Plus Ultra

by Carlo Zen

  “Tanya, sweetie, are you here?”

  Sadly.

  “Hey, today we’re finally gonna get your makeup done!”

  Her indomitable resolve.

  “It’s a special occasion, so why not, right? We got a cute outfit for you! C’mon, let’s try it on!”

  Her oath to resist.

  “Change into this, okay?”

  Her sense of dignity.

  “And this is a new corset. You said the other one was too hard to move in, so I brought the most flexible one. C’mon, c’mon.”

  Today, under these circumstances, they would all be crushed underfoot.

  …It all started with orders she received three days previously.

  It was supposed to be a mission to help out with some minor business in the rear as part of her receiving the Silver Wings Assault Badge and being transferred back there. Of course, this was the “minor” of not only the military’s but any organization’s upper echelons. It had to be taken with a grain of salt.

  But she wasn’t going to become the guinea pig of a mad scientist and get blown up by his invention; she wasn’t going to have to perform delaying action in isolation on the front lines; this time it was supposed to be simply supplying a word or two on some topics for a little propaganda piece.

  Nothing had seemed problematic when she received the orders, but the moment she knocked on the door of the Culture and Promotion Division in her type I dress uniform, things started to go haywire.

  Her hair was tucked under her well-starched cap, and her Silver Wings Assault Badge gleamed on her chest according to regulation. She could move briskly after her injuries in Norden thanks to advanced magic treatment for mages, and she thought she had made a model salute. Her boots were polished to such mirror perfection that even her sergeant at the academy wouldn’t have been able to pick on her.

  “Be mindful that as a magic officer, you are a model member of the Reich.” She thought she had followed her orders to the letter. Like past heroes who had left behind any number of propaganda photos, she would say beautiful things and look sharp like an officer should.

  First impressions stick in people’s minds, so she had given her appearance extra attention.

  And yet. She was forced to realize she had made a huge mistake.

  The moment she walked into the room and everyone’s eyes gathered on her, there were sighs.

  She was then dragged before similarly disappointed military women, who grumbled at her so furiously she didn’t know what they were talking about.

  Before she knew it, she was stripped of her new riding breeches, the boots she’d spent half a day polishing were thrown away, and although she just managed to keep her underwear, she lost her cap.

  Her resistance futile, she was forced into an outfit so mortifying she could hardly take it.

  A floor-length frilly skirt, incomprehensibly designed, and a pair of strappy women’s shoes that would be impossible to march in.

  But all that was still tolerable compared with the smiling murmurs. Before that, she still had room to debate.

  “It’s great that your skin is so clear! We heard you were hurt, so we were worried…but I guess the surgeon did a great job! And your legs are so slim. Try this one for just a second.”

  It was another frilly skirt, but for some reason, this one left her legs exposed when she sat down. And to top it off, the corset’s restraints were pulled impossibly tight until she could hardly breathe.

  Hurry, hurry, please just be over. Tanya could only hope, but even that was in vain; it went on for half a day. And when both her body and mind were flagging, finally the hands of the woman in charge stopped moving. It’s finally over. She had nearly sighed it aloud when she suddenly heard something that made her heart freeze.

  “Well, this simple outfit is good enough for the first day. Let’s try some makeup!”

  The first day? …The first day?!

  “Oh my gosh, your hair! Are you taking care of it properly?!”

  “Huh? Umm, according to hygiene regulations—”

  Her hair was cut to regulation length. In some ways, the Imperial Army was quite traditional, and this was a vestige of a rule created mainly with nobles in mind. The bizarre regulation stated that “in order to distinguish the sexes of young members of the service” or whatnot, girls who went through the academy before they had reached conscription age were to maintain shoulder-length hair. When she had looked into it, the imperative turned out to have been included mainly for the sake of noblewomen.

  Sadly, the Imperial Army stuck fast to the rules, so she had to grow her hair that long, too. But Tanya could boast that her duty was performed in full. It was the perfect length—she measured it.

  “Stop right there. Do you brush it?”

  “Sorry, uh…”

  “What kind of comb do you normally use?!”

  “The standard-issue…”

  There was nothing she could do. Every time she opened her mouth, the lady’s expression grew more severe, and she couldn’t fix it.

  “Hold on. By the standard-issue, do you mean this…celluloid one?”

  “Yes, that’s right…”

  “That’s insane! We’ve got to teach you from square one!”

  With that, she took out several combs and began to speak voluminously about each one, while Tanya stood there and felt like her mind was being physically scraped away.

  …O Being X, I don’t even care if it’s thee this time…

  If you call yourself God, then you should be able to at least fix this issue with my hair. No, I know it’s impossible. I know it’s impossible, but…

  In her thoughts, she began bandying about absurdities that would affect her life’s mission. But as her mind was about to escape reality, she was suddenly jolted back by something that looked like a branding iron.

  “Umm, excuse me, what might that be…?”

  “Oh? So you are interested in some of this, huh? I do think you would look charming with a perm. Hmm, wanna try it?”

  “No, uh, er, with that iron rod?”

  “Yeah, you use it to make waves, you know?”

  She smiled and said she was confident in her wave-making techniques. But honestly, at the point Tanya heard that the rod would be used, all she could think about was formulating some plan of escape.

  “Uhh, no thanks, er, I think it would interfere with my duties…”

  “Yeah. It’s too bad, but I guess we’ll have to hold off on that. Then I’ll at least do your makeup really nice.”

  “…I can’t just look the way I always do?”

  She knew it was a bit late to say that. She was ashamed to admit she had been overpowered, but if she wasn’t able to speak up, then it would have been the undeniable truth. So she mustered her courage and asked. Would her type I dress uniform really not work?

  “You look too dangerous like that. And you can talk in a gentler, more girlie way, you know. Just because you’re in the army doesn’t mean you have to act like a man.”

  “Oh, this is easier for me…”

  “Oh boy, well, let’s at least try this, okay? We have four days until the event, so let’s do our best here, all right?”

  Thus, she was shot down.

  If this is how it’s going to be, I’ll take the battlefield. I want to go back…

  How many times did she murmur that deep inside?

  It went on for three days. She withstood the weirdness of the foundation brushed onto her face, the stickiness of the lipstick, the constricting corset, all of it.

  …If public relations wants a dear little patriot and if that is recognized as an order by the army…then I have no choice…

  Suppress yourself.

  This is work. Smile, c’mon, smile.

  “Hello, everyone! I’m White Silver, also known as Tanya Degurechaff!”

  (Fin)

  Appendixes: Mapped Outline of History

  Afterword

  Before I greet you, I, Carlo Zen, declare
:

  The publisher known as Enterbrain actually has only one screw that’s tight. On top of the title, The Saga of Tanya the Evil, this revised manuscript with no concern for political correctness… When they were working on my revised manuscript for Volume 1, they didn’t say a word. I seriously wondered what level hero they are.

  Now then, they’re a bit belated, but greetings.

  To those of you who bought books one and two at the same time: Nice to meet you. I appreciate you buying these two thick books. I have the feeling it’s probably already too late, but…you might want to read the afterword from Volume 1 first and then come back here.

  Next, to the readers of book one who picked up this book: My apologies for keeping you waiting. I personally regret it very much. I wrote in the back of the first book that the next one would be out “next spring,” but I totally meant spring in the southern hemisphere (huge lie). To speak in extremes, I guess we could say the problem was Clausewitz’s internal friction. And I was busy with moving and whatnot. I won’t mention the name of the company, but a certain major communications infrastructure something or other had me nearly crying at the standard of their east side service. That’s what they call “external friction.”

  In other words, Clausewitz wrote about why my book was late in On War. Ahh, the fog of war is scary. In conclusion, it wasn’t Carlo Zen’s fault.

  …Uhh, I’m going to make the next volume more compact and get it to you sooner. This one is so thick I’m getting scolded to make the afterword short.

  Okay, I’ve fulfilled my duty of accountability (I’ve decided), so on to a few gripes. To be blunt, it seems that you all like Grantz, or Weiss, or the middle-aged Ze-Ru duo better than Degu-san.

  Please take another look at the cover. This is a light novel called The Saga of Tanya the Evil. It’s popular among authors I know, as well as children—a light novel with a favorable reception. In other words, it’s a story you can enjoy as a family.

  Strangely, my editor is like, “I like when the older guys get a turn. I feel closer to them than Degu-san, so I can relax, lol,” explicitly telling me to boost their presence. But I won’t yield to this pressure.

  So as not to turn my title, The Saga of Tanya the Evil, into a scam and earn society’s harsh criticism, I will do my duty, even if I must resist pressure from my editor and some readers telling me, “Give us more of the cool old dudes.”

  Rest easy as you wait for Volume 3.

  P.S. Last time I forgot to put this in. I’m peaceably extolling the virtues of peace, love, and democracy on Twitter: @sonzaix

  May 2014 Carlo Zen

  1 sealed orders Securely sealed orders. May only be opened in a certain place at a certain time or in a certain war situation. Delivered by an officer.

  2 doctrine In a military sense, pertains to beliefs about combat. In other words, the thinking behind employing each army’s fighting force and the strategy, operations, and tactics involved. Of these levels, the concept of operations has been nearly forgotten, so be aware of the terrible tendency to discuss war as strategy and tactics. Also, even if you know the difference between strategy, operations, and tactics; the different hierarchy terms; and hierarchy-like terms, it’s still so easy to mix them up.

  3 paradigm shift When phenomena unexplainable by the current paradigm, the current way of understanding things, pile up and we switch to a new way of understanding. Example: geocentric theory → heliocentric theory

  4 Molotov A Soviet diplomat. Stalin’s minister of foreign affairs. He once proclaimed that even in wartime, noncombatants should be protected and that they had the right to be free of starvation. In retaliation for dropping “bread” from heavy bombers on Finns in war against Finland, Soviet soldiers got to taste special Molotov “cocktails.” Now that is a friendly, well-mannered relationship between two civilized nations.

  5 Animals are not your food! From an NPO’s sign.

  6 1800 hours Six PM in military time.

  7 CP Command Post. It’s one step down the hierarchy from HQ.

  8 harassing attacks In a nutshell, attacks with the intent to cause disturbance and confusion—e.g., the Doolittle Raid or saying hello to Berlin with Mosquitoes on January 31, 1943, during Göering’s speech celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Nazis gaining power.

  9 phony war The France-Germany border during the beginning of World War II was the very picture of peace. This phrase describes a strange state of conflict in which parties are at war but not fighting.

  10 Koskenkorva An alcoholic drink.

  11 aal Pet name for German torpedoes. In German, aal means “eel.”

  12 pretty hands for a sophisticated game of cricket A typical English thing to do. When a British pilot taken prisoner by the Germans was missing a prosthetic leg and asked to be sent one, I guess the British dropped one with a parachute in addition to some bombs or something. When the Germans said it was bad manners, the British were like, “This isn’t a game of cricket!”

  13 RTB Return to base.

  14 VT fuse A proximity, aka “magic,” fuse. A revolutionary gadget that makes shells explode when they are near the enemy.

  15 two British ladies Ships are female, and British women are ladies. You all need to play Paradox Interactive’s game Victoria (aka Vic)! Or maybe take a look at Britannia (the goddess).

  16 mole A spy, or a double agent. Usually the kind who infiltrates a nation’s domestic organizations.

  17 flight leader The one in front who guides the others. They mark bombing objectives, guide aviation units, and so on, so it’s a job for veterans. Leaders are important.

  18 produce silence with a shovel To shut someone up by hitting them. Doesn’t really distinguish between knocking someone down, knocking them out, and killing them.

  19 QED “It has been proven.”

  20 WTO Warsaw Treaty Organization

  21 Rudel A great pioneer of enlightenment who turned a certain lying encyclopedia honest. Or the king of destroying tanks.

  22 Mr. Yamashita Thought to be the precedent for International Criminal Court Statute, Article 8, also known as the “Yamashita Standard.” In a nutshell, that’s what we call General Tomoyuki Yamashita, who was tried in the pickiest way in an American military tribunal for bad things his subordinates did—command responsibility.

  23 Shimahdzus The Shimazu clan.

  24 ECM Electronic countermeasure. Can jam transmissions, among other things.

  25 Matsusheeta Kōnosuke Matsushita.

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