The Price of Duty

Posted on Sat Dec 28th, 2024 @ 11:56pm by Amalie Cochrane & Princess Royal Giana Orsini & Richard Ramsay Ph.D & Empress Cosima Orsini & Crown Prince Paolo Orsini

Mission: Historiae Terrae Et Imperii
Location: Terra
Timeline: Date 2371-11-03 at 1500
2142 words - 4.3 OF Standard Post Measure

Perhaps it was just poetic coincidence that it was raining on the daySacha’s body was brought back to Terra, or maybe the gods themselves where weeping. Either way, Terra itself seemed to be joining Giana in her grief. It wasn’t just Sacha She wept for, but all Her fallen sons and daughters.

It had been six days since the news had reached them of the Klingon ambush on the marine regiment in the neutral zone. Not a single Romulan lost their life, but hundreds of marines had been slaughtered in the air raids. Those who didn’t die were killed with the bat’leth. On a peaceful landing pad surrounded by wet green grass, they waited for the transports to arrive.

The Regents were present, as was the Crown Prince and the Lavigne’s. The Chancellor was there as well, and the Emperor’s Own Marine Band played tunes in the distance. Several lines of marines stood at attention behind them, waiting for the arrival of their brothers.

Giana stood quietly between Ramsay and Cosima dressed in an exquisite modest black dress. While it would have been more usual to flank Cosima, the decision had been made in the name of public image for Giana to take the center as she had been so directly affected by the incident - it would poll well with the people. It also had the benefit of keeping her away from Sacha’s mother and sister. To say Giana was angry was an understatement, but she had been like a cat without fang or claw; her anger was useless. She had requested one thing be done in her grief, and everyone around her had either failed her or ignored her - and she wasn’t sure which was worse. All she wanted to do right now was go back inside.

“I can’t believe this.” said a quiet, accented voice next to them. Genevieve Lavigne was wearing a black dress which stopped just below the knee and suited her slender figure well. The darkens veil over her face partially hid her a own and her ruby red lips. “What are we going to do now?”

“Now isn’t the time for that, Genevieve.” Jolene said in an almost scolding tone. “We will speak privately. For now, we wait and behave respectfully.”

Next to them, the Empress frowned sadly. This war of her husbands had brought so much death, and Richard had hardly made any real progress on it in the time he’d commanded the military. Many more sims would die. Her black gloved hand slipped into Giana’s as the click of a camera could be heard.

“I’m so sorry, Giana.” She said quietly.

Giana’s blue eyes had shifted down the line to glance at Genevieve and Jolene. Anything she might have said was cut off by Cosima’s hand and softly spoken words. She didn’t return the gesture, and merely faced forward still. “You all got your wish, at least.”

Cosima eyed her daughter, her frown deepening.

“What does that mean?”

“None of you ever liked him, you always thought he was a bad match. You wanted me to be happy so you sort of accepted it. The only one who ended up liking him was Paolo after the whole thing with Giuseppe.” Giana pointed out coolly.

“Do you then think it possible, Giana, that we wanted him to die?” Cosima asked with emphasis bordering on incredulity.

“I think you wanted him to go away, so I don’t really expect you to be grief stricken over this.” Giana frowned. “But thank you for your sympathy.”

“You’re grieving, so I won’t begrudge you your moment of cruel implications.” Cosima said, turning her face forward and allowing her hand to fall to her side. Her daughter could be quite mean. She used to be so sweet when she was small.

Giana didn’t give anything else to her mother and instead faced forward. Finally, the transport broke through the clouds, and she took a deep breath. “Forgive me for being unkind, I wasn’t prepared for my grief to be turned into a spectacle since I asked it to not be.”

Cosima nodded in the direction of the gathered families, most of whom were crying.

“Dear, you aren’t the only grieving woman here. You may have the power and position for your own unloading, but these men were heroes of the Empire. They must be treated as such. Publically.” Cosima declared roundly, though she wasn’t overbearing. It wasn’t the first time they’d had the discussion. “Think of how important it is for them to have you share this moment.”

“He was a hero.” Jolene said, turning to Cosima, her eyes welling with tears.. “And now he’s gone.”

Giana had to very pointedly ignore Jolene; the woman was an impressive actor and always had been. Instead, she turned her head to look directly at her mother. “The only thing I wanted was a moment of privacy to look at him and be with him before we did this. It wouldn’t have taken anything away from the rest of these people grieving, and maybe they even would have appreciated the same. But no, you couldn’t even give me that after everything. You call me cruel. I learned it from you, mother.”

She turned her head back to face forward, her hands balling into fists for a moment but she forced them to relax again. ”You know what’s different here? Those people there, they really are grieving. You aren’t.”

Down the row, standing on the other side of Richard, Paolo stuck his head far enough forward to look at the women in his family. He had grown several inches since they last appears in public together, and his scowl indicated exactly how he felt about the interaction. He cleared his throat loudly.

“Perhaps we can all wait until later to say awful things to each other we can’t take back.” He suggested, his tone unusually insistent. Amalie stood at his other side, and that seemed to affect the way he thought of the situation

“Your sister is upset. She’s lost someone very important to her.” Cosima said, lifting her head as if rising above the cutting words from her eldest daughter.

“Yes, we can all see that.” Paolo said, finding himself frustrated more by his mother’s response than anything Giana had said. “I suppose that’s the excuse.”

“Please don’t fight.” Amalie said softly next to Paolo. They had barely seen each other over the past months, and she hated that this was the first time she had seen him in such a long time. It made her sad he didn’t seem to understand.

“One I at least have the decency to pray you never have reason to use yourself, little brother.” Giana’s voice was cold, but it seemed her mother making the excuse for her had at least stymied the bitter flow of words for the moment.

“I appreciate your prayers. Thank you.” Paolo said, meeting Richard’s gaze for an instant. It seems the older man and friend of the family had no intention of getting involved. “Can we fight later? This is the worst time I can imagine.”

As he spoke, the large, bulky transport made its final approach, hissing as it started to descend and, at last, touched down on the pristinely clean ground.

Amalie let out a sigh, but otherwise said nothing more.

As the transport touched down, Giana turned her head not toward her mother, but to Jolene instead. “Don’t make a spectacle of yourself, Jolene. I fully know your feelings about your son, don’t make things worse by speaking lies over his corpse, hm? The gods will frown on that.”

Paolo looked to Amalie as if to indicate the ridiculous situation they found themselves in. He decided to say nothing else. No one could stop his sister when she was behaving this way.

Jolene, for her part, gasped at the accusation and looked at Giana as if she had just slapped her.

“Your Highness, your rank forbids me from responding to you as I would.” Jolene said, drawing nearer to the Empress. “This is shameful.”

“The only shameful thing is how you treated him when he was alive. Be a good mother for once to your son, and treat him better in death.” Giana replied and glanced to her own mother. Cosima would have had to have been completely blind and dumb to miss how Jolene had treated Sacha, but perhaps given she never cared for the man, she wouldn’t care.

Cosima said nothing more out of an uncertainty for how to get her daughter to stop more than anything else. She wondered at her husband’s wisdom in making them share the command of the Empire for the first time in months. She wished he was here.

Jolene, for her part, said nothing, but Genevieve mumbled something under her breath.

Giana didn’t hear exactly what Genevieve had said, but she could imagine it well enough. Her warning given to Jolene, she faced forward again and watched as the large doors of the transport opened.

The doors to the transport opened and it was clear the vehicle was used for transporting caskets as its main purpose. Five paths of light illuminated the isles between the rows of marines. In rows of their own, the caskets started following the paths, floating slowly, each crowned with a service picture and a name.

“Sacha will be last as the unit commander.” Paolo said loud enough for the people in their row to hear him.

“How many were lost?” Amalie asked him quietly. She wasn’t informed of such details, she had only been told Sacha had fallen with his men and that she should be present at the occasion as future Empress.

“4,792.” Paolo said with a scowl that suggested more than just sadness. He read his boxes, starting with the most interesting topics including military maneuvers. He knew the Romulans' loyalty was shaky. How had this fell through the cracks? “4,792 Terran patriots snuffed out.”

“That’s… that’s terrible.” Amalie frowned, even her voice trembling slightly.

“Just the cost of our failure.” Paolo said, his voice somewhat hollow. He felt low and powerless. He was the heir to the throne, but he was powerless to prevent this. As the caskets slid by them slowly, he watched the names and faces as the band played heroic fanfares as if their sacrifice had been somehow glorious.

Amalie didn’t quite understand how it was their failure, but she trusted Paolo’s assessment of what was playing out before them. The sounds of mourning only intensified as families caught the sight of the portrait of their loved ones atop of their caskets. She shifted a bit closer to Paolo, not outright touching him even though she wanted to reach for his hand.

Paolo leaned over toward her, his hand brushing against hers until their pinkies were interlocked. This wouldn’t be the last time they would see something like this together.

The sad display continued for a long while, and when the single casket that rounded out the end of the procession finally began to descend the ramp, Giana drew in a sharp breath and balled her hands into fists. She couldn’t even cry for him. She hated her mother for doing this to her, for not even giving her a moment with the man she had dreamed of making a life with to say goodbye.

“I’m never going to forgive you for this, but I think you knew that.”

“We can just add it to the list.” Cosima said, eying Giana. Her daughter was too old to behave this way, and she’d been as understanding as she could stomach. “I’ve arranged for his body to be transported in a separate car. You can ride with him if you’d like.”

“Thank you, that’s very thoughtful.” She replied flatly.

Cosima frowned at her daughter, then turned to lead the procession out. At once she realized they had agreed Giana would do so, and so she waited so the younger woman could get in front of her.

Giana cast a look at her mother from the corner of her eye and took the lead of the procession out. She cast one more look at Sacha’s casket, wanting nothing more than to go with him since that was one thing she could at least do, but it would take some time before she was able to be in the car with him. Resentfully, she turned and began the sad, lonely walk ahead.

END