The Situation: The Eternal Emperor has been
assassinated. There have been hundreds of attempts during his very - VERY -
long rule, but only four have been successful. Alas, this was one of those
times.
The Goals: (1) Return to life, which is the easy
part. (2) Relearning - by working from the bottom up - how to get his Emp's
moves back. (3) Oust whoever the scrotes were who took power during his absence.
Step One: Find a likely planet where there is an
election going on, then steal said election. Thus gaining a big club to beat
his ultimate enemies about their heads and shoulders. Or worse.
What follows over the next days and weeks, is
adapted from Sten #5 - The Return Of The Emperor. The first chapter - which sets the scene - is
drawn from the final chapter of Sten #4 - Revenge Of The Damned.
Who know, maybe one of the candidates in the
upcoming Presidential Elections, will pick up a tip or three to swing things his way.
CHAPTER ONE - FIRST MOVE
THE
ETERNAL EMPEROR clumped down the ramp of the Normandie, his Gurkkha
bodyguards pressed tightly around him. He paused at the bottom, then breathed a
silent sigh of relief. As per his orders, there were no welcoming crowds at
Soward, Prime World's main spaceport. Instead, a short distance away, there was
only his personal gravcar and its escort to take him back to his dreary
makeshift quarters beneath the ruins of Arundel.
He would have to do something about that, he reminded
himself. Time to give the rebuilding program a boot in the butt. It was not the
image of pomp and splendor he missed but the carefully built-in comforts and,
above all, privacy. Just to be alone for a little while with one of his nutball
projects—like reinventing the varnish used on a Strad violin—would be an
immense relief.
At the moment he felt that if one more being asked him for a
decision or brought some trouble to his attention, he would break down and sob.
The problem was that emperors who sobbed publicly were never eternal. Still,
that was exactly what he felt like doing. Just as his face felt as if it was
going to fall off from smiling at vidcameras, and his fingers were bleeding
from shaking the hands of so many grateful subjects. They were all anxious to
tell him what a hero he was.
He thought of another hero and winced, with a small smile.
After a decisive battle, one of the man's aides had told him what a great hero
he had become. Sure, the new hero had observed. But if I had lost, I would be
the greatest villain in our nation's history. What was the guy's name? Who
knows. Probably something Prussian that starts with Otto. So much for clottin'
heroes.
The Eternal Emperor pulled himself together and headed for
his gravcar. A few years earlier he would have slept the clock around three or
four times, then donned his Raschid identity and gone on a long drunk at the
Covenanter, with maybe a tumble with Janiz for old time's sake. But the
Covenanter was gone because of treachery. As was Janiz. Both gone, and it was
his fault, dammit! He had let it get away from him somehow.
The master of doublethink. Bah! Maybe that's your problem,
Engineer Raschid. You overclottin' complicate every clottin' thing. Keep it
stupid, simple, and a whole lot of folks might still be breathing—instead of
dead or, worse, on their knees, praising your name.
The Eternal Emperor was feeling every year of his 3,000-plus
span as he reached the car. Then he saw Tanz Sullamora's smiling face, and he
groaned and almost groaned again as Tanz stuck out a hand to be shook. Instead,
he took it—gingerly.
"Welcome back, Your Majesty," Sullamora gushed.
"We're all very proud."
Sure you are, the Raschid side of him thought. You just
can't wait to figure out how to intrigue me out of a few more warehouses full
of credits. But the Eternal Emperor side of him made him merely smile and
mutter a polite thanks.
"I have one small request," Sullamora said.
"I know you're anxious to get home, but…"
The Emperor raised an eyebrow. He was about to be put out.
He was too tired to speak, so he just motioned for Sullamora to continue.
"It's the spaceport employees," Sullamora said.
"They've been waiting for hours and…"
He glanced over where Sullamora was pointing and saw a small
mixed-uniform crowd near the main gate. Oh, no! More smiling. More hand
shaking. More… Ahhh…
"I can't handle it, Tanz," the Emperor said.
"Get Mahoney to do it. He's back on the Normandie taking care of
some last-minute business. He'll be out in a sec." He stepped to the door
of his gravcar.
"It won't be the same, sir," Sullamora insisted.
"It's you they want to see. I know these beings aren't real fighters
and all. But they have done their best in their own ways. So, won't you
please…"
The Eternal Emperor resigned himself and changed direction
for the gate. He wanted to get it over with, so he picked up speed until he had
his Gurkhas trotting on their stumpy legs to keep up.
The little crowd broke into cheers as he approached them,
and the Emperor, who was too professional to disappoint under such
circumstances, painted on his most Imperial smile and started shaking hands. He
made sure he asked each being's name as he took the outstretched hand with his
right and clasped the elbow with his left. It was a handshake guaranteed to
generate warm feelings, and at the same time he could use the elbow hold to
move them gently to the side as he pulled back his shaking hand and stepped to
the side to take another.
He was about a third of the way down the line when he came
to the man with the pale face and too-bright eyes. The Emperor asked the man's
name and went into his hand shaking act. He could not make out the nervous
mutter he got back so that he could repeat it, so he just grinned more widely
and started to withdraw his hand and pass on.
The hands stayed clasped.
The Eternal Emperor had only a heartbeat to puzzle at what
was going wrong, and then he saw the pistol coming up in the man's other hand.
And he was falling back, trying to get away, but he could not let go as the
pistol went crack-crack-crack-crack and he knew he was hit but could not
feel a thing except maybe that his stomach was bruised and—
The Gurkhas were on Chapelle, slashing with their deadly
kukris, and the man was dead even as his trigger finger kept pulling in reflex
and the gun was clicking empty. It happened so fast that only then the crowd
began to get the idea that something awful was occurring. The first screams
began.
Tanz Sullamora stood there for a frozen moment, shaken at
being so close to violence, even though it was of his own making. Then he
turned and started to drop to one knee before the Emperor's body.
There was only a small bloody splotch on the Emperor's dress
uniform to mark where the bullets had penetrated, and for a moment Sullamora
was not sure if he had even been hurt.
A minute later, the worry was over. The Eternal Emperor was
dead.
Then the privy council turned up the joker in the Emperor's
deck.
The bomb implanted in his body exploded. The size of the
blast had been determined thousands of years before. Sullamora died. And the
Gurkhas. And the sobbing crowd. And anyone and anything within a precise
one-eighth of a kilometer.
Odd things happened in all explosions, and that one was no
exception. A week later, a tech from the pathology lab found Chapelle's face.
That was all—just his face. There was not a blemish or a mark on it.
Chapelle's face was smiling.
****
MAHONEY PRESSED HIS thumb against the print sensor, and the
door to the Eternal Emperor's study hissed open. He hesitated before he
entered. This would probably be his last time. There were only a very few
beings the sensor would pass, and for an hour or two more Mahoney was one of
them.
After that, the memory would be wiped and a new order of
permitted presences would be installed. Mahoney knew there was no way his name
would be on that exalted list, just as he had known there was something very
wrong almost as soon as he had scattered his handful of dirt on the Eternal
Emperor's coffin and stepped back to let the others pay their last respects.
The five surviving members of the privy council stood
slightly apart from the other mourners on a small grassy knoll, just beyond the
screen of rosebushes the gardeners had hastily planted to fulfill the Emperor's
burial wishes.
But there was only one rose blossom on the entire span of
bushes. It had no hidden meaning, but Mahoney found it strangely apt, and as it
drew his attention, he made note of the presence of the Council of Five.
They stood together, but at an apparent measured distance,
as if they were afraid to be too close. Not a word was whispered between them,
and their faces were stony and guarded. It was as if they had something to feel
guilty about, Mahoney thought; then he wiped away the thought as a product of
Mick romanticism.
But the image nagged at him, and when he saw the news feed
that night, he marked the announcement that an emergency session of Parliament
had been called. Now, what could be odd about that, my friend? Mahoney thought.
This is an emergency, isn't it?
Sure it is, Ian, but bless your sweet dumb Irish behind,
don't you see it? The session was called by the privy council. Mahoney did not
have to be a legal scholar to realize that such an action was well beyond their
constitutional authority. All right. So why didn't any member of the Parliament
complain? Or, better yet, refuse? Simple.
Because it was wired, dear Ian, dear Ian, wired.
The Emperor had been murdered, and Mahoney knew who had done
it, and it was not the poor mad fool the livies were going on about in their
endlessly recycled analysis. It was not Chapelle.
Sure, Chapelle had pulled the trigger. But the real guilt
rested with the five lone figures on the grassy knoll. And there was not a
thing Mahoney could do about it because, even if he wanted to, he would not be
part of the new order. Just as he knew that the hero of Cavite had better get
on his horse and haul butt out of town before they came to really thank
him.
Mahoney stepped into the clutter of the Eternal Emperor's
study for the last time. He was not sure why he had come, except for the mad
hope that there would be some clue about what to do next.
He was so used to his old boss having every base covered
that it had not quite sunk in yet that this was one contingency that had been
impossible to plan for.
Mahoney looked in dismay at the many scattered books on the
shelves, some lying open just as the Emperor had left them as he searched for
some arcane fact or other.
The study was jammed with the idiosyncrasies of his old
boss: from ancient windup toys that clattered about with no purpose but to
amuse to experimental cooking tools; plas bags of spices he was considering;
scattered notes and scrawls; and even music sheets crammed with marginalia. An
entire division could not have found a clue in that mess in half a thousand
years.
So Mahoney decided to have a drink. What else could he do?
He walked to the Emperor's desk and slid out the drawer
where the boss kept his Scotch. He noted that the seal on the bottle was
unbroken. That was strange. The Emperor never put an unsealed bottle in his
desk. He always took a snort first.
Mahoney shrugged, pulled out a shot glass, and reached for
the bottle.
As he picked it up, something small and white came unstuck
from the bottom and fluttered to the floor. Mahoney stooped over to see what it
was. When he saw the scrawling on it, he almost let it drop from his fingers in
shock.
Mahoney dropped heavily into a chair. He held the piece of
paper before his disbelieving eyes. His face was flushed, sweat leapt from his
forehead, and his pulse rate jumped into triple time.
The message was for him. From the Eternal Emperor. And this
was all it said:
"Stick around, Ian. I'll be right
back."
NEXT: THE RESURRECTION
*****
THE NEW STEN OMNIBUS EDITIONS
Orbit Books in the U.K. has gathered up all eight novels in the Sten Series and is publishing them in three handsome omnibus editions. The First - BATTLECRY - is available now and features the first three books in the series: Sten #1; Sten #2 -The Wolf Worlds; and Sten #3, The Court Of A Thousand Suns. (Click this link to buy it.) The Kindle Edition BATTLECRY, includes all three books but is only available in the U.K. and territories. (Click this link to buy it) Coming in November: JUGGERNAUT, which will feature the next three books: Sten #4, Fleet Of The Damned; Sten #5, Revenge Of The Damned; and Sten #6, The Return Of the Emperor. In the following months the nice editors at Orbit (a division of Little Brown Publishing) will issue
DEATH MATCH, which will feature Sten #7, Vortex, and Sten #8, End Of Empire. Both Juggernaut and Death Match will be issued as Kindle editions as well. Stay tuned for details.
STEN #1 DEBUTS IN SPANISH!
*****
Sten debuta # 1 en español! Narrada en cuatro partes, Episode Dos ahora aparece en la revista Diaspar, la mejor revista de SF & F en América del Sur!
Y es gratis! Aquí está el enlace.
EMPIRE DAY 2012 - A COMMEMORATIVE EDITION
Relive the fabulous four-day Stregg-laced celebration. Alex Kilgour's Worst Joke Ever. New recipes from the Eternal Emperor's kitchen. Alex Kilgour's Worst Joke Ever. Sten's thrill-packed exploits at the Emp's castle. How to make your own Stregg.
And, did I mention, Alex Kilgour's Worst Joke Ever?
And, did I mention, Alex Kilgour's Worst Joke Ever?
Two new companion editions to the international best-selling Sten series. In the first, learn the Emperor's most closely held cooking secrets. In the other, Sten unleashes his shaggy-dog joke cracking sidekick, Alex Kilgour. Both available as trade paperbacks or in all major e-book flavors. Click here to tickle your funny bone or sizzle your palate.
THE COMPLETE MISADVENTURES: IT'S A BOOK!
THE VITAL LINKS:
The MisAdventures began humbly enough - with about 2,000 readers. When it rose to over 50,000 (we're now knocking at the door of 115,000) I started listening to those of you who urged me to collect the stories into a book. Starting at the beginning, I went back and rewrote the essays, adding new detail and events as they came to mind. This book is the result of that effort. However, I'm mindful of the fact, Gentle Reader, that you also enjoy having these little offerings posted every Friday to put a smile on your face for the weekend. So I'll continue running them until it reaches the final Fade Out. Meanwhile, it would please the heart of this ink-stained wretch - as well as tickle whatever that hard black thing is in my banker's chest - if you bought the book. It will make a great gift, don't you think? And if you'd like a personally autographed copy you can get it directly through my (ahem) Merchant's Link at Amazon.com. Click here. Buy the book and I will sign it and ship it to you. Break a leg!
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