Chương 132: Epilogue Five - The Complicated Love Life of Ivil Antagonist

A Year Later, Mars Ivil Antagonist, Empress of Mars, Destroyer of Worlds, Embarrasser of Emperors, and Best Girlfriend in the Solar System (Pixie got her a mug that said so) was currently lounging on a sofa. It was her sofa. The one in her entertainment room in her favourite palace. The room was rather large, with rows of pillars holding up the ceiling far above. A cathedral ceiling, she thought it was called.

The place had been built by some famous Martian architect, taking inspiration from a thousand-year-old church on Earth. A wide-screen television was bolted to the wall, so she could watch her soaps, and speakers were cleverly hidden around the room, to provide as good a quality of sound as possible. She mostly cared for the couch, though. It was new. Before, she had an armchair. It had been a very nice armchair, mind. Very plush, with some cushions, and a soft velvety covering and fantastic lumbar support.

The kind of thing that would cost the average Martian half a year's pay. The couch, however, was new, because she needed more space. There was a 'hup' and then a shift as someone hopped over the side of the couch and crashed in next to Ivil.

"What're you watching?" Pixie asked.

"Nothing, yet," Ivil said. She glanced at the screen, where there was a grid of tiles, each with the thumbnail for a different show. She... was actually behind on several of her shows, something that hadn't happened in a while. She would never admit it to anyone, but she'd actually sometimes spent entire days wandering her empty palace in something of a bored daze, waiting for the next episode to come out.

She even considered hibernating for a while but she knew that she could be called upon to defend her home planet one day, and being stuck in a sleeping state wouldn't do for that.

"I was... thinking of watching the newest season of Bajo el Domo Carmesí."

"Is that... Spanish?" Pixie asked.

"I learned it to be able to watch in the non-dubbed state, but the dubs are quite good," Ivil said. Pixie shrugged.

"Okay then," she said before settling into the couch more comfortably. Ivil felt strangely nervous as she started the episode, this was sharing in something she usually kept to herself. Of course, she went back a few episodes, to start at the start of a new season, it would mean less explaining.

"Who's that?" Pixie asked.

"That's Pedro. He's Maria's lover, but also her son. He time-travelled back into the past."

"Is he his own dad?" Pixie asked.

"No, that'd be silly," Ivil said.

"If you say so," Pixie said. She shifted, then slowly slid to the side until her shoulder bumped against Ivil's. A few minutes later, the familiar click-click of high heels on marble echoed through the room, up until Aurora came up next to the couch. She eyed the TV for a while, then frowned at it. She looked ready to say something, but then just kept on watching. It took a moment before she shook her head.

"What are you two doing?"

"Watching soaps," Ivil said.

"Watching this drama. These people are insane, I think." Pixie pointed to the screen.

"That Pedro guy is definitely his own dad, and that Susan character is a slut."

"Now now, she's a little... promiscuous, certainly, but I wouldn't go that far," Ivil said.

"Nuh-uh, the amount of sex you have has nothing to do with sluttiness," Pixie argued. Aurora watched the two of them, and then looked at the screen again.

"This looks like trash. Why would you watch it?"

"It's not trash," Ivil said.

"It's art." She was a little hurt, actually, that Aurora didn't like her soaps. Aurora crossed her arms and continued to watch, then after ten minutes, she sat down, then after an hour and two episodes--and a small break for the washroom and snacks--and she was knee-deep in an argument with Pixie.

"I'm telling you, it doesn't make sense. Pedro is an idiot, not because he's trying to get it on with his own mother, but because he's clearly not thinking about the economic and political value of the core he has. Unlimited backwards time travel!"

"It has a cost," Pixie said.

"Yes, in gems from some mine that are inexplicably required to fuel the core. He could make enough in a few jumps back to buy ten mines," Aurora said.

"Ah! But the mine is currently owned by Alejandro, who has vowed that he will make Pedro pay for stealing Maria away from him," Ivil said.

"Making the gems uncommon."

"What? When did that happen?" Aurora asked. Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

"Two seasons ago," Ivil said.

"Which season is this?" she asked.

"Nineteen."

"And we're only starting now? How can you expect me to understand any of this if we're starting so late?" She crossed her arms.

"Start it over."

"But we just watched four episodes," Pixie said.

"How many are there per season?"

"It depends, but usually sixty or so," Ivil said.

"If we start now, we can be caught up in two months." She perked up a little as the door to the far end of the room opened, then there was a pitter-patter as Twenty-Six crossed over. She stared for a moment, smiled, then went around and fell backwards onto the couch, nestling in between Ivil and Aurora and pulling the noblewoman closer.

"What are we watching?"

"Some horrific soap opera," Aurora said.

"It's trashy. The writers are incompetent and the acting is barely tolerable... The music is alright."

"I never paid much mind to the music," Ivil admitted.

"Give me a moment, I'll start it over for Twenty-Six. Season one is actually pretty good. The actors were much younger."

"How much younger?" Pixie asked.

"See the child in the thumbnail? That's Pedro's actor. Though he wasn't in the role of Pedro at the time, that character hadn't been written in yet. Maria is there, though. Her actress was replaced in season nine."

"He was cuter as a kid," Pixie said.

"Yes, he kept fumbling his lines, it was sweet," Ivil replied. She started from the beginning. She'd never really enjoyed rewatching things, but this felt different. She was reliving it through the eyes of people she cared about, and seeing them enjoying it made it... more special, somehow. Twenty-Six had gone a little still, just her feet swinging back and forth, the front of the couch unfolded to make more room for them.

She was leaning her hips to one side, so that they touched Ivil's, and her head on the other, drooped onto Aurora's shoulder. Aurora, always prim and proper, didn't seem to mind at all. She idly watched the show, sometimes adding a snide remark about production quality, or the unrealism of it, but never truly stopping to watch. Her hand was open, palm-up, and she was toying with Twenty-Six's hand without looking at it.

Pixie was on Ivil's other side, lounging across the couch with her head on Ivil's lap and her legs up over the edge. She was starting at the screen, but sometimes her eyes would dart up, and she'd glance at Ivil, or the others, just for a moment. And Ivil? She was in the middle. The literal middle. Pressed between three women who didn't know the full weight of what they were doing. Of what it meant to her that they were here.

She had built an Empire, had broken dynasties, had survived assassination attempts and political manoeuvrings, sabotage and heartbreak. She'd come out of it stronger. And yet lonelier. It was, for several years, just her and her soaps. And now here she was, in a room designed to look pretty for dignitaries, which she'd turned into a living space to watch something most would consider a little trashy in a fit of spite. She was still doing the same thing, in a way, but not alone.

She was barely pretending to pay attention to the show. One hand was snaking around Twenty-Six's shoulder, the other was scratching idly at Pixie's head. For years, there had been a voice in the back of her head, an unspeakable fear that she had buried and repressed and which resurfaced all too often. It said that she would be alone forever. Somehow, that voice was louder now. The irony didn't escape her. The voice was different now, though.

It warned her that this moment might not last, that this yearning she felt might be too strong, or not strong enough, that the love she was given wasn't one she deserved. Why was love so much scarier than anything she'd faced as Empress? She... found that she didn't mind, so much.

The voice might be louder, but tonight, it was muffled, by Pixie's soft laughter, by Twenty-Six's giggles, by the tutting noise that Aurora made as she covered them in blankets and complained about them catching a cold if they weren't tucked in properly, because she didn't know how else to show them that she cared. She hadn't asked them to do that. They just had. She had fought wars. Won revolutions. Toppled governments. But the war inside herself? That was taking longer. But at least she had allies in that battle.

"I... love you," she said. Pixie glanced up to her, Twenty-Six giggled again and leaned in to her side, and Aurora shook her head.

"Obviously," she replied.

"We love you too."

"Okay," Ivil said. And it was.