“They just have to reimburse society for their second chance by turning pioneer and risking their lives, and those of their families, by hopefully expanding the Empire’s borders,” Mr. Simpers said neutrally.
“You can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs,” Cornwallis shrugged callously, “and besides, if you want to join in the great game of Empire and have a shot at real power, there’s no room for that in the Core provinces. You or your family has to go out there and at least bring in a newly developed world first.”
“Even then the game is rigged against them,” pointed out Simpers.
The Senator shrugged. “It’s how most of our key Senatorial Client Houses came up,” he shrugged.
“My point exactly,” muttered the Agent before straightening, “regardless, I believe I understand what you desire and have at least an 80% chance of achieving an acceptable result. I’m in.”
“That’s what I wanted to hear,” smiled the Senator.
Chapter 30: Sending Gants on Assignment
“Mr. Gants, thank you for joining us,” I said as soon as the Head of Armory came into the room.
The Lieutenant braced to attention and saluted. “Lieutenant Gants reporting as ordered, Sir,” he said.
“At ease, Gants,” I instructed, and the other man relaxed fractionally his arm falling back to his side. “So, tell me all about it?”
“If this is about the children, Admiral, then I can assure you that security is tight and each of the children has one of my most trusted men watching them round the clock. There have been no issues,” he assured me.
“Good to know, though not why I called you here, Gants,” I said.
“What do you need, Admiral? Just say the word,” Gants said seriously.
“We’re having a little problem on Tracto and I need a man smart enough and loyal enough to find it and root it out,” I leaned forward, “are you that man, Lieutenant?”
“I don’t know if I qualify very highly on the smart scale, Admiral, but if you need me and can use me I’m your man,” Gants said firmly and then looked uneasy for a moment before he spoke again. “I just worry about who will watch over the children when I’m gone is all, Sir.”
“You think too little of yourself, Florence,” I told him, “you may not be winning prizes in astrophysics anytime soon but, then again, neither will I.”
“If you say so, Admiral. I know I don’t have what it takes to run a fleet like you do. A suit of power armor and a team of men I can handle but more than that…” Gants shrugged as if to say he was willing to give it a go.
“Don’t worry about the babies: half your team will be staying here to continue guarding them. Just pick out the man you want to leave in charge when you go so I know who to go to and set your mind on your new assignment,” I said.
Gants nodded, “What’s the assignment, Sir?”
“I need to send a team back to Tracto,” I said flatly.
“We’ve got lots of people back in Tracto, Sir. What’s special about this mission?”
“I believe there is a fly in our ointment back there, Lieutenant, and I aim to squish it before it can lay any maggots,” I said harshly.
“A fly, Sir?” Gants' brow wrinkled.
“A traitor, Gants. Maybe a spy, maybe just corrupt and criminally incompetent. Either which way he has to go, along with anyone who’s helping him and I’m going to put you in charge of it,” I informed the other man flatly.
“I’m your man,” the earnest young man hastened to assure me, “but are you sure it’s one of ours?” he asked, looking troubled.
“There have been a lot of new people brought into the MSP very quickly and someone,” here I paused dourly, “seems to feel they can give orders concerning the status of my prisoners in Gambit all the way from Tracto,” I said, bringing up a file onto my pad and shooting it over. “And no one would ever even know about it if I hadn’t gone down there personally. Study that file; it has everything we’ve got on the situation and make sure to a take tech team with you when you go. I’ll arrange transport on a destroyer that will ostensibly be going to Tracto to increase the system defense force but, in reality, will be there to back you up if you need more manpower. I’ll leave sealed orders with the ship’s captain.”
“Will do, Sir,” Gants said, his face hardening. “We won’t let you down. and we don’t need anyone thinking that because the Reclamation Fleet is gone that they can start taking advantage of us and start selling us out to the Sector Government!”
“Whoever it is. I want them stopped. Whether they’re Sector Government, Reclamation Fleet, Caprian SDF, or any other independent operators,” I said.
Gants frowned when I mentioned the Caprian SDF, but reluctantly nodded his agreement. Clearly the idea of fighting with our old home world didn’t sit well with him, but he was ready and willing to stand by me which was all I could ask and more.
“I won’t let you down, Sir,” he repeated.
“Good man,” I said, moving around the table to clap him on the shoulder, “now go pick your team, both the one going and the one staying, and report back to me when you’re ready. In the meantime I’ll look up ship captains and have everything ready by the time you leave.” Or at least my new Chief of Staff will, if I get bogged down with other work, I silently amended, because one way or the other this mission was going to happen.
Chapter 31: Information Gathering in the Grand Assembly
“So how is my favorite Assemblyman?” Mr. Simpers asked, stepping into the most innermost sanctum of the Assemblyman’s office.
The woman seated behind the desk jumped and then shot the Agent a hard look. “Mr. Simpers,” she acknowledged, tapping the name plate on the desk that clearly said her title was ‘Assemblywoman.’ “How many times have I told you not to sneak into my office and startle me like that? And that’s ‘Grand’ Assemblywoman, if you please!”
“Thirty two, if I’m not mistaken,” the short-statured agent said, plopping himself down into the visitor's chair in front of his desk and lifting an eyebrow. “And I seem to distinctly recall your sharp and vociferous requirements that I address you as ‘Assemblyman’ and not 'Assemblywoman'.”
“Yes, but that was when I was protesting male privilege and the complete emasculation of the female gender that was an inevitable result of male heritage week by masculating myself with a symbolic gender change. But right now I’m showing my solidarity with people of Cantipola IV, a super-majority of which were strong-willed women and transgender survivors locked into survival capsules against their will by their now dead patriarchal suppressors, during a once in a ten thousand year cycle solar flare. As such, I have re-feminized myself in support. Thus it is more appropriate to address me as ‘Grand Assemblywoman' or, if you want to subtly rebuke, Assembly-hir, in protest for my overly specific title instructions during our previous meeting,” the Assemblywoman said primly.
“I wasn’t aware that the Yin gender could be emasculated,” Mr. Simpers said solicitously, “but please, let me say how quite recovered you look for a person who's gone through multiple rounds of physical reconstruction and genetic re-lathing—twice, it seems—and, what’s more, I can hardly see the adverse effects of such massive multiple reconstructive surgeries at all!”
The Assemblywoman gave him a withering look. “That’s because your Imperial brainwashing has failed you once again, Mr. Simpers,” she said tartly. “The Grand Assembly recognizes over 132 genders, many of which do not require reconstructive surgery or any alterations of the physical body in order to recognize an inherently re-gendered state of existence. For the purposes of our discussion, you can consider me to have mentally restructured my gender into today’s more pleasing—read: necessary for solidarity's sake—form.”
“Interesting,” Simpers said, his eyes flashing with suppressed impatience, “It was my understanding that Imperial Science has definitively found that the chemical and hormonal baths a person’s brain undergoes during their formative yea
rs results in structural changes which are unable to be reformed by simple willpower alone. I hope that there hasn’t been any trouble with your current gender assignment?”
The Grand Assemblywoman bristled like a stung cat. “Imperial propaganda and ‘fake science' strikes again. The whole 'nature versus nurture' argument is now a false paradigm,” she declared, throwing her hands wide. “With the latest advances in Confederation science, we can finally accomplish things your Empire can only dream about! The complete restructuring of not just the body, but the brain itself, completely cuts the nature portion of that archaic and divisive 'nature versus nurture' debate entirely out of the equation once and for all. Finally, we can put an end to any wrongheaded, regressive attempts at appeasement of wrong thinkers and their aberrant behaviors.”
“A fascinating if, you will forgive me, rather pointless advance in science, at least as seen through the Empire’s eyes,” Simpers said. “But I am amazed that your healthcare establishment is able to provide such enhanced reconstructive services to the entire body politic.”
The Grand Assemblywoman winced. “Currently I am told our budget cannot support such wide-ranging measures, even if certain regressive elements of the Assembly that are automatically opposed to any unnecessary alterations of their physical bodies,” she sighed.
“It is a sad day when the Confederation finally has the tools to fulfill its stated goals, but not such plebian matters as the funding or the legislative support of certain unenlightened factions to do so,” Simpers said without emotion. “Turning from the macro, I hope all is well with you personally in these trying times?”
“Unfortunately there has been a wrinkle of my own creation,” frowned the Grand Assemblywoman. “It seems this outdated level of the Assembly Offices only has restrooms designated for the traditional 32 genders recognized during the construction of the Grand Assembly Building and, out of a force of habit, I mistakenly entered the wrong toilet facilities. However, the gentlebeings present in the facility at that time were willing to overlook my faux pas considering my recent transition and the mental strain that traditionally accompany such changed circumstances. You might not realize it, but such transitions can be quite disconcerting.”
Mr. Simpers rubbed his eyes with both hands. “As fascinating as this discussion on strain of mental gender transition, toileting misadventures, and how much a struggle the transitioning to a traditional female gendered mindset has been for you…” he trailed off, sweeping the woman’s clearly unmodified female body from top to bottom with an assessing look while simultaneously thinking about the millions of Imperial Credit Marks that had been funneled into the Grand Assemblywoman’s private accounts, “if you could indulge a simple Imperial brute then we could get down to the business at hand, which I would certainly appreciate.”
“I’m pleased with both your kind consideration and with how well you’re starting to adjust to a more progressive Confederation mindset,” she said happily. And then her entire affect seemed to change, and gone was the nitpicking gender-conscious crusader while in her place was the hard-nosed, wheeling and dealing politician he’d spent millions to suborn for an ally, “Now, what exactly did you want to know.”
“A simple run-through on where we’re at now would suffice,” Mr. Simpers said simply.
She nodded sharply. “As you requested, a bill empowering the Imperial Senate to ‘save’ the Spineward Sectors from themselves has been floated around through committee,” she said seriously.
“Any push back?” he asked.
She scowled. “As expected, a large protest movement blaming the entire situation on the Empire, instead of those backworld hick regressives in the Spine, cropped up,” she said savagely before smiling with satisfaction. “Fortunately, we fought back with a coalition counter-movement which started by pointing out the Spine stopped paying its taxes years ago to sap the wills of certain budget hawks, before shifting to the abysmal state of their across-the-board universal services acts at Sector level prior to the Imperial Withdrawal that so many of our right thinking political parties love to champion. That, and a combination of outright bribes and backroom trading, successfully stopped the protest movement cold.”
“Good,” he said shortly, “although I’m unsure what the status of their social service programs has to do with anything from a practical stance. Politics do make for strange bed fellows,” he finished quizzically.
“Well if you stop paying your taxes to the central government you can hardly expect to have your social programs subsidized by the Confederation, now can you?” she pointed out brightly. “And if something is not subsidized by a higher authority and earmarked for improvement, local politicians will always find something else they’d rather spend the money on in such a regressive region of space. Thus requiring a resulting backlash from right-thinking political parties at the Confederation level”
“I see,” Mr. Simpers said, shaking his head. Confederation logic was hard to understand sometimes, especially here in the heart worlds.
“Let’s be honest: at this point they’d just pull us back down,” she said looking conflicted, “all hyperbole aside, their hearts are in the right place—or were, generally speaking—but they’re such provincials out there that they simply couldn’t have afforded to implement the Confederation’s new Fairness Doctrine before the separation.”
“You mean the legislation the fringe areas were holding up in committee before communication with the Spineward Sectors became…sporadic?” he asked.
“Yes! But that leads us to another problem,” she exclaimed. now looking ill at ease. “It was one thing to allow the Spineward Sectors to fall out of contact with the heart-region, at least long enough for their representatives to be cut off at the Grand Assembly prompting them to either go home or degenerate into non-voting members until communication could be reestablished…”
“Thus bypassing their intransigence on certain key initiatives, just like we planned,” Mr. Simpers nodded in agreement.
“Exactly! However, now that your principle has decided that it’s time to bring them back into the fold, many—even many in my own party—are dragging their feet on the proposed legislation,” she took a deep breath, “the issues are twofold that once the isolated Sectors rejoin the central regions they might have the votes to overturn the Fairness Doctrine, as well as several other absolutely vital programs that we were only able to ram through the Grand Assembly after they lost their voting rights due to inactivity. And that even if they fail to overturn Fairness outright the sheer number of bailouts we would need to provide to get their economies back on track would be so large that we might have to roll back Fairness or risk a Confederation-wide recession.”
“That is a pickle,” Mr. Simpers said confidently, “recessions aren’t good for reelections.”
“Not unless you can blame it on the opposition,” she pointed out, “which is beside the point. Anyway, with my Absolute Choice party on the fence and our natural allies the One Wayers openly raising concerns in committee this has given our adversaries in the Assembly, specifically Border Integrity Movement and Responsible Labor, the opportunity is here for them to make political hay with all sorts of ‘I told you so’ rhetoric and ad hominem attacks,” she rolled her eyes.
“Such as?”
“Like if the Empire had only continued to pay its ‘fair share’ then we, the Confederation Assembly, could have afforded the very fleet that the Empire is offering to send for free themselves. Which is particularly appealing to the Confederation Industry Party as well as the Balanced Tax Progressives,” she burst out and then looked at him to see if he was about to lose his cool. “I’ve been fighting these vicious slanders against our greatest ally, and your patron, with 230% of my power but it’s been hard to quell.”
“An entirely understandable political attack since it's essentially the truth,” Mr. Simpers shrugged it off, “perhaps there’s a way we can address everyone’s concerns. Even the Border Integrity Party has t
o understand that this isn’t two centuries ago.”
“That’s what I keep telling them!” she cried happily. “Everyone knows the Confederation at large won’t stand for thousands of military casualties like in past centuries; it would be career suicide for any Assemblyperson who voted for it!”
“Meanwhile the Empire is prepared to absorb potentially millions of lives lost if that was the cost to reclaim the area,” Simpers agreed frankly.
She blinked looked taken aback and disconcerted before giving herself a quick shake. “Forget the losing millions rhetoric; it won’t play well here no one would believe it,” she said, rolling her eyes, “but simply requiring millions of military personnel to go out into the Spine on peace-keeping missions is likely to cause a voter revolt!”
“I hadn’t realized it would be considered rhetoric here,” he murmured and then made a 'continue' motion, “but do go on.”
“I don’t know about how things play in the Empire; your populations appear much more willing to soak up large military deployment budgets than ours. But it would almost be worth it to try sending in our own fleets just to see those road-blocking Border Integrity Assemblymembers voted right out of office the next election cycle, along with their 'But they’re our worlds!' slogan with them,” she paused, smiling viciously at the thought of her political enemies laid to waste and removed as a future impediment before giving herself a shake. “It might almost be worth it just to see them completely marginalized...but only almost. I’m a woman of my word and, anyways, better in the long run if we give them to the Empire and be done with the whole hot mess. I surely don’t want to be the one to tell billions of disgruntled voters that Grandma’s life-prolonging treatment has to be delayed for six months, or that their work-free living wage has to be cut by 10-20% for the indefinite future. What are they supposed to do?” she asked rhetorically before answering her query in kind. “Get a part-time job just to cover non-vital expenditures?! Cutting into a voter’s entertainment budget is a surefire way to a slip in polls, and future revolts at the voting booth are all but assured.”
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