The Vice-dictator
I apologize for being late, but my wifi router crashed and I had extremely limited internet access for several days. I bought a new router but couldn’t get it working. Nevertheless, I now have full internet access and I don’t know how or why because the new router is back in the box. It must be the FM technology
The Vice-dictator, the de facto leader of zaftans everywhere, slithered around his office. Generally referred to as VD for short, he had two tentacles wrapped behind his back. He moved past the picture window looking out over a garden filled with shrubs and flowers in various shades of grey and black. He slid past the book case that concealed an emergency exit and stopped in front of a wall map. He studied the star systems controlled by the zaftan navy.
The Vice-dictator was a bit over six-foot tall and weighed a trifle over three-hundred-twenty-five pounds,. He was considered scrawny by zaftan standards, but he had been in power during many dictators, a testament to his staying power. Two of the previous dictators had challenged the Vice-dictator’s power and both had died suddenly shortly afterwards. The current Dictator wisely spent his time doing three dimensional crossword puzzles leaving the Vice-dictator to run the government and the military.
The VD forced his eyestalks to swivel and he peered at the red spot near the edge of the map. It was just outside the zaftan sphere of influence in the Betelgeuse System. It was a planet occupied by the hated gundies. The gundies were a world of mongrels discovered by a zaftan mining expedition over three hundred years ago. The miners discovered a backward mongrel population consisting of humans, dwarfs, elves and other races. At the time, the gundie technology was primitive and presented no threat to the home world, Zaftan 31B, or to zaftan interests anywhere.
Since then, their technology had exploded and now the gundies directly threatened the zaftan empire. The Vice-dictator knew the gundies had super-fast computers that made zaftan computers look like toys. They had developed faster-then-light technology for their warships while the zaftan navy plodded along at lower than light speed. It was only a matter of time until the gundies built up sufficient forces in Betelgeuse to launch an attack on zaftan territory.
The VD had initiated intelligence operations to ferret out gundie plans but they had all failed. It was useless trying to use a zaftan as an undercover agent with all the gundies that got sick from the smell once a zaftan got with ten feet of them. And he couldn’t recruit a gundie as an agent because none of them would trust a zaftan. Thus, he operated in an intelligence vacuum.
Zaftan traders had reported on massive building works on the planet occupied by the gundies. Unfortunately, these traders didn’t know what the buildings were for. The gundie military would let any of the traders get close to the construction sites. That alone was sufficient intelligence to know the gundies plotted an attack.
This situation was the work of the author, Hank Quense, another mongrel. The Vice-dictator was convinced the author wasn’t neutral. The cretin supported the gundies at every turn. That unfair advantage must stop! The only way that could happen was for the Vice-dictator to gain access to the author and convince him to support the zaftans. If he, the VD, could lay tentacles on this Quense, within hours the author would be willing to write any story the VD wanted.
For the present, the VD had set himself the goal of disrupting the gundie attack before it could mature. That could be settled with a new short story. Then, the real work could begin: a new novel in which the gundie civilization would be destroyed.
To accomplish all this, he needed help and that help was scheduled to be in his office a few minutes. He clicked his beak, the zaftan equivalent of a smile.
He slapped four tentacles together to reflect his relief. In another hour or so, his plan would be underway and the author was as good as strapped in a chair in the Vice-dictator’s personal torture chamber.
Life was good.
~ ~ ~
Zaftig pushed himself around the waiting room to hide his nervousness. Having the Vice-dictator order you to show up in his office was enough to put anyone out of sorts. Standing guard were three thuggish soldiers. One held two clubs in his tentacles, another had a spear gun and the third used a laser rifle. The guards watched Zaftig as if hoping he would do something wrong so they could use their weapons.
Zaftig stood seven feet tall and weighed over four hundred pounds. His rubber-like skin oozed green-gray slime. His eyeballs flopped around at the end of two inch eyestalks and a had an eagle-like beak. His eight tentacles kept twisting around each other when they weren’t used to move him around the room
A loud buzzer startled Zaftig. His eyestalks rotated to find the sound, but one of the guards pointed a tentacle at the door to the inner office and said, “Go!”
The door slid open noiselessly when he approached and revealed an immense office with a wide desk at the far end. Behind the desk squatted a small wizened figure wearing a mask. Zaftig had heard the vice-dictator always wore a mask in public so no one would recognize him.
“Come in.” The Vice-dictator beckoned with a tentacle. “You are Zaftig the Magnificent. What is so magnificent about you?”
Zaftig tamped down his nerves and replied. “I am in show biz and a boastful name is useful, Sir.”
“Be squatted. And what is so magnificent about you do?”
Zaftig let his tentacles spread out and lowered his torso until it sat on the floor. “I recruit talented performers and put them in shows all over two galaxies. I produce all those shows and I am quite successful.”
“Interesting, I am sure. To business. I have an assignment for you. Since you are in entertainment, you must know of the author Hank Quense.”
“I have heard of him.”
“You are to find him and bring him here to this office.”
“May I ask why I am doing this?”
“So I can extract what he plans to have the gundies do in his next book. Once I rip his limbs off his miserable body, he’ll tell me anything I want to know. After I know the gundie plans, I’ll have the author rewrite the book the way I want it to end, in destruction of the gundies.”
“Excuse me, Sir. If you rip his limbs off, he will not be able to write the book.”
“Hmm, you are correct. I see you can think for yourself. I like that. And you are not afraid to speak up. I like that also. I do indeed. However, if you do a second time, I will have you disappeared.”
“Sorry, Sir.”
“Hmm. Now what can I do to get the author to disclose his plans? Ahh, an engineer in the torture lab developed a penis crusher. I will use that on this author instead of removing his limbs.”
Zaftig, usually filled with self-confidence, knew he was in a dangerous situation, one that held horrid consequences for him. “Sir, why was I selected for this assignment? Where is the author? Do you know?”
“What I know is that the author lives far away. Probably in a different universe. You were selected because we know you leave our universe for parts unknown.”
Zaftig goggled at the Vice-dictator who clicked his beak. “You think your ship can suddenly disappear from the military scanners and no one would notice? You think your ship can suddenly pop up on the scanners and no one would notice? We believe you are using a wormhole, but we are content to leave it unexplored for now.”
Zaftig twisted three tentacles into a knot a boy scout would be proud of.
“Bring back the author and you will be richly rewarded. Umm, how about an exclusive right to produce shows on our home planet.”
Zaftig’s eye stalks whipped around in surprise. The reward would make him one of the wealthiest zaftan’s in history.
“On the other hand, if you fail, then I will pull off your tentacles one a time, let them regrow and pull them off again. Over and over. Time after time until I get bored with doing it. So you see, it is in your best interest to give me this Hank Quense.” The Vice-dictator waved a tentacle. “Go! Be about your mission.”
Zaftig left the office in shock. He had been given an almost impossible assignment with a hideous death as a price of failure. The Vice-dictator was correct. Zaftig did indeed know a wormhole to a different universe. But it was vast and he had only visited one location on one planet: a densely populated island called Manhattan.
He left the office and caught a shuttle to his ship parked in orbit. It always made his heart beat fast whenever he saw the gleaming white yacht with the big red letters, Zaftig the Magnificent: Talent Scout and Producer.
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