dozens of chimes nearly deafened the representatives responsible for causing them, as the computer registered the Chamber’s general consternation with Soft Hoofbeat’s proposal. Repressing his own flinch, somewhat more successfully than Tower’s Voice standing at his flank, President Glorious Advance glanced at his own console long enough to recognize the legal validity of the vast majority of the submitted objections, and audibly sighed as he pressed the button allowing the computer to arbitrate the coming debate.

Representative High Starburst has the floor. Representative High Starburst –

– was dead. His body still stood where he had gotten to his hooves at the computer’s demand, but his head no longer ruled it, instead lying on the bed of cushions under him. Slowly at first, under the weight of hundreds of eyes, the mighty trunk of a Sadrithian senior admiral, Glorious Advance’s firmest ally and longest friend, sank to the floor in a shower of arterial blood, collapsing to the side at last with a thud. Eyes that had followed the corpse to its rest now rose to find what stood in its place, a gore-covered tail blade suspended menacingly over the body pointed directly at the appalled President. Stepping over High Starburst’s body, Tower’s Voice declared from lips that should never have existed, “Boeth has bestowed upon Honorias a worthy master. Against this divine judgment, what is this collection of rabble to devise plots against him?”

There would be time enough for questions later. <Guards!> called Glorious Advance, already stepping back from the threat on the Chamber floor as his tail blade waved threateningly in front of him.

The guards were slow to respond – no, they too were dropping, for Tower’s Voice had murdered them already – how was he already in place, so many places in fact, to eliminate the most potent security personnel known in Honorias? The senior admiral turned to the doors leading to the President’s quarters, a private portal accessible only to him, and Tower’s Voice was there, pistol raised and waiting. The gunshot was final. The President fell dead on the spot.

______

Despite all efforts to the contrary, both legal and physical, the seal of a closed session was not entirely absolute. Prosecuting purveyors of secrets did not retroactively erase public knowledge of a secret so lost; nor did door locks and insulation protect the ears of the waiting public from whatever sounds might emanate from the Chamber. During closed sessions of the past, reporters and other curious citizens might sometimes catch hints of the matter at hand as the occasional Suranese representative gave his verbal speech; as audio technology became more sensitive, this likelihood only increased, almost requiring Suranese representatives (and, in the years since the Boethian War, those few representatives of foreign ancestry) to relinquish their right to debate on the floor whenever a closed session was declared. Those same instruments, finely tuned toward the merest reverberations of sound from within the Chamber of Congress, could not possibly miss the stampede of hooves, the crash of collapsing bodies, or the unholy roar of gunfire from within the very center of Honorian democracy. Those who manned those instruments could only look at one another in horror as their very understanding of Honorias crumbled to misshapen ash on the other side of one locked door.

From the Desele Stargazer came the first reaction, their senior reporter shouting to his Sadrithian colleagues, “Alert the captain! Find security and alert the captain!” Some, of course, were too busy devising their breaking news reports to bother with such paltry concerns, but others – multiple others – recognized patriotic duty over personal aggrandizement, littering the ground with recording equipment as they galloped away to find help, joined by the residents in earshot and those who learned the story along the way. Those who remained, fulfilling their duty to their employers rather than their country, were witness to the unsealing of the doors; those who departed more often than not did not live that long. By some means, news arrived to Captain Long Tail, but it was long in coming, and by then…

By then, Tower’s Voice was master of his ship, and Admiral Parting Waves was master of Honorias.