Boy's Adventure Tale - Part 6

This is a boy’s adventure tale.

But this is not a boy’s adventure tale prepared by a stuffy old man in a tweed jacket with elbow patches. This is the sort of story that a boy might imagine for himself, filled with action, mystery, a red-hot space queen, and nary a whiff of precious moral instruction.

Well, maybe there is some moral instruction. But this is Reversed Black Maria. Nothing is as it seems, and the thread is very fine, indeed.

Boys Adventure Tale Part 6

A Reversed Black Maria Novelette in Multiple Parts

“Oskar, hold still!” scolded Aunt Karina. She sat next to him on one of the curved couches in the Galaxia’s dorsal observation lounge, pinching his smarting cheek wound shut with her fingers.

“Sorry. It’s close to my eye.”

“Men are so fragile,” she sighed, swiping a healing pencil across the cut. The pain vanished. “There. All fixed."

“Thanks, Tante,” Oskar said, rubbing his vanished injury.

“Don’t touch that. It might gape again,” Farmor warned from her seat down the couch. Nils was asleep in her lap. Both were unharmed, as was Farfar Hendick, who sat in a captain’s chair a few paces away, where he could take in the incomparable view of the distant Earth.

“It will be alright, Mamma,” Farfar said. “That time the ready oxygen store exploded, we had twenty casualties to stich up, and only one of those pens. The first nineteen did just fine.”

“What happened to the last one?” Oskar asked.

“His wound burst open the next time we pulled gees. It made a hell of a mess on my bridge!”

“Pappa! Enough!” snapped Aunt Karina. “Oskar’s seen enough blood and guts for a lifetime.”

Oskar silently agreed with her. Before today, he’d never realized how much blood a human body contained. Or how fragile they were, at least when Inna was the one doing the breaking. “Do you know what happened to us?” he asked.

“Inna told me, but she didn’t have to. I know her methods. You got off light. You should see what she does to Arzenekoi.”

“I’d like to avoid that. Speaking of Inna, where is she?”

“Down in the ops center with Miriam, getting a situation report. Things warmed up in a hurry today, and she’s trying to get a handle on it.”

“If this is warm, I’d hate to see hot. It all went down so fast. I still have no idea what happened. One minute I was with you on the picnic grounds, and the next Inna was carrying me through the woods.”

“I don’t know, either,” Farmor said.

“Nor I,” said Farfar, absently massaging his right arm. “I felt the shock of a stunner, and then I was here, aboard this wonderful starship. I thought I had woken up in heaven. Someone had already poured me a coffee.”

Aunt Karina giggled. “That was me, Pappa. I’m a little bit angry with myself over the whole thing. In trying to outsmart our pursuers, we walked right into a trap. As soon as we left the tunnel, they hosed us down with stunners. It would have worked, except that Inna can’t be stunned, and I have a wetware mod that revives me instantly.”

“A mod? Is it legal, dottir?” Farmor asked nervously.

“No. But you’ve surely noticed that there isn’t any law but Inna’s, and it was her idea. Anyway, she and I aren’t new to ambushes. We pretended to be unconscious until our attackers broke cover. Then we struck. Inna took the lion’s share. She killed a dozen before I even got back on my feet. Those guys weren’t pros. The survivors broke and ran. I shot a couple stragglers...”

“You had a gun?!” Oskar blurted.

She peeled up the edge of her silken midriff sash to reveal a hidden gauss pistol. “I’m the Empress’s Retainer, Oskar. I’m always armed. After the attack, we decided to take cover in the pedway tunnel. It took two trips, because all of you were still out, and we had to carry you. But when Inna went back for Oskar, somebody closed the tunnel entrance.”

“That’s how we got separated!” said Oskar.

“Yes. Inna already had you in a carry. She ran for cover in the forest. That was the last we saw of either of you until Miriam brought us here. We got sloppy, but we were lucky. Very lucky. Had our attackers been Legionnaires, or former Ord Lex, there’s no way we’d have made it out in one piece.”

“Inna would have been okay, though. She’s invincible,” Oskar observed.

Aunt Karina shook her head. “There are fates worse than death, Oskar. She knows it well, or at least I hope so.”

A thoughtful silence descended on the lounge. Oskar tried–futilely, as it turned out–to imagine something worse than death. Farfar Hendrick watched the stars, and Nils woke up and began to fuss.

“I think he needs a change,” Farmor said.

“I’m sure he does,” Aunt Karina agreed. “I’ll take him.”

Farmor rose from the couch. “I’ll come, too. I’m getting queasy. This room is too open, I suppose is the word for it.” She gestured at the expanse of space all around them. They left with Nils in tow, leaving Oskar and Hendrick alone in the room.

Hendrick chuckled. “Mamma could never abide space travel,” he said, flexing his arm and pumping his fist.

“Is your arm okay?” Oskar asked. “You’ve been favoring it since we came aboard.”

“It’s nothing, just a little numb,” Farfar said lightly. He was always loathe to show weakness. “It does me good to see you, grandson,” he added. “When I came to, I was very concerned for your wellbeing. But I should not have worried. You were in good hands.”

“I don’t know about that,” Oskar muttered.

Farfar heard him, and nodded. “I saw Her Imperial Majesty when she returned. She was ghoulish to behold. Is what they say of her true?”

“Every word. She kills with her bare hands, and she eats her enemies. But that isn’t the worst of it.”

“Oh?”

“She thinks she has the right!” Oskar exclaimed.

“As well she might. She is the Empress, you know.”

“In civics, they teach that no person is above the law.”

“They always have, even when I learned civics. But are they right?”

“You don’t think so?”

Farfar leaned forward in his chair, the view of Earth forgotten. “ Oskar, you were too young to fully grasp the impact of the Arzenekoi war. Before it, humans were the established rulers of the galaxy. We had peace, prosperity, and unlimited interstellar travel. In just a few short months, it all fell apart. We learned that everything we believed about ourselves was wrong. We ruled nothing and were nothing. Our mastery of the cosmos depended on a single, irreplaceable engine factory, and it was lost. Then Jorgen Pangloss came out of legendary Eisenhimmel and named himself Emperor. His power was so great that no one could stop him. He was authority, he was law, and we all became his property.”

None of this was news to Oskar. “Farfar, the Mad Emperor vanished!”

“But not before installing his successor. Even if Raina doesn’t always act her station, she still wields the authority.”

“But, doesn’t all authority depend on the consent of the governed?” Oskar retorted.

A woman’s voice answered him. “No. Not all authority.”

Oskar looked up and found Miriam watching. “There are two kinds of authority,” she said, settling onto the end of the couch. “There is imputed authority, which is what you speak of. Imputed authority flows up from below and requires the consent of the governed. But there is also intrinsic authority. It flows down from above, and requires nothing except obedience.”

“The divine right of kings,” said Farfar.

“We did away with god-kings a long time ago,” Oskar protested.

“We did, because we realized that our kings were naught but mortal men. Their authority was a lie. But the Empress’s authority is real,” she replied.

“What’s the difference? She’s a person, too.”

“Nay. Unlike the kings of yore, the Empress has two natures, one airy, and one divine. She has no equal among flesh.”

“That much is obvious,” Farfar agreed.

Oskar was unconvinced. “Take away her fleets and her servants and she would have no power, other than her fists, that is.”

Miriam studied him closely. “Is that so, Oskar Winter? Are you sure? You have rarely seen either servant or warship of the Empress, and her fists have never touched you, yet she owns you entirely, body, soul and spirit.” Her eyes drilled into Oskar, or, more precisely, into a spot on his forehead. His blood ran cold as ice as he recalled the mysterious sigil shining there. Silent laughter sparkled in Miriam’s eyes, and she smiled a knowing smile.

“People aren’t usually thought of as chattels, Miss,” said Farfar, even as he watched Oskar closely. He was no fool. He’d certainly seen their silent exchange.

“There are different kinds of property, Herr Winter. But all property has an owner.”

“We did away with slavery, too,” Oskar noted.

“Man establishes and abolishes as he chooses, yet the great powers are not troubled,” Miriam retorted. “You mention slavery. It was first abolished by the United Kingdom. I once walked her streets, in the days before the royal line failed and the darkness fell. How may I visit her today? She is gone. So it is with all the decrees of man.”

Oskar stared at the beautiful young woman. If she was telling the truth, she could be no less than three thousand years old.

“Really? You don’t look a day over thirty, Miss,” Farfar said with a wink.

“You flatter me, Herr Winter. Truly, I was far older when my change came. In making me a Valkyrie, the Emperor returned my youth, and tenfold better than my youth. He was most generous to his servants. Yet servants we were, and remain.”

“Why?” Oskar asked. “Why be servants at all?”

“Because that is what we are. It is our purpose, our calling. There is nothing for us than to be what we are.”

“You could be anything!”

Miriam shook her head. “Could we? What can you be, other than yourself, Oskar?”

“I could be anything I want to be! Anything at all!”

“Can you be a mountain, then? Can you be a starship?”

“Of course not! I’m a person! I can’t be something other than a person.”

“Exactly. You are a person, and persons are naturally servants. You will serve something, even if only yourself. You have no choice in the matter, just as the Empress has no choice in the matter. It is her nature to rule, and all who encounter her fall into her hands, as surely as a magnet attracts iron. It is the order of things. There is no other way.”

Her logic made Oskar’s head hurt. “Where is freedom, then?”

“There is none, either for you or for the Empress, save this: it falls to you to make the best of the choices set before you. Do this, and you are as free as a man can be.”

Oskar nodded dumbly. While a thousand objections occurred to him, Miriam’s position made perfect sense, and explained a great deal. It did nothing for his comfort. He had certainly fallen into Inna’s hands, and he had no idea what it meant for him.

Farfar sensed his mood. “I think some lighter chitchat is in order. A lovely, established lady such as yourself has a companion, no?”

Miriam smiled impishly, and re-crossed her legs. “I have had many companions, but I am presently unencumbered. It is well, for the Empress is most vigorous. I have little time left for myself.”

“A pity. It turns out that my grandson here is an eligible bachelor.”

“Farfar!” Oskar squawked.

Miriam laughed. “He is a sweet morsel, Herr Winter, but will you pardon me if I demur? If I am not mistaken, he is marked for another.”

Hendrik turned a sly eye on Oskar. “Is there something I should know, grandson?” he asked.

“No, nothing, really!” stammered Oskar. “I had a crush on Anje Geert last summer, but she dumped me.”

His grandfather studied him for a moment, as if searching for a hint of untruth. Finding none–or so Oskar hoped–he returned his attention to strange, stunning Miriam. While they talked of small things, Oskar stewed. What had she meant by ‘marked for another?’ Why had she called him a ‘morsel?’ After today, Oskar was unwilling to be thought of as property or food, even metaphorically.

There was a bustle at the lounge door, and none other than Inna strode in. She’d obviously stopped somewhere to freshen up. Her hair was drawn up in a severe bun, and she wore a gleaming black armored spacesuit that flamed with her own magnificent blazon, a triple-headed golden eagle.

“Here you are!” she exclaimed. “Follow me. We’re having a council of war.”

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6