“Die, Giant!”
Druma, Viscountess-in-Waiting of Luniari, leaps from the picnic table onto Grant’s shoulders. He lets out an exaggerated bellow and chucks the cackling girl into the bounce house.
She bounces twice, hair fanning out at half-speed in the low-grav field, and ends up belly-flopped onto the rubberized representation of a ZKZ command deck. “Avenge me,” she cries.
“None can defeat the Evil Giant!” Grant shakes his leg, where another Taiikari kid clings to him like a monkey. “I’m invincible. I’m invulnerable. I’m in—”
Lady Anakai fastball specials herself into Grant’s midsection and knocks him backward onto the bounce house. The gaggle of spectators to their epic clash boing into the air as the Maekyonite lands.
“Victory for the warriors of Taiikar,” Ana crows, one tiny foot on Grant’s chest, as her nameday guests cheer and slowly return to the ground.
“I’m dead.” Grant demonstrates by sticking his tongue out. “I am off to Giant Heaven.”
Ana pouts. “I wanted to take you prisoner.”
“You’re simply too powerful.” Grant sits up and plucks her by her tail into the air. Her weight reasserts itself as he climbs from the bounce house. “Happy nameday, Lady Ana,” he says.
She bows upside down in an impressive display of core strength. “Thank you, Majesty.”
He places Ana on the turf and gives her a pat on the head, then strolls across the meadow toward the adults’ tables. It’s such a lovely day in the park, as long as you ignore the distant Qarnaq II lightning storm outside the agropolis dome, and the marine section loitering at the festive edges. The royal couple are sitting with the Countess and Count of Korak at a small side table that a queue of well-wishers and toadies parade past.
Wenzai is laughing at something Tikani just said around a mouthful of flaky layer cake. Sykora is staring at Grant, hand clapped over her mouth, tears glistening in her wide eyes. Grant’s so distracted by his weepy wife that he nearly trips over Orlo, who gives a brief “pardon me sire” as he scurries, knuof’i cake in hand, to his parents.
Wenzai holds up a finger to halt her son’s approach. “Up bup bup. Go climb dad, Orly Borly.”
Orlo frowns. “Why?”
“Mama’s talking to the Prince and Princess of the sector. And you’re getting too big for me, nameday boy.” She tousles his dark locks. “Look at your horns coming in. Gonna poke my eye out with one of these.”
Orlo solemnly crawls under the table and begins the trek up his father’s legs. Grant flops down next to Sykora on the picnic bench. “You okay, Kora?”
“Uh huh.” She sniffs and laughs through the tears. “Gods of Qarnaq, I’m such a faucet. I’m really all right.”
“Okay. Because I didn’t die for real, you know.”
She blows her nose loudly on the edge of her crimson sundress. “I just keep thinking about when I’ll watch you do that with ours.”
“Awwww.” Across the table Wenzai nudges her Kovikan husband. “Look at ‘em, Tik.”
“Stars in their eyes,” Tikani says.
“Not a single diaper changed between them.”
“Not yet.”
“Excuse me.” Grant and Sykora’s plus one shuffles to the table, fussing with his finely-pressed tunic suit. Prince Consort Auki, once of the Cloud Gate, gestures over his shoulder to a knot of squabbling kids, one of whom watches him with a look of defiant victory on her little dimpled face. “But she is still doing it.”
The table shifts to take in the chartreuse interloper.
Grant and Sykora had gone back and forth about bringing Auki to this, with the Maekyonite eventually winning out—he needs enrichment. Lounging around a ZKZ doing nothing is how he got the way he is in the first place.
Grant is now sure Sykora is going to give him some kind of smirking I told you so after the party. The Prince Consort has been engaged in a heated argument with a hectocycle-old baroness about the merits of loose-leaf tea that he keeps attempting to rope an arbitrator into.
In Grant’s defense, he hadn’t even wanted to allow the husband-of-the-void onto the Pike in the first place. About a tenday ago, the poor pathetic widower had presented himself to them along with his indenturement contract to the deceased Void Princess Kanori—an old rival of Sykora’s who had experienced a fatal case of her brain getting exploded—and asked them to take ownership of him.
The royal couple of the Black Pike agreed to house him only after Sykora impressed upon a deeply skeptical Grant that the former husband-of-the-void of Cloud Gate placing himself in their servitude would be particularly useful during the various legal battles she was waging across the deceased Kanori’s sector.
Grant really, really hopes that’s true, because in every other aspect, Prince Consort Auki the Kovikan husband-of-the-void has proven entirely useless. He’s handsome—handsome enough that even Grant, who has no taste for the squid-alien species—can see it. But he doesn’t cook, he doesn’t clean, he doesn’t know shit about the workings of a ZKZ, and now he is being rhetorically bested by a six-year-old, and he keeps trying to get them to hear their arguments and declare him the victor.
“Twa!nkia, Auki-ng’l,” Tikani says, in a conciliatory tone. “Nw!kniuni wie knrik !na iet.”
“Pardon me,” Auki says. “What?”
Tikani’s emerald brow furrows. “Do you… do you not speak Kov?”
Auki mirrors Tik’s confusion. “Why would I?”
“Okay. How about—” Tikani waves a three-fingered hand toward his taciturn servant, Kroie, who stands in a flour and grass-stained uniform by the entrance to their home. “Kroie, could you please give Auki a hand with his debate, please?”
Kroie bows. “Right away, sir.”
Tikani beckons Kroie closer as Auki wanders off. “Just give the guy… whatever the hell he’s looking for,” the Count murmurs. “Rule in his favor and then give the kid an extra gift bag when he’s stopped paying attention.”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
“Understood, sir.”
“Thank you. Thank you, Kroie.” Tikani waves as the manservant departs. “You’re getting an extra day off for this.”
Grant drags his palms down his face. “That guy is such a dipshit.”
“Why haven’t you just freed him?” Wenzai asks.
“He doesn’t want to be freed, is the thing,” Grant says. “He wants to eat and play javelin sims and lounge around looking pretty.”
“And I already have my eye candy, thank you kindly,” Sykora says.
“I blame Kanori.” Grant watches Auki pout before the leering children. “He’s just so—sheltered. She didn’t want a partner, she wanted a pet. If that’s what a usual husband of the void looks like…”
Wenzai chuckles. “That is kinda the stereotype.”
“As soon as we have bandwidth we’ll find a spot,” Sykora says, clearly uncomfortable about the husband-of-the-void conversation. “Thank you so much for bearing with us bringing him in the meantime. He just pesters the command group when he’s on the Pike, and I don’t want them pestered right now.”
“Really I ought to be the one thanking you.” Wenzai stoically accepts a daub of frosting on her nose from Orlo, who’s already applied the same to Tikani (where his nose would normally be). “Taking the time in the middle of all this shit to party with us. I would have skipped out, or rescheduled, but the kids have been really missing their pod, and we’d already paid for travel.”
“It is entirely our pleasure, Countess,” Sykora says. “I’m sure the knuof’i is delightful.”
She glances impatiently over at Quartermaster Kymai, who’s loading up by the dessert table with one of everything.
“Still, it’s so kind of you to find the time in the middle of everything.” Wenzai gestures to Sykora’s round stomach. “I mean you’re looking ready to pop, Majesty. In a very regal and graceful manner.”
“I am about ready to regally and gracefully waddle over to those desserts and force my taster to tender the goods,” Sykora says.
“How about we ditch the party and the taster for a moment and duck into the main house, before your lost lap pet comes back?” Wenzai jerks a thumb toward the Koraks’ manor, a charming but compact bungalow. “I have a splendid vintage of amrita that I think you’d—well, that I think Grant would love to try. And we can save a flute of it for Sykora. Won’t be long before you can enjoy it.”
“Lovely idea.” Sykora begins the gradual process of standing. “Let me just—oh, Gods. No, dove, no, I can do it.” She waves Grant off and hums triumphantly as she gets upright. “Bungalow time.”
“Lakai sends her love, by the way,” Tikani says, as they set off toward the manor. “She’d love to see you, but kids’ nameday parties aren’t her scene.”
“She’ll be at the board presentation tomorrow,” Wenzai says.
“If you wanted to give me a little preview of the board presentation tomorrow…”
Wenzai sighs.
Grant frowns; he didn’t think anything was amiss. “As long as it wouldn’t ruin the party?”
Wenzai seems to hesitate and come to a decision before she answers. “No. No, not at all. Just gonna…” She shuts the paneled front door behind them. “I mean, we’ve been doing great ever since the Eqtoran crews returned. Totally papered that hiccup over. There are a lot of processes that you can optimize when you’ve got massive hunky fish on the crew deck. Overall, I would say…” She exhales through her nose. “We’re doing about as well as we could have hoped for.”
“That’s an oddly melancholy delivery of good news.”
“Well, let me put it this way.” Wenzai leads them into the kitchen. “You’ve given equity to the union, you’re paying above minimums, you’re spending on benefits and making sure your workers are safe and comfortable. And we’re operating on a level roughly equal to a Ptolek firm in the first decacycle of its life.”
“And that’s—good?” Grant asks.
Wenzai nods. “These numbers’ll never knock the old Ptolek clans off their pedestal, but it’s proof of concept that your way is valid. It’s more work, for the same result, but it’s paying off. Thanks to the deal you somehow struck with Ondai to halve her dues, and some excellent work from Vora on efficiencies and subsidies.” She passes a plate of flaky knuof’i to Sykora. “How is she, by the way? I was doing a book club sort of thing with her, and she’s had to withdraw.”
“She’s, uh.” Grant thinks to the last time he saw Vora, yesterday afternoon, when she’d emerged from her cave for her fifth cup of doublestrong tea. She’d had a pen behind her ear and another one in her pocket, and she’d asked him if he had a pen she could borrow. “She’s very busy, lately. Nothing personal, I’m sure.”
He’s been trying to channel his fretting for Vora into taking more off her plate. But no matter how much he urges the Majordomo to spend her opened-up hours at rest or relaxation every task he picks up just gets replaced by more and more studying. He would feel better about it if he thought it would make a difference, but he can’t forget the machinelike recall of their replacement waiting in the wings. How do you beat that kind of inhuman talent?
Vora’s not human either, dummy. You’re the only human around.
“We haven’t gotten to the sigh-y part yet, have we?” he asks.
“It depends on your priorities, I guess,” Wenzai says. “If your intention is setting up a successful exo business, we’ve done it. If your intention is beating Ptolek, or Shoskia…” She sighs. “Then we’re losing. At the rate she’s growing, she’ll be the biggest exporter on Qarnaq by next deca, if not earlier.”
“Ah.” Grant winches a kitchen stool to maleborn height and sits on it, somewhat deflated. “How’s that happening?”
“There’s things she can do that we just can’t, Majesty.” Wenzai studies her palms. “Their margins are insurmountably better than ours.”
“Is it labor? Or industry connections? Or Narika’s aid?”
“Uh—yes.” Wenzai grimaces. “It’s all of that. It’s everything. I won’t lie, Majesty. Narika’s investments here do move the needle, but Narika’s not the only one investing. She’s got friends on Ptolek who are cutting her sweetheart deals on everything. And even without those, the simple fact of the matter is that Shoskia is cutting to the bone for profit everywhere she can, and we aren’t. You give less money to the people who work for you, your bottom line is better. Simple as that. Her exclusive goal is making money.
Tikani shakes his head and clicks a face tendril. “What a sad, small life.”
“Sad and small, maybe.” Sykora is eating with her hands. She’s been fork-agnostic lately. “But if I award favored contracts to the rest of the exo ring to Grantyde instead of her, that’s...”
“That’s your right,” Wenzai says.
“I know.” Sykora licks frosting off her thumb. “But he doesn’t want it.”
“If I’m—doing something, with Shoskia,” Grant says. “Something kind of cloak-and-dagger. Is that something you want to know about?"
"Whatever it is, Majesty, you have my blessing.” Wenzai intercepts Mava as the cute little countess-in-waiting scurries into the kitchen and climbs her leg. “We’re talking about business, Mav. You promise to be quiet?”
Countess-in-Waiting Mavakai nods. Her too-big ears flop slightly. “Yes, mom.”
“Good.” Wenzai kisses the top of her head. “Listen well.”
“Happy nameday, Mava.” Sykora does her best to curtsey.
Mava half-bows in her mother’s arms. “Thankies, Majesty.”
“You need a pillow or anything, Majesty, you let me know,” Tikani says.
“I remember how a threefer feels,” Wenzai adds.
“Your Princess requires no pillows, friends,” Sykora says. “But thank you.”
“You can pour yourself some of that, Majesty.” Wenzai nods to Grant, who’s lingering by that amrita she promised. “I see you looking. You thinking of being awake for it, Sykora?”
“I hadn’t decided. Were you?”
Wenzai chuckles. “Fuck no. I wasn’t about to, uh—” She hikes Mava. “We don’t say that word until we’re older, right?”
“The fuck word?” Mava asks.
“Correct.”
“Okay.”
“One place I think you’re wrong, Wen.” Grant uncorks the amrita and takes in its cornflower honey scent. “Making money isn’t her exclusive goal.”
He pours a highball glass’s worth of amrita and passes it to Wenzai, who pours half of the Maekyonite-sized portion into Tikani’s flute. “What is it, then?”
“Her exclusive goal is ruining me,” Grant says. “Humiliating me so hard that Sykora loses face with the Empress. She hates me. It was pretty clear last time we talked.”
Mava’s mouth makes a little O shape.
“In fairness, I hate her too,” Grant says. “But I have too many people counting on me for too many things to be single-minded. To me, she’s a—” He glances at Mava. “She’s a jerk. To her, I’m an existential threat to the Empire. That means this equilibrium here—it can’t last, not for her. This isn’t just business. If there are other ways to hurt me, she’ll take them. I’m not going to wait around for that.”
“So what’s this cloak and dagger stuff, then?” Wenzai asks.
“I don’t think I should tell you. Just trust me, right? And keep doing what you’re doing. I’m more than happy with what we’ve got. I don’t need to revolutionize the industry. Not yet, anyway.” Grant winks at the Countess and her duty-destined daughter. “I just want to beat Shoskia.”
Superhero Sci-Fi
The Old God's Game
Superhero ? Sci-Fi ? Psychological ? Action ? Space Opera
When you’re trying to save your world, the last place you want to be is behind a desk.
What to Expect
- Slow-burn mid to strong progression
- Long-form and character-driven plot
- Intern to hero arc
- High-Stakes and OP Antagonist
- Superhero action and office slice of life
- Multiple POVs with unique voices
- Romantic subplots with no harem
- Especially for fans of Dispatch and Invincible
Updates Wednesday and Saturday
Evolving Powers ? Space Combat ? Found Family
Targeted damage or total catastrophe?
Someone has to decide.