09-02-2023, 09:36 PM
Chief Advisor Javed Hashemi was quite pleased with the cat wedding idea. It was excellent; it would keep the King happy and busy, and far away from more important things. Truly, he could not have engineered a better distraction. Things were about to come to a head, and Hashemi simply could not risk Shapur doing something foolish and getting in the way. The useless Crown Prince was also nicely distracted, trying to coax his sister into returning to Zargothrax from Salad Land.
Frankly, Hashemi thought Leila was the most sensible member of the Royal Family. She had managed to escape her father and get a good job. He did not quite understand the people on the internet up in arms about ‘child labour’. Most Thraxian commoners got their first job at the age of twelve, only a year older than Leila was now. Okay, granted, catching lizards was hardly a good job. But for an eleven-year-old, a job requiring any skill, no matter how bizarre, was an achievement.
Leila being out of the way too suited Hashemi. She was too clever, and too suspicious of him. He’d spotted her trying to follow him several times, and once he’d started looking, he had found evidence that she used the same passageways as him. She was good, too; he would never have been able to sense her presence there if it wasn’t for the residual scent of the cat-repelling perfume she wore. Plus, she had her own black-market contact for the perfume: none of the servants had a clue.
His initial plan, with Bahman, would never have worked. Bahman was far too weak to do anything of consequence. This was fortunate: his secondary plan was much better. Bahman’s weakness could easily be turned into Hashemi’s strength. If he’d interfered with his father too much, it could have ruined all of Hashemi’s careful plan. It had been decades; to be brought low by a twenty-year-old child would be embarrassing. How fortunate that he was no challenge at all.
Cosmic Infinity. He chuckled to himself. The name of Shapur’s religion was taken from a little-known 1960s comic book from some inconsequential corner of the Daryan Empire, that nobody in Zargothrax had ever heard of. The name had become the entire basis for the cult, formed piece by piece, with no aim other than the creation of something bizarre and confusing that could be turned to his own ends. He had been little older than Bahman when this plan had begun. Now he was in his seventies, and finally about to see results.
It amused Hashemi that Shapur truly believed the tenets of Cosmic Infinity. There were others, too; but they were inconsequential. Shapur was truly perfect; gullible as can be, and all too willing to swallow whatever nonsense the mysterious unidentified leader of Cosmic Infinity spouted. How shocked would Shapur be, to find out how close he was to the mysterious individual he practically worshipped? Well, he was not going to find out. The Saladian war had been a fantastic piece of providence. All of it was, really.
Like someone up there wanted Hashemi to succeed.
Frankly, Hashemi thought Leila was the most sensible member of the Royal Family. She had managed to escape her father and get a good job. He did not quite understand the people on the internet up in arms about ‘child labour’. Most Thraxian commoners got their first job at the age of twelve, only a year older than Leila was now. Okay, granted, catching lizards was hardly a good job. But for an eleven-year-old, a job requiring any skill, no matter how bizarre, was an achievement.
Leila being out of the way too suited Hashemi. She was too clever, and too suspicious of him. He’d spotted her trying to follow him several times, and once he’d started looking, he had found evidence that she used the same passageways as him. She was good, too; he would never have been able to sense her presence there if it wasn’t for the residual scent of the cat-repelling perfume she wore. Plus, she had her own black-market contact for the perfume: none of the servants had a clue.
His initial plan, with Bahman, would never have worked. Bahman was far too weak to do anything of consequence. This was fortunate: his secondary plan was much better. Bahman’s weakness could easily be turned into Hashemi’s strength. If he’d interfered with his father too much, it could have ruined all of Hashemi’s careful plan. It had been decades; to be brought low by a twenty-year-old child would be embarrassing. How fortunate that he was no challenge at all.
Cosmic Infinity. He chuckled to himself. The name of Shapur’s religion was taken from a little-known 1960s comic book from some inconsequential corner of the Daryan Empire, that nobody in Zargothrax had ever heard of. The name had become the entire basis for the cult, formed piece by piece, with no aim other than the creation of something bizarre and confusing that could be turned to his own ends. He had been little older than Bahman when this plan had begun. Now he was in his seventies, and finally about to see results.
It amused Hashemi that Shapur truly believed the tenets of Cosmic Infinity. There were others, too; but they were inconsequential. Shapur was truly perfect; gullible as can be, and all too willing to swallow whatever nonsense the mysterious unidentified leader of Cosmic Infinity spouted. How shocked would Shapur be, to find out how close he was to the mysterious individual he practically worshipped? Well, he was not going to find out. The Saladian war had been a fantastic piece of providence. All of it was, really.
Like someone up there wanted Hashemi to succeed.
LIDUN President 2024 | she/her | Puppets: Kerlile, Glanainn, Yesteria, Zongongia, Zargothrax