NaNoWriMo 2022
Gulf
American Kingdom Day 51
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Prince David opened a couple of glass doors onto a wide deck, darkness beyond. The moon behind us showed an expanse of water, hills rising on the far side. Off to the left a glow behind a ridgeline hinted at a sizeable city.
He led me to the railing. I looked down. We had to be at least twenty floors up.
“If Armageddon happens, Sergeant, it will be here.” He pointed, sweeping his arm around. “Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, all in eyeshot, all looking nervously at one another. And we here in the middle.”
I bent my head. “Jesus, my Lord, you are almost home here. Thank you for watching over me and may we meet in the flesh, near in space, close in time.”
Prince David was watching as I lifted my head and gazed over the darkness of the waters. A boat was moving steadily across; I could hear the purr of its engine.
“You feel the power of the place.” A statement, not a question.
“I feel close to the source here,” I said.
Seth appeared with our drinks. He set a tray down on a small table.
“Sit down, please,” Prince David said, “I want to have a chat with you, Sergeant, before you get some well-deserved rest. But first, Seth, any highlights I need to know about?”
He seated himself, gesturing to nearby chairs, the sort that could be reclined. I guess ruling a small kingdom wasn’t entirely hard work.
Seth sat down and hoisted his Scotch to his father and I. “Good company,” he said.
I raised my glass of coke. Gosh, it probably had as much sugar and caffeine as a regular coffee. I hadn’t thought that one through. Just a sip then.
“Good company,” I said, thinking of the friends I’d made.
“Sergeant Wandurn,” Seth said, echoing my thought, “has the technical skills. We can set her to auditing the communications, see if she spots anything. The lawyer has a keen mind and a prosecutor’s nose; they can work as a team.”
“Perhaps he might be a little distracted?” suggested the prince. “After all, we’re throwing a party for him and his bride.”
“He can have a day — ah, and a night — off duty and then nose to the grindstone,” Seth said. He must be head of HR or something, I guessed.
“The doctor? She have anything for us?”
“Only that she heard it from Sergeant Payne at table. On that note…?”
The prince sighed. “Sir Duane questioned her but it’s what we already knew. All over Holystone by then.”
“And that brings us to…”
They both looked at me.
“Have you read anything of the discussion on Holystone?” Prince David asked.
“Um, Holystone?”
“She hasn’t been assigned an account yet,” Seth said to his father. Then to me, “Your formal graduation ceremony will be held tomorrow and you’ll be given Holystone credentials as part of the process.”
“Holystone,” the Prince added, doubtless sensing my continued confusion, “is our private communication channel. We use it to inform our members and to receive feedback through discussion.”
“As I indicated earlier,” Seth said, “your situation — dying and returning to life — has sparked some spirited discussion on Holystone and well, everywhere else.”
“And,” his father added, “created a security problem for us. Some details of a private conversation between Duke Francis of Charleston and myself appeared a few hours later on Holystone.”
“Posted by an account that belonged to a member who recently passed.”
“And giving us a second security headache, because access to Holystone is enabled by a member’s lapel pin.”
“Another job for Sergeant Wandurn.”
Another well-polished double act; father and son picking up each other’s thoughts and running them on a few more yards.
“Wait,” I interrupted. “Perhaps it was me. I told a friend some of — well, all of — the details.”
I told them about my girlfriend Leonie and how we had discussed my situation over a beer or three.
“The timing’s right,” Seth said, “but how would Leonie or anyone in her circle know about the Kingdom, or have access to Holystone?”
“We’ll find someone to look into this,” his father said, catching the conversational ball. “It’s a long shot but we want to cover all the bases. The thing is, we have checked with everyone who knew those precise facts about a private and rather embarrassing incident and none of that very limited circle recalls discussing it with anybody else within the Kingdom.”
“At least until the story broke on Holystone and then it was everywhere.”
“Perhaps some external agency is hacking into your systems?” I said. Seemed like the obvious answer.
“We take it for granted that our communications are secure apart from our hosts here, and of course the NSA,” Seth said. “That’s the National Security Agency in the US, you may know?”
“I’ve heard of it,” I admitted. “Perhaps they leaked it?”
“But why would they do that?” Seth asked. “Just to show us that they have broken our codes? It was a deliberate act and that sort of behavior is so unprofessional we can rule it out for the NSA.”
“And the Israelis. Both of them are very, very good at keeping secrets.”
I yawned.
“Oh, excuse me!” I said. “Sorry.”
“We won’t keep you much longer,” Prince David said. “Graduation in the morning, followed by a wedding and a celebratory meal. And in the afternoon, we’ll send someone to interview you, get your stamp on the whole dying-and-coming-back story so we can kill off all the silly rumors.”
“Anything you want to say, any questions you want to ask while you have the Regent’s sole attention?” Seth asked.
Gosh. Not more than a million. “Uh, no. I’ll read the handbook and ask around if I need to. Speak to my supervisor. You know, chain of command, keep everything in order. Ah, who do I report to, do you know?”
“Sure,” Seth said. “Me.”
He raised a hand and a figure appeared from the shadows. “Corporal, please take Sergeant Freytag to her room.”
He rose from his chair. I did the same. “Here’s your room key. Your luggage should be there. Dress uniforms for graduation at ten. Goodnight, Sergeant.”
Prince David rose to his feet, reached out his hand to shake mine again. “Thank you for your time, Molly. Until tomorrow.”
I shook his hand, did the head bob again.
“Thank you, Your Highness. My Lord.”
I followed the guard inside, back to the elevator lobby, and we rode in silence to a much lower floor where he led me along a corridor until we got to the door that matched my key. I swiped it and the door clicked open.
“Goodnight, Corporal,” I said, feeling a twinge of something about being back in a military outfit once more.
“Goodnight, Sergeant,” he said as I turned to enter a room that looked like every other hotel room on the planet.
I found the light switch, closed the door.
Wait. Was this the right room? There was someone stirring inside.
“Molly? Is that you?” Hazel said, sitting up in the king-size bed.
Next chapter:
The whole story so far:
Notes
Getting back into the story. I don’t know if I can keep up a chapter a day but it’s something to aim at.
A few more surprises to come. For the reader. And me, most likely.
I’m getting the hang of this NightCafé thing. It can produce some awesome artwork. Not the best at human or animal figures and some of the bicycles in the earlier chapters look very wonky donkey. But for landscapes and abstracts, it is magical.
Molly
