Date 03: Picnic

originally rewritten several times in late 2010 and finally published in January 2011

Lifting the insulated bottle out of the hamper, Davish offered a refill to Vanya before warming up his own cup of muja cider. "In that case, tell me about the incident with the pillow clubs."

Vanya suppressed a giggle, wanting to keep her cup steady while he poured. "Good grog! People still talk about that?"

"I take it that was a fairly popular story, back a few years ago. There's an assumption to the effect that I know what is being referenced. I'm never quite sure if it's wise to ask."

Laughing, Vanya set her cup back on its saucer. "Several years ago, and yeah. This was how I met Lord Danar. Skipping most of the background as irrelevant: a hateful brat of our host's family used her Pruneface-provided training in the Dark Side to hypnotize this big muscly type into challenging our sole Vor into an honor duel. Officially not fatal, not-so-officially a blatant trap. The tool in question outmassed Danar by at least sixty percent, and had nothing better to do with his life but try to kill big critters. If Danar killed him, that's a capital charge: he's known to be a saber-rake, illegal of course, and death duels are forbidden by Imperial fiat, and he's the child of a disfavored House. Which is basically just looking for any excuse to ruin him, his folks, his siblings, and their vassals."

Leaning back slightly, Vanya continued, "So in an absolutely brilliant stroke, Danar pointed out that the challenged party gets to choose the weapons. And I stop paying attention for five minutes, and when I look back up, he's got this injured dignity thing going, and he's gravely insisting on 'feather clubs'. A weapon that demands skill instead of relying on quality tools, he points out. And sure enough, there're a pair of PILLOWS sitting in perfect presentation among all the other pairs of weapons. I have to assume that the little blue alien smuggler – that's Khun – or the only present Vorpaderan armsman – that's Angus Priest – snuck them into place while Danar kept the principles distracted. Absolutely fantastic. That's when I knew this Vorpaderan kid was going to be one hell of a motive force when he hit his legal majority." She glanced up at the tree-dappled sky, briefly. "Well, I wasn't predicting that he'd be Emperor Pro Tem by the magic birthday, o'course. 'Happy Birthday, man, you're finally legal to sign binding contracts without a Regent, oh and we got you the real Emperor back' doesn't come on your typical birthday card."

Davish would've laughed, but a blaster shot suddenly filled the space between them and buried itself in a hassock of tiny blue flowers. They, naturally, began to smolder.

Clearly the errant shot had been intended to kill, not stun.

Davish and Vanya stared at it for a moment. Then they exchanged gazes for another moment.

"Well." Vanya shrugged one shoulder. "We can knock 'hide out on picnic in forested segment of backwater planet' off the possibilities, then."

Davish could only nod. "You get the cloaks, I secure the hamper?"