The Clones of Mawcett

by DePrima, Thomas

  "You're quite lovely, my dear. Our son is quite taken with you."

  "Thank you, your majesty. Prince Chazurz is a credit to the Royal Family."

  "Yes, he is. And we have you to thank for saving his life."

  "I was only one of many aboard the Vordoth."

  "Yes, but you were the captain. It was your decision to rush to the aid of the convoy."

  "I'm glad that we were able to help. May I ask a question of your majesty?"

  "Of course, my dear."

  "Am I being honored for helping Obotymot, or saving the prince?"

  The Queen was quiet for a few seconds as she poured the tea. "The two are not mutually exclusive," she finally said as she set the teapot down. "You actually performed several great services for Nordakia. You saved many lives aboard the three freighters, and many thousands of lives on Obotymot. We are naturally very grateful that our son was among them. The medal is being awarded for that service. You are as deserving of the Tawroole as anyone who has ever received it, if not more."

  Jenetta nodded. "Thank you, your majesty."

  "You're most welcome. You also have, almost single-handedly, curtailed the Raider threat in this part of the galaxy. Your title as Azula, and the lands that accompany it, are a reward for your outstanding bravery and the difference you have made in the lives of our citizens by eliminating the Raider scourge.

  "The status of Lord or Lady of the Royal House is bestowed upon nobles who have performed an outstanding service to the crown. The honorific is a small compensation for saving our son. You are aware that Prince Chazurz maintains a separate identity, so the specific reason for conferring the honor will not be publicly explained.

  "Your command of Dakis is excellent, by the way. There's a scholarly inflection when you speak. Are you ready to become a citizen of our planet?"

  "Yes, your majesty. I hope that I can live up to your expectations."

  "You already have. We can't tell you how delighted we are to have you become an officer in the Nordakian Space Force. It's taken us years to see women gain any sort of acceptance and respect there."

  "You want women to be in the military?"

  "Oh, yes; it's long overdue. It finally became a reality when Nordakia became a member of the Galactic Alliance. And owing mainly to your actions, the King and our military leaders have at last acknowledged that women can make a significant contribution to the service, although the only women in the service are very junior officers at this time."

  "I expected you to be opposed to the concept."

  The queen appeared shocked. "Why ever did you think that we'd be opposed?"

  "I suppose because of the hair and clothing requirements at the palace and on the planet. Long hair and tight clothing don't allow women very much freedom. No female military officer is ever going to distinguish herself, or accomplish anything significant, if she keeps tripping over her hair and can't move freely because her uniform doesn't even allow her to walk easily, much less fight. I wouldn't be here now if I had to wear a tight skirt as a Space Command officer. I mean that quite literally."

  "We're as opposed to the hair length and restrictive clothing as you."

  "Please forgive me if my question appears impertinent, but if that's true, then why haven't you done something about it?"

  The queen smiled gently. "We're as much a victim as every other woman on the planet. Hair and clothing requirements are very clearly spelled out in the Almuth. You've been studying our sacred text, so you know what we're up against."

  "Yes, but can't it be changed? The colonists on Obotymot don't follow the dictates as it pertains to hair length and dress."

  "Obotymot is a very long way from here, my dear. It might help you to understand that the church was very much opposed to our establishing a colony on another planet. They fought it for years, but the fact remains that our survival may one day depend upon the food and raw materials that our colonists can produce. We are not immune to a meteor strike ourselves, or other global catastrophe. So the king and his advisors pushed ahead in spite of the objections. The church then decided to boycott the effort, believing that it would fail without their blessing. Our spiritual leaders were most upset when the colony flourished, but they had backed themselves into a corner and felt that they couldn't soften their position.

  "After the planet was struck by the meteor, priests went to the planet and told the colonists it was the price they paid for not strictly following the Almuth, but the colonists weren't ready to give up the simple freedoms they had come to enjoy. They rejected and ignored the religious orthodoxy of the priests sent there to bring them back into line. It seems to us that our colony may one day eclipse us here on the home world, but as the Queen of Nordakia, we have a duty to set an example for the faithful on this planet."

  "I'm not advocating sweeping changes, your majesty," Jenetta said. "I'm only suggesting that the passages dictating hair length and clothing be changed because they keep women in virtual bondage."

  "The Almuth is millennia old, my dear. So old that no one knows for sure when it was written. Its exact origins have become inexplicably obscured through the ages. But if we allow one passage to be changed, where will the changes end? I'm working to change our system without changing the Almuth. It's possible; it just takes longer. Our laws are based on interpretations of the Almuth, and a new interpretation of a passage that defines a woman's service to the community has permitted women in the military to shorten their hair by as much as a third of the length normally required of them. The same interpretation has been used to shorten their skirt lengths and allow more freedom to move. We're still a very long way from Space Command standards, but it's been a giant leap forward for us."

  "I'm happy to hear that. Can't the same interpretation be used in the palace?"

  "Unfortunately not. Our advisers have warned that it would be stretching things too far, too fast. Perhaps once the uniform change becomes widely accepted by our people, we can make more such advances. It just takes time."

  Jenetta spent another hour with the Queen discussing life on Nordakia and the extensive changes the Queen was working towards implementing. She left the Queen's chamber feeling infinitely better about her approaching citizenship ceremony and the future of women's rights on the planet. The advances that had taken place during the reign of the current ruling family, was in no small part owed to the intelligence and diplomatic skill of Queen Ckuhah.

  * * *

  Chapter Seven

  ~ November 11th, 2269 ~

  In a ceremony covered by every major news service in Galactic Alliance territory, and carried live on every vid channel on Nordakia, Jenetta became a citizen of Nordakia. She was not the first Terran to become a citizen of Nordakia, but there were only a handful on the planet, and she was the first Space Command officer to take the citizenship oath.

  The day after becoming a citizen, six Nordakian Space Force officer uniforms were delivered to her suite in the palace. Following her morning bath, Jenetta's three handmaidens dressed her in one of the new uniforms. The same palace dressmakers that had made all the gowns must have made the uniforms as well, and Jenetta was required to wear a corset to squeeze into the skirt and button the formfitting jacket. The hem of the skirt was higher than the gowns that Jenetta had been wearing, but it still extended to the middle of her calves. While it allowed a bit more freedom of movement, it was a distant cry from the mobility that Jenetta enjoyed in her Space Command uniform. She still had to take two steps to equal her normal walking stride, and instead of the soft, flat-soled ankle high boots issued by Space Command, the Nordakian uniforms included knee-high, black leather boots with thirteen-centimeter heels; not that Jenetta was expecting shorter heels since they would have required her to cut her hair. Although the Queen had told Jenetta that female military officers could wear their hair shorter, Jenetta left it long for now, out of respect to the Royal Family and because her role as Azula required it to be an acceptable length while she was on the pla
net.

  An honor guard arrived at Jenetta's suite after breakfast to escort her to the ceremony, which was to be held in the palace gardens. The guests and the press had already arrived and been seated, and the King arrived in the company of the senior admirals a few minutes after Jenetta. Lasting almost an hour, because a few admirals got a bit carried away with their speeches, the ceremony concluded with Jenetta being commissioned into the Nordakian Space Force with the rank of captain. No one could have been more surprised than she. Expecting to be commissioned as an ensign, or at the most, a lieutenant (jg), she certainly didn't expect a rank higher than that of her Space Command appointment. The commission explained why the Prince had continued to call her Captain Carver.

  Following the ceremony, Jenetta returned to her suite. Her handmaidens brushed her hair and generally fussed over her appearance as she waited to be notified that the shuttle had arrived for her tour of Nordakia's largest Space Force base. When the call came, Vronnesa quickly tied her hair back with ribbons. Because of security restrictions, the young women couldn't accompany her on the tour.

  At the Nordakian Space Force base, Jenetta had lunch with several admirals and half a dozen captains. She felt they were testing her knowledge to see for themselves if she deserved their regard. Where they'd addressed her as My Lady at the start of the meal, they were calling her Captain Carver by the time the meal was over, and she decided that the subtle change in title meant she had passed their tests and was deserving of the respect owed her Nordakian Space Force rank.

  Jenetta's tour of the base continued after lunch, including areas posted as top-secret and requiring retinal scans for entrance. Jenetta had a chance to observe planetary security monitoring systems and view new weapons testing.

  Jenetta spent the next few days touring other military installations and trying to decide if the purpose was for her to see, or be seen. Since her uniforms offered a little more freedom than the gowns, she wore them at every opportunity, to the complete dismay of the handmaidens who kept laying out gowns for her in the mornings.

  * * *

  Chairman Arthur Strauss nodded his approval following a presentation by Councilwoman Erika Overgaard, then shifted his body slightly in the 'oh-gee' executive chair to get more comfortable. Since the demise of his predecessor, Chairman Andrei Gagarin, he had occupied the seat at the head of the orotund table.

  The meeting hall, located in the sheltered complex of a legitimate industrial conglomerate, was sheathed in the best sound-deadening building materials and employed the most advanced electronic jamming equipment available. Eavesdropping on conversations, celebrations, or tirades in the Raider hall was impossible with current technology. The spacious elliptical chamber, with its smooth, unadorned walls, was as secure as the headquarters of any nation's intelligence service. As members of the powerful Lower Council, these people spent their days planning and coordinating nefarious activities and deeds that would be perpetrated throughout the known galaxy.

  "You told me earlier that you had an important matter to present to the Council today, Ahil?" Strauss queried as he looked towards Councilman Ahil Fazid.

  "Yes, Arthur," Fazid replied. Of medium build and height, Fazid's appearance was mostly nondescript, except for a nose with a prominent aquiline bridge. A naturally dark complexion meant that he never had to waste time lying in tanning beds. "My chief agent on Mawcett has learned of a startling discovery by one of the archeological teams on the planet. They've found ancient equipment capable of cloning!" Fazid's excitement was obvious, but none of the other council members could muster much enthusiasm.

  "Cloning?" Strauss said. "That's what has you so excited? Who needs clones?"

  "Think of the possibilities," Fazid said. "Shutting down our pirate operations in this part of the galaxy has had an enormous impact on our slavery operations. If we could acquire cloning equipment, we could make our own people; people that no one would ever miss. We could clone slaves that have proven to be compliant and hardworking."

  "Their collars keep them compliant and hard-working," Strauss said dismissively. "I'm not ready to initiate a decade long project to grow people that we'll have to feed and clothe for a dozen years before they become even marginally useful. Our slavery operation had been so profitable because we collected the slaves as a byproduct of our other operations."

  "But we won't have to feed them for a dozen years. The clones are fully mature in a few months," Fazid said.

  "A few months?" Strauss echoed.

  "I'm not sure exactly how long because our agent hasn't been able to nail that point down, but the equipment was only discovered in June and there are already eleven fully mature clones on the planet."

  "The clones might have other uses as well," Overgaard suggested.

  "Yes," Strauss agreed, immediately grasping her unelaborated insight. "Very good, Ahil. This could be just what we need right now. How can we get possession of the equipment?"

  "We still have much to learn. For example, I don't know how large it is or what powers it. And we don't know what— ingredients— are required to make people."

  "We'll figure that out once we have it," Strauss said. "We own some of the best scientific minds in the galaxy."

  "I'm sure that the Mawcett Archeological Expedition simply won't sell it to us, so we'll have to— appropriate it."

  "That's going to present a problem. As you know, when the damn Spaccs wiped out our armada at Higgins, the Upper Council declared a moratorium on most pirate activities in GA space. The preponderance of our warships have been sent to bases in the Frontier Zone or outside GA space, where the Spaccs never venture. All base commanders have orders never to attack any vessel more than one hundred light years inside the GA's Frontier border."

  "How about farming out the job?" Fazid asked. "There were a couple of merc groups at Raider Four a few months ago."

  Strauss deliberated for a few seconds before replying. "Okay, see if someone is available."

  "Right."

  "And Ahil, if we do manage to get our hands on the equipment, make sure that our representatives clean up after themselves."

  "Completely?

  "Completely!"

  "Right, Arthur. SOP. All healthy bodies under sixty will be collected as slaves; all others will be terminated and their bodies discretely disposed of. There will be no evidence left to point to our being involved."

  "Very good, Ahil. See to it."

  * * *

  The day of the medal ceremony finally arrived and Jenetta eagerly looked forward to getting back home to the Prometheus. She naturally wore a Nordakian uniform to the ceremony, affixing her Space Command medals and the ribbons that revealed her participation in two major space campaigns. She had been well schooled in the required, hours-long ritual and performed her role to perfection. At the obelisk monument where the ceremony took place, the name of every Nordakian ever awarded the medal was read, followed by a brief statement by various Nordakian Space Force officers describing when and why each medal had been awarded. Newly cut into the marble facing on the monument, 'Jenetta Alicia Carver, Captain' was the last name to be read. The Prime Minister himself stood to read the account of her service to the planet.

  "Captain Jenetta Alicia Carver ordered her lightly armed ship into a raging battle against overwhelming odds to save three freighters on an errand of mercy to Obotymot. The three destroyers acting as escort had been destroyed before her ship arrived. Her small ship, although significantly outgunned, destroyed a Raider medium cruiser and dozens of fighter craft by acting with speed and daring. Following the fight, Captain Carver ordered her ship to remain in hostile space to protect the three freighters for an entire month while necessary repairs were completed. During that time, she personally undertook a clandestine operation to penetrate a Raider base. Although captured early in the mission, she managed to escape captivity and rescue all other captives held prisoner by the Raiders, then singlehandedly destroyed the Raider base during the escape. The destruction
of the base, along with the destruction of dozens of Raider warships and over eighteen thousand Raider personnel, has since that time resulted in an almost complete cessation of Raider attacks on passenger and freight operations in this part of space. The Nordakian people are pleased to bestow this small token of our gratitude on one of our greatest military officers."

  The Prime Minister placed the wide medal ribbon over Jenetta's head as she bowed slightly, then all the officers on the podium saluted her. She returned their salute, turned and walked back to her place on the stage while a few more speeches were read. Glancing at the marble monument where her name had been inscribed, she felt that her Anglo name looked strangely out of place among the others. Although it had been written using the culture's alphabet, the different grammatical application of vowels and consonants made it obvious that it was not of Nordakian origin.

  Most Tawroole medals had been awarded posthumously, and the only other two living recipients of the medal attended the ceremony. Neither was able to get there under his own power, both being confined to wheelchairs. One appeared so ancient that it seemed unlikely he'd be around for the next medal ceremony, and the other had been horribly disfigured. Jenetta determined to read the complete account of their actions at her first opportunity.

  The delegation from the Galactic Alliance Council participated in the event as honored guests. Their speeches, on the heels of speeches by Nordakian politicians, substantially increased the time normally taken for the ceremony. Both Captain Gavin and Captain Kanes attended the ceremony, but Commander LaSalle didn't make an appearance. Jenetta wondered if she had decided not to attend after being told what she must wear. The two female GAC delegates were suitably dressed for Nordakia. They wore huge headdresses to hide their shorter hair, but were allowed to wear gowns with wide skirts since they had no Nordakian nobility status to uphold.