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Beyond Hope
- Chapter 8 -[]
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"Lizzie? She's fun, always came up with ways to make our time in-patient at the Marsden Clinic less horrible…I totally believe her crazy mom shot her, Hope she's getting the good stuff in the Hospital. I'm 145 days clean today."
-excerpt from the personal diary of Penelope Doons, Entry dated November 18, 3051.
Dealing with Loss[]
Spider Moon, Baronial Annex "Plateau Crate Houser"
Kowloon System, Federated Commonwealth
January 11th, 3054
Elizabeth had been uncomfortable with forcing Helena to move to Kowloon's surface, not even with the improved remote. She set up the First-Lord-in-Waiting at her own, personal estate, the one she would have had if Patrick had lived to come home, and installed 'Helena Drillson' on the identicard documents as a sponsored Noble-in-waiting with a land grant at the Ducal level.
For a while, as Helena and staff began to adapt to this new, more chaotic and primitive 31st Century, it was just nice to have a home where random callers really need to not be random, was kind of nice. Helena could choose who came and who had to go, she could visit the Psychiatric specialists at the Coast Guard Naval Station, shop for goods on-line with the income stipend from Elizabeth's own, personal funds (and the funds generated by several small burrows on Spider Moon itself) and gradually get a handle on how things worked without being thrown, unprepared, into the kettle that is modern Feudal Politics…or, rather, the broiling froth of Kowloon's electoral politics, something the Duchess had reinstituted to help with the day-to-day operation of the system.
The setup pleased Alicia Li as both Commodore of the Coast Guard, and Senior Baron for the offworld. As a candidate awaiting confirmation, Helena did not have to attend the System Assembly on Kowloon itself unless she wanted to, but there were plenty of 'civil administration' roles that the Duchess and the Senior Baron could hand Helena that don't require meeting with more than a handful of anyone at a time, having Helena out here with her (tiny) Estate of only 500 Kilometers by 1000 (by fifteen deep) ON spider moon itself, meant the Duchess had to spend more time in the orbitals, and on the outer (and deep inner) system settlements than her Grandfather had, and certainly more than any of the Regencies over the last 270 years had.
The surface level portion of "Plateau Crater House" was a marvel of architecture made of endo steel, star-slab, and Ferroglass, and overlooked a stark, unyielding territory that hid several large 'cave burrows' under Solatubes and reflectors, where valuable commodities like grain were produced in deeply-dug, reinforced underground farms.
Most importantly, Helena learned, some of her farms produced something extremely valuable within the in-system trade.
Meat. Red meat.
Specifically, sheep and goats, their pastures in deeply buried, heavily reinforced bedrock bored caverns lit by 'solatube' prisms and fed by orbital mirrors.
Red Meat out here, is kilogram-for kilogram more valuable to the Rockjack community than the metals they were harvesting and refining from the ring system and belts.
The official produced by the livestock was also valuable as a domestic trade good, as was bacteria rich mulch drawn from the combined sewage systems-the waste that SLDF fleets dumped out before jumping, was worth roughly half as much as an equal mass of high-grade ore to the prospectors with their tiny, supply-dependent Burrows and pioneer stations.
The situation was a sort of pastoral near-retirement environment, Jane Cameron didn't have to run on extra batteries, she could link directly to the ship's AI core without more than the very rare interruption, while the ship itself was kept hidden in Boojum's ring, only a few light-seconds from the moon. (or closer during certain periods of the year).
"When did they build this?" Helena asked on one of Elizabeth's visits.
"Oh…let's see…Grandfather said the Plateau-Crater was done sometime in the twenty-ninth century, it was going to be Duke Karl's palace-that was the Duke who-"
"-The Duke who wanted to move to the orbitals." Helena showed off her having learned much of Kowloon's historical oddities.
"Yeah…he wasn't wrong, the problems were more because he had to let Comstar know stuff-he wanted to lease a B-station out here, from them, to help tie the system together with mass communications. That kinda went south when his vanity project made the Stripe a thousand kliks south of here and actually fractured a pre-continental plate."
"The tower hit that hard??"
Liz shrugged, "The Stripe's there, so…it must've? Karl's nephew took the Ducal seat at twelve, sat as an 'in waiting' while the Archon of the time used their Regent to 'secure critical assets for the realm' from Kowloon itself…you know, like the port facilities we still haven't got the gear to rebuild. Duk Ngo put a stop to it right after he swore in, got the Archon Himself to end the looting, and was one of the better rulers my family has…but his uncle lost us a lot."
"I'm surprised your people didn't rebel against the Lyrans the way you did against the Rim Worlders…"
"Who says we didn't?" Elizabeth asked, "We didn't have to go all 'car bombings and knives in the night' but then, Kowloon's entry into the Lyran Commonwealth was mostly voluntary-that is unlike the Rimjob conquest, we agreed to join and the treaty of annexation had actual Conditions unlike those poor bastards on Arluna-we retained a few of our rights, including a lot of our self-government…the big problem being, after Karl's Mistake, most of the time, leadership's kind of defaulted to nodding to Lyran norms instead of breaking with them…except Grandfather Dinh."
"Yeah…I'm kind of confused there…" Helena commented, "he and his brother ran your company and governed mostly by not governing until…"
"Oh… yah… Grandfather Dinh spent five years as a political prisoner, while Great-Granduncle Truk actually ran the firm. He was locked up under Alessandro, and Katrina released him five years after, Granddad said it took three years for Lohengrin to admit they still had him alive after she ousted Alessandro and put notice to Freidrich."
Helena was so used to hearing such events, she no longer flinched-Elizabeth's first act as Duchess had been forcing the release of political prisoners, including opposition leaders who were even now making her job harder.
"What…what did they lock him up for five years for?"
"Hiding Katrina and her fiance from Loki kill teams." Elizabeth commented. "I remember listening to Grandfather storming at my dad for choosing a uniform over his heritage, and dad rubbing his face in the fact that he broke three Lohengrin interrogators in five years and never once told them what they wanted to know. When Momma would bitch about Grandfather demanding things, Dad called him 'The strongest man I've ever known'..." she sighed, "i wish I'd known him longer."
"He died in what, '46?"
"Yeah, I was with mom and dad on Coventry in '46, I'd just gotten tossed out of Groningen for bullying some foreigner's kid…I wasn't bullying him, I just didn't like him pushing the younger kids around, and he called me a 'zipperhead whore'...so I hurt him, apparently badly enough that his folks got the boarding school to kick me out. Which is, I guess, what happens when you make a fat Feddie brat eat dirt and rocks for his pottymouth. My brother Henry got the security record and carried it around until he went to Blackjack."
"Where is it now?"
"If it still exists? Probably somewhere on Blackjack, maybe the Clanners are watching it like a blooper reel?" Elizabeth laughed, but there was something empty in her eyes. "How's your treatment coming, Helena?" she asked, "is there anything you need? Should I have corporate find another doctor? Are you okay with the counseling you're getting? Are you comfortable with the staff and getting along with your neighbors?"
"Doctor Huyn is very…she's helping, I think." Helena observed, "what was her specialty before you assigned her to me?"
"Doctor Mai Huyn was assigned as senior medical director for the Coast Guard's Special Victims Unit under Commodore Cartwright, one of Grandfather's best men, she retired a few years before you showed up, so she was available and willing to help me with a very special victim."
"Me."
Duchess Ngo nodded, "yeah. Amaris hurt you bad, I found the best qualified person I could find to help you get through it."
"What about you?"
Elizabeth looked out the panoramic window. "My damage is organic, counseling won't make a difference. When I start losing my marbles, it's because my brain's rotting from the inside, but you can be saved." she met Helena's eyes, "what kind of person would I be, if I didn't do my best, while I can? I'm still dormant-phase right now, early stage one at the worst."
"You're asking a lot of questions that would normally be handled by messaging, what's going on?" Helena demanded.
Elizabeth sighed, and dug a picture out of her pocket.
Three girls, younger even than the young duchess and Helena realized the small one was Elizabeth…much younger. They were wearing identical white and blue, 'patient pyjamas' and the background was clearly a hospital ward.
"Your rehab?" Helena asked for confirmation.
"Yeah. The redhead is Penelope Doons, two years older than me and already chasing Serpents on Bluerock, or Sezz. The Blonde is Daphne Rowe, she stole her mother's Gieneh Roadster and a bottle of MacAllan's and tried to run her ex boyfriend over by driving through his house, while drunk…we were the Three Musketeers of Marsden Rehab. Best Friends for Life.
"
"Oh god, one of them died."
"Penny fell off the wagon and spiked herself to death in a spaceport bathroom after running away from her Grandmother's care on Donegal. I…promised Maggie Doons I'd make it to the funeral. We're setting up a circuit through our shipping interests to get me there in time. I thought I should look in on you before I take off for what's going to be the third worst experience in my life thus far."
"Oh god, I'm sorry…but…"
"Nashan Enterprises is worth sixty seven billion Kroner per year to my company, which confers those contracts generate nearly three times that in employment revenue for the Kowloon system." Amanda explained, "means even if Penny wasn't a friend? I'd still go if Maggie asked me to. She's an important client, and one of Grandfather's friends from the old days."
"What…what's 'sezzanine'?" Helena asked warily.
"Injectible raw pleasure." Elizabeth asserted, "Like one step below Neuroin itself, it's even one of the precursor drugs for making bathtub Neuro. For me, it'll be 'early stage two medicine', but for a normal person who doesn't have what I've got? It turns you into a dog and then…it kills you. It's horrible stuff, and the high? Is how it turns you into a dog-sezz isn't something you just 'kick'-the direct pleasure's too strong for normal people to handle, hell, there's an animal On Kowloon does the same thing but it has the decency to kill you before you can become a slave to it. We hoped the treatment would keep Penny Clean, her Grandmother was moving mountains to try and help her stay off it…"
"I can help you, Liz." Helena steeled herself. I can do this...
"Helena, your anxieties, your trauma-"
"Your friend is dead and it's tearing you up. I can help you." Helena insisted.
"Helena, there's going to be a lot of people there, and the press!" Elizabeth argued, "You need to recover Helena, not back-slide…are you sure? We can't bring Jane with, Helena, she's got a Jump core and we'll be hopping freight runs and passenger ships back-to-back all the way to Donegal."
Helena regarded her. "You're not taking a Dropship?"
"Shuttle can find more bays than a Dropship can find empty collars, Helena." Elizabeth said, "I need to be 'going' from one ship that's arrived to another that's about to leave, that's timetables, timing and advance warning to shippers I either own notes on, can hire, or can bribe to get there. It's a sprint, not a marathon, and I'll be a shitty traveling companion because my TDS means I'll be puking so often that I'll be spending more time with a sickness bag over my face, than not, and that's if we don't have a Corpsman from my detail just put me in a medical coma for the trip there."
“Then we’ll be miserable together. Doctor Huyn says I need to start challenging myself with more social situations, not keep hiding.” Helena proclaimed. “Plus it’ll help that I’ll be with a friend.”
Elizabeth relaxed. "Thank you." she said.
“You’ve been here for me when I needed it and setup everything just the way I wanted, even if it is not exactly the sort of thing I should do to actually get better according to Doctor Huyn so the least I can do is be there for you.”
"I wasn't about to push you into in-patient." Elizabeth admitted. "I know how horrible in-patient treatment can really be. But thanks for coming with me, I don't know how I'll face Daffy without losing it, and Maggie…"
“Like my sis says, we’ll take it one day, one step at a time. Put me down for day three for the betting pool for ‘traveling incident’.”
Elizabeth laughed hollowly, then, "pack light, we'll have to get formal wear for the actual funeral on Donegal, Penny would criticize endlessly if I showed up to her f-f-funeral in last year's…" she started crying. "I should've been there for her, maybe if I'd been there I could've seen it couldovestoppedher!!!"
“I can’t make it better but I can understand.” Helena hesitantly reached out to Liz, then in a jolt hugged the smaller girl. "You'll be okay…" she said. Hot tears soaked into her blouse.
Prepping for the Jump[]
Coventry System, Federated Commonwealth
3054
The shuttle Elizabeth chose was…well, the ST-46's aren't known for being exactly roomy and part of Helena's mind thought the girl should've somehow bought or obtained a K-1. She had the money, after all…and even owned a few, but the aerodynes ARE fuel efficient for what they are, and they're relatively quick fliers in good hands, without needing the extra care that a tail-standing K-1 needs, making the transfers a little bit faster between Jumpships.
Over Coventry, three jumps in twelve hours, three different Jumpships Corpsman Nguyen had to sedate his Duchess, and put her into deep sedation.
"She WILL recover from this, won't she?" Helena Cameron asked, concerned.
"Ayeh, mum, the Docs calculated her doses to account for her stage of progression, body weight, general health…and I've got antidote and revivication drugs if we need them."
“Good.” Helena was trying to hide how much anxiety she had herself.
The strangers, cramped confines, it was challenging to say the least but she was holding together for Liz.
"You're better than her mother was." the strangest of the strangers was sitting in one of the jump-seats next to the bar. Evelynn Mosovich almost didn't look human, with medical grade cameras for eyes, and a face made of myomer and lately, colored Synthex latex. Not quite as good a job as her sister's remote, to cover the kind of wounds that even in the Amaris War, were usually lethal.
“She’s been kind to me, so I’m doing my best for her.” The strangeness of the woman was actually almost a relief in a way. That panicked animal portion of Helena's psyche didn't see 'one more person' there, it saw something mechanical and safe.
"It's good that Lizzie has you." Baroness Mosovich noted, "I couldn't get her to open up after…after Tamar. She kept up this 'wall' where she tried to always show a positive face to everyone, or at least, a decisive face. You got her to at least start to grieve."
“She is a lot like an old friend and a lot like me. So I probably have an unfair advantage.”
"I'll take that unfair advantage any day over wondering when the pressure, and her bottled up trauma cracks her, Lady Helena." Mosovich observed, "besides, it helps that you treat me like I'm still a person, and not a freak that must be tolerated on Her Grace's word…or a creature to be pitied the way the AFFC liaison does."
“Well you’re easy for me too, Evelynn, you don’t trip my triggers. So I can be straight with you in a way I can’t be with most people. And that cuts away a lot of the bullshit, so yeah. You’re a person.”
"Pat would've loved having you around." Mosovich managed to communicate 'fondly' despite the vox-box and expressionless pseudo-face.
“Some days I think I was meant to be born Kowloonese.”
"Well, not everyone can be that fortunate…" the crackle of what passed for Evelynn's laugh would have been startling several weeks ago.
“Of course, Doctor Huyn would probably dissect it and say it’s because you all don’t trip my triggers quite the same way.”
"I expect she'd be right." Evelynn noted, "I served with guys who had issues with me back when I had a face-asian eyes, right on the Drac border. Not bad guys per-se, just…traumatized."
“Yeah. Good old prejudice never seems to go away. Even if it is due to trauma.”
"We all have to work through it in our own ways, Lady Helena." Evelynn said, "It's funny how much clearer things get, when you realize it. Pat and I had the paperwork filed, but the General used her pull to keep us from tying it in the post Chapel, then Liz had to sic Miss Whyte on them to prove that we'd filed at all."
“Damn. I know Lyrans can get weird, but that’s a new level even for me.”
"Nah, the problem boiled down to a Davion from New Syrtis in the Personnel Command who got his kicks hassling certain ethnic minorities, because of the Cappies, you get used to it, when you live with it long enough…though I'm never going to really get used to losing Pat. He died a hero, he called down artillery on his own position to buy the Armor time to get the lady Heir out."
“I’m sorry. No one should have to deal with that.” Helena found herself suddenly lost in thought about all the people who she condemned to death due to her orders and those they left behind.
"You're musing." Evelynn said, and opened the drinks cabinet. "If you're going to brood, we can brood together over a drink."
“Sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry for, during that fight, I ordered a recon section into a position I knew they'd be killed, lost good friends there. It's not a sacrifice if you don't value them, Helena. It's a crime, it's murder if you don't care, okay? Command is different from what the holotapes or the Academy pretends, there's a moral dimension, sometimes you're forced to put your people into a position to get killed, so you better care about it so you don't do it maliciously or frivolously."
“I know. And I know there’s a really good chance that I’ll have to order people into battle again to do what Elizabeth wants me to do.”
Evelynn passed her a filled bulb. "THAT, comes with the title, the job, and the position. As Tran Truk Ngo said…" Evelynn took a drink, "...if it doesn't hurt, you're not human anymore'."
“So it does, and that’s why I spend time with people like Doctor Huyn. So the hurt doesn’t swallow me whole.”
Evelynn nodded agreement. In the windscreen, the next ship, this one belonging to Langenecker Plastisteel, loomed, the pilots turned and docked smoothly, the bay closed but didn't repressurize, because they'd be pulling right out and going to the next one at the next point.
"Here's to making sure the hard calls, stay hard. Here's to keeping our humanity." Evelynn raised her bulb.
Helena raised hers in response. “I’ll drink to that.”
////////////////Discontinuity\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Donegal Orbit[]
Helena awoke. "We're in Donegal orbit." Elizabeth Ngo said, "So wake up, sleepyhead."
“Uggh. Wow, this must be a first, you waking up and being ready before me.” Helena complained.
"Evvie got you drunk after the corpsman mickied me, so drunk you passed out and they gave you an IV to keep your fluids up for the final twenty four hours."
“Right, so I should prepare myself for a lecture about combining booze with my meds when I get back.” Helena commented.
"Well, you, and Evvie. She wasn't exactly not taking some of the same scrips." Liz said impishly, "When Doc Huyn talks about her Thursday?" the girl glanced at the still unconscious…? Evelynn Mosovich. "PTSD, or so they say in the paperwork. I of course, don't have to take THOSE drugs, I get my own."
“Yeah. That tracks. I think I have that somewhere in my diagnosis too. Probably part of why we shouldn’t be left unsupervised like that.”
"Anyway, we're in the orbital approach pattern, could be half an hour, could be tomorrow before they clear a lane." Liz explained, "Donegal's a major world and they've got the same problems all major worlds do-everyone shows up all at once and wants to land or take off, we're in the queue behind an AFFC regimental team who gets priority since they're lifting for the Clan Front."
“Wish I could help but all my authorizations for priority clearance would make them think someone was punking them.”
Elizabeth leaned back, and said, "Money works, I just won't use it when they're going to fight Clan Wolf."
Helena nodded.
"As for helping them, remember that problem I asked you to help me with? The Groves contract?"
“Yeah. What do you need me to do exactly?”
"You did it, you gave me the solution that un-****** that product line, so those soldiers leaving Donegal?? They're shipping with full ammo bins on-time and on-budget because you told me what to do about the shipping problem. You're helping."
“Hangover is a bitch.”
Elizabeth passed her a bottle of something orange. "Alcohol? No, how about a nice, refreshing sports drink!"
“Yeah. Time for us to start putting on our game faces.” Helena sipped the drink slowly.
Money talks, but not Lizzie's money. "Kowloon Six Three One, this is Donegal control, you've been cleared corridor Six One Alpha, welcome to Donegal, enjoy your flight."
"Must be Maggie." Elizabeth scowled, but nodded to the pilot.
"Huh?"
"That's a diplomatic priority corridor." Evelynn WAS awake, "I'd say Her Grace Lady Doons decided she wants us to be on time, and made it happen….did you tell Helena who Margaret Doons really is?"
“No.” Helena gave a playful glare at Elizabeth.
"Elizabeth is the richest teenager in the Commonwealth, minus the Heir and his siblings." Evelynn said, "Third richest individual in the Commonwealth, loads of money and inherited influence. Maggie Doons is probably third most influential industrialist in the Commonwealth, but she's number eight on the money scale-and she turned Nashan from a small radio-and-sensors maker with a couple of contracts, into the AFFC's choice for all the support electronics Macintosh won't take, is a personal friend of the late Archon Katrina and still family friends with the Steiners-she can tell, and has, in the past, told, Marshalls of the Army to jump and watched the air go under their feet. She made the Brewers change their contractor for their product lines."
“Proper lady mode for my visit then, got it.” Helena nodded.
"She gives Hans Davion investment advice." Evelynn continued, "And he takes it. Hence, we got clearance while everyone else gets to wait."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes, "right, and she's got Death Himself as a side-piece. When Maggie Doons cries, the tears cure cancer, but she never cries…I've heard the jokes before, Evvie."
“Some of them aren’t jokes. Hans really does take her investment advice.” Evelyn chuckled. “Or so I have on good authority.”
"Yeah, but the Steiners wisely didn't take her advice on how to raise the heirs, or Victor would be a waste, Katherine would be a junkie…" Elizabeth argued, "They aren't, so Her Majesty Melissa didn't copy Maggie's parenting style with her own offspring."
"What?"
Elizabeth sighed, "Penny was with her grandmama because her own parents are oxygen consumers. She got on drugs because her father was absentee, so was her mom, her aunts have longer records than I do...They're perfect examples of what rich kids become when their…parental guardians don't guard, but instead, indulge them and cover up their mistakes."
Helena frowned but said nothing.
"You turned out mostly okay, Liz." Evelynn noted.
"Yeah, well, I had Grandfather Dinh for the first seven years of my life!" Elizabeth observed, "So did you, and for a lot longer thanks to you and Pat being…like…close until you were teens! Penny had nobody but contract au-pairs until Maggie realized something was wrong and stepped in!"
Helena felt the tears beginning to form in her eyes. “Excuse me, I’m going to the little girls room before we have to secure for orbital insertion.”
"Here…" Elizabeth handed her a handkerchief "You've got something…in your eye, okay? Maybe I should help you with the touch up?"
“Thanks, Elizabeth.” Helena nodded.
"I'll guard the bar…" Evelynn said, as Elizabeth followed Helena to the shuttle's tiny head.
“Wow. I almost made it to Donegal before breaking down into tears.” Helena admitted.
"Progress!" Elizabeth said, "you can do this."
“Thanks Elizabeth.”
"You're keeping me up, I'm keeping Evvie up. She drinks too much now." Liz commented, "had to get the aviators to water the wet-bar down."
“Game face. Time for my game face.”
"Yes, game faces." Liz pulled out a small compact, and started touching up Helena's makeup, before holding still to let Helena touch hers up. "We gotta look good for the parasi-I mean, the press."
“Uggh. I hate them. You know because I was putting on a bit of weight at the time combined with a comment by my sister and I was declared pregnant.”
"Ick…they really are creeps, aren't they? There you go, smears all cleaned up and fresh mascara…"
“Worst part is the rumors continued well past, well you know.” Helena nodded. “But that’s not important right now. I’m supposed to be supporting you and we need to secure for orbital insertion soon.”
On a certain level Elizabeth knew she would eventually have to stop letting Helena deflect like this, but she was hardly objective herself.
“Yeah come on. Time to get to our seats.” Elizabeth smiled.
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