Chapter Ninety-Six - Ice Cream

  "Ice cream?" Twenty-Six asked as the dessert was revealed.

  The only sign that the butler was surprised by her question was a very slight perking of his eyebrow. "Indeed, ma'am," he replied simply. "This is Europan Comet Cream. Milk from dome-raised goats with sprinkles of sugar rock."

  The prior courses had all been well-presented and well-proportioned when the plates were handed to them as a complete item and they weren't required to cut the meat off the bone themselves.

  This dessert was slightly different. The main part was a ball of blue-white ice cream placed off-centre of the plate. Behind it was a trail of creamy lines sprinkled with colourful little pieces of rock candy. It gave the appearance of a comet with a long trail behind it.

  Cecilia sighed, and the young woman turned to give her mother a rather unimpressed look.

  Eleanor, in response, simply smiled. "This was little Cecilia's favourite dessert as a child. Please forgive the rather infantile presentation. She loved these when she was little. More than once, an ice cream comet was the only bribe she'd accept as recompense for taking a bath or going to bed on time."

  "Mother," Cecilia replied. "I'm a grown woman."

  "As am I. Obviously you haven't grown enough to appreciate that infantile things are just as enjoyable when you're older as when you're still young and youthful."

  "I think it's rather charming," Aurora said. She eyed Cecilia from across the table. "Who knew that the president of the League was fond of such... cute things."

  Ivil smiled and cut into the ball of ice cream with a spoon before taking a bite. Vanilla with a hint of mint. It was nice. Refreshing and sweet without being too much so. "This is quite good," Ivil replied.

  "It is," Pixie said from nearby. "All of the food has been. You have very good cooks."

  "Why thank you," Eleanor replied. "We have a rather large staff of help, including a few gourmet cooks, some of the best in the system. And yet you would be impressed by the number of times my children ordered absolute junk from them."

  "There's a place for junk and comfort food, I think," Pixie replied. "As long as they're taken in moderation, of course."

  "Of course," Eleanor replied.

  "So, if it wouldn't be inappropriate for me to ask, how did you two meet?" Pixie asked. She only briefly glanced at the Emperor of Jupiter, who was mostly just sitting there and smiling. He had only touched a few of his meals, and Ivil knew well that any 'eating' he did was all for show.

  Eleanor tapped her chin. "I'm not quite good with dates and times. Honey, how long ago was it?"

  "Thirty-two years ago," the Emperor said. "A few months and change. You know I rarely forget our anniversary."

  "Rarely," Eleanor said with a knowing grin. Ivil found that the woman was rather cheeky. She wasn't Ivil's sort, being a little old and taken and having baggage in the form of far too many children and such, but she could nonetheless see what the Emperor saw. "Anyway, we met at a hotel of all places. At the time I was working for a non-profit. The Jovian Helping Hands I think it was?"

  "That sounds about right," The Emperor said. "You can skip the embarrassing parts."

  "I think not," Eleanor replied. "So! Here I was, in the middle of the lobby at the Ganymede Galactic hotel, the only five star in the system, and I was in quite the pickle."

  "How come?" Twenty-Six asked.

  The woman clearly enjoyed the attention because her smile only widened. "I was arguing with this man. The executive in charge of a mineral extraction company mostly centred around Io. Anyway, they'd earned themselves a reputation for mistreating employees and I was there to protest. The CEO of the company stepped out and started to give me an earful. Then hotel security got involved. Fortunately, I had some strong-armed friends with me, and they weren't comfortable just stomping in and kicking us out."

  "I can see the picture, but not how the Emperor fits into it," Pixie said.

  "Ah, yes, I'm coming to that. So, the CEO orders his troops forwards. He had a team of well-armed gentlemen who seemed to have fewer scruples about smacking a young lady around. And then, between one blink and the next, no security at all. In fact, I was left without most of my rowdy friends either."

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  "What happened?" Twenty-Six asked.

  "They were noisy," the Emperor said. "I just wanted the attention of the hotel's staff, but the entire thing was keeping them from doing their job. So I teleported the lot of them outside."

  Eleanor nodded. "It was quite surprising. The CEO ran off soon after, but not before I took the opportunity to give him an earful. That night, I tracked down the kind gentleman who helped me and I discovered him mid-meal at the hotel's restaurant."

  "She just sat across from me, bold as day," he said.

  "One thing led to another, and nine months later my eldest was born," Eleanor replied.

  "Mother," Cecilia groaned.

  "How about you, Miss Pixie?" Eleanor asked. "How did you meet the Empress?"

  "Oh? Uh, it wasn't anything too special, I don't think. She hired me for protection duty on a short mission around Jupiter. I'm a fighter pilot for hire," Pixie said.

  "The Empress needed protection?" the Emperor asked.

  "I thought she was cute, and figured that hiring her would keep her close," Ivil admitted.

  The Emperor chuckled. "I suppose that's one way to go about it," he said. "In any case, with our meals finished, is this perhaps a good time to discuss the business you first approached me about?"

  Ivil shifted so that she was leaning on an elbow, a very casual pose across from the man. "I suppose," she allowed. "The Emperor of Earth, as usual, needs to be put in his place."

  "Did you intend to kill him outright?" he asked as he picked up a cup of wine and swirled it.

  "As much as I'd enjoy that, I doubt it would be so easy. Unlike the way you've arranged things for yourself, the Emperor of Earth and I are both significantly more mobile."

  "More mobile?" Twenty-Six asked. Then she glanced between the two and shrank back. "Sorry. Didn't mean to interrupt."

  Ivil waved the concern off. "It's fine. I mean that certain cores function best in certain configurations. That can mean keeping those cores deployed and functional at all times. Some core users are forever stuck in one place unless they want to lose much of their power. As Emperors we can forgo some amount of strength in exchange for greater mobility, of course. The Emperor here has chosen not to do such a thing."

  The Emperor shrugged. "I am not quite at the level of the Empress here, though within the confines of my home where I am at my most powerful... I suspect that if it came to blows it would be quite the spectacle."

  Ivil met his eyes from across the table.

  The temperature in the room shifted, growing at once warmer and cooler, small vortexes of sparking wind formed and the hair of a few at the table started to rise.

  Then Eleanor reached over and patted her husband on the hand while Twenty-Six looked at Ivil with big, watery eyes.

  Ivil and the Emperor broke eye contact in the same millisecond, neither giving ground. "In any case," Ivil continued as if nothing had occurred. "To answer your question Twenty-Six, the Emperor of Earth isn't tied to a single location. He would be stronger if he were, as would I in some respects. But even so, a moving battle between the two of us wouldn't be short or subtle. A lot of our cores are dedicated to keeping us alive and counteracting even terribly esoteric attacks."

  "Oh, okay," Twenty-Six said. "So if we do meet him, it'll not turn into a fight?"

  "I didn't say that. Just that if it does, it'll be a running battle. If he reaches the cores around Uranus first, he might think himself strong enough to make a stand. The fleet with him, disparate as it may be, will still be a minor factor in any combat."

  "Can normal ships actually pose a threat?" Pixie asked.

  Ivil considered it. "A normal mosquito is no threat to a well-armed human soldier, but that doesn't mean it can't fly into the soldier's eye, distracting them for a moment."

  "Comforting," Pixie said.

  "It is what it is," Ivil said.

  "I wish you luck. Genuinely. I'm happy enough where I am with me and mine that I don't see much point in running after that fool boy, but if and when you catch up to him, give the back of his head a good smack on my behalf, would you?"

  ***

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