Preacher Man

by r. a. Ben Miller

  Finally, almost two moons after their arrival at MS-1, Zeer and Paris got word of their appointment to speak with the Commandant. They arrived at the main gate a few minutes early for the appointment. They were kept waiting in the stifling anteroom for almost two hours. They were packed in with hundreds of others. Some were miners right off the boat. Some were played out miners waiting for their release vouchers to move their money and families back home. They had completed their contracts and were leaving, glad to still be alive, and hoping that they could get to the spaceport with their lives and fortunes intact.

  They watched as apartments and furniture was bought and sold at incredibly high prices in the waiting room while the miners waited for their appointments with "the Frog." Finally, they were ushered into the office of the commandant. He was a short, greasy, little man. The skin that they could see had a slight gray tinge to it as if he were not well. His uniform looked as if he had slept in it for a month. The sweat stains had left salt rings around the unbuttoned neck and armpits. Somehow, he was sweating even in his air-cooled office. As he talked, he had a disgusting habit of smacking flies with a fly swatter and popping them in his mouth.

  "Whew," said Par in the middle of his mind, "Stinks worse than the dead preacher mans."

  "Paperz, pleez, Mishoor." The man reached a webbed paw out without even looking up at the applicants.

  "There ya are, sir."

  "By your accent, you zound like zum one from the Emerald Planet."

  "Me Mum was Emerish, Highness."

  Zac snorted, "Oh, lordy, suckin' up ta a Frogger!"

  "Hush, dad, he may be a mental..."

  "Them Froggers never used their brains fer nothin good. How do ya think I hid from them for thirty cycles..."

  "Check him for me, will ya, sweets."

  "This stinking frogger canna do mental speeching."

  "Par... dinna talk like Dad..."

  "It zez here that you were born on Zeddat III."

  "Aye, me dad, rest his soul..."

  "That's a good'n, sonny."

  " ... was a humble Traveler, also..."

  "Unofficially, of course."

  To his dad, "Will ya let me finish one sentence before you butt in! "

  "Well, excuuuse... me..."

  To the commandant,"...And I was raised on Zeddat III after the wars. I have never actually seen the Emerald Planet, me self."

  "Ya never will since these motherless wimps ruined our planet in the Frogger Wars, ya mean."

  "Dad, I'm tryin' ta concentrate."

  And, as Zeer predicted, the Commandant was talking to him, "You muzt be old enough to remember zzee glorious entitlement? I myself, got my first commizzion zere…"

  As he always done, Zeer lied. "I did hear of it, but, it meant little to me. I was but a boy and far away with my parents doing the Master's service. Religious life has removed any political interests from me life."

  As he was answering, Zeer noticed that the Guardian had not even looked at him. He let his voice trail off. It was clear that, while the question had been directed at Zeer, the Commandant was not interested in his reply. The Commandant kept reading from the forms that Zeer had brought, scribbling arcane symbols on them, and typing into his system. Zeer remained quiet and let the frog work. He instead began to amuse himself with reminiscing about his true involvement in those old battles.

  It was an exciting time. By the time he was eight years old Zeer had been a runner. He and his friends had carried dispatches between the underground army units and secret societies. At first, nothing much more than a few shootings and some bombings ever came of it. After he was 10 solar cycles, his older brother, Shannon, took him flying. By the time he had recovered from his first bout of jump sickness, he was in love with flying. When they were out on patrol one evening, Shannon had let Zeer fire the laser cannon into a hated Winser's pleasure barge.

  By age eleven, he had been trained to run the laser cannon and would sneak out almost nightly to ride with his brother on some of his missions.

  “Yer mother went to her grave not knowin’ ya was runnin’ that young, laddie…”

  “Aye… I hated lyin to her.”

  Zeer went on telling his story to Paris, “I was a lad of only twelve when I was in me first battle. That night, my little gang of wharf rats, as Shannie used ta call us, tasted death for the first time. I was firing at any UKP flitter I could see when a huge flash blinded me fer a sec. It was me best friend, Joey. He was a gunner on a ship right next to ours. It was hit by return fire from a trap set by the UKP to catch us all.”

  “Cheeky buggers…”

  “Aye. Many of me comrades did not come home that night. Only the brilliant flying of me brother got us out of there alive…”

  “After that night, me son there considered himself to be a battle hardened veteran with one too many missions under his belt.”

  “Still even with the losses, I continued to serve on me brother’s pirate vessel as a gunner and had several kills to me name.”

  Dad piped in, “I remember the best one. There we was, all near ta kilt when ya did yer most famous kill ever!” He mentally sent a picture to Paris of a gawky boy in an oversized naval kit leaning nonchalantly on a laser cannon. She laughed to see him so young.

  “It was true grand moment…The bloody Winsers had sent a robo-drone to hunt ma wee sons down and blow their entire crew to tiny specks of space junk. That was his first medal.” Another picture formed in Zeer and Paris’ melded mind. “Ma wee Zeer made yeoman first class, that day, he did.”

  “Man, Da’…yer good at this mental picturing…”

  “Had a bit more practice than you, laddie buck…”

  Another 3-D holographic picture formed of Zeer’s mom when she was young. The old ghost continued, “Me wife, his mom, was so proud. She was mad as a wet hen when she found out we had taken the lad, but, she forgave us all when we got home safe and Shanny was saved. He was the heir to throne, dontcha know after me, o’ course, and Z-boy here was cock o’ the walk for the rest of his sixth form at school.”

  “Right…” Paris was fascinated by this heroic tale, well told. Zeer had actually been there. He was reliving his own story and still, he was drawn into the magnetic speaking style of his poor dead papa.

  Zac jumped in, “Aye, both me boys were holy terrors, back in them days. Shanny was a righteous fine collector of spare space vessels.”

  Zeer chimed in, “They called us pirates, of course…said them spares was stolen property…”

  Zac laughed and added, “We was privateers fer the cause, I tell ya. ‘ats wot we was…”

  “Dad! Are you still checking for mind sweepers?”

  “Aye! never stopped… you, me and the pregnant fur ball are the only ones ‘round here…””

  (Zeer focused back to Paris) “We was funding our war with their own credits.”

  “Aye…”

  “Yeah…well…I’m new at this game, so, you have got to do it for me for now.”

  “Gotcha! Still it makes me laugh just ta think that if this piss poor excuse for a hero had any idear who was really standing before him, Zeer MacTarn, Crown Prince, third heir…”

  “Second heir, Dad. You’re dead.”

  “Oh yeah… Right! Second heir to the Emerald Throne was right in his clutches, dressed as a humble Breather of the Word, there’d be green slime all over the floor under that desk, I’m thinking.”

  Zeer could not keep the tiniest smile from twitching the edges of his mouth. He could hear faint laughter from Paris as well. He went back to his memories. They were as fresh today as when he had been a boy. He had not been away on some other planet. His dreams were still filled some nights with all the terror and all the senseless destruction. In truth, he was one of the few who knew the tale of the Sanser Imperion's so-called "Glorious Entitlement" and was alive to tell about it. The smile turned grim as these memories played across the backdrop of his mind.

  Brought back to the present by a cramp i
n one foot, Zeer’s shuffled his feet a little for a better stance. He was getting tired, but, he had participated in enough of these interviews with these bureaucratic napoleons. If he made one wrong move, he might find himself at the back of the line waiting even more hours. He tried to remain focused as the Commandant slowly filled out form after form.

  To make things worse, the bastard kept getting calls on his viddy phone. He kept excusing himself to step in to a nearby office for each one. This Guardian Major had smelled bad enough at the beginning of the interview. As time passed, the smell of liquor on his breath told the whole room that while he was in that back office, he had clearly been taking drinks from some rot gut hootch hidden back there. So, this already long and boring process was made more so by these stops in the action.

  Zeer continued to tell Paris his life story, trying to ignore the stench. He started with a brief review of his planet’s history, “Ya see darlin, me planet is called Emerand, the Emerald Planet. We used ta be free and flyin’solo. We were happy and content, we was. Starting about two hundred and fifty cycles or so before my birth, a different clan ruled our planet. Because of their bad leadership decisions and some unlucky battles, we came to be absorbed into an ambitious political coalition called the United Kollection of Planets. Although strong at first, by the time the MacTarns came to lead the Emerish, the UKP had deteriorated to an aging Empire being run by the latest heir to the Winser dynasty.”

  Zac piped in, “Aye. We MacTarns were sick of hundreds of cycles of oppression from this petty family. Vowing to do something to make things better, we gathered a collection of rebel houses together, the Emerish Republican Armada was formed.”

  “Really? What’s that?” she said.

  Zeer continued, “At first, it weren’t much ta shake a stick at, just a bunch of rebels flying around in a ragtag collection of souped up clunkers and garbage scows. Even without jump capabilities or hardly fast enough to get out of planetary gravity pools, we were still good enough pilots to board and seize newer vessels. These newer ships helped modernize us and make us more effective. The UKP called us pirates. We called ourselves patriots. Mostly we fought for fun and revenge. We could see the Winsers were a sorry lot. We thought time was on our side... oop, he wants me ta sign somethin’.”

  Zeer was handed several papers to sign. His dad picked up the telling of the tale, “Romantic, futile struggles for freedom are always attractive to a certain type of person. The Clan MacTarn, was just filled with such romantic adventurers. Our clan saw themselves as generation after generation of men and women with hearts both strong and true. Our clan has sat firmly on the Emerald Throne above and below the law for ten generations.”

  Zeer returned to the story, “Finally, just after me Dad was born, a new leader took the throne from a weaker cousin after a bitter sword duel that left the new leader with only one arm, but, he took what he saw as his.”

  “It was me own father, dontcha know. He did more wi’ one arm than most could do with two…”

  Zeer continued, ignoring the interruption, “He was named Shannon at birth after the two greatest MacTarns. They called him Bonny Prince Shannon III, because of his giant laugh and his good looks. To me, he was just Grandpa. As me dad was growing up, Grandpa, using his force of will, some victories against the odds, and some luck, took the political reins of the Planet and the consolidated the military reins of the ERA under one central command.

  The old ghost could not contain himself, “Me dad was in his early fifties when he came to power. He was very charismatic and well spoken. He did not shout, but people listened to his sage advice. Band after band of pirates, tired of fighting alone or against each other, flocked to the Emerald Banner. They came in person to the Emerald Throne Room to lay their swords and their houses in allegiance to our house.”

  Zeer broke in, “Awww, lassie, ya shoulda seen that place. It was a cave hideout carved deep in the third moon, but, ta me and my siblings, it was a true palace…”

  “Why not be on the home world?” she asked.

  “We couldna do it, ya see, the main planet was crawlin’ wi’ spies…there were UKP troops everywhere. In those days, it had just been easier to operate off world.”

  The dad continues, “From this influx of new men and ships came new leadership options. The new prince proved to be a master strategist. Victory followed victory as the ERA grew braver and bolder. He created coordinated attacks using his new navy. Using a series of feints to draw off the UKP forces, he sent Shannon’s lone ship right to the center of New London City, on the UKP home world.”

  Zeer jumped in, “Finally, around my fourteenth birthday, a plan was formulated that seemed certain to lead us to freedom.”

  “The old ghost made a spitting sound, ”Phhhhhhht…”

  “I know, Da’ Ya see, darlin, in reality, we were being offered a clear path to certain doom. My grandfather was contacted by a group representing interested sympathetic parties. This group made money and weapons available for us to use in our "war of liberation." We didn’t know who the interested parties really were.”

  Zac was embarrassed and sad, but, he continued, “Aye, in truth, me dad’s little revolution was the bought and paid for handy work of the Sanser Empirium. Isn’t your planet part of their space now?”

  “Yes. We have our own sad tale to tell on this.”

  “Do ye know how Paron was taken?”

  “No, I never much attention to politics.”

  “Well, me darlin fur ball, let me clue you in. Ya see, for generations, the Amphibian Lords of the Imperion have sought expansion. First, they had tried alliances, but, the nasty little wart mongers were too disgusting for humanoid types ta be around.”

  ”Aye,” said Par, “They are truly foul.”

  “On top o’ that, their mean as their snake cousins.”

  “Dad! You aint never gonna get these specie groups organized right…”

  “Hesh up, laddie…You are breakin’ me concentration! Now, let’s get back to your education, ma dear. Any one who has known these blasted Froggers fer long was made quickly aware that they had no ethics of any kind. Their personal interests were all that they cared about. From their philosophical point of view, they believe that the use of any means necessary is the best path to getting what ever they want. It is their special definition of the word ‘good’.”

  “I have seen that often enough on Paron.” she added.

  “So, after a long unsuccessful period, they found the perfect solution. They began to start little revolutions. They knew that every government, no matter how well run or conceived, has enemies. They would seek these unhappy groups out and fund their activities. When ever they could, the Imperion encouraged these dissidents to engage in activities that would involve economic disruptions. Under their tutelage and funding, these rebels became successful as pirates. The more the pirates stole, the more a targeted government would appear shaky. The SI bastards made sure that they had cargo on all these lost ships. Then, they had grounds to go before the High Courts of the Galactic Senate and begin to complain about these lost cargos. Once there were lots of complaints before the Court, the HRE would step back in with an offer of helping every one out with their little police problem.”

  Zeer added a bit, “The Senate is all about trade. Without trade, there are no taxes. Without taxes, they don’t get paid.”

  “Thankee, son. To continue, once the damned Froggers had gotten the approval of the Galactic Senate, they moved right in with full ticket to do what ever was necessary to restore free flow of trade. Under the guise of mopping up a mess, they really were just claiming new territory. These lands were supposed to be freed whenever the insurgency was over, but, since they never intended to wipe out the insurgents, they made sure that it was never safe enough to release the territories.”

  “Clever…” said Paris.

  Zac sounded sad, “Yeah, we were so stupid, we played right into their hands. Sure, we took their guns and newer ships. We were so
focused on ruining the UKP that we never watched our new ‘friends’. Groups like us let their hatred allow them to play right into the hands of the Froggers.”

  “We did a fine job, too. Using these smuggled weapons, we struck against the UKP planet of Hessia. Using surprise and a viciousness driven by years of frustration and hatred, we drove the Hessians before us. We captured ships and stored supplies. With even more new equipment, we recruited more soldiers and were encouraged to go after more U.K. shipping. Soon, the UKP was reeling like a punch drunk fighter in the last round.”

  “Me son, Shannon IV, using one of the newest ships, became an admiral in my father’s new navy. At seventeen, Zeer was assigned to serve with his brother on his flag ship.

  “Yeah…it was grand. I was trained to fight in both single and double manned flyers in the fighter squadrons.”

  Paris cut in, “All thoughts of school were forgotten, I suppose?”

  “You remain ever the school teacher, aint ya? Nope, school got nary a thought. I was a pilot and a fighter. My favorite assignment was to fly a one-man flitter called a laser monkey. It was devil fast and the laser was deadly. I was to be guarding the flanks on Shanny’s main assault cruiser, the Emerald Blade. Our older sister, Tess, leading a ship of her own, was my wingman. "Aye, lad," said his dad, sharing the memory with him,"we was sure havin' fun in them days. Then, these reptiles sold us a bill of goods and, before we could take a breath, we MacTarns was runnin' fer our skins."

  "Again, Dad, I remind you…Froggers are amphibians, not reptiles..."

  “What ever...slime is slime…”

  Zeer went back to the history for Paris, “We just continued on our merry, ignorant way. We got bolder, we were takin ships every day. We had all but crippled the UKP's economy. These problems got the attention of the Galactic Senate. The Sanser Empra called a secret meeting of the Senate’s Inner Council. He even sent ships to carry the poorer members of the Council so that they could arrive in style. Darigan the Terrible, Kzar of the Red Planets called the meeting to order, "Vee are here to dizguzz da Vinser claims...Ya?"

  Zac brought out old viddy tapes from his memories. Zeer and Paris could see the chambers as clear as day. “Wow, Dad…”was all Zeer could say.

  They saw the Frogger Empra trying to stand as tall as he could manage before the circle, "The situation in the tenth quadrant is becoming too dangerous. Shipping is down fifty percent from one standard solar cycle ago."

  Zac interrupted his memory for a word, “Here’s another thing that we did that was stupid. Following stolen plans (given to us by the Froggers), we had destroyed most of the UKP communication satellites. This, we thought, would lead to a sooner victory.”

  Zeer finished the thought, “S’truth! The only thing it did was to prevent the news of these meetings from reaching either the Winsers or us.”

  Zac restarted the memory. They saw the Kzar lean forward. He loved a bloody tale more than he should have, "Ya..? Tell me more…"

  "These shipping lanez are supposed to be guarded by the Winzers of the U.K.P. They can not manage their own planets, as the nearest neighbor, the Sanser Empirion would gladly handle this situation for the greater good."

  Zeer took up the telling, “Unknown to all, at that very moment, across the galaxy, a Tritonian Tiger Cat, actually a Frogger spy, was meeting with me own grandfather. He played his memory tape for Paris, "We have just heard from that the U.K.P. is at its weakest and most vulnerable that we have ever seen it. We hear of much Senate support for you all to become a legally free system. Perhaps, this would be the best time to attack."

  Zac interjected, “Pheh! The bloody bastards were waiting for us to bite at their plan. When we went to form up for our attack, new vessels appeared. They were painted like ours, so we thought, ‘the more the merrier…’ It was a glorious victory with the Sanser ships joined in. The U.K.P Navy was destroyed in one bold stroke. What we didn’t know was that the Sanser ambassador was, at that moment, offering the Winsers exile in a home in a secret location. Like the cowards they were, the remaining Winsers fled. Before leaving, they deeded several estates on Hessia to the Sanser Empra. A family Froggers was moved into one of the palaces.”

  “Yeah…and we were told that the Winser Queen was in that house. Like the head strong fools that we were, we attacked it and wiped it out. Again, the Froggers jammed the news satellites thus maintaining these planets in black out from the news. The Sansers immediately made a huge stink in the Court about the barbaric slaughter of their citizens by these Emerish pirates.”

  “The Court sends a recommendation to the Senate and within days, the Sansers had all the papers they needed to move in. So, this is how, with the full approval of the Senate and only days after the fall of the House of Winser, the Frogger consolidation of that area began. The Council ruled that the Froggers were entitled to defend their citizens from "pirates" infesting their quadrant. No one mentioned that their piece of the quadrant had suddenly doubled in area. They were "entitled to defend their citizens against "pirates."  The Sanser Empirion called this their ‘entitlement.’”

  “The promises that the Sansers had made to leaders of the Emerald System of freedom were lies. Them stinkin’ Frogs only meant to replace one master with another. When the new Emerish government tried to get recognized, the full Senate denounced them all as ‘pirates.’ We were tried in absentia and convicted using file tapes the court had gotten from ‘secret sources’.”

  The dad continued, “I remember worst, me last night on Emerand. The Sansers had secretly given us all of our new security satellites. Thinking they were safe, we kept ourselves busy placing them around our home planet. Using secret subroutines, they were sabotaged the very night that the damned Froggers implemented their ‘entitlement.’ Small bands of fighters using these stolen security codes landed quietly all over me home planet. They knew who we were and where lived.”

  “How awful!”

  “Aye, the first thing we knew, my home security is beeping and there are explosions at me gate. Low flying laser monkeys are strafing and bombing the whole neighborhood. I sent me mum, two of me daughters and me wife down the hidey hole just as a huge bomb exploded. I was knocked out and trapped in a pile of rubble. I was saved by two metal file cabinets that made a crawl space just big enough fer my bony buttocks. Most of the other ERA leaders were assassinated in their beds.”

  “Bloody bastards!”

  “The ones of us that escaped were hunted down and killed. I managed to shake them for more than two decades before they found me.”

  Zeer mental voice dropped in, low with emotion, “My own brother was never heard from after a pitched naval battle. I know he escaped because I still see wanted posters hanging all over the galaxy charging him with piracy.”

  “Where were you, Zeer?” she asked softly.

  “I was safe enough. By now, I was a space pilot with several long jumps under me belt, so, I was thrilled to be escorting me grandfather to a meeting with the Embassy Committee of the Senate. We were so sure of ourselves that we was trying to get recognition when the news came that the planet was under attack.”

  “What a shock, eh?”

  “I’ll say. When we got word of the attack, we turned the ship around and jumped within half a parsec of Emerand. Still, we were too late. I couldna even save me mum. The tunnel had caved in by the blast and all were lost. Then, strangely enough, I just started digging in this pile of rubble and found a boot.”

  “My boot, sez I…”

  “I dinna fesh how I knew where to dig, but, I did.”

  “Of course, I was sending ya instructions, ya dim wit.”

  “Oh, yeah, well knowing what I know now, I can see it.”

  “Lucky fer me, you inherited the mental speech gene from yer gramma…”

  “Aye.”

  Zac resumes the tale, “Prince Shannon gets arrested on the spot. He was summarily charged with calling for the murder of those Froggers in the palace. Because of me connection (unkn
own ta her) wi’ me darlin wife. I knew as soon as I had come to that they was all dead. Zeer and me hid in the rubble. They were so sure that nothing could have survived the blast that they never even searched the mess.

  “Arrogant little bug eaters…” and she laughed a hissy laugh at her own joke.

  “Luckily, we had stores and stashes that the Froggers didn’t even know about. We got a two-man ship and escaped to become the hunted criminals that you see before you. Still wanna be friends?”

  “You silly buzz gwump. I hate Froggers more than you two. They’ve been no friend ta me own home world neither.”

  Zeer signed two more papers and continued, “During my late boyhood, dad did many things to help us survive. Being a Preacher man was only one of them. Finding this despicable Frog, one of the very soldiers that bombed our homes and killed half of me people is almost too much to stand for…”

  "Steady, son, we need him now."

  "Aye, dad but, some day, these beasts must pay for what they did to us. And even still they hunt what few remain of us."

  "Aye they hunted me down right square. They found me in me cups at a fine establishment called Quid's. Blasted a whole pleasure dome full of innocents just to get me that night, they did."

  "Dad, that’s enough rememberin’. I'm tryin' ta keep me wits here. I gotta git calmed down."

  "Alright, son, watch yer back."

  "No its your guys job ta watch me back."

  “Aye, aye, cap'n.” said both voices simultaneously.