Patsy Murray

by Douglas E Roff

  Whatever Marius and Seth had done to hide their schemes and deceptions had either been so simple as to be in plain sight, or so complicated that Adam, Niona and the Council were just never up to the task of seeing what clearly had to be there.

  In fact, it was both.

  On the simple side, Lord Seth had been taken from his planet of exile by a friendly and loyal Immortal just ahead of being forcibly removed by the Itician Counsellors for the ill-treatment of the women he brought to his residence to pleasure him. At first, the women were drawn to him as a different kind of male force, one that did not ask for liberties to be granted, but took them, often by force. The women of the planet and most of the men had long given up many of their primitive ways in favor of a way of life that was collective, including the sharing of sexual partners. They had learned ways to control reproductive processes to the point that the consent of both the woman and the man was necessary to achieve a viable new life. That being the case, contraception and “accidents” did not happen any longer as most men and women always had their “no” signal on so that altered states could not be the reason for an unplanned pregnancy.

  Since nutrition, water and life forces were available without cost or need for farming; the society was centered around learning and the integration of nature into technology in such a way that lives were improved, and people were free to pursue whatever interests were most appealing to them. The arts and education flourished as the Iticians debated changes to their culture and folkways to enhance their living over many decades, if not centuries. They took their time in everything and took care with pleasure, separating it from the sanctity of procreation.

  As highly evolved and sensual creatures, they had abandoned the ways and needs of taking pleasure and using their partners for recreation that was painful, hurtful or cruel. Still, some vestiges of old ways and the desire to know what things must have been like before their awakening made the strange man living on the edge of a large city that much more inviting to try out.

  He was the quintessential “bad boy” in a society that permitted almost anything that was consensual among adults and pleasurable to the parties involved. Multiple partners were common and children raised in an atmosphere of safety, protection, and care. Life in this respect was communal, and community meant everything to them.

  To Lord Seth, this way of life was boring and didn’t sufficiently satisfy his craving for lust. Not pleasure, lust. He wanted more whether the females were feeling permissive or not. Women who wanted the experience, perhaps just once, of being taken and abused would find their way to Seth who would do things to them they had never experienced, and never wished for again. After a while, the Seth took to inviting unsuspecting women to his home and using them and, with some, for weeks at a time.

  Complaints began rolling in making it time for him to move on. He would relocate, and when the time was right, he would reclaim his role as father to his only son. He had devised the plan to avoid the attention and eventual detection he knew would befall his son; Seth knew how Immortals would search for him.

  Lord Seth had gone from a middling decent Immortal who had worked his territorial way up the Immortal ladder, to a pariah to all but a few.

  One of the few was his son, Marius. Marius shared his father’s contempt for weakness that he saw in his other “father” and his Immortal mother. What was the point of having such power handed to you if you didn’t use it? Had his father been a little wiser, which his son knew he was not, he would have had pleasure planets everywhere where he could enjoy the fruits of his Immortality and power, while at the same time letting the lesser Immortals run his empire. Make it look good, as Marius had, and gain the trust of those who mattered while currying favor with those who didn’t trust him.

  Those on the Council who did not trust him and, in fact, detested the young Immortal, were about to give up finally on discovering his agenda when Marius made his only mistake. Lord Seth knew that Adam, and every other Immortal, would enter and thoroughly search Marius’s mind with regularity until the time they finally were convinced that he posed no serious threat. Adam and Niona were convinced he had never represented a problem and never understood the preoccupation of the few who would just not let the matter drop.

  Lord Seth didn’t hide in a place; he hid in his son. And within his son, he hid not in his mind, but in his body and being, distributing his essence throughout Marius’s corporeal and incorporeal state, other than his mind. Since no one ever checked anything but Marius’s mind, there was nothing actually to find. This technique was old and almost forgotten, obtained from the same ancient Immortal who taught the Lord about Immortal procreation. Had the Lanarii or the Councilors asked but a few more questions, they would have discovered all the arcane secrets of the Immortals that had been imparted to Seth.

  But they only asked one question.

  Lord Seth would occasionally leave his son’s being and coordinate his activities with other Immortals still loyal to him, preparing for his return at the same time as his son prepared the other items his father needed for war. Intelligence on Adam and Niona, their state of readiness for war, and their standing among the Immortals still in power. Marius would train himself, and take part in the preparations for war, training new soldiers and arming them in ways that could defeat other Immortals; knowledge gained from the Ancient one.

  With intelligence from Marius and the readiness of Seth’s army, he was ready to awaken and retake this realm and place it under new management. He didn’t need billions of soldiers to fight army-to-army; he needed enough warriors to take Adam by surprise, neutralize Niona and her Sari, and confirm the Lanarii had gone back to their resting place. He would find that place and destroy it. After all, a few gems could not put up much of a fight especially when set in media of rock. Adam’s reforged Blade would be his, and he would use all his weaponry to finally destroy the Sarii Blade. There would be no more mistakes of that kind ever made again.

  As Seth reawakened after centuries of sleep, he found his son in battle gear and with a full accounting of their state of readiness. Both were confident they could not fail, so clever had they been and so careful had been the planning.

  Unfortunately, Marius carefully charted only the moves and activities of Adam and his mother, and a few others on the Council, but not Hana and Noki, the two pacifists and proponents of that weak philosophy, the Way and the Balance.

  While the Lanarii had seen the Ancient Immortal and asked only one question, Hana had gone alone to visit with him and made a few more relevant inquiries. All were related to what the other Immortal had asked about, and the answers are given. For thousands of years she tracked Marius, never discovering exactly how or where Lord Seth was hidden. The Ancient Immortal had explained much, and in much detail, but exactly where the Lord would hide his being was never discussed, only how.

  Hana and Noki were agreed that although it could be any Immortal, it was likely Marius; however, to discover the truth would require the dissection of the boy, molecule by molecule. That was never going to happen.

  So, guessing that Lord Seth would one day rise up again and that their Immortals would be no match for his, they decided upon a simple but “next best” plan. And they told no one, especially Adam and Niona, and no one on the Council.

  ***

  The weapons of the ancients resembled swords but modified, not exactly like the Sari, but to be able to cut through an Immortal in the same way. A combination of action, material and force were all that was needed to strike down any Immortal, and Marius was slowly building up his stockpile of these ancient arms and training his massive number of troops in the proper use and deployment of forces, weapons, and tactics. So many worlds and systems were now so passive, in Marius’s estimation, that control of the RealVerse could be had by defeating only a small number of important planets and systems. Their numerical military advantage, with Lord Seth’s ruthlessness and leadership, would be over a thousand to one, even t
hough Adam and Niona’s population advantage was in the billions to one against Seth and Marius. The latter numeric advantage meant nothing, however; if Adam’s “military” were defeated, so would Adam, Niona and the Council.

  In practical military terms, Lord Seth and Marius would win easily, and they would begin in the heart of the new RealVerse, Hana’s planet, home to Adam, Niona and the Council of Governors. Once defeated, the other Universes would quickly fall in line.

  Lord Seth had a surprise for his son; there couldn’t be two Immortal leaders, so once the RealVerse was Seth’s again, his son was not only expendable but posed an imminent threat to his rule. Seth was highly aware that his son thought himself the better leader and the heir to the throne if not his father’s outright co-emperor. Lord Seth would no longer be just a Warlord; he would take the ancient Earth title of Emperor.

  His rule would be absolute and his word law. He would take whatever he wanted and what he wanted was everything that the new RealVerse contained. His Pleasure Palaces would be greater than the famous summer palace of Kublai Khan, Xanadu, and his appetite for mortal and Immortal flesh unquenchable. Resistance to his rule, as he built up his forces and armies, would be weak and pathetic, just like Adam and Niona.

  So, one day, on a bright summer morning, Seth, Marius and his Brownshirt Army showed up on the gorgeous seven hills surrounding the capital city of Hana’s Planet, named the City of Light, and demanded to see Adam and Niona immediately to discuss their terms of surrender and the transfer of power to Emperor Seth.

  Nothing happened for quite a while as Lord Seth grew more impatient; Marius went to the City walls to proclaim the beginning of the new era and to call out the cowardly Adam St. James.

  Adam came to a parapet on the City walls and asked, what was it that the child wanted again? Had he heard it right that his biological father, Lord Seth was alive and that he, Marius was in league with him to overthrow the rule of Adam, Niona, his mother and the Council of Governors?

  “Come down and face us, coward. Meet your death with what little honor you can muster. My true father is here to take back what is rightfully his and to kill you on the field of battle.”

  “I’m in a meeting now, but I’ll send Hana and Noki down to speak with you. Oh look, your mother has come to watch. Would you like a refreshment before we begin? These days lately have been quite hot and uncomfortable for this early in the season. By the way, nice armor. Why do you need armor, young Immortal?”

  Lord Seth approached, dressed in full black battle gear accented by gold and silver.

  He pulled his sword. “Do you know what this is, Adam St. James?”

  “Looks like a sword. Is it real or the plastic kind the children play with?”

  “It is of ancient design and more powerful than the single Sari Niona carries with her. We have millions of this weapon; you have one Sari and your Jeweled Blade. Surrender, and we will not kill everyone. But we shall kill you and take all the women as captives and trophies. You recall the old saying of the Great Ghengis Khan?”

  “That old one about a man’s highest joy blah, blah, blah ending in we’re going to take all your women and fuck them? Something like that?”

  “You laugh, but these walls will not protect you when my hordes attack.”

  “Talk to Hana and Noki first, then go away.”

  Adam turned to leave, then stopped.

  “And when we’re finished here, we’re going to hunt you and your son down, find all the traitors who sided with you and return your essences permanently to the RealVerse.”

  “You don’t kill. Your rule” said Marius.

  “Except in war. You should have studied law like we asked you to.”

  The gates to the walled City of Light opened and, as Adam said, only Hana and Noki came out, dressed in simple peasant dresses embroidered in the colorful Mexican fashion.

  Marius jeered, “This is your defense?”

  Hana spoke, “No, this is our defense.”

  As she finished billions of trained Immortals began descending from the sky, armored and armed with new Sari Blades.

  “Noki and I visited the Ancient Immortal you spoke with, and after that, all of our new Immortals born were trained, the capacity to fight ingrained in their being, and the ability to fight to defend the Realm. You have many, but we have thousands and thousands of times the number of your fighting men and women, all armed with weaponry superior to yours and with impenetrable armor. You stand no chance. As we speak, battles across the RealVerse are being waged against your forces, and their defeat is but a matter of minutes away. So, scoot little men and know that while you will not be sent to the afterlife today, we will send you there as war criminals at a time of our choosing.”

  Panic took over in the eyes of both Lord Seth and Marius. As the sting of defeat began to take shape in their minds, they realized something.

  Two women for whom they had no respect had defeated them.

  “Know that your defeat is at the hands of two women pacifists who hate war, but despise treachery even more. We, not Adam and Niona, figured you out and now take pride in defense of our Realm. Go wherever you may find refuge but leave this Realm, or you will be put to death instantly.”

  They turned to walk away.

  “And by the way, Marius, your father planned to kill you as soon as he took control. He is not your father; he is your sperm donor. Goodbye.”

  Lord Seth and his son turned invisible and left.

  They were never seen again.

  Epilogue

  Lord Seth and Marius were never found in the RealVerse and where they went was never discovered, though speculation about the few parts of the RealVerse in which they could hide was fodder for speculation until eventually lost to memory. That they were not captured and killed, or imprisoned for their offenses against the peace and stability of the RealVerse, was also a subject of much discussion. Most of the rebels fighting for Lord Seth were sent to essence and were never brought back into existence.

  The general thinking at the time was that the two most powerful Immortals of the time, Adam and Niona, could not bring themselves to killing the pair. Niona was, after all, Marius’s mother and though she was more than happy to send Lord Seth to the afterlife, it was Adam who vetoed the idea. He was no fan of Seth, but Lord Seth had been a benevolent ruler for most of his tenure as the prime Immortal in the RealVerse. Killing him would do no good; Adam believed he had no chance of ever rising again, certainly not in the RealVerse.

  Only time would tell if Adam’s prediction was correct. Not a single mortal, Cyclical Immortal or Immortal sided with Adam on any of these issues. They did not seek revenge; they sought justice and freedom from the fear that these two would one day reappear. In this instance, it was good to be king.

  The RealVerse is infinite, the news of the new rules began to disseminate in a strange way for which Adam could not predict outcome or compliance. On the one hand, he sent out a message through his mind regarding the change in direction, but whether the message ever got through simultaneously was never known. Adam also sent the same message out one Universe at a time, hoping for a domino effect that the message would go from Universe to Universe infinitely. The two were difficult to reconcile with the concept of infinity, so this was just the best he could do.

  Adam hoped that infinity meant that there was a first Universe, a starting point and that new Universes were added periodically forever. In that event, the news might reach, eventually, all Universes.

  The center of the RealVerse was and forever remained Hana’s planet. The predominant philosophy of the RealVerse became the Way and the Balance, though never did it compete with or replace religion. The structure of the RealVerse at the inception of the Adam/Niona era did not endure; all Universes adapted to the basic tenets outlined by Adam and Niona, but none were the same.

  Eventually, the solar system in which Hana’s planet was located solidified into many worlds that became in
habited by mortals, Cyclical Immortals, Immortals, and mixed-race beings. These were the homeworlds from which legislative delegations were sent to Hana’s planet for Council.

  The mortals died and were forgotten by all except the Immortals who embarked on this amazing adventure with Adam, and who remained with him throughout eternity. Adam never had another adventure and never left his home planet again. There was too much to do, and he was tired of conflict.

  It had been a long journey from Earth as a mortal to Hana’s planet and Immortality. That he came to rule as had Seth before him was never contemplated, and mostly an accident. His prisoners never left the planet; the mortals died, and the Immortals adapted.

  Adam’s long journey from young hothead in his first life, just trying to survive, seemed like a long time ago.

  It was.

  In the end, he brought peace and safety to his flock, which was all he had ever wanted.