Round One Results
Victoria is a Charming little girl who could wrap most adult around her finger with just the right words and smiles and whose grandfather in his duties to the Starforce took him across the Vasudan Grand Duchy. Already at young age, Victoria has the eye and pulse on fashion, and is more trusted to dress herself then her servants whose job is it to pick out her outfits. As a result of spending so much time in space tagging along with her Grandfather, she has a wide network of fans of the new imperial royal who no doubt in the future will be chuffed when she arrives to ask them a favor.
~~~Arrival~~~~
As the yacht moves away from the wormhole staging area, you can see three quick moving shapes of vessels on an intercept course, actinic blue lights of drive fields flaring into vision as the vessels spin around their axis and take up escort position of the port wing. From your grandfather's duties as Starforce marshal you know these ship types very well, dragoons, destroyer-size parasite ships that punch well above their weight class in return for limited endurance and the lack of sophisticated enough drive kernel to pass through a starway. The Imperial Navy disfavors them, wealthy enough to have proper cruisers for its various duty stations, but for the imperial nobility, the dragoons are very popular as they could allow the more moderately financed warlords. more flexibility in bringing in firepower than the standard unit types, and as such a cult of romance had been building around their operators, and dragoons pilots and crew have a reputation of living too close to the edge, drinking too much and being dangerous to be around with your unmarried children.
However, these dragoons display none of the hotdogging of the Star Force operators, no their actions are cold and machine-like, and from what you can see of the closet one on the port-side, you can see the hull painted in black and silver and red, the colors of the Imperial Guard. The yacht shakes slightly before its compensators crank up to deal with reentry as you begin your final push towards the planet, to your eye the escorting dragoons you can see and you realized there must be more as you could only look out the port side, are glowing like fiery angels, as their shields flare up from heat of entry.
You are about to get a closer look at Luxor itself, when a voice carries down the hall, "Your Highness, I have ordered the servants to finish packing up, but you need to get ready for when we land."
You turn and look, and see the grizzled face of Seil Goodhaven, your majordomo, bodyguard and honorary uncle. Seil had been your mother's steward during her career and had naturally taken his service to you when she no longer required them. Stern, always officious and very proper, he nonetheless a father figure, and it had been reassuring to you that he would be coming even if your Grandfather was told explicitly to continue his duties on the frontiers. You wondered an idle moment if he was nervous, operating at the Palace was much more difficult and stressful and dangerous environment than the wardrooms of the Imperial Navy or banquet halls of marcher lords. If he was nervous or concerned he had never let it showed on his face which now still is a proper mask of deference of a very proper servant.
"Very well Seil" you sniffed imperiously, and force yourself to turn away as yacht broke through the clouds and the city in all nighttime grandeur vanishes behind you as you make your way back to your cabin and quickly direct the maids to finish helping with the outermost vestments of your attire. By the time yacht had landed in the enclosed hangar on the upper decks of the Palace, you were ready, decked out in stunningly cut version of your mother's uniform with a few imperial flares such as the purple half cape, and red and white glitter-gems in your hair.
The hatch leading to hangar opens up, a red carpet across the black metal floors has been rolled up for you, on either side of the carpet, lines of guardsmen in their dress uniforms, with black berets, energy rifles at perfect drill position stood at attention. You start walking down, Seil three steps behind you, followed by the coterie of your maids, as soon as you step foot on the carpet, the guardsmen salute all at once.
You swiftly with military precision of practice with Seil and your Grandfather give a salute back (though in the style of the Starforce), your eyes catching shock and surprise and some amusement cracking on the faces of the guardsmen nearest to you as you make your way past the line towards the small crowd of dignitaries at the end. You scan it and feel a sense of both disappointment and relief when you see that your father is not there, though it appears in his stead he had sent the rising star of the Imperial Court. Dressed in the black and gold uniform of a rear-admiral of the navy, Princess Fel da Moya Zel-Phonecia smirked as she spotted your salute. Behind her, almost as if she was cowering was another one of your sisters, born a day before you, Miziuru-Saria, dressed in white and gold ensemble with enough ribbons and frills that probably weighed as much as she did looking at you with dull eyes. The two imperial royals were a study in contrast, da Moya, tall already a adult, (youngest rear-admiral in the navy) with fiery red hair with blue highlights barely contained under her beret and copper skinned with a larger then life presence taking after her father, whereas her half sister, the youngest non-bastard child of the emperor was like daughter of the Empress-Consort who maintained her family image, of almost doll like fragility of pure silver hair, almost chalky white skin and purple eyes, that would of been captivating if not for the total lack of emotion on the younger girl's face. You wince internally, you had suspected that meeting Miziuru-Saria would be awkward for the timing of your births, but you didn't expect such a cold reaction.
"Welcome to the family finally, Victoria." da Moya says breezily, as you end up in front of her and her courtiers and hanger-ons. "Its nice to be finally able to see the daughter of the man who beat Guilter in the flesh at Passerelle."
You felt a sharp pang of sadness, your mother did in fact do the impossible fought the great Jardinan admiral to a standstill and beat back his advance on the Blue Line, saving the Empire, but at the cost of her own life. Still you been around enough nobles in your days as shadow of your grandfather to know that nothing da Moya was saying was accidentally and she was probing and testing you. Still though the mention of your mom dregs up other feelings and thoughts.
How does Victoria feel about the death of her mom at the hands of the enemy's greatest general. Such a feeling would be a strong motivating force on the direction of Victoria moving forward.
[] A sense of sadness and lost, and a determination never to lose anybody to the war again
[] Anger and rage at Jean-Baptiste Guilter and his army of Republican thugs and a desire for revenge
[] Flat numbness, knowing that death can take anybody at any time
[] Anger at the futility of the never ending war and resolve to end it
[] Pride in her mother's service to the Empire, and resolve to take her place as defender of the Empire
[] Write in
You give her best winsome smile and bow slightly, "I have ever been eager to hero about the flower of the imperial court, even in Vasudan we have heard your actions in the March in dealing with the barbarians at Krill."
Da Moya laughed, "Oh I was warned that you are a charmer, but yes indeed, I did great things at Krill. Perhaps we can talk about that sometime later."
[] Yes I would love to do that
[] Polity demure
[] Only if you tell me your secret at the battle of Redwing [Attempt at charming her using your trait]
Giving your answer, Da Moya puts a hand on Miziuru-Saria's shoulder, prompting the other girl to speak in very courtly but flat style though not without some bitter venom cracking through at the word "princess", "I welcome you to Imperial Palace, Princess Victoria"
You wince internally again, she's a cool customer, and before you can say anything in response, she turns to Da Moya "Elder-sister, I am not feeling well, I am retiring to my quarters." and with surprising fierce look that pierced the mask of stoicism on her face, she turns around, her head a flutter of snow white hair as she turns her back on you, servants following in somewhat chaotic fashion as they didn't expect that.
Da Moya looks shocked for a second before recovering, "Miziuru-Saria is one who makes friends with great care, don't be offended on my sister's actions, I'll have a talk with her later about her rude behavior." she says darkly, before brightening up, "Father is unavailable till this evening for dinner, Imperial family only, so do you want a tour of the palace or retire to your new quarters?"
[] Take da Moya up on her tour
[] Go to your room and regroup
[] Decide to explore the palace yourself
[] Call out to Miziuru-Saria and ask for tour [Charm roll]
[] Write in
~~~Glossary~~~
Drive: Reactionless drives standard for space use the past seven millennia
Drive Kernals: The advance supercomputer plus mechanisms that allow for the local warping of spacetime to create a drive field
Guilter: Jean-Baptiste Guilter, Admiral of the 7th Fleet, universally considered by friends and foe the greatest living military mind alive, it was his leadership that took the last major flare up of the war from a cataclysmic defeat for the Republic to near invasion of Imperial space proper, only stopped at tremendous cost of lives and ships and timely reinforcement from the Starforce at the battle of Passerelle.
Blue Line: The smaller of the two passages between the Empire and the Republic.
Krill: A small march of worlds that was settled to cover a possible Rifter passage past the Wall as settlement on both sides side expanded.
