Princess of the Void
3.15. Show of Force

“We begin,” Hyax says, “with a show of force.”

She hits the trigger on the command deck table. The Eqtora system unfurls from its projector. Eqtora itself is so small in the three-dimensional star map. Like a little bauble, and not the massive world before them. 

Grant’s view of the genuine article’s great blue span is marred, somewhat, by the ships. There are more of them than he can count, filling the digital windows around them like a dot matrix. Lumpen and cubic and bristling with weaponry. They surround the Pike. Their weapons are live and pointed directly at the ship. The Taiikari at the command group table pay them no mind.

Hyax points to the simulacrum lunar body on the starmap. “This moon will do nicely. Eqtora’s largest.” 

“Not that one,” Sykora says.

Hyax’s brow raises. “Doctrine is their homeworld’s moon, Majesty.”

“Overruled, Brigadier.” Sykora folds her arms. “Too many spiritual connotations. It’s the celestial palace for an entire wing of their deities. We don’t need that religious acrimony as our first action.”

Hyax bows. “Well argued, Majesty.” But Grant sees her glance at him as she straightens.

“Perhaps this one.” Vora points to another planet and Waian highlights it. “Taiqan. A twenty-eight arcminute moon and roughly four million inhabitants. Plenty of observers.”

Grant leans on his palms against the table. “Are you going to blow their moon up?”

“Of course not, Majesty. That’d wreak havoc with their axial tilt. No.” Hyax gestures to the dual-glaive logo embroidered into Sykora’s topcoat. “We’ll carve our Princess’s sigil into it.”

Grant stares at the blazon across his wife’s back. “Holy shit.”

“They will, of course, dispatch as many orbital and galactic defenses that they can muster to stop us.” Hyax does a slow turn, gesturing to the vessels that menace them. “The Eqtoran fleet—we’ll witness their action firsthand.”

Grant’s eyes dance across the armada arrayed before Eqtora. “Is this our first battle, then?”

Hyax shakes her head. “We’ll ignore them entirely. The only casualties will be if any of them get in the way of our plasma discharge. They’ll hammer our membrane for a few hours while we carve. When we’re finished, we choose whichever world has the smallest population, and park ourselves in its orbit.” 

“That’s Taiqan again, so we’re already there,” Waian says. “Handy.” 

Hyax moves the display to the planet one place closer to the sun. “Here’s our target, then. We bathe its settlements in telecom waves. We announce from every device and loudspeaker we can reach—which is all of them—our ultimatum.”

Sykora’s hand finds Grant’s, and holds it tight.

“One cycle,” Hyax says. “Twenty days, five hundred twenty hours. To evacuate, or to come to the table and discuss terms of surrender. For the more dysfunctional or chaotic civilizations, we extend that timer up to two full cycles, but that won’t be necessary with the Eqtorans. At the end of the cycle, we desolate Taiqan.”

Grant stares at the scarred Brigadier. “What does desolate mean, as a verb?”

“It means we render it uninhabitable,” Hyax says. “We’ll turn the full power of the Black Pike upon it, the power they just witnessed, and we’ll boil its biosphere. Nothing survives.”

A stiff silence around the table.

Hyax punctures it with her emotionless exposition. “We count it down for them. Every morning. The only actions we take are to ensure the safety of any evacuating vessels. Any vessels or armies they send, we ignore. Any ordinance they launch, we allow the membrane to absorb. We make them understand the extent to which we can defend ourselves. We let them take their best shot.”

“That’s when the Kovikans gave in,” Sykora adds. “They had this marvelous flagship—it had taken a full hectocycle to build it—that they’d ordained as the ultimate defense of their system. And it was quite impressive. They’d come up with this ingenious hardlight point defense system. Something the Taiikari had never even considered, although our membranes are strictly superior. When we delivered the twenty-day ultimatum, they gave us three in return. They had banks of atomics. They’d figured out rail tech. I think they even had a plasma cannon, right, Chief Engineer?”

Waian’s half-paying attention, intent on her tablet readouts. “Mmhmm.”

“Day three came, and they launched it all,” Sykora says. “Two hours of constant bombardment. And the discharge clouds cleared, and the ZKZ was standing without a scratch on it. They surrendered the same day. You can still see that warship. It’s in an orbital museum on Kovik. It’s quite beautiful. Shaped like a crescent moon.” Her face when she looks at Grant has a quiet desperation to it. She’s watching his reactions closely, he realizes, as her Brigadier relays the horrors planned for the Eqtorans. “Perhaps I could take you sometime.”

“It’s a Kovikan shipwright company that designs all our interceptors, y’know,” Waian says. “Don’t let those placid squid gals fool you. The Kovikans were proper scary in their day.”

“That’s one reason we bring only a single ship, to begin with,” Hyax says. “Even a huge one. Large enough to terrify—but surely one ship has a weakness. One ship can be felled. One ship isn’t the end of the line. It’s useful to see how a regime acts when they still have a kind of hope. And how it reacts when it becomes clear they can’t hurt us.”

“You make it sound so monstrous, Hyax,” Vora says.

“It is monstrous, majordomo,” Hyax says. “We are here under the command to be monstrous.” She cycles her holographic presentation. “Once time is up, the selected world is glassed. We drop sufficient ordnance on it to destroy everything and everyone that didn’t leave. We leave it an inert lump of rock, like the vast majority of planets in the firmament.”

Grant’s fingers are tapping on the lacquered wood. “How many people does that usually kill?”

“It depends, Majesty. If they evacuate as ordered, none.”

He stills his drumming. “I’m asking usually.”

Hyax’s posture stiffens. “On average, it’s a few thousand. But that average is skewed by the Malkest incident. Most often, the evacuation encompasses the whole planet, or—” 

“Malkest incident?” Grant looms over the system projection.

“An infamous incident, Majesty.” Hyax is expressionless and matter-of-fact. “The Malkesti refused to evacuate their colony and shot down any ship that tried before it could leave orbit. It stands as the costliest and most ignominious annexation of the Zithran Expansion. Twelve million Malkesti died in the desolation.”

Grant feels a numb chill, like Hyax has upended a bucket of ice water on his head. “Twelve million.”

“That will not happen.” Sykora’s tail is tightly wrapped around Grant’s wrist. “This is not Malkest. This is Kovik.”

“Once the bombardment is complete, we offer lesser terms,” Hyax says. “One last chance to enter the Empire as parolee citizen-subjects, under permissive but watchful occupation. And if we are still refused, the invasion fleet assembles in the Imperial Core, and the Black Pike prepares the way for them.”

The minuscule simulacrum of the Pike blooms with virtual cannon fire.

“In the days it takes for the main fleet to arrive, we destroy every satellite, bomb every spaceport, obliterate the repulsor lanes that allow them to sweep safely.” As Hyax speaks, a growing nimbus of red encircles Taiqan. “We transform the interplanetary republic into fearful isolated pockets, their networks dark, their colonies unresponsive, their atmospheres blanketed with curtains of their own satellites’ shrapnel and Pike-released chaff that will hamper any launch. Over the next few days, as our full invasion fleet sweeps into the system, their supply lines, already strained by the mass relocation we caused, break down further in the absence of the satellites their telecoms relied on. No need to destroy production—we want to keep that where it is, to ensure speedy recovery. We aim for their distribution.”

Grant is trying to picture this happening to Earth. His mind isn’t equipped for it.

“We never leave the Pike,” Hyax says. “We remain here, behind our invincible membrane. There is nothing they can do to harm us. Casualties here range from the thousands to the millions, depending on the severity of societal breakdown.”

“What’s the estimate on that for Eqtora?” Grant asks.

Hyax clears her throat. “Majesty. This isn’t exactly my field of expertise—”

“Brigadier,” Grant says. I know there’s an estimate.”

Hyax glances to Sykora. The Princess nods. “Considering their hardiness and closeknit temple communities? The listening post researchers figure approximately ten thousand.” The Brigadier’s mouth twists. “Optimistic, in my estimation. Our ground annexations and aid efforts begin within days, before the deaths by famine begin, but the distribution systems we break aren’t fixed overnight. And a republic can foster a sense of individualism as easily as collectivism.” 

Vora nods. “Those same dioceses that are harmonious now can go territorial quick.”

“We detain or destroy every vessel that somehow gets past their shrapnelized atmospheres,” Hyax says. “By now, our invasion fleet has arrived, and firmament-based resistance is impossible; the system is already under our control. The Void Princess and the Princess-Margrave in charge of the ground invasion become joint commanders.”

Sykora’s expression darkens at the mention of a Princess-Margrave.

“The assassinations are next,” Hyax continues. “The demagogues, the high-ranking military, the councilors who led the resistance to our ways. This is the moment they find out about our invisibility and our compulsion. Whoever remains is now terrified of unseen Taiikari assassins or hypnotized male sleeper agents. They are blind, they realize. They are deaf and mute as well, because all of their satellite infrastructure has been destroyed and they haven’t yet discovered datacryption or quantum communication. The shelves are empty. Confusion, panic, fear. It’s time for us to give them one last chance, case by case. We broadcast into every radio tower, every communicator, we plaster it onto every snowed-out screen. We relate our terms to every isolated leader.”

“We’ll use the temples and their councilors for this,” Vora says. “There’s two hundred of them across the Eqtoran worlds. The first few to willingly join the Taiikari Empire will do so with full citizens’ rights, with access to our medicine and our technology. Say the first twenty.”

“The first fifty,” Sykora says.

Vora bows. “As you say, Majesty.” 

“We bring them wonders,” Hyax says. “We show them everything they have gained by their fealty to us. We supply aid and communications; we help them rebuild what we broke. Families reunite, profiteers and pilferers are punished, injuries and diseases are cured, everyone’s fed. The communities that resist are smashed, their populations made prisoners, house-arrested on their worlds, monitored and separated.”

Waian’s mechanical hand raises. “If we get to this point, I recuse myself. I’ll set it up with my Specialists and they’ll take it from the ground invasion on. I won’t be a part of it.”

“We have to be, Chief Engineer,” Vora says. “That’s what our commissions demand of us.” 

“Majordomo.” Waian scoffs. “With all the respect and love for you in the world, fuck off. I’ve been in the Navy longer than you’ve been alive. I’ve given more than enough. I don’t give this.”

“That isn’t your prerogative, Waian,” Hyax says. “You don’t pick and choose your service to the Empress.”

“You can fuck off too, kiddo.” Waian parks her scuffed boots on the table. “Her Majesty can execute me for it at her discretion.”

“This is needless quarreling, command group,” Sykora snaps. “We’ll do our jobs and do them well, and it won’t come to that. We’re the ZKZ Black Pike. We will bring the Eqtorans into the fold bloodlessly.”

A trilling tone asserts itself into the silence that follows. Grant barely hears it. His gaze is fixed to the projection.

They made him a Prince. They gave him power. Now he needs to figure out how to use it. 

He will not allow this to happen.

The trill again. “That’s our Council connection, Majesty,” Vora murmurs.

“I know.” Sykora steps to the table console and hits a switch. “This is the command deck. Read, bridge?”

A monotone reply: “Yes, Majesty.”

“Accept that hail,” Sykora says. “And patch me through to Citizen Havnai for translation.”

“As you say, Majesty. Hold for translation.”

Grant steps to the window and stares at the world below them. He folds his hands to keep from trembling. A tiny blue hand settles across his knuckles. 

“I know,” Sykora whispers. “I’m here. It’s going to be okay.”

A percussive wash of dissonant chords pipes into the bridge. The guttural Eqtorish pronouncement follows, ringing through the prow of the Pike. Havnai’s hushed translation accompanies.

“Alien vessel. In the name of the Gods and the self-sovereignty they champion, the Council of Two Hundred refuses to accede to your demands. Leave Eqtora’s orbit immediately, or be destroyed.”

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