Telling the Governor

“Are you sure you do not wish me to accompany you?” her husband asked for the tenth time.

“No, Love,” she said, sneaking him a quick kiss and causing him to blush and look about wondering if anyone would turn them in for an Article IV. Pretty much everyone else in line was preoccupied with their own affairs: families trying to manage their children and cases, couples chatting animatedly together. Only one lad seemed to have seen their indiscretion, a ranker who seemed to be carrying an official case, and he blushed and turned away. She guessed a ranker would not be turning in a Staff Major’s wife for an Article IV.

“Ma’am, if you could come with me?” she heard, and turned to see one of the ship’s officers at her side. Nodding, she followed him past all of the others in line. He took her to the door, whispered to the officer there, and disappeared. Then he reappeared, seconds later, with the ranker with the case, and placed him next to Aleshia. He had seen her and looked down, still blushing red.

She giggled and turned back to the door which, second later, opened. Miss, Soldier?” the officer said, and they followed him down a cooridor and through a hatch, where she was hit by a very different smell, no doubt that of the station, and then to a door, “Special class,” the officer said. “I’ll have the families down in a minute.”

The officer looked bored by the ranker, but raised his eyebrows at her. “Will you be needing special transport when you reach planet, Ma’am?” he asked. She had had time to get her uniform, so he had no question about her status. She had chosen bright pink for her uniform, today, with some highlights of red. She hadn’t been at all sure about how to dress for this interview, so had chosen something familiar, that might even be familiar to the governor, whom she had met several times while hanging with Illoia.

“I will need to get to the governor’s mansion as quickly as possible,” she said.

His eyes flickered to the ranker and said, “How convenient. Well, follow me.”

He only went a few steps, then pointed into a compartment. “The crew, when they have time, will be sitting with you in here. Choose two of the seats, please.”

Aleshia moved to the far side of the small compartment, and the ranker rushed into a seat on the opposite side and as far away as possible. Aleshia decided to put him out of his misery… or, perhaps, to increase it, “You aren’t going to report us, are you? We were just 17’d yesterday. I’m so sorry for the Article 4 breach.”

“Ma’am, no Ma’am,” he husked out. The poor child, his voice probably wasn’t even broken yet. Rankers were sooo young, and so many of them died, poor lads. This lad was probably very lucky, getting some job delivering important cases from place to place.

“Where are you from, Dear?” she asked him.

“Ma’am? Here, Ma’am. I’ll get… they said I might get to see my folks, tommorrow.”

“Oh, well, isn’t that lucky of you. I’m from here, too, you know.”

“Oh, yes, Ma’am, I know. You’ve been in all the newsys.”

“Well I suppose that is right. Say, I have an idea, how about if you have your folks come to my house. I’m going to have a big party,” she said, making the decision on the spot, “For a lot of people from the trip. Just think, all those 17’s, we’ll all need to meet each other’s 17’s.”

“Ma’am, I…”

“It will be lots of fun. Nothing against any of the articles, don’t worry about that. We have a couple of large pools so you and your lad friends can swim, and they’ll be lots of food, and I’ll order in a small orchestra, and you can dance… maybe even Article 17 a lass,” she said, teasing him unmercifully, knowing he was too young for Article 17. “Say, you’ll come. I’ll send you, oh, a dozen invitations, will that be enough? Plus a family invite. I assume there are several more at home?”

“Twenty, Ma’am,” he said, with a hint of pride. “I’m tenth.”

“Well, a true middle child. They say we get along with everyone. What’s your ID?”

He blurted out his ID… a soldier was never actually allowed to refuse to ID himself… but tried, “But Ma’am I…”

“Oh, I know, you might have duties. Soldiers seem to always do. But I’ll alert your commander to my invitation, that sometimes makes a difference.”

Given who her father was, that almost always made a difference. And they had no doubt sent this poor lad on this trip to give him a chance to see his folks. Twenty! That was pretty good breeding. Since the great genetic correction of 67, which had been designed to fix a few genes which caused miscarriages, and had resulted in most lasses having practically nothing but twins and triplets, and that often, most lasses with decent medical care, and who were obedient to Article II, managed almost 20, but 20 was still something of a mark of pride. Thirty, now, that won one special recognition.

The crew started coming in and strapping down, and Aleshia leaned back and started putting the party together on her comp. The social net told her, pretty quickly, who the lad's ‘pals’ were, and they started getting invitations to the party of the year, at her father’s house. She giggled, and texted her father, telling him about the party he was hosting. She would invite the governor and his family too. It wasn’t like Illoia was their only daughter that she knew!!

The shuttle landed in a flurry of snow and Aleshia watched the snow blow over an aircar parked nearby,and two soldiers standing next to it. They had hardly set down when the crewlad next to her said, “Soldier, Ma’am?!” and Aleshia and the ranker, still clutching his case, stood up.

The outer door opened and the cold air blew at Aleshia’s face. Her furs covered the rest of her, but she felt her nose turning red, an effect which she thought was not at all lady-like. She covered it with one mittened hand and followed the the crewlad and ranker down the ramp, and over to the snow covered air car. “Two!” the crewlad shouted, “Both to the governors mansion!”

The one soldier held an honor salute while the other soldier opened the door to the car. Aleshia climbed in gratefully, the ranker and the soldier following.

“No bags, Ma’am?”

“They’ll deliver them,” Aleshia said, breezily. She supposed her non-appearance at the shuttle port would cause some consternation, so she quickly texted her chauffeur as the air car lifted off, blowing snow in all directions. She saw a hover bus coming to pick up the rest of the passengers and smiled at the thought that, barring her urgent message, even she would have had to be on that bus. About the only time she had ever been on one was when she boarded the shuttle for her ride out.

“Do you want anything, Ma’am?” the soldier asked.

“I think we both could use some hot chocolate,” she said, looking at the ranker who blushed, but took his hot chocolate eagerly enough.

“Did you have a nice trip?” the soldier asked nervously.

“Oh, it was simply fantastic,” Aleshia said, glad for a chance to take her mind off her interview. “I got to see just everything. The liner ride wasn’t so much fun, but, still, I was with good company. You know Illoia, the governor’s daughter?”

“Slightly, Ma’am,” the soldier said. “I was actually expecting that she would be on this trip.”

“Ah, well, she won’t be coming down planet. In fact she has already gone on, probably.”

The soldiers faced showed his confusion, and Aleshia said, “She got 17’d.”

The soldier went white. “The governor’s daughter, Ma’am?!”

“It’s perfectly legal,” Aleshia said.

“Oh, oh yes, Ma’am, I didn’t mean to imply anything else,” he said, looking nervously back and forth between her and the ranker, who was staring at the floor. “I was, I was just surprised. Who… who was it? I mean, what rank?”

“Leader,” Aleshia said, enjoying his shock.

“A leader…?”

“A hero,” the ranker burst out. “Three Dictator’s Own.”

“Him?? Leader Tomirosh?”

“Yes,” she said. “You should have seen him at the party. He had his uniform set to all black, and his three gold flashes looked so… well, they stood out, you should have seen them. He came into the room, and two other leaders and a Commander tried to stop him, but he made a beeline right for her, declared his undying love, and, drug her off to his room.”

“Really?! I mean, ummm… do you need anything else, Ma’am?”

Aleshia giggled and sat back to look out the window. She was sure that rumour would be all around the planet in minutes.

The snow wasn’t that deep yet, but it was still falling. It looked to be a decent winter. She wondered if her new husband had ever seen a decent winter. Or perhaps he came from a planet that had lots of winters. She hadn’t exactly asked him.

She stared out the window. She hadn’t been along this route before; her house was in a totally different direction than the shuttle port. They were travelling through some low hills with short trees when she saw a large, long clear building, brightly lit from inside. “What is that?” she asked.

“Those are the neo-silk gardens,” the soldier said, looking out the window beside her. “They must be in the clean-up phase.”

Aleshia shuddred, “I heard of that. They have to go through all of the, umm, the… do they call them beds? And pick up all of the dead moths?”

“Yes. They are actually quite valuable. They make a dye out of them.”

She peered out the window. “Oh, so most of them are in the dark? I see all sorts of buildings.”

“Yes. Each building will be at a slightly different phase… egg phase, tadpole phase, leaf phase, then cocoon phase.”

She sat back, “And the govenor makes a lot of money from those cocoons.”

“Not just the govenor; and there are hundreds of people employed. Clean up phase, for example, everyone in the family works. They only want it to take one night so the biorythm of the eggs isn’t disrupted.”

The aircar settled down at the gate of the estate, and she watched the driver passing over his ID. Seconds later he was continuing down the marked path, and then it came around the corner and she saw the mansion and smiled.

All decent estates were built for defense, but the govenor’s mansion managed to do so with style. It was in the shape of a hexagon, and had towers with doezens of auto-turrets on them, but the red stone it was constructed with was beautifully shaped into all sorts of balconies and walkways. And it was covered with a light green creeping plant which grew easily up here in the hills.

The car settled into a covered hangar and Aleshia saw two men waiting for them. One was an officer, a commander. She let the ranker go first and he went directly to the commander, saluted, and the commander led him away. The second lad, in the govenor’s livery, watched her curiously. He watched as she pulled back her hood and his eyes widened. They leapt back down to her dress, her pink uniform skirt sticking out underneath her coat, and then flipping back to her face.

“Ma’am?” he asked, coming forward with a bow. “Can I help you?”

“I need an interview with the governor,” she said.

“I understood that from the text from the car,” he said, “but you do realize it is 2 AM?”

“I put that badly,” she said, “I am an intimate friend of his daughter, as you know, and I need an immediate interview with the gov… with her father on a private matter.”

“Oh!” he said. “I understand. If you will come with me.”

He led her to a beautiful panelled room that Aleshia had never been in before. Given the desk and books on every shelf she imagined it was the governors private study. A few seconds later a young lass came in with a tray with chocolate and cookies. Aleshia was just helping herself when she heard a noise at the door and the governor, looking very sleepy and not very governerish in a large purple robe, was staring at her from the doorway. “Aleshia?!” he said. He was rather good with people to remember her, as she wasn’t Illoia’s best friend, although, she was her father’s daughter…

“I’m sorry to get you up, but Illoia sent me with a message.”

“Sent you? Why didn’t she call or text? For that matter, where is she? We expected her this morning. I thought she would let herself in, though… Aleshia, you were 17’d?!!” he said, finally catching the significance of her dress.

“If I could just deliver my message, please, Sir, and then we can go over all the details?”

“Very well,” he said.

“Illoia sent me with a message, and then I have a flimsy for you from the captain of the liner.”

His eyes narrowed, and Aleshia hurried on. She had typed the message into her comp so she wouldn’t forget it. “Sir, Aleshia met with me and she told me to say exactly this, “Tell my father I am married….”

“Married!” he said, “Without my permission! What nonsense!”

Aleshia began to quail in the face of the govenor’s famous temper, and she hurriedly said, “there is this flimsy from the captain,” she said.

“I don’t care if he is the captain of a ship, the father must affirm all marriages. I don’t know who this lad is but…”

He broke off, staring at the flimsy. “But… this says she was Article 17’d?!”

“Yes, Sir.”

“But you said she said she was married!”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Well, which is it?!”

“Thomas!” Aleshia heard, and turned to the door. “Stop yelling at this poor lass. Hello Aleshia… you were 17’d?”

“Yes, Ma’am, a Staff major, home guard.”

“Well, that will be nice. A Staff Major, that isn’t bad. And home guard, so with influence. You look nice in the uniform. Now, Thomas, what were you yelling at Aleshia for?”

“Illoia was 17’d!!!” he yelled.

“Well, surely that wasn’t Aleshia’s fault,” she said. “Who is the brave lad?”

“Brave lad?!”

“Well, it would take a brave lad to marry any daughter of yours,” she said. “I was beginning to wonder if she would wither on the vine. Who is he?”

“He is a leader…”

“A leader?! A mere leader dared to invoke Article 17 against my daughter??”

“He is a three time Dictators Own recipient,” she said, and the room grew silent.

“I remember reading about him,” Mystiny said after a few seconds of silence. “So is she happy? I pity the poor lad if she isn’t. He is young, too, I thought I read. And why are you here, Aleshia? Surely we would have heard the news from the report and Illoia herself.”

“She sent me with a message, a personal message. And I… I didn’t get to deliver all of it.” She turned back to the governor. “Sir, she told me to tell you that she was married, and she was pleased.”

The room got still, and the governor nodded, silently. “But they are on their way to Talutus IV, their ship would have already left.”

Mystiny’s eyes grew damp, “They’ve left already?”

“She said she married him!” the governor burst out, turning to his wife. “I don’t care if she is pleased. What kind of story is that? She was 17’d by some upstart of a ‘hero’.”

“It isn’t a story, my Dear,” Mystiny said, taking his arm, “It is a message, to you. She is your daughter, and she understands politics as well as anyone. Much better than me.”

“Message? Politics?!”

“Yes, Dear. She sent her friend here to get yelled at, poor dear, and to deliver a message, so that when you leave this room you will be able to face the staff, the rest of the family, and the planet with a proper attitude as the Dictator’s Own Governor.

Thomas sat, heavily. “It is all right, Dear. Aleshia and I understand. It is your job to protect your daughter and this news hit you hard. But really, Dear, if you had chosen you could hardly have done better. This lad is very young, but I think Illoia might find that easier, and he is already a very decorated officer, very brave, no doubt strong willed… why he sounds just like you when I married you!”

“I wasn’t a decorated officer!”

“True,” she said, but that wasn’t your field. But by the time you were twenty, and swept me off my feet, you had made enough money to retire on, and were ready to start in politics. And now you’re governor.

Yes, they got married in a very different way, and earlier than we did… but everyone is doing that now… but this lad sounds like he is just as bound to be a success in his field as you have been in yours.”

“Aleshia says that Tomirosh is going to be a general.”

“No doubt, particularly with our Illoia at his side. And today, Darling, a General is a very, very big deal. Very important and powerful and all of that. So, Dear, you were 17’d? Tell me about your husband.”

“You’ll get to meet him tomorrow night. I’ve invited you all to a big party at my house!”

“Oh, and does your father know?”

“I’ve texted him…”

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