Epilogue - Rise If You're Sleeping; Stay Awake

5 N.I.C., Heinessen

Reuenthal's headquarters in Thernussen were in a broad building directly in the center of the city, a heavy black facade with long bars of windows that stretched in horizontal rings all around its surface, giving the impression of the stripes of some kind of animal. From his corner office, he could distantly see the river and the site of the former Free Planets Alliance Command Academy, now taken over as offices for the Neue Reich's military. Behind Reuenthal's desk, the golden lion flag hung limp from its pole, only fluttering when he strode by or when the air conditioner whirred to life.

Reuenthal had been on Heinessen for several months, acting as Governor-General of Neue Land. While he had not exactly been welcomed- there was no emissary of the Imperial government who would be- he sensed that Neue Land had breathed a collective sigh of relief to see Oberstein go back to Phezzan. Reuenthal took pride in being an efficient and fair ruler, though he had no delusions about how the citizens of Heinessen and the rest of this half of the galaxy saw him. Kircheis seemed satisfied thus far, not interfering with any of Reuenthal's decisions.

He couldn't say if Kircheis trusted him or not. It was unlikely that Oberstein did, and it appeared as though Oberstein had slotted himself directly into Kircheis's inner circle. From his position on Heinessen, Reuenthal couldn't tell if Mittermeyer was enough of a counterbalance to Oberstein's cold weight. He hoped that he was, but he was isolated here. And he suspected that Oberstein was able to keep more tabs on him, perhaps having left loyal- however much anyone could be loyal to Oberstein- spies embedded in the government of Neue Land.

It was that kind of paranoia- and there was a part of Reuenthal that could admit it was paranoia- that made him feel on edge, no matter how peaceful the world appeared to be. He did not resent Kircheis's position, precisely, but there was something in him that chafed at bowing to an infant. It had been easy to bow to Kaiser Reinhard, who had been as close to a god as men get, but Kircheis, though talented, had none of Kaiser Reinhard's magnetism, and the baby was in no way guaranteed to be an able successor. Still, it should be eighteen years before the baby was expected to take the throne.

Despite having plenty of urgent work to keep his mind on Neue Land, Reuenthal couldn't help his thoughts filtering back to that whenever he had a second, like he did now, sitting at his desk and watching the reflected light bounce off the walls of his office.

His aide, Heinrich, knocked on the door, and Reuenthal called him in.

"Your Excellency," he said, looking more confused and flustered than Reuenthal had ever seen him. Heinrich was usually fairly calm and reliable.

"Yes?"

"There's a woman outside who is asking to see you."

"What does she want?"

"She claims you're" - he shuffled uncomfortably- "the father of her baby."

Reuenthal put down the pen he was holding with a hard clack on the desk. "What's her name?"

"She didn't say, Your Excellency."

"And what does she look like?"

"Blonde, not very tall, angry-"

"Ask her how much money she wants and what address I should send it to," Reuenthal said. "I don't want to see her."

Heinrich nodded and scurried out of the office. Reuenthal leaned back in his chair. Elfriede could be lying, of course. He hadn't thought she was pregnant when Princess Grunewald had had her sent away from the capital on Odin. But perhaps both of those women were disinclined to mention such things to him. In any event, that had been two years ago; Reuenthal had no idea why Elfriede would come calling now, except to find new ways to torture him.

It was true that they had not been careful. Care had been the last thing on either of their minds.

But if he were in her position, he would not have carried any such pregnancy to term. He could hardly fathom why she would want to have his child. It was possible that it was some sort of elaborate blackmail scheme. But Reuenthal wouldn't fall for it; he would simply pay whatever she asked for.

If it wasn't some sort of scheme, then maybe she was just more stupid and sentimental than he had given her credit for. The thought vaguely disgusted him.

Heinrich returned. "Your Excellency," he said, "she doesn't want money, and she says she won't leave without seeing you."

He frowned. Of course she didn't- it was a scheme. It wasn't as though the two of them had any real attachment to each other. There was no affectionate reason for her to come calling. And, he knew that if he didn't see her now, she would find his house and ambush him there. He would conduct this business here, rather than risk that.

"Fine," Reuenthal said. "Send her in."

Elfriede arrived, looking just the same as he had remembered, the same cruel smile on her lips. The only difference was the toddler she held with one arm, a skinny baby who pressed their face into her neck and tugged at her hair. She was dressed in a black skirt, but it was of the type that was fashionable in the Neue Reich, and it hugged her legs when she walked.

She just looked at him for a second, and Reuenthal gave Heinrich a look that sent him out of the room.

"Half the galaxy, Oskar?" she asked, walking towards him. He didn't flinch or get up from his chair. "I don't know if I have to think more or less of you for it."

"What do you want?" he asked. "If you're here to blackmail me, don't go to the trouble. I'll pay whatever you ask."

She made a dismissive noise and perched on the edge of his desk. The baby did not turn their head to look at him. "You would like to see me beg, wouldn't you?" she asked. "I don't want your money."

"You're not here for a social visit."

"No? Wasn't our parting so abrupt that I wasn't even able to say goodbye properly?"

"I didn't think you were sentimental."

She laughed at that, and the baby made a noise, half a babble, whispering into her ear. "No? I came here for purely sentimental reasons."

"Oh?"

She pried the baby off her chest, disentangling their sticky hands from her hair, and held them out towards Reuenthal. "A boy should know his father."

Reuenthal made a dismissive noise. "I would have been better off without mine."

The boy's legs dangled over the desk, and Elfriede lowered him enough that he could stand on its surface, though still held in place by her hands grasping him underneath his armpits, her long, red-painted fingernails digging into his smart black outfit. "Klaus, turn around and say hello to your father," she commanded.

"Klaus?" Reuenthal asked. "You weren't that close with your great uncle." On some level, he was glad that the boy hadn't been named 'Oskar' as a different type of bitter recrimination from Elfriede. His thoughts were interrupted as Elfriede turned the child around, and Reuenthal got a first look at the face of the boy she claimed was his son.

His face was slender for a child's, and he looked like the few photos of himself at that age that Reuenthal had seen. His hair was wavy and dark, falling down around his ears, and his mouth was pinched in a fearful line, eyes wide. Blue.

There was no room to doubt that the child was his.

"Oskar, say hello to your son. I assume you haven't forgotten how to be polite."

"Klaus von Kohlrausch," Reuenthal said. He reached out and put his hand on the boy's chin, tilting his head like he was examining an animal. The boy tried to shy away, but Elfriede held him in place. Reuenthal was disturbed, and dropped his hand, holding it out for the boy to shake. "Hello," he said.

"Shake hands with your father."

Tentatively, Klaus held out his hand, and Reuenthal shook it.

"Don't you think he should have your name?" Elfriede asked.

"No," Reuenthal snapped. "There's no reason for anyone to have that."

"You won't claim your own bastard, then?"

Oh, she was goading him, but he couldn't help but rise to the bait. "I have no problem claiming him, but he doesn't need my name."

"Oh, good," she said. "He's yours to take, then."

A dark silence fell over the room. "I beg your pardon."

"Take him," Elfriede said. "He'll have a better life with you than he will with me." She brushed her hair off her shoulders.

"I doubt that," Reuenthal said. "I recall you spent too much of your time detailing how terrible I would be as a father."

"I changed my mind," she said.

"Oh?"

He knew he had fallen into some trap of hers by the way her lips turned up. "You bow to an infant on the throne well enough," she said. "You could hardly do worse than that to your own flesh and blood."

"Plenty of people have," Reuenthal said, trying to keep his voice unbothered. She had a way of getting under his skin.

"Perhaps. But it seems that you've changed your mind about things, too."

"Oh?"

"You spent quite a lot of your time telling me that you would only follow someone who had seized power with their own hands." She smirked. "An infant hardly fits the bill. Isn't that right, Klaus?" The baby on the desk turned to look at her.

"What is it that you want, Elfriede?"

She continued as though he hadn't said anything. "It is rather pathetic of you."

"I don't know what right you have to judge me. I thought you enjoyed the privileges of hereditary monarchy."

Her lips curled. "Oh, most certainly, Oskar. I liked it quite a lot when my family had those privileges." She laughed. "I resent their absence."

"And so you're giving me your son in the hopes that he will become essential to the crown?" Reuenthal asked.

Her eyes were cold when she stared at him. "If that's all I can hope for, I'll have to take it. But I thought you were a more interesting man than that."

He understood what she was implying, and his heart beat faster. Why did she have this power over him? "I seem to be only interesting to you when you can cause me trouble."

"Trouble? I've never caused you any." She tossed her hair. "Blaming your troubles on me would be cowardly."

"You came here to insult me, more than anything else."

She bared her teeth in something that resembled a smile, but wasn't.

"How long are you staying in Thernussen?" he asked.

"Not long."

"Where will you go?"

"I intend to see all the sights that the galaxy has to offer," she said. "That's difficult to do with a child."

"All of the sights?" he asked, a tone in his voice that signalled he was talking about more than Phezzan and Heinessen.

"I'm curious about the way people live in other parts of the universe," she said. Iserlohn, then. There were certainly smugglers that slipped through the Iserlohn corridor to bring supplies to the fortress. His fleet had never been able to stop them all; single ships were hard to catch.

"And if I say I won't take him?"

"You will."

"I don't think you know me very well."

"I know what I need to, Oskar."

They stared at each other in dead silence for ten or fifteen seconds, long enough that Klaus grew nervous and tried to squirm back into his mother's arms. She kept him at an arm's length and nodded at Reuenthal. "Take him," she said.

"Bring him to my house tomorrow night," he said, pulling out a piece of paper to write down the address. "I'll take him then."

"Why the delay?"

"I will need to make arrangements for his care," he said. "Not all of us can change our plans on a moment's notice." And he needed to think. He might not do anything that she wanted, but her words had stirred something up in his chest, ambitions that had laid half-buried at best.

She nodded, picked up the baby, and said, "Klaus, say goodbye to your father."

The boy, who had been nearly silent the whole time, lifted his head from her shoulder and made a tiny wave at Reuenthal. "Bye-bye."

Reuenthal nodded and watched them go without another word.

That night, over a glass of whiskey, he began composing a letter. He didn't know if he would give it to Elfriede to deliver, but he wrote just the same, plotting out a new course.

Dear Marshal Yang Wen-li,

I understand that this message is an unexpected and perhaps unwelcome one, so I shall state my business as clearly as possible.

Though I have spent these past years serving Mein Kaiser to the extent of my ability, I have always held the opinion that the galaxy should be governed by the most able ruler. For all that she may be Mein Kaiser 's chosen heir, Alexandria von Lohengramm is an infant, and definitionally not a capable ruler.

I believe we both understand that power should rest in the hands of someone qualified to use it. Perhaps we disagree on the specifics of this; I was not raised to trust in the democratic process as you were.

While we may have been enemies in the past, I have the greatest respect for you and your talent. With the passing of Kaiser Reinhard, the universe has lost half of its vital energy.

There are things that both of us want to see come to pass. I do not doubt that you would prefer democracy survive outside of Iserlohn, and I do not think that my own goals are antithetical to that. To that end, I would like to propose the opening of a dialogue between us...

Author's Note

chapter title - www. youtube watch?v =AMj6tCQ1MNc

I doubt i will ever actually write the sequel to this story, but i wanted to close on some taste of what the future could feel like. you are welcome to write the sequel (or prequel) to this story of course- i'd be interested to see what other people think a post-reinhard world looks like

poor alternate universe felix. being raised by reuenthal and elfriede in weird shifts is probably significantly worse for your emotional well-being than being raised by the mittermeyers lol. i don't actually think that reuenthal would be the world's worst father fwiw, but I definitely don't think he'd be like an emotionally healthy one. the bar of 'don't abuse your kid' is pretty low though and i think he would at least manage to clear that.

anyway! thank you so much for reading 3 let me know what you think of this story

thank you very very much to em for the beta read. you can find me on tumblr javert and twitter natsinator. my other writing is at gayspaceopera . carrd .co and you can also join my discord discord . gg/2fu49B28nu