by Bill Etem
Chapter 10. Single Moms Living the Sweet Life in the Welfare State
`I told you not to go to there. Didn’t I tell you not to go there?’ asked Her Majesty Rabbi Queen Brittany Cohen-Schwartz. She was directing her question to the single moms / warrior girls and to their kids, and to Al and Martha. Debra and Katie decided to remain in Hibernia with their families. `You destroyed that city of Menzies with your actions, not that it was your intention to destroy it. You took a thriving city of 3 million industrious, happy people, and via your actions, you burned it to the ground. It’s like you took a knife and stabbed 3 million people through their hearts. That’s what you did! You created the unstable conditions by which seven gangsters saw that they could rise to power, they saw that they could grab power and become like Caesar or Alexander, by unleashing bloodbaths against anyone who opposed them. So, if your actions in Hibernia were like a term paper, then I would give you a big fat F for a grade on your term paper. If there was any grade lower than an F, I would give you that lower grade. Try to think of a grade below which it is impossible to conceive of an even lower grade. I give you that lowest of all possible grades…..But we’re not all about laying big heavy guilt trips on people round here. You made huge enormous gigantic stupendously large mistakes, but you can learn from those mistakes, and you can be wiser next time. Who hasn’t made a mistake or two in their lives? I sure have. But I don’t think I ever destroyed a city of 3 million people. I don’t think I ever turned a metropolitan area into a smoking pile of rubble where men fight and murder each other like starving rats fighting over a rotten piece of meat.’
`The weird thing is,’ said Jacqueline, Casilevatates’ 7-year-old, `is that Al and Martha were always talking about these motion pictures involving heists or prison breakouts and it usually went bad for the main characters. Remember Rafifi, and remember in A Prize of Arms the guys more or less burned themselves alive at the end of the picture, which is what happened to a lot of those P.O.W.s that we liberated. So that’s kind of eerie in its foreshadowing, you know?’
`Are you throwing my mom under the bus for not having enough sense to learn from those movies?’ asked Valmyristarsis’ 7-year-old, Heather.
`I’m not throwing anyone under the bus, per se,’ answered Jacqueline, `or maybe I’m throwing myself under the bus along with you others, because I should have known things would go from bad to worse, but as Queen Brittany says, we want full disclosure at this meeting. It doesn’t do anyone any good to cover up facts which are material to the fullest exposé of the crimes, blunders and follies which befell this company on its mission to Hibernia.’
`That’s right,’ said Queen Brittany. `It must be a thoroughly honest and above-board reappraisal of all of our efforts. It might be an agonizing reappraisal, but we all have to give ourselves a good long look in the mirror as we ask the tough questions about our motives, our competency and our professionalism, or lack thereof.’
`I might have known everything would go to hell,’ said Martha. `The streets in Menzies were often named after traitors, though a few were named after heroes too.’
`Let’s have full disclosure of the facts and an agonizing reappraisal of all of our actions, but let’s also have some sense of proportion and rationality, for goodness sake,’ exclaimed Heliomirabellisima. `We did rescue 1,000 of our soldiers from a hideous dungeon after all. Queen Brittany’s popularity has taken a large hit with her core supports of peaceniks, but the hawks have praised her and us for freeing those 1,000 P.O.W.s.’
`What you say is true,’ added Queen Brittany, `but overall it is huge defeat for me. The Hibernians will hold me responsible for the destruction of a metropolitan area of 3 million people, and we can expect retaliatory strikes any day now. I’m popular with the hawks, with the warmongers, as you say, but how long will this last once the body count starts to climb in another round of warfare?’
`Apropos of proportion and rationality, I’m still not convinced that a policy of full disclosure is more prudent than a policy of partial containment,’ said Curt, Navorrasicaa’s 4-year-old who liked to think he had the lingo of grown-ups down pretty well.
`No, I must stand firm on this issue,’ interjected Queen Brittany immediately. `Expertise gained from innumerable attempted palace coups has taught me that partial containment is a sound policy only for Sovereigns, whereas full disclosure is best for subjects….I hope you realize just how angry and enraged the peaceniks in Avallonia are at you at this moment…I hope you can realize how fishy it sounds….how the whole story just seems to stink to high heaven…when all of you single moms fail to conquer the little city of Cromwell Town….but then your actions result in the huge city of Menzies being turned into an inferno. This nation had lost all appetite for a continuation of its war with Hibernia. Now we might have another 50 years of war thanks to you guys. It’s going to be a feeding frenzy with the press; the sharks are circling round my castle as we speak, the jackals in the press are assuming I’ll be hurled from the throne and then any guttersnipe reporter will be able to stab me in the back. I just hope a mob of peasants carrying pitch-forks doesn’t string up the lot of us any minute now.’
`It will all be explained in our books and on our lecture tour. The blind will no longer lead the blind. The people who now stagger in darkness will understand the truth, and then peace and happiness will reign on earth!’ exclaimed Desiree, Sevaladelia’s 11-year-old.’
`Oh brother,’ exclaimed Queen Brittany. `Try to see it from my point of view, will you? The press is already saying I’m conducting Operation Whitewash. They’ll say I never cared two cents about those P.O.W.s in the first place, and that’s why I sent such a poorly equipped force to rescue them, because I wanted that mission to fail.’
`It was just like in the movie A Perfect Storm,’ piped up Martha Manning., `You’re thinking: no way are they going to kill off George Clooney at the end of the movie, but then the right weather conditions came together to create this perfect storm, so to speak, and sure enough George Clooney gets his ass kicked big-time by a monster wave at the end of the movie. We were always thinking we had to move fast fast fast, ya know? We cut their beards fast, we threw some Aqua Velva on them fast to try to kill as much of their stench as possible. But they were so weak at first, and the mobs could locate them just by their weird smell, or at least that’s what we read in the Hibernian papers that we were able to read on our trek back here. I mean we were throwing any sort of perfume on them to try to tame their stench. Of course we know they would still stand out in a crowd, but we were convinced we had to move fast; we were thinking the cops would close in on all of us if we spent minute after minute getting the escapees to look and smell 100% presentable. We did what we could for them. In retrospect it is obvious we didn’t do enough for them. Hindsight is always 20-20. But the single moms had to get their kids out of the city fast. They had a maternal responsibility to make sure their kids were not torn to pieces by angry mobs.’
`I like this line you’re taking here,’ said Queen Brittany. It sounds reasonable. I think it will sell. But we got it wrap it up and put a pretty ribbon on it. We got to memorize it and just keep repeating it: It was a perfect storm; you had to move fast; you had to protect the kids; you got the escapees to the abandoned warehouse. You washed them. You shaved them. You fed them. You clothed. We know that it sounds fishy as hell to think that a group of single moms and their kids could all escape mobs of citizens, whereas half of the P.O.W.s couldn’t escape street fights, but the facts of the matter are they were just too weak to move as fast as you were able to move. They got cornered by mobs. The mobs set fires to burn them out of their hiding places. It was the Hibernian mobs who burned their own city of Menzies to the ground….There’s also the fact that you, Martha, and you Al, are a huge problem for me. You’re both a big problem because the press will spin things to say that I permitted two crazy-ass mothers who claim to be from a parallel universe to go with the s
ingle moms and their kids on a military mission to Hibernia, the press is going to say that I wanted to sabotage the whole mission right from the start. They will say I was in on a plot, on a conspiracy to destroy those P.O.W.s, because, my failure in previous years to liberate them would eventually become known, and therefore I had to destroy them before it became widely known in this country that these 1,000 P.O.W.s existed, or some such rot that the press likes to invent: but, trust me, the press will say that I had to destroy those P.O.W.s before their existence became widely known, or else the Anti-Divine Right of Kings Party would gain enough strength to topple my regime in a coup, in a coup having the support of the majority of my subjects, rather rebellious subjects I might add.’
`That’s another reason why I continue to insist that partial containment is a better policy than full disclosure,’ said Curt.
`On the issue of Al and Martha claiming to be from another universe,’ said Queen Brittany, `let’s all agree to go with a policy of full containment on that issue: we’ll say it’s news to us, assuming their claim ever gets publicity, but for the most part I think we want to go with the policy of full disclosure.’
`We’ll deny ever seriously claiming to be from another universe, though we will have to say that we made some jokes about it,’ said Martha. `Do you agree with this, Al?’
`Yeah sure,’ said Al.
`All right, it’s settled then,’ said Queen Britanny. `I’ll agree to assign you to some soft sinecure post on the frontier, far away from any angry mobs where you will all continue to receive your salaries as officers in my army, and where a full pension will be yours after 20 years of service, provided you all continue to insist to the press, and to everyone else, that I begged you not to go to Hibernia, and that I was not part of any plot to destroy the P.O.W.s, that I only permitted you to go because I was curious about your chances, and I didn’t want to set a roadblock in the path of such devoted, patriotic, single-minded officers as yourselves. You must agree to never say that the reason I permitted you to go was because of politics, or because of power politics, namely, you must never tell the press that I permitted you to go because I knew the Pro-Divine Right of Kings faction would lose members and power, and I knew the Anti-Divine Right of Kings faction would gain members and power, if I expressly commanded you to not invade Hibernia. So, I’m asking you to cover-up the truth, and I will sweeten the deal that I’ve offered you, provided you not only promise to cover-up the truth, but you actually do it. The Anti-Divine Right of Kings faction will no doubt offer you money to say that I permitted you to go because I knew I would be hurt politically if I commanded you not to go. They’ll offer you money to tell the truth, but I’m offering you money to cover-it up. And well, I’m still your Sovereign, so when I ask you to do something I think you ought to do it, even if I didn’t sweeten the deal, but I will sweeten the deal. OK?’
`How sweet will you sweeten it?’ asked Jay-Jay, Seraphinaria’s 3-year-old.
`Let’s leave that ambiguous. We all more or less know what a sweet deal looks like, right? I promise to keep my word, and you’ll know that I kept it,’ said Queen Brittany.
`Just a ballpark figure, Queen Brittany, would be really appreciated,’ said Jay-Jay.
`£100 every month to every man, woman and child of you provided you all hold up your end of the deal every month. If one of you talks every one of you forfeits his share.’
`Could you make it £1,000 to each of us every month?’ asked Jay-Jay.
`No, final offer is £100 to each of you per month. Take it or leave it.’
`It’s a deal!’ exclaimed Jay-Jay.
That’s weird how the policy of partial containment is always more sensible than the policy of full-disclosure,’ whispered Kayla, Heliomirabellisima’s 9-year-old. She whispered her thoughts because she didn’t want Queen Brittany to hear her.
`I know,’ whispered back her sister Guilia. `It’s like you have to be a total moron not to understand something that simple.’
`One moment please, Queen Brittany,’ said Guilia in a louder voice. `I just want to make sure that everyone in the room is on the same page, and that everyone is clear that we must tell the press that we have all embraced, 100%, the policy of full disclosure, whereas, of course, in secret, we have all actually embraced, 100%, the policy of partial containment.’
`Righto,’ said Queen Brittany. `Everybody straight on this? Jay-Jay, do you got it?’
`Yes indeed, Queen Brittany,’ said Jay-Jay. `It’s all perfectly clear: we want to all get with the program of insisting that the escapees who didn’t make it back to Avallonia succumbed to a `perfect storm’ of wretchedly unfortunate events. We’re willing to admit to a limited amount of bungling incompetency; we’re willing to admit to making our share of mistakes, but under no circumstances will we ever admit to being part of a plot or a conspiracy to destroy the escapees, and under no circumstances will we ever say that you, Queen Brittany, permitted us to invade Hibernia for reasons of power politics, in order for you to bolster the Pro-Divine Right of Kings faction and to weaken the Anti-Divine Right of Kings faction. We will tell the press and the public that we’re all about full disclosure, that we are 100% committed to bringing the facts of our mission to Hibernia to the light of day, but in reality, we’re actually all about pursuing a policy of partial containment. We’re all about telling the public that we’re telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the fiery unfortunate end of those Avallonian escapees who didn’t make it back to Avallonia, but, in point of fact, we’re all about keeping the most sensitive and the most embarrassing facts secret, and we’re all about making an extra £100 per month for each of us, and keeping that a secret as well.’
`An excellent summation,’ said Queen Brittany. `Well I guess that about wraps it up then.’
`Not quite,’ said Seraphinaria. `I’m not taking any £100 a month as part of some quid pro quo deal, and I’m sure none of the women under my command will either, and none of our kids will. We’ll take the assignment at the frontier post, and if we speak to the press or anyone else about your motives for not preventing us from invading Hibernia, we’ll just say we must have inspired some confidence in you, but we’re not taking any money as part of any deal to keep quiet.’
The other women agreed with their group captain on this matter, though there was some grumbling among the kids.
`Splendid,’ said Queen Brittany, `that is the principled decision, of course, though perhaps it’s not terribly dodgy if you were to accept a favor from me out of my own funds after I received a favor from you. Still, you’re taking the high road and that’s to be commended. So unless there’s anything else, we can adjourn. Anything? No? All right then. Goodbye to you and better luck in the future.’
Queen Brittany stood up and smiled at everyone in a warm and genuine way. She gave Al Mancini an odd look though as she said goodbye to him. She still might have some issues, some sort of hang-up, with his claim to being from a parallel universe. And perhaps his former slave status would always be lodged somewhere in her memory. But who knows? Maybe she was simply disconcerted and trying desperately to figure out a way to get better acquainted with this guy who looks exactly like the young Rock Hudson without the press finding out about his insane claims about being from a parallel universe. But, overall, her smile was warm and friendly. If you could read minds however you would know that the Queen was really thinking: `OK, you can go now. You can get out of my castle now. Thanks a lot for making me feel corrupt when I was just trying to be nice, and then you make it sound like I was offering you a bribe. Well, try not to destroy any more large metropolitan areas in the future! I mean, thanks for risking your necks freeing those 1,000 P.O.W.s, but thanks for nothing for extending the war between Avallonia and Hibernia for another 100 years, or, rather, thanks for everything for helping me to solidify my hold on the throne via my new popularity with the pro-war faction! But, on the other hand, thanks for nothi
ng for weakening my already tenuous hold on the throne by making my name dirt with the anti-war faction etc., etc.’
The End