Chapter 387 - The Right Thing

Note :

Gods I hate patreon. They started force activating AI 'Autopilot' crap to try and spam members with offers and shit like that. I am so done with this.

Chapter 388 is also almost done, just not added to the queue because I got cut short by a session.

Chapter 387

Eris Empire, Capital City of Starcore

Imperial Palace, Agency Bunker

Cassissa looked up from her desk as the door slid open.

To her total lack of surprise, the director walked in. She was the only one for whom door chimes or knocking seemed utterly superfluous. Even her sister, the Empress, knocked.

Though she wasn't going to admit it, Cassissa also found it refreshing to meet someone who could not give less of a shit who she was and what she'd done. She was useful, so the director would make use of her. Everything else was superfluous.

Which was why she had the slightly bemusing experience of having a prim, standardized office for a high ranking bureaucrat that was approximately half the size of her private study with a quarter of the amenities.

As usual, the director had her nose in paperwork. Cassissa had learned there was a running betting pool on whether she had some kind of sixth sense, or a special spell...

She was betting on a suite of sensor implants giving her a constant, instinctive knowledge of her surroundings. It was why she worked with text so well, because she 'knew' everything around her like someone knew where their hands were at any given time.

"Of all predictions, yours have proved the most accurate." Said the director, without preamble nor, truth be told, needing one. There was only one type of predictions that mattered right now. "Not that you hit the mark on all of them, especially concerning the Hegemony, but on average." She lowered the papers she'd been reading, and glanced at the princess. "Congratulations."

"Thank you." Coming from the taciturn -at least outside of anything work related- elf, that was high praise.

"Mmmhhh. Now, you are predicting that she will fail to integrate the Far Reach? Why?"

"I failed to see the leverage she would have with the Hegemony thanks to their buildup and their resulting critical financial problems." Which she should have had, since military expenditure was one of the reasons the Empire had to balance its forces so carefully. That, and its limited manpower. "Or at least I didn't expect it to counterbalance and overpower their need for more territory."

"Not the question I asked."

"I am aware. I was simply setting out why I was wrong with the Hegemony and I still believe I am right with the Far Reach." That seemed to grab the elf's attention. "And yes, my opinion hasn't changed. The problem for the Far Reach isn't that they're fractured. It is an issue in many ways but not one here. If the majority of the clans go in, almost every one will follow. Not much different from winning the key players in a unified country that will tip the scales. No the problem is their culture. They're insular, and loyal to the point of fanaticism. They were the last remaining loyalist holdout of the Sapphire Kingdom during the Wars of Shattering and to this day the only province that didn't rebel. They appreciate the gestures the New Republic has done to them by emptying the border fortresses. They trust in Allya's word that they will not be attacked again so long as she rules. And their own raids across the border will end, peace will return. But so long as it looks like Allya is poised for a conflict with the Saphire Kingdom, direct or otherwise, they simply won't contemplate joining her Empire. To them, attacking their old liege, the people who paid their unfailing loyalty back however they could even when times were the darkest, is unthinkable."

"Mmmhhh. I see. So you believe this will overpower their assessment of their strategic situation?"

"Strategic situation of what? Being virtually encircled by an infinitely more populous and powerful nation? That was already the case! Has been ever since the Republic colonized the western wildlands. The names have just changed."

"And relative capabilities. The Aurorean Empire is a lot more capable than the Republic ever was."

"Doesn't matter to them. They know that if it comes to a conventional confrontation, they will lose regardless. Even with Tark's help, they were losing during the Republic invasion. The dragons are what saved them and there's a reason they brought one here. That was their opening statement to the summit."

"Interesting." The director rearranged her papers, glancing briefly down at them. "Settling well?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Your office. Are you settling well?"

"You...You're checking up on me? Ma'am I mean no offense but that seems...Unlike you."

The director pulled up the paper she had been reading and presented it.

Cassissa recognized the hand writing immediately.

It was her sister's.

"Ah."

"Indeed." She put the paper back into her pile. "I do answer to higher authority, however unlikely it may seem. Your sister is also highly aware of my proclivities. She sent a checklist."

"Oooof course she did." Cassissa pinched the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes. "Do we really have to run through these?"

"She is my ultimate authority. And you are a high value asset."

"Wonderful to know my wellbeing is key to the success of this operation."

The elf nodded, taking it at face value.

"Your insights have been extremely valuable. Furthermore, you are in the line of succession."

"Distantly."

"Not very. More catastrophic losses of life have befallen the Imperial line before." The elf glanced down at the paper, more by reflex than any actual need if Cassissa's bet was correct. "Have you had any problems with your colleagues?"

Cassissa had to hold back a sigh. This was going to be a looong day.

*****

"Things are moving fast." Said Alexandra, before squinting as she delicately removed the part from the drone, and set it aside in a zero gravity field.

She'd missed this. Precision engineering. Well, not precision precision, when you got to a certain level you stopped using hands and you started using carefully pre-programmed microarms in a vacuum chamber. But precision enough that she couldn't just chuck everything a big pile and call it a day.

"And accelerating." Completed Allya. "I see you're quite busy on your end."

"Yep. I'd rather know what the Guild has out there before they come knocking, and that means working around the clock."

"Should I assume our little downtime is delayed then?"

Alexandra did her best to keep her expression level and neutral. Allya had one of the greatest abilities to read others she'd ever seen. Sometimes the archduchess, no, Empress now, didn't even seem to realize how amazing it was that she could read seasoned diplomats and former high ranking military officers like her so easily.

She couldn't let slip any hints of the ambush she'd planned with Emilia.

"No. Emilia would have my head."

"You mean she'd tie you up while you give her-" Allya stopped as Alexandra pointed a screwdriver at her.

"Do you want her to teach Pyn how to do it too? Keep talking and I can clear enough of her schedule to make it happen." The silence that followed was absolute. "Thought so. Our downtime is maintained. But as you said, things are accelerating." She brought another part up, and closed one eye as she focused the other on it. As with normal people, her avatar's senses had gotten a lot better and sharper as her core's essence grew. She nodded, and slotted the part back in, after a bit of dusting, just in case. "We're on top of things for now, but I'm not mad enough to believe it's going to last for very long."

"Agreed. But we have the Hegemony in our pocket. That's something."

"They accepted quicker than I believed."

"You're a wonderful strategist, Alex. The best I've ever seen. You know military matters and the flow of logistics and industry like no one else. But you don't know people half as well. Which is fine under most circumstances, but try as you might you can't reduce everything to a psychohistorical script where individuals are variables."

Alexandra sighed.

"I know." Psychohistory and most forms of predictive analysis were just tools and not magical ways of predicting the future for a number of reasons, and one of them was simple: try as you might, a single key individual could change the course of history. She could plan for the Hegemony's strategic and economic situation but she couldn't completely predict which way its representative or its Hegemon would jump. Which, in this case, had affected her timetable. Because, in a purely logical and pragmatic perspective, they should have held out for longer. Just like the Kingdom should have. Try and negotiate more. But they weren't. "Arcie was more of a people person. She usually took care of that for me."

"...Do you miss her?"

Alexandra set down her tools.

"...Yeah. Even before I...left, I missed her. A lot." Alexandra blinked as her vision blurred, and she realized she was crying. "She was my best friend. My partner. My..."

My everything. Even my life, because when I was about to take it, she saved me.

The dungeon core felt Allya's hand on her shoulder.

"She seemed like a great person. I wish I could have met her."

The Earth-born nodded.

"You'd have liked her." Alexandra smiled, suddenly. "Though she probably would have tried to get into your pants."

"Pyn would have taken issue with that."

"Oh she'd have wanted Pyn too. She was...Arcadia was something else."

That was what hit her. Because technically, she was an Arcadia. So was Ghost. Or Emilia. Even all of the AIs, Seraph, Glitch, Subtlety...

But none of them would be the Arcadia. The half mad, pathologically extroverted and unbelievably promiscuous AI that had originated from Project SERENE.

Would her copies have counted?

Did Alexandra even count as the same person as Ghost? Was Ghost nothing but a pale shadow of the woman who had once gotten on a ship for Alpha Centauri, ready to defend her homeland?

She felt Allya's position shift, her hand withdrawing a second before she hugged the dungeon core. Which was...a bit awkward given her stool and the armor.

"We've all lost so much getting there." Said Allya. "But we made it, didn't we?"

"Yeah. Just..not whole."

"No. Not whole. The only thing that would keep you whole would be not to fight. It would be not to try. It would be not to live." Allya sighed. "We've all done terrible things. I know I have. I'm sure you have too. Terrible, terrible things. I can see it in your eyes. We all do mistakes, or what we needed to to survive."

Allya. I murdered an entire planet.

I murdered an entire planet because it was the right thing to do.

Because that's the thing Ghost couldn't admit, could she? Why Alexandra herself had to exist.

What had broken her was that murdering a whole world had been the right thing. Killing millions upon millions of innocents, watching them plead and scream and beg as nuclear fire consumed their world was. the. right. thing.

She had commited the single greatest crime since the Terran Hegemony brought humanity to its knees and instead of court martialing her for genocide they threw her a fucking parade when she came home.

That was the day Ghost had almost swallowed the barrel of her service pistol.

The day Arcadia had literally fought her way through FleetCom to get to her and stop her.

Did those poor fools think that was an isolated incident? Did they think it was a moment of passion? A coincidence that Arcadia had detailed schematics of every nerve center in the European Federation? That she had combat androids ready to use within them?

They must have. Arcadia's hold had only expanded afterwards.

No. It would be more accurate to say that there was nothing they could do already. The Federation was already gone, already in Arcadia's pockets.

It was the rest of Earth, the rest of humanity that should have been afraid.

Alexandra took a deep breath, putting an arm over Allya's and squeezing her hand.

She wasn't on Earth anymore. Most likely, she would never see her homeworld again, except in pictures and paintings.

And she had people here to save. She had a girlfriend who she swore to every star, nebula and true deity she would make her wife. She had a daughter. She had friends, colleagues and...well, not subjects, but close enough.

People who depended on her. People she could bring out of this mess.

And this time, she would make damn sure she wouldn't have to kill a whole world to make it happen.