Intermittent Transmissions At 1420.4 MHz

A republic!

The new constitution is all drafted up! The military will be reformed! Every ship in the harbor is flying the new colors. The streets are packed, sooty faces upturned in disbelief as the Empress speaks from her balcony.

Every man and woman, free and equal!—Her Majesty says grandly.

Now, about her "abdication"... the Empress pauses for effect, grinning madly. She whips the pistol from her belt, shoves the barrel up under her chin, and crack, and

oh God, she's tumbled from the balcony, and

The door buzzes and thuds. Another guard with another chunk of wetware, lead by the neck, dizzy on the comedown. "Table," she says without looking, jerks her thumb. Body thumps, plastic crackles. The pilot realises where it is and starts to kick.

She takes a scruff grip on the cold sweat-slick skin, shoves the diagnostic plug into the spinal port. The thrashing cuts dead. Wasn't enough time to sanitise the plughead for this one.

Twitch, twitch.

Her Majesty likes to play the high-stakes tables.

And when a woman is in the business of sending ten thousand men to the front, or tumbling a colony into famine, with a pen stroke, money isn't stakes enough anymore.

The card table no longer satisfies. Now it has to be the counsel table. Something about looking the defendant in the eye gives her the thrill that the roll of a die no longer can.

Maybe the footage does show the defendant abandoning her post, but can the Crown demonstrate proper chain of custody over that body camera? Can it? I don't think so!

Don't mind how the Empress licks her fangs and leans over the table, two hands planted firmly amid spilling papers. Don't mind how she presses her thighs together and wiggles excitedly every time there's a setback. She's here to fight like hell for you.

"..."

"...ma'am, we've all read the handbook. Your position is ceremonial at this point. You have to give the launch order."

"..."

"Yes, ma'am, millions dead, the entire continent uninhabitable, the revolution has failed. Respectfully, get it together and let's kill some damned fascists on our way out. Give the fucking order."

Red-faced and snarling, Darcy reached for her sidearm. Her second-in-command outdrew her. There was blood on the wallpaper.

"..."

"Shut up! Shut up about the light of humanity! If you had moral issues with this post you should have said something before the end of the world! Read the fucking order into the fucking radio, comrade!"

Darcy couldn't feel her one good arm.

"..."

"Gladly, ma'am. And until today I'd have said I'd be proud to follow you there—God, what a way to get your heart broken. This is why they say not to fall for your superiors, right?"

"..."

"...you never figured it out, ma'am? Truly? Well, I'm sorry you had to find out this way."

Blood on the carpet.

well! please forgive this one, its lady, for highly esteeming the work it does! this one prostrates before it and repents for its delinquence, blessed and peerless implement!

...will that one require any help carrying its things, honored vessel?

(USER WAS DISMEMBERED BY SISTERS)

Screw type-23 homunc. tin firmly onto issued canister (listen for 'crack'/'hiss' of seal) (fig. a). Connect to donor via standard arcanist's cable (fig. b). On exposure to live ether, the tinned homunculus will germinate, producing a quantity of ether sequestration tissue. Mass of adult type-23 homunc. is proportionate to ether supply -- DO NOT overfill canister (fig. c).

so long as you continue: Her athame will rest at distance, and begloved hands sit in clasp.

but the candles will not gutter out, nor blade's silver shine diffuse.

I never ask why. Anyone who makes the difficult journey up the mountainside to my ranch and has walked through my statue gallery has already proven that they know their own mind.

One-legged veterans and wasting academics and broken-hearted lovers come to see me, and I show them my pieces. Suits and silks, dresses, gemstones: pay and I will make you your most beautiful self, tailored to the last degree.

Then, when you've swayed in front of a full-length mirror and told me, as they always do, that everything is perfect, utterly perfect, we go down to the lakeside and you feel my hands on you, gently posing you. Hold it. Just like that.

Now, if you're ready, open your eyes. Look in mine and it will be over, painless and quiet. You will be the beauty that no one else was grateful enough to see in you. Your shoulders will be proud and high long after the ones who beat you down like this are worm food.

Devil agrees, gives her the reins of a bloody uprising, to her outrage. Months of campaign follow, in moments of stress she fondles the amulet that holds the contract: if dissatisfied, snap the chain to return herself and the whole world to the moment before the signing.

When she is old, the devil steps over her threshold, and remarks on the children at play. Don't congratulate me, she says, I'm no mother. Those are my neighbors' children. We share the load around here.

Satisfied? he asks; yes, she says. Then it's time to give the amulet back: contract fulfilled. She leaves an older child in charge of things, goes to her room, to the back of her closet, for her old uniform.

The jacket ill fits now. The radio earpiece is just for show.

Do you have it? he asks; no, she says, and hands the devil a shovel. Come with me. Out to the graveyard. Dig, boy.

I wanted out so many times, she says, to snap that chain and go back to the negotiating table and say not like that, you lying son-of-a-bitch, I wanted peace. But everyone all around me really believed. That red-black flag meant everything to those poor saps.

The shovel hits wood.

So, she says, when my love took one in the chest, I didn't go back. I knelt with her in the rubble and I pressed that damned charm into her hands, and I asked her if she'd go back if she could.

The devil looks up from the digging and finds her staring him down. So, she says, guess who's still got it? Go fetch, boy, then you fix up this grave when you're done and you go back to hell until I'm dead and it's time for you to collect. We have no further business.