Tansy Rayner Roberts's Blog, page 60

Verity! Extra! – Doctor in a Strange Land

This week’s Extra! features crossover madness! Join Deb, Erika, Katrina, and Tansy, as we muse over what it would be like to plop the Doctor into other fictional worlds. What makes a good crossover? Which Verity isn’t really comfortable with crossovers? Who coins the term “Capaldi-flicted”? And who observes that Capaldi “gives good cape”? Listen and see!

Then let us know in the comments what fictional worlds you’d like to see the Doctor (and/or his companions) visit. Inquiring Verities want to know!

^E

Related links:

Tansy’s Musketeer Space

Radio Free Skaro #428 – Believe it or Not

Download or listen now (runtime 29:36)
http://traffic.libsyn.com/veritypodcast/veritydrstrangeland.mp3

Musketeer Space Part 8: The Nesting Habits of Musketeers

Wednesday is Musketeer Space day! It’s the school holidays here, and I’ve just finished editing a book, so hopefully lots of musketeer writing this week. Thanks everyone for all your lovely comments about Look Good in Leather, the first of my Musketeer Media Monday reviews of the BBC Musketeer series. I’ve been acquiring a whole bunch of other adaptations to review including the Mickey/Goofy one from Disney, the one with Tim Roth, and one that appears to be a gender-swapped Hong Kong action movie. So there’s THAT to look forward to…

I’m SO CLOSE now to the next milestone on Patreon, and really hope we hit that $200 level because I am storing up all kinds of brilliant ideas for a Christmas story. Hello to all new subscribers! Thanks for joining the party.

This chapter is a bit different – the last bit of calm set up and worldbuilding before the first wave of crazy plot antics begins. It’s going to be a fun month!



Start reading from Part 1

Missed the last installment? Track back to Part 7

Main Page & Table of Contents

PREVIOUSLY IN MUSKETEER SPACE: Dana D’Artagnan came to Paris Satellite to become a Musketeer pilot – but closest she got was befriending three of them. The Regent was pleased with her valiant contribution to drunken bar brawls, and rewarded her with a job – but not the job she wants.



NOW READ ON!

This chapter is dedicated to John Devenny with gratitude for your support!

PART EIGHT: The Nesting Habits of Musketeers

It is a truth universally acknowledged that anyone with piloting experience can easily get to grips with a mecha suit within a few hours.

Dana was pretty sure that anyone who made that claim was full of enough shit to fill the mecha suit in question.

This was her life now. She was a Pigeon.

Not just any Pigeon. She was the newest recruit of Commandant Essart’s Elite Mecha Squad, charged with protecting and serving the inhabitants of the Luna Palais and surrounding city, within a giant plexiglass dome on the moon.

Dirtside guard duty.

She pretty much wanted to kill herself.

“Stop complaining,” said Aramis, who had (along with Athos and Porthos) sacrificed a rec shift to come and laugh at Dana’s attempts to put her new mecha suit through its paces in the Mecha Training Centre, in the outer city of Luna Palais. “At least it’s a job.”

“This is not flying,” Dana said between gritted teeth. “This is the very opposite of flying.”

She had worked in a mecha suit when she was fifteen, and saving every penny for flight hours. But that had been space-going mecha, for a few hours at a time, performing basic repair work in zero-g on the outside of Gascon Station.

It has been tolerable. But this was hell – she could barely walk, she couldn’t wrap her brain around what all the buttons were for, and once she got the hang of it, her main duties were going to be breaking up duels and drunken brawls between civilians and pilots on leave. Oh, with a side order of providing an extra layer of wall between the disgruntled masses and the royal family in the event of assassination attempts.

This was not flying.

“It’s a start,” said Porthos, who had brought a laden picnic basket for them all to share while they amused themselves at Dana’s expense. “And it’s not every baby pilot gets a private audience with the Regent before being rewarded with a plum position.”

“Guarding her Royal Highness’s person is the greatest honour there is,” agreed Athos, who had found the bottle of wine in the basket and wasn’t sharing it with anyone. “You impressed her.”

“If you’ve all quite finished making fun of me,” Dana snarled. “I only have the rest of this shift to master the controls before I go on duty. So if you want to make sure I don’t accidentally set fire to Luna Palais or your precious Regent, a little help here, please?”

The mecha was a lot like flying a dart. It was plugged into her synapses, the helm of the metal body connected intimately to her brain. But while it was second nature to her to be ‘at one’ with her ship, gliding effortlessly through the depths of space for days and weeks at a time, it was remarkably difficult to deal with limbs. These large, throbbing metal appendages stuck out from her giant tin can of a mecha suit, and had a tendency to lash out in any direction if Dana let a stray thought distract her.

She knew how to do this. The theory was exactly the same as flying a ship. And yet… ships didn’t have arms.

“I can’t,” she moaned. The mecha lowered its pigeon-grey head, and the large metal shoulders slumped. “Maybe I can volunteer for a civilian transfer.”

Athos leaned towards her, rapping lightly on the visor of the mecha. “Sweetness,” he said in a stern voice. “That’s not how this works. The Regent likes you. She gave you this job as a dainty treat – as a reward for nearly stabbing Captain Jussac to death which I have to say is a task I have accomplished at least three times in my life and never one been rewarded for… what was I saying?”

Aramis reached out and took the neck of the wine bottle off Athos. “He’s saying, Dana darling, that you can’t turn down her Royal Highness’s reward. It’s rare enough to be a favourite of hers. Believe us, you don’t want to make yourself her enemy. There wouldn’t be anything left of you but a small pile of skin and sequins.”

“I always wondered what it would be like to pilot a mecha,” Porthos said thoughtfully, peering up at Dana. “Isn’t it even a little bit fun?”

Dana flexed her fingers, and one of her power arms shot a sudden burst of flame at the surface of the training room, making all three Musketeers jump nearly out of their skins. The floor melted into a pile of slag, then patiently began to rebuild itself. “I suppose there are compensations,” Dana admitted.

Whenever she lay down to try to sleep in the tiny bunk allotted to her in the Squad barracks, Dana found herself thinking of the Regent, and the look on her face as she presented Dana with her “reward”.

“And perhaps, someday,” she had purred, not finishing the sentence. Still, everyone else in the room had known what she was implying.

Perhaps, someday, the Musketeers.

The Regent had to be the most beautiful woman that Dana had ever seen. She was a sylph of a creature, all soft lines like a watercolour sketch of a weeping willow. The Regent’s lips, Dana remembered, had been painted gold to match her clinging gown and elaborate hair brooches.

Dana had previously considered Aramis to be the pinnacle of feminine grace and beauty, but Lalla-Louise Renard Royal, Regent of the Solar System, left them all in her perfumed dust.

Perhaps, someday, the Musketeers.

Hope could keep you going longer than anything else. Hope would have made this whole Mecha Pigeon nightmare almost tolerable, if it wasn’t for the fact that Dana could not sleep on the moon. She did not understand how anyone could.

Dear Mama,

It could be worse. I think if you say something often enough, you come to believe it. I didn’t come to Paris to waddle around inside a robot body, but as the weeks have passed… well, I’m almost glad of this strange reward that the Regent bestowed upon me.

After all, we had been caught duelling (the fisticuffs kind, as Athos would say, not the fuck-your-brain-up kind), and I might well have been turfed into a cell for a month or two, or given my marching orders from this sector of space.

Yes, I’m billeted on Luna Palais on a permanent basis, and if I think too hard about that word ‘permanent,’ I would scream at the walls. Dirtside is not where I want to be. But as it turns out, there is work for Pigeons up on Paris Satellite too, and once the first probationary month passed, I started getting as many shifts Up There as Down Here.

Things that are good about living on the moon:

1. Leaving the moon on a regular basis.

2. Attending Zero-G TeamJoust matches at the Andromeda Bowl, especially with Porthos who knows more about the game than any sane human being should, and has colour coded wigs to match the three different teams that she supports depending on which stream you’re following… you know what, I’m not even going to try to explain.

3. Earning credit, which means I can pay for my own meals instead of sponging off my friends – and they can even sponge off me when they’re out of pocket (which seems to happen a lot, it’s amazing how easy it is to spend money on having a good time in Paris).

4. Commander Essart is way less scarier than Amiral Treville, and even cracks a joke sometimes.

5. It’s not forever.

I don’t love my mecha suit the way I’m supposed to. It’s nothing like the relationship I’ve formed with even the most basic of practice ships. But it’s getting better. I didn’t accidentally set fire to anyone this week, which highly reduces the risk that I might do so to the Regent or the Prince.

After my second month in the Mecha Squad, I even scored the occasional shift flying shuttles back and forth between Luna Palais and Paris Satellite to transport equipment and some of my fellow Pigeons. The shuttles are bulky and ugly just like the mecha suits, and I always want to throw up when I make moonfall, but flying a ship is better than anything else. Always and forever.

It’s not planetside, at least. The shifting green-brown, gold and blue orb that is the over-heated planet Honour looks pretty from up here, but I’m happy to keep my distance from the wretched place. Bad enough that I’m supposed to sleep on the moon, and I just can’t. I wish it was just a phase, but it’s been months and I’m pretty sure that I’m not going to adapt.

I used to manage an hour or two in barracks, when I was exhausted, but it wasn’t enough, and I was starting to worry it might get me seriously hurt, or worse. I don’t know if it was my stupid brain or my stupider body or some gravity shit that I was never going to figure out, but sleeping on the moon was just impossible.

Aramis noticed it first. “You look like shit,” she told me when we met for a drink not long after my first shuttle job to Paris. “Have another drink,” she added.

At that point, I was facing a black spiral inside my own head. “I don’t think I can,” I told her. Drink wasn’t going to help. Nothing helped.

“Sleep, then,” she urged me.

“If only.”

Then – I think I collapsed in the corner of the booth in the Abbey of St Germain some time later. Athos and Porthos had joined us by the time I woke up – the three of them had been ordering wine on my credit stud for hours, the bastards!

After that, one or other of them always insisted I crash in their Paris digs when my shift ended. And after Porthos had a word with one of her boyfriends who apparently works in Scheduling and Admin (sooo convenient I can’t even tell you), suddenly I get all these double shifts which happen to end on Paris Satellite instead of Palais Luna.

So I have friends, crash space, and my credit is increasing at a slow but positive crawl. Life could be worse.

Thanks for not telling Papa about the Buttercup – and for being so understanding. I hated not telling you both, but I most of all didn’t want to hurt his feelings. I know you’re steel-coated, like me.

Love,

Dana.

Dear Mama,

What, really? You want to know more about these Musketeers I’m always hanging around with? I thought I talked about them too much already!

Let’s start with Athos, because he’s the one I know least about. Aramis says he has a tragic past, which wouldn’t surprise me at all, but she never provided more details – all three of them are loyal to the point of sheer stupidity, so that doesn’t surprise me.

Athos lives in two rooms beside a grimy bar on the fourth level, which is the only drinking hole in Paris that he refuses to patronise. I think that means it’s pretty bad.

He shares digs with his engie, Grimaud, who is much older than I expected, and the perfect roommate because she’s constantly plugged into headphones, and never talks.

“She doesn’t laugh at my jokes, but that’s the only downside,” Athos said the first time I unfurled my trusty bedroll on his floor. “She also doesn’t chatter through my hangovers, or suggest I call my mother more than once a year. Love you, Grimaud!” he yelled in the direction of the tiny kitchenette.

She gave him the finger, which I took to mean she loves him too, but won’t put up with his bullshit.

Grimaud wears a starscarf all the time but I don’t think she’s especially religious – I wouldn’t be surprised if the scarf was there for the same reason as the headphones – blocking out the universe. Or maybe blocking out Athos.

“The Sabres keep trying to steal her,” Athos told me once. “Best engie in Paris. But she likes my ship too much to let me go. There’s no artistry involved in keeping a fucking Sabre in the sky: they just replace each part the second it fails. Her children are convinced that we’re secretly married, and they always send me brandy at New Year.”

“Possibly they’re trying to kill you?” I suggested. Everyone know that Athos is the Musketeer most likely to drink himself to death. There may be a formal betting pool on that one.

“I didn’t say it was good brandy.”

Apart from the obvious matters of his cheap habits, his silent engie, his perverse sense of humour and his formerly ridiculous beard, Athos the New Aristocrat remains a mystery to me. I’ve learned not to try to match him drink for drink, not to talk to him at all when he gets a certain maudlin look on his face, and never to tease him about lovers, not even when Porthos does (because she teases everyone about everything).

He doesn’t have friends apart from Aramis and Porthos and now me. The others have wider social circles, but I think sometimes Athos would rather have no one at all.

He has, however, been teaching me to use a pilot’s slice for recreational fencing, which is not the same AT ALL as illegal duelling, so don’t freak out. I’m getting quite good, I think.

Porthos, or Pol to her other friends, is the polar opposite to Athos. She has a large apartment somewhere over in Gilles Section – was it as trendy in your time as it is now? Very popular civilian sector, all fashion emporiums and cafes. Her rooms are lush, and she never stints when it comes to food, drink or treating her friends. Honestly, I have no idea where the money is come from.

She has at least four boyfriends that I know of, and I’m not entirely sure if any of them knows about each other. I can’t bring myself to ask.

Porthos rooms with her engie, Bonnie – it’s still traditional for pilots to provide board for engineers because accommodation up here is bloody expensive, and engies get paid so much less than pilots. That goes double for the Musketeers. Can you have double of less?

Bonnie is a dab hand at cooking as well as patching up spaceships, and she usually has Porthos’ rooms smelling and looking like heaven. She’s happy to do all the cooking and cleaning as long as she has the freedom to dip in and out of the treasure trove that is the Wardrobe of Porthos. Apparently if you’re a lady of short stature and large bosom, regular access to designer outfits that fit you is better than actual currency.

Whenever I crash with Porthos, it’s on a comfortable sofa bed with the promise of croissants in the morning. The only reason I don’t do it more often is because I think Bonnie disapproves of me. Not sure if it’s personal or if she feels I make the place untidy.

Still, when picking which of my friends to stay with, it’s hard not to lean towards the option that means warm cinnamon milk at bedtime, and a pillow that feels like a marshmallow dream made by silkworms.

Finally, Aramis. I’m still figuring Aramis out. When we’re out and about she’s all about wine, women and general debauchery, but at home she’s a lot more quiet, introspective and – yeah, religious.

Her rooms are stark apart from a collection of antique theology texts, a brilliant selection of herbal teas, and at least four virtual windows dedicated to the weirdly green and storybook-pleasant country scenery of the planet Valour.

The main view in her salon displays rolling hillside with an old-style Church of All.

“I like to be able to see the church from my home town,” she said once, when I couldn’t help asking how much this apartment actually cost. “Someday I’ll have one of my own.” She really does seem to believe that she’ll do it one day – leave the Musketeers to join the Church. People can be weird about aspirations. Why would anyone want to do anything but be a Musketeer?

The weirdest thing about Aramis’ rooms, is Bazin. He’s a church android that she picked up in payment for a gambling debt, and then reprogrammed with engie functions. His original program remains, and serving a human who isn’t part of the priesthood is a constant cause of background distress to him.

Which basically, makes him the most passive aggressive android I’ve ever met. He delays all but the most necessary functions, except those involving religious activity, and hates all of Aramis’ friends, especially those who sleep over. I always half expect to find that I’ve been neatly moved out into the corridor, bedroll and all, when I wake up.

Aramis writes, all the time. Letters and articles on theology or the state of the soul, which she gets published in journals. Some of the letters are private, ongoing debates with other theorists. Only some of them are elaborate flirtations. She loves this work so much that sometimes do think she’d rather do that than fly her ship. If she could only give up her habit of seducing married unavailable women, she would do fine in the Church.

But there’s that pesky morality contract thing, you know.

“I am moral,” Aramis insists, when challenged on this point. “Who am I to seduce if not married women who are attached elsewhere? If I sleep with someone who has expectations of me and my future, I’d be bound to disappoint them when I leave Paris to become a priest.”

She also suggested once that if/when she leaves the Musketeers, there will be a place opening up for me. We were a bit worse for wine at the time, and I confessed that I didn’t want to be a Musketeer without her. We hugged and there might have been a few tears. Athos and Porthos laughed at us.

(Yes, in case it wasn’t obvious, I have a slight crush on her, it’s fine, I’ll get over it)

I’ve never had friends like this before. I know what you mean now, what you used to say about being a Musketeer and the friends you had at your back. I’m not that, but I have this, and it’s good.

I wouldn’t sacrifice any of them to reach my dream, not one.



Perhaps, someday, the Regent suggested to me. A tease, not a promise. But it’s easier to return to the dull grind of Mecha Squad Essart, knowing that I have friends like these.

Your,

Dana

You have been reading Musketeer Space, by Tansy Rayner Roberts. Tune in next week for another chapter! Please comment, share and link. Musketeer Space is free to read, but if you’d like to support the project for as little as $1 per month, visit my Patreon page. Pledges can earn rewards such as ebooks, extra content, dedications and the naming of spaceships. My next funding milestone ($200 a month) will unlock a special Christmas story.

Looks Good in Leather: the BBC Musketeer Edition Part I (2014)

It’s Musketeer Media Monday again! This month, we have a series instead of a single movie, so I’ll be reviewing it over more than one Monday.

I’m a little embarrassed to admit this, but I think The Musketeers (BBC 2014) may have ruined me for all past and future Musketeer adaptations. Which is a hell of a thing to say when you’re partway through writing your own Musketeer story… but I love this show so much. Stating the bias up front, here. I want to eat this show with a spoon. I have literally bought the t-shirt.

The BBC Musketeers is a gorgeously made show, with full commitment to swords, swagger and scenery. The scripts are fun, irreverent and fast-paced. There are also a huge variety of female characters with agency, who make an active contribution to the story, despite the deep and necessary focus on machismo, brotherhood and other blokey things of blokehood that is part of the Musketeer baggage.

I think the proves the case that sometimes it’s the adaptations that take more liberties that can better capture the spirit of original material. This is a thoroughly modern Musketeers, and maybe in 20 years it will look at dated as Kiefer and Co. do to me now, but I don’t care.

The visual tone is striking – part French historical, part Western, part Guy Ritchie shoot-em-up movie and oh, so much leather, from the armour to the cloaks to the slouch hats. The men are beautiful and snarky, the women are intelligent and complex, and the Prague-based sets add a level of authenticity to every scene, from the filth in the streets to the ornate Palace rooms. Even the music makes me happy.

Also, there are muskets. Oh, so many muskets. The guns are characters in the story as much as the swords – and they’re shown in loving detail, all gunpowder and musket balls and reloading for every single shot.

Just in case it wasn’t clear that this show was made entirely FOR MY BENEFIT, it brings in many of my favourite guest actors in meaty one-off roles, including Tara Fitzgerald, James Callas and Sean Pertwee. And the costumes are so good that I could honestly write this post just about those.

The BBC Musketeers is not only worth watching, but worth watching in the highest resolution you have access to. The detail and the design is extraordinary, so that in Blu-Ray every scratch shows up on every piece of leather armour.

Character Notes:

1. D’Artagnan. Let’s just stop right now and marvel at a likeable D’Artagnan. I’m still coming to terms with this bizarre notion. Played by Luke Pasquilino (formerly of Skins) he is dashing, a bit arrogant, rash and brave to the point of stupidity. He gets to be witty and sarcastic, which automatically makes me like characters more. It’s actually convincing that the Musketeers see potential in him, and take him on as a protégé.

2. Constance is written well and consistently, as a complex character. Most adaptations don’t take into account all the facets of book!Constance – notably, both 1993 and 2011 film versions of The Three Musketeers keep her as a lady-in-waiting to the Queen, but leave out the parts where she’s a married landlady, and a madcap conspirator, and a self-assured, amusing woman who calls out D’Artagnan on his protective bullshit. For this most recent, leather-clad Musketeer series, they keep all the personality and landlady aspects, and ditch the connection to the Palace. It works very well for the show, but I’d love to see this Constance build a friendship with the Queen in the next season. Tamla Kari has all the facial expressions in the world, and wonderful comic timing.

3. Milady de Winter is allowed to be a proper villain, utterly without redemption, while still compelling at all times. Murder, death, revenge, seduction, and anger. I love how rage-filled she is in her stories, and how justified she feels in all her actions even when she’s talking about cold-blooded murder. Her hatred for and conflict about Athos drips off the screen whenever she’s near him, and her relationship with the Cardinal is all about power play, rather than just him eyeing off her boobs.

4. The Three themselves are wonderful. I could watch them all day. There’s a strong sense of the history that Athos, Porthos and Aramis have together – and yet, they don’t tell each other everything. As a fighting unit, they’re brilliant to watch thanks to some amazing choreography (highly recommended; the documentary extra on the Blu-Ray about their fencing and horseriding boot camp, and also the one about all the work and thought that the designers put into the individual costumes), and strong performances. All three of them are my favourite versions of the characters now. Athos is reserved, deadpan and (of course) a melancholy drunk; Porthos is loyal, tough as hell and self-mocking (Howard Charles rivals Tamla Kari for hilarious facial expressions); and Aramis is the soulful tart with a heart of gold and occasional religious tendencies. They’re all really good with the swords and the guns and they have the best hats. Seriously. THE BEST HATS.

5. Cardinal Richelieu, or as my friend Liz calls him, Capaldieu, is a fantastic, nuanced take on the character. Wicked and power-obsessed, but subtle about it, and genuinely wanting what is best for France – though obviously him continuing to have most of the power and influence over the King is what he thinks is best for France. Also his clothes, OMG his clothes. His Twelfth Doctor is now going to have to be extra bloody good to make up for him not being able to be in Season 2, that’s all I have to say.

6. King Louis is a tough and thankless character to portray – but this version of the King is so much fun. Petulant, vengeful, capricious and erratic, he feels the most historically authentic of the bunch and not only because his clothes are a bit more period-proper. What’s most interesting about this king is that everyone in service to him genuinely thinks he is the best current option they have to rule France – and this is supported by various hints and callbacks we get to the civil war that preceded this time of relative peace. He’s a weak king, but he’s way, way better than the horrors that came before him.

7. Another excellent Queen Anne – though I’ve liked all of the Queens from the adaptations I’ve reviewed so far. I do appreciate that there are no attempts to present the marriage between Anne and Louis as anything other than a business transaction with occasional fondness mixed with their various issues of conflict: religion, infidelity and political differences. Even though the diamond plot is not enacted in this season, we still see that the Musketeers feel loyalty and protectiveness towards the Queen, at times more so than towards her husband.

I have been told that I must review individual episodes. There are too many for one post, so I will split it up.

EPISODE 1: Friends and Enemies

The first episode of a show should tell you exactly what you’re going to get in the series – and also barely scratch the surface. From the opening scene, we learn that this isn’t going to be a note-for-note adaptation. D’Artagnan’s journey to Paris touches on familiar notes, but then chucks them all into a blender.

A group of masked Musketeers hijack the tavern where D’Artagnan and his D’ad are staying on their way to Paris. The one called Athos murders said D’ad. D’Artagnan then runs all the way to Paris in a vengeful frenzy, shags Milady in a dodgy tavern, gets framed for a murder, jumps out of a window on to the clunky part of his sword, runs from an angry mob and snogs Constance, all on his way to declare vengeance on this Athos chap and duel him to death.

Seriously, all these things happen, and I still really like this D’Artagnan.

We’re introduced to the real Musketeers one by one – first a beautifully filmed scene in which a hungover Athos awakes in his dodgy apartment, soaks his head in an ice-crusted rain bucket, and then slowly pulls himself together, one piece of choreographed leather at a time. By the time he has his slouch hat firmly on his head, he’s ready for a day’s work.

Porthos we meet in a tavern, where an accusation of cheating leads him to duel a stringy-looking Red Guard armed only with a fork. Yes, it’s cheesy, but he pulls it off by dint of charisma and violence. Athos, meanwhile, poses at the bar with his leather collar pulled up, Elvis-style, ready to back up his friend if necessary.

The two of them then go for a stroll, where they discover Aramis hanging off a beautiful Prague window ledge, because he’s been sleeping with the Cardinal’s mistress and the Cardinal came home early.

I don’t know why these intro scenes were so enjoyable despite being ridiculous cliches. But my love of Musketeers is not always a subtle thing.

The classic three way ‘invitation to duel’ scene is played for more speed, drama and intensity than accuracy to the book, with D’Artagnan hurling himself at Athos and then taking on the other two at the same time when they try to talk sense into him. There’s a lovely moment when all three use their swords to pin D’Artagnan’s to the table… and he still won’t give up!

Athos has been framed for the murder of D’Artagnan’s D’ad, of course, thanks to the ongoing anti-Musketeer campaign of the Cardinal and his secret agent Milady. D’Artagnan teams up with Aramis, Porthos and Constance to save their melancholy friend from the firing squad – while Athos wallows in his own angsty death wish thanks to his sad history with a mysterious woman from his past.

The format of the episode pretty much tells you what we’re getting here – a mystery/caper of the week show in which the answer is almost always going to be ‘The Cardinal did it’ with a side helping of ‘Milady did it’.

Also in this episode, we are introduced to the cheerfully maniacal King, his gravely intelligent Queen, and the ongoing political tussle between the Cardinal and his Red Guards, vs. Captain Treville and his Musketeers. There’s gunfights, fancy dress, assassinations, politics, swords, swords, more swords… and of course, eternal friendship.

This is a packed episode! But I think it’s enough tell you whether or not this is a show you’re going to like/love/hate. Obviously, you know where I stand on the matter.



Episode 2: Sleight of Hand

D’Artagnan has been well and truly taken under the wing of not only the Three, but also Treville. Having been training him around the clock, the Musketeers now figure out a way to use his loyalty and lack of formal attachment to their regiment, sending him on an undercover mission in a prison. He ends up taking part in a prison riot, prison break and a Guy Fawkes style explosive plot against the king and queen, generally getting into trouble along the way.

It’s the relationships that make this episode worth watching and rewatching. I like that Constance is a practical ally to the Musketeers, instead of just a hot lady for D’Artagnan to flirt with – she has a strong sense of civic responsibility, and thinks nothing of hosting a conspiratorial meeting in her kitchen no matter what her husband thinks about it. She and Aramis are also developing a pleasantly platonic friendship that revolves around her beating him up for being reckless with D’Artagnan’s safety, and him cheerfully writing D’Artagnan/Constance fanfic in his spare time.

Milady and the Cardinal don’t do much in this episode except some generic scheming – but I enjoy that the Cardinal and Treville aren’t in opposition to each other as a matter of default. Their interests are often aligned and in this case, with an enemy in common (the criminal Vadim with his elaborate plot against the King) they support the King as a unit. It’s a far more complex and subtle arrangement than you often get in Musketeer adaptations, especially with the Cardinal who tends to be portrayed as BWAHAHAH maniacal laughing villain. I also like that we see how much the Musketeers value and respect Treville as their boss.

In between assassination plots and jewel heists, Aramis gets a miniature sub-plot about rescuing and impressing the Queen during the prison riot, and Athos develops a slightly adorable protective streak towards D’Artagnan. Porthos brings the snark, and gets to pull out some marvellous “I have a bad feeling about this” facial expressions when Aramis is discreetly rewarded for his valour by the Queen. D’Artagnan gets to pretend Constance is his mistress, and claims a few more Espionage Snogs from her, with those big innocent eyes of his.

Episode 3 – Commodities

[SPOILER WARNING: I spoil the hell out almost every tiny bit of this episode because I couldn't stop talking about it, please keep that in mind if you choose to read without having watched the show]

I knew as soon as James Callis stepped off the ship in his pirate hat that this was going to be a good episode. Since he finished up his run as the snivelling Gaius Baltar in Battlestar Galactica, he’s made a habit of scene-stealing guest appearances in other shows.

Here, he’s Emile Bonnaire, a charming international trader and scoundrel whom the Musketeers (plus D’Artagnan, along for the ride) have been charged with escorting safely to Paris, despite the many people who want to kill him. His experience in the Americas, Africa and the Caribbean is a good excuse for the show to raise the relevance of slavery in this time period, and how this affects Porthos in particular, our black Musketeer.

Apparently some viewers were a bit non-plussed by the casting of mixed-race actor Howard Charles as Porthos, and at least one review went so far as to claim it was a tokenistic nod to modern tastes for multicultural casts. Actually, it provides an interesting twist to the least dimensional of the Musketeers – Porthos is generally played for laughs and/or thuggery, and in the books and the film adaptations alike, he has the least amount of backstory and character motivation.

They didn’t just “colour-blind cast” the character for this production, but gave him a history that honours Alexandre Dumas’ father, a Haitian who was the son of a white aristocrat and a black freed slave, and rose through the ranks of Napoleon’s army to become a celebrated general. Porthos, we learn in this particular story, grew up on the streets of Paris after his mother (a freed slave) came to a bad end, and eventually found his own special talents in soldiering.

Porthos discusses his history openly with Bonnaire, and enjoys the trader’s stories of adventure and profit on the high seas and in distant lands. He might be proud of his life as a Musketeer, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t dream of something bigger – and after he is wounded in a skirmish with one of Bonnaire’s enemies, he starts thinking about life after soldiering.

Which makes it all the more of a betrayal when Porthos discovers that Bonnaire’s massive profits comes from the slave trade, leading to an awkward exchange with Athos who agrees that slavery is vile and disgusting but has to remind Porthos that it is not in fact a crime.

That doesn’t mean that they’re going to let Bonnaire get away with it, of course! All for one and one for getting revenge on the slave trader, because that’s what friends do.

This isn’t just a Porthos episode. Quite unexpectedly, we also get blindsided with a whole lot of answers to any questions the viewers might have about Athos and Milady. The adventure with Bonnaire brings the Musketeers uncomfortably close to Athos’ estate, something he only admits reluctantly when they need somewhere to repair the wounded Porthos.

So Athos’ closest friends learn for the first time that he was the Comte de Fere in his life before the Musketeer:, a wealthy aristocrat with a mansion now closed up and abandoned.

The buildings they have found to use as interior sets in Prague are extraordinary, and the House of Athos steals the episode almost as dramatically as James Callis, which is quite a feat. Tom Burke comes into his own in the role of Athos in this episode, especially with the dramatically sombre opening of window shutters and doors, as he reacquaints himself with the house he left behind and the memories buried there. We see flashbacks of his happy marriage to Milady in nearly every room, indispersed with the much less happy memory of that time he had her hanged from the tree on the hill.

(Honestly, you hang ONE wife…)

Everyone else is so busy dealing with the chaotic A-story involving Porthos’ injury, Bonnaire, Bonnaire’s awesome if surprisingly violent wife, and Aramis’ skills as a field surgeon), that it’s up to D’Artagnan to notice that there is something more than usual wrong with the highly depressed Athos.

Athos holds it together for most of the story: leading the team, punching Porthos unconscious when he needs anaesthesia, making the decisions and that sort of thing, but having quietly gone through a houseful of emotional turmoil, he sends the others back to Paris without him just so he can torture himself a tiny bit more by catching up on old times with the blacksmith and town executioner. Who has been recently murdered, thanks to Milady getting wind of Athos’ return to the region, and deciding it’s time for Closure.

Being the detective genius and effective crime fighter that he is, Athos’ response to the mysterious murder is to go back home and drink himself to death in the house he hates. He awakes to find the house on fire, as his dead wife walks from room to room with a burning brand clasped in one hand, for all the world like she is inventing the gothic novel from first principles.

Other series might have stretched out the whole Athos and Milady subplot for the entire first season, with a dramatic reveal at the end, but no, not these Musketeers, they’re holding nothing back! Athos and Milady have their first rage-filled, drunken, still-kind-of-hot-for-each-other reunion in five years, as their marital home burns around them. He learns she’s still alive, they yell at each other until they are exhausted about whose fault it is that he hanged her from a tree, and they have pretty much collapsed into a suicide pact when they are interrupted by the young D’Artagnan who has returned unexpectedly to the house on the grounds that Athos is probably going to need a designated driver.

The Basic Manual of Musketeer-wrangling goes thus: when Athos is sad, he drinks too much, and someone has to make sure he gets home safely; Aramis should not be left alone with pretty ladies who are married to or otherwise attached to the most powerful men in Paris; you don’t try to sew up Porthos’ wounds unless you’ve punched him unconscious first. Apparently D’Artagnan has been keeping a list.

Milady escapes unseen and Athos pours his poor wounded, slightly-charred heart out to D’Artagnan about his whole tortured history, without either of them putting together that D’Artagnan is intimately acquainted with the wife in question. Awk-ward.

There’s a coda to this – while Athos puts his big boy hat back on and joins in the ‘let’s thwart the slave trader’ final act of the story, Constance receives a visit from Milady which is utterly chilling. (Especially if you know how things end in the book between Constance and Milady, the part that rarely gets included in the movie adaptations)

When D’Artagnan returns home, casually changing his shirt without closing his bedroom door, because apparently getting occasional flashes of half-naked Musketeer is part of Constance’s rental agreement, she tells him about his visitor… But he’s never even heard of Milady De Winter, so doesn’t take it seriously until Constance describes the woman in question, and tells him how scared she was.

No wonder Milady is able to be such an effective secret agent! Changing your name regularly is almost as useful as those fancy silken hoods for staying under the radar, in the days before Google was invented.

Shawarma.

More BBC Musketeer reviews to come later in the month. Musketeer Media Monday is brought to you by the Musketeer Space project, and the supporters of my Patreon page. Previous installments include Musketeers in an Exciting Adventure With Airships (2011) and Musketeers Are All For Love (1993). Thanks for reading.

Tansy’s Musketeer t-shirt thanks to redscharlach & Redbubble

ROBOTECH REWATCH 6: Death by Flashback

Welcome back to the Robotech Rewatch, the blog about the show that put all the wrong people in charge! This weekly rewatch of classic animated space opera Robotech is brought to you as bonus content for the Musketeer Space project. Thanks everyone for your support!

Episode 7. Bye Bye Mars

More months have passed.

Like the Wolf in Red Riding Hood, Breetai and Exedore’s Zendraedi forces drop out of hyperspace and get to Mars ahead of the Micronians, ready to set a trap for them as they bring their basket of goodies to Grandmother’s house. Most of the humans on the Mars outpost have already been wiped out by other Zendraedi forces, so it’s a good place to hide.

Exedore is horrified that Breetai has summoned Khyron’s forces for backup. By all accounts, this young blue-haired captain is too nasty for even the Zentraedi, with rumours he has killed his own men for looking at him funny. As soon as Khryon turns up, he establishes himself quickly as an arrogant little shit, who laughs maniacally at random intervals. Oh yeah, Breetai, no way this could possibly go wrong for you.

The crew and the pilots are exhausted by daily attacks coming from the aliens. Rick is feeling particularly rough, and is depressed when he runs into a bright and cheerful Minmei – school is out because of the attacks, and she’s in a good mood.

Yes, she’s a schoolgirl. Makes that whole sexual harassment by soldiers thing extra icky, doesn’t it?

Rick confesses to Minmei that the official announcements on the city PA aren’t telling the truth about about how dire the situation is – she doesn’t want to know, refusing to take him seriously as he tries to discuss his trauma with her.

Lisa meanwhile is lost in flashback – the SDF1 is being inexorably pushed towards Mars rather than the Earth, and her first love Karl Riber was posted there years ago. She even joined the armed forces explicitly to follow him (and not because she comes from a military family, or any sensible reason like that, cough, daughter of an Admiral, cough).

What is it with grown men chatting up extremely youthful schoolgirls in this story?

When Lisa realises the base has been destroyed, she begs permission to search for survivors on Mars, and sails off on a solo mission in a cute little spacesuit. Rick, meanwhile shows his priorities by using the official air channel to beg Roy for a day off so he can attend Minmei’s birthday party – only to discover that she has invited EVERYONE and so all the pilots want that day off. Rick is not feeling very special right now.

Claudia: Captain Gloval, do we really have any defences?

Gloval: No, not really.

Caught in the Zentraedi trap, Gloval’s first instinct is ‘suicide mission’ and while he particularly wants to send Roy on this (REALLY? Is that the best use of a senior man like Roy Fokker as a resource?), Lisa volunteers instead since she’s already on the base. She sets the furnace to self destruct.

When all the doors go into lockdown, Lisa spots Karl’s room and succumbs to a fit of melancholy. Surrounded by Karl’s possessions, she can’t snap out of it, and fails to call in to report her situation. Suicide mission it is, then!

Claudia, worried Lisa might be hurt, passes the request for rescue on to Skull Squadron, and Roy sends Rick to save the damsel.

Lisa, however, is too pissed off by life in general to allow any damselling around here. She throws a massive tantrum and refuses to leave the room. Rick points out that she is now endangering him too, and rescues her whether she likes it or not.

As with Minmei a few episodes ago, Lisa is carried limply to safety in Rick’s giant robot hand – unlike Minmei she at least has a spacesuit, which should come in useful in the following episode. Refusing to even let Rick speculate on whether this is a meet cute or not, she pretends to be unconscious rather than talk to him. I can understand that impulse.

“Next time I’ll win, bwahahaha!”
Khyron, yes, really, that is a direct quote.

To everyone’s surprise, the narrator suddenly starts shipping Rick and Lisa in his closing remarks, pointing out that Rick is attracted to her even though he still wants Minmei to be his girlfriend. This confuses me a bit. Did I ship Rick and Lisa back in the day because the narrator told me to? They haven’t actually shown any sign of being attracted to each other yet! Also, they are animated characters, which makes the chemistry a little tricky to parse.

Still, the narrator speaks in a very authoritative voice, and I do tend to trust whatever he says.

Maybe it’s like Hollywood logic, where if two people are played by famous actors, the film doesn’t have to try hard to make everyone think they might be hot for each other.

Which actors would YOU cast in a live action version of Robotech?

Musketeer Space Part 7: A Royal Reception

Welcome back to Musketeer Space! This is the first chapter with a non-Dana POV scene, and there are going to be lots more of these from now on, as Dumas started changing things up quite a lot in the original, and I’m going to match chapter for chapter as much as I can.

Also, exciting! New characters are introduced here, my gender-swapped versions of King Louis and Queen Anne of Austria. Still quite a few weeks before any diamonds turn up, though.

This week, I sent out the first newsletter, The Pilot’s Slice, to all Patreon supporters of the $3 level or higher. These will be monthly. If you should have received one and didn’t, please let me know. The spaceship names have started rolling in, too, with at least one featured substantially in this chapter!

Finally, this is a red letter week because it’s the first time I’ve had to make a substantial retroactive change to a story detail so far – Treville is now ranked as an Amiral, not a Commander because I messed up her title before. And yes, the missing ‘d’ is intentional, because I like the French word better. In case you were wondering, our Musketeers remain ‘Captain’ as casual address, because they each have their own ships, but their actual rank is Captain-Lieutenant.



Start reading from Part 1

Missed the last installment? Track back to Part 6

Main Page & Table of Contents



PREVIOUSLY ON MUSKETEER SPACE: Dana learned an important lesson about not getting involved in random swordfights in bars when drunk. Well, no, possibly no one learned any lessons. But at least Athos agreed to get rid of his beard, because that was an accident waiting to happen.

Now Read On…

This chapter is dedicated to Nicole Murphy, with thanks for your support.

PART 7: A Royal Reception

Lalla-Louise Renard Royal, Regent of the Solar System, awoke in a haze of perfumed sheets and the musky scent of her husband.

Even with her thoughts already turning towards the business of the day, she always enjoyed the performance art that was the morning ritual of Prince Alek of Auster. It was really the only reason she had not suggested separate bedrooms after their first night together.

The prince was slim like a cigar, and he had an endless supply of suits which were every bit as beautiful as himself. Alek’s eyes were modified emerald this season, to match his shoulder-length emerald hair. A man built for jewel-tones, if ever there was one. She might have enjoyed the effect more if she didn’t know it was chosen to honour his TeamJoust colours.

This morning, Alek selected a suit of mint and silver, dressing himself slowly and with great deliberation. A long streak of metallic scales traced a line directly from his temple, down his neck and the side of his torso, over his bare hip and all the way down to the soft underpad of his foot. It was a common mutation for the inhabitants of the warm, desert climate of Auster.

“I hear they fuck dragons,” was a common slur, a drunken joke, and one that Lalla-Louise had steeled herself against when the betrothal was first mooted. But she liked her dragon man, and from the few times they had touched each other, she knew that his skin was soft where it was not scaled. As the metallic streak disappeared beneath layers of silk and cotton, she found herself even more fascinated by the phenomenon, peeking out as it did at his throat and ankle.

This morning, Lalla-Louise lifted herself on one elbow to watch the dressing process through lidded eyes. Oh, men. Why were they so much more attractive when their angular lines and curved muscles were covered in pretty things?

“I suppose you can’t come to the match today,” he said when he reached the cravat, his fingers hovering in the act of a careless knot as if he wondered whether to bother. More scales disappeared beneath that whisper of silk so that the silver flecks on the side of his face were all the more stark and surprising against his beige-gold skin.

Such a question was rare for him; she was as disinterested in the game he played as he was in her own work, and her favoured recreations.

Oh, how she longed for the Hunt. There were three opalescent ampoules awaiting her in her dressing table drawer, awaiting a moment of leisure. But there was never enough time.

“I’d adore to, dove,” Lalla-Louise said lightly. “But I have Amiral Treville to meet for morning chocolate. Some of our pilots have been misbehaving.”

Alek gave her a twist of a smile. “Oh, your marvellous Musketeers. Are they making you look bad again?”

He was sharp, her husband. She had not expected intelligence or wit from this planet-born New Aristocrat of the wrong religion, who only came alive when he was playing that ridiculous team sport in zero gravity, but Alek had proved to be a pleasant conversationalist with occasional moments of incisive commentary. Keeping her side of the contract was hardly a chore at all. If only Lalla-Louise enjoyed the embrace of his body as much as she liked looking at it, they might actually have a marriage to speak of.

Another eight years. It seemed like an eternity. Ten year contracts were rare these days, even among royalty, but Lalla-Louise and her advisors had wanted to make a statement to the solar system: that the Church of All was not the only source of moral stability. By the time this marriage contract ended, Lalla-Louise would be secure in her position, but Alek? She had no idea what he would do or want or need when their time as husband and wife was done. She barely knew those things about him now.

“You have hit the nail on the head, darling,” she said. “There are times when I seriously consider letting the Cardinal’s blades take over once and for all. Let the Musketeers disappear like the anachronism they are.”

Alek winced at that, she noticed. Hardly surprising. If the Cardinal gained more power than she already held, life would become much harder for those who followed the Elemental faith of the planet-dwellers. “Not really?” he said.

“No, not really.” Lalla-Louise rose naked and crossed the room. A quick bath was all she had time for, with Treville waiting. At least Treville wasn’t nearly the stickler for punctuality that the Cardinal was. “I do like to dream sometimes, of a life free from responsibility. Can you imagine how splendid it would be to have nothing to do all day?”

The bathroom door slid shut between them, and so if her husband replied to her tactless remark, she did not hear a word of what he said.

Lalla-Louise wore formal silks and a wrapped star-scarf over her sleek black hair when she greeted Amiral Treville in the breakfast room, less than an hour later. She preferred modesty when discussing the Musketeers for exactly the same reason that she chose scandalous outfits for discussing Church business with the Cardinal – she liked to keep them all on their toes.

Theirs was a fractured and fragile ecosystem. If either Amiral Treville or Cardinal Richlieu believed for a moment that the other had lost all credibility with her, she would be vulnerable. Lalla-Louise Renard Royal had been taught by experts since the age of five: if nothing else, she was a sleek weapon of the diplomatic arts.

“My dear Jeanne,” she said as the fearsome commander of the Musketeers stomped into the breakfast room in full uniform. “What a week you’ve been having! Sit down, please. I’d hate you to overdo it.”

“My job requires a steady state of overdoing everything,” Treville grunted, and then gave Lalla-Louise a wary look. “As does yours, of course, your Royal Highness.”

“Indeed,” said Lalla-Louise with a very small smile upon her lips. Her maids bustled around them in starched-perfect uniforms, presenting steaming cups of chocolate with cream and pastries.

Lalla-Louise knew for a fact that Treville detested sweets, but was always too polite to say otherwise. It made these breakfasts so much more entertaining. “My dear,” she said as she inhaled the fragrant spices from her cup. “What are we going to do about your poor broken Musketeers?”

Treville gave her a flinty look across the delicate breakfast table. “Who said anyone was broken, your Royal Highness? My gals are as robust as they ever were.”

“Ah yes,” said Lalla-Louise with a secret smile that suggested that wasn’t the ringing endorsement that Treville might have hoped. “But the current calamity is beyond the pale, you must agree. I spent simply hours placating the Cardinal last night. The poor darling has made herself quite ill with the strain of it all.”

Treville’s expression did not alter. “I had no idea that her Eminence was so frail. Perhaps she needs an ocean holiday to blow the cobwebs away.”

That was going too far. Lalla-Louise frowned. Witty side-stepping of the issues was expected at a meeting such as this one, but she was only prepared to allow a certain amount of wilful ignorance. “I don’t think her Eminence is the one falling down in her duty, Amiral. How does it reflect on me to have the Royal Fleet brawling in churchyards and bars?”

Treville leaned in, giving up all pretence at drinking her chocolate. “How am I to do my job when the Cardinal’s Sabres and the rest of the red guard are allowed to run rampant across Paris Satellite and beyond, claiming rights of jurisdiction where none exist, and picking fights with my pilots?”

“If only the Musketeers and not the Sabres had won the war against the Sun-kissed, the Cardinal should not feel so entitled now!” Lalla-Louise bit into a lemon-dusted croissant the size of a peach, allowing the powder to explode prettily across the tablecloth. “This nuisance behaviour helps no one.”

“I quite agree, your Royal Highness,” said Treville. She reached for what appeared to be the only unsweetened pastry on the plate, and chewed vigorously on it until she reached the gooey centre of plum jam and almond creme. After an almost imperceptible pause, she kept chewing as if the pastry had not horribly betrayed her.

Lalla-Louise licked lemon sugar off her lips and fingertips. “Tell me about the girl. The one who was taken into custody with your gallant troublemakers.”

Amiral Treville blinked. She did not look suspicious, but Lalla-Louise knew that it was best to proceed as if Treville was thinking the worst of her at all times. “Dana D’Artagnan. Daughter of one of my best pilots from your mother’s reign.”

“A new recruit?”

“Hardly,” Treville scoffed, then realised that Lalla-Louise was not joking. “Oh, no, your Royal Highness. Not with our recent budget cuts. I’d have liked to offer her something, though. The kid has guts, and a good flying record.”

“Perhaps her Eminence could use a new Sabre…” Lalla-Louise teased, knowing that this was a sore spot with Treville, that the Cardinal’s pilots had not been subject to the same degree of budget cuts. Then again, the Cardinal largely funded the Sabres herself, thanks to the ample finances of the Church of All. It was hardly the Regent’s fault.

“I am on your side, your Royal Highness,” Amiral Treville said sharply, out of nowhere. “You remember this, don’t you? My Musketeers serve the Crown first in all things.”

“Are you suggesting that the Cardinal and her Sabres are not equally loyal to me?” Lalla-Louise countered. She met Treville’s angry eyes and sighed. “Oh, my dear. You know how it is. The balance of power is a tricky thing, and we owe the Cardinal so much.”

“You don’t owe her your throne,” Treville snapped. After a far too long pause, she added, “Your Royal Highness.” The rebuke still stung.

“As I said in the beginning,” Lalla-Louise said, dropping the game. “Let us see what can be done. Captains Athos, Aramis and Porthos have been released from the Cardinal’s custody and returned to their quarters. No charges are to be laid this time, given the faults on both sides for the – ruckus.”

Amiral Treville’s eyebrows rose almost completely up into her closely-shaven scalp. She had come prepared for a greater fight than this. “I had no word of this.”

“The matter was handled about thirty seconds after you entered this room,” said Lalla-Louise. “Keeping them overnight has been enough to assuage her Eminence’s outrage… for now.”

“I understand.”

“But let us speak of the young Gascon. I believe she felled five red guards in the fight at the Abbey.”

“Five and a half, according to my reports,” said Treville.

“That suggests that she is very loyal indeed, to the Crown,” said Lalla-Louise. “She had only just met these Musketeers, and yet was prepared to fight against impossible odds to defend their honour. I like that.”

Treville’s mouth twitched as if she had almost thought about smiling. “I like that too,” she admitted. “A year ago, I’d have put her in the blue and white already.”

“Is it true that she fought Captain Jussac to a standstill, and wounded her in the arm?”

“After the Cardinal’s favourite knocked Athos unconscious with a wine bottle,” Treville confirmed.

Lalla-Louise sighed. She would rather have liked to see that. She had been at school with Claudine Jussac, and found her a most irritating creature. “I think we’re going to need to start putting security cameras inside the bars, Amiral.”

“As you say, your Royal Highness.”

From the look of her face, Treville thought she had won. But Lalla-Louise had a card she had not yet played. “I think I would like to meet these Musketeers, Amiral. And their new friend also. Arrange it, if you please.”

Dana had no idea why she was doing this. She had worked for so long to reach Paris Satellite, and after a single night spent in the custody cells of the red guard, she was leaving Paris already.

Groundfall had never agreed with her. Even the joy of being allowed to ride pinion in Porthos’ simply beautiful Musket-class dart, The Hoyden, was not enough to compensate for Dana’s alarm she felt at descending towards the moon.

Paris Satellite had been in her head for years, and Dana had not once thought about how near that would bring her to Luna Palais, the Royal Moon of Honour.

The Hoyden was several generations newer than Dana’s old dart (which she would never now think of anything but “Buttercup”), but that didn’t make it new. The midnight blue paint job was less than pristine, and there were several meteor dents along the outer frame. Like all Musketeer ships, there was an elaborate and artistic tattoo splashed over the tail-fin – most of these were monochrome, but The Hoyden’s tail was decorated with a multi-coloured mural of a spiral galaxy.

Inside, the surfaces were gleaming and bright, better tended than any ship Dana had seen before. She could not help thinking of the heavily studded belt that Porthos had been showing off when they first collided with each other. Was it professional pride or personal vanity that led her to keep her ship in such good condition?

She shouldn’t judge, though. When Dana saw the scratches and battered interior of Athos’ dart, the positively antique Parry-Riposte, she had been a bit relieved that Porthos extended the invitation first.

“Here we go, pet.” Porthos leaned over her controls with a fierce grin, guiding the dart down towards the moon as if it was nothing to her. The helm covered her shaven head neatly, with cables webbing out from it in all directions.

It was all Dana could do not to drag the helm off Porthos, and take the ship for herself. Being a passenger made her knuckles tight, and her heart beat too fast.

As they fell into the final descent and the landing gear flicked out, Dana felt the moon’s gravity kick her hard in the spine. She knew in reality that this was nothing – the actual gravity of the moon was going to have far less wear and tear on her body than the grav on any given space station.

And yet, and yet, this was real. Dirtside. Dana could count on the fingers of one hand how often she had set foot on a moon or planet. There was a wrongness about solid ground that she could never quite get over.

Put me back in space where I belong.

Porthos let her breath out in a long, satisfied hiss as she completed the docking procedure, and the dart finally stilled. She plucked the various cables out of her head with a swish, and removed the helm. “Don’t worry, peanut. Once we’re under the dome, the air will be just as fake as anything else you’re used to breathing.”

Dana scowled. “I’m fine.”

“You can let go of the seat now,” the older pilot smirked. “Don’t fret yourself. It’s only the Regent. She’s a doll. Well, most of the time.”

“Only the Regent!” Dana was wearing her best flight suit, but she felt shabby for such fancy company. “Do you think she’s going to arrest us?”

“It’s hard to tell with her Royal Highness. Could be a right telling off or a big wet snog.” Porthos shrugged, stretching her arms and legs as she eased out of her own seat. “She pretends she doesn’t approve of our bad behaviour, but secretly she’s all over it. She’d be duelling herself if the protectors would let her out more often. Still, she’s unpredictable. It depends who has annoyed her more, recently: Treville, or the Cardinal.”

“Wonderful,” Dana groaned. Still, part of her was wondering – secretly hoping – that maybe the Regent could overturn Treville’s decision.

Maybe Dana D’Artagnan was going to get to be a Musketeer after all.

Lalla-Louise had been working all morning, appointment after meeting after public appearance, and she was worn thin. When she retired to her rooms for a late lunch, she did not eat a bite, but instead stretched out on the large perfumed bed, emptied an ampoule of nexus under her tongue, and plugged The Hunt directly into the port in the back of her neck.

The forest of Valour embraced her, dark and delicious, and she ran so fast she nearly flew. She could smell her prey nearby, a blend of fear and alien pheromones. Her bow flew into her hand as she tracked him, step by step, scent by scent.

Nothing could compare to this. Not her beautiful husband with his silk suits and muscles, not the thrill of politics, not food, not sex.

There was only this.

An hour later, the alarm wrenched her out of the game, sweating and shuddering at the return to reality. She used to let a servant awake her, but her reflexes were too violent when she was fresh from the Hunt, and it was so inconvenient to wash blood from her knuckles before going to her afternoon meetings.

She had not eaten, but that hardly signified.

If Lalla-Louise had only been able to stay inside another fifteen minutes, she was sure she would have destroyed the beast once and for all. It was infuriating.

On the other hand, she had already been running late for her appointment with Amiral Treville and the Musketeers when she first went under, so at least she wouldn’t be the only one who was annoyed.

Lalla-Louise rose and tidied her hair away again, beneath the rich blue star-scarf. Walking at an unhurried pace, she made her way along the long balcony that led to the Crown Gallery.

She could hear a slash and twang of metal against metal, and halted at the very edge of the balcony so she could observe without being seen.

They had obviously given up on her ever arriving. Other subjects might have stood to attention even into the second hour, but Treville and the Musketeers had always had a touch of irreverence about them, and this was not the first time their Regent had kept them waiting.

Athos and the others had dropped their formal jackets on the polished floor, and were giving their new friend a sword lesson.

Dana D’Artagnan, if this was she, was a lithe young woman with deep brown skin and a pilot’s buzz cut. She concentrated, frowning as Porthos demonstrated a move on Aramis. Athos leaned in and corrected Dana’s grip on the pilot’s slice, and then her stance.

Treville, watching them from the sidelines, glanced up and saw the Regent. Lalla-Louise lay a silencing finger against her own lips, and Treville nodded reluctantly.

The sword lesson continued. The three of them made surprisingly good tutors, and the young newcomer had grit. Every mistake only made her more determined to work harder.

Lalla-Louise had never understood what it was that drove people to be pilots. The thought of flying through the cold of space, bound to your ship with implants and cables, had nothing like the appeal of taking game drugs in her own bedchamber.

But this – the clash of metal on metal, the elegance of duelling your way past another person with a sword. The Regent could understand why it was that her pilots never stopped fighting each other.

She cleared her throat, to let them know of her presence, and descended the stairs. By the time she reached the polished floor below, they had all scuttled back into their formal jackets, and were standing at attention with the blades nowhere in sight.

“Your Royal Highness,” said Treville, clearing her own throat. “Can I introduce you to…”

But Lalla-Louise was already standing in front of the new recruit. “D’Artagnan,” she said in her most musical, seductive voice. “I’m always glad to meet young people who are eager to serve the Crown.”

D’Artagnan met her gaze with a wary deference that Lalla-Louise was used to seeing in the faces of her subjects. “Your Royal Highness,” she said. “There is nothing I want more.”

“Good.” Lalla-Louise smiled, and clapped her hands. “Commandant Essien, I think, is looking for new blood in the mecha squad. It will be an excellent training ground for you. And perhaps one day…”

She let the words trail off, pretending not to enjoy the look of crushing disappointment on D’Artagnan’s face. Someone as young and energetic as this girl needed to learn that your dream did not simply fall into your lap because you had friends in high places.

“Perhaps one day, the Musketeers,” the Regent said finally. “But not quite yet, I think.”

You have been reading Musketeer Space, by Tansy Rayner Roberts. Tune in next week for another chapter! Please comment, share and link. Musketeer Space is free to read, but if you’d like to support the project for as little as $1 per month, visit my Patreon page. Pledges can earn rewards such as ebooks, extra content, dedications and the naming of spaceships. My next funding milestone ($200 a month) will unlock a special Christmas story.

Galactic Suburbia 103 Show Notes

New episode is available to stream or download.

In which we talk harassment policies, upcoming publishing projects, Hugo reading and more!

News

Update on the Elise Matthesen harassment case from Wiscon 2013.

Anna Tambour collection – The Finest Ass in the Universe to be published by Twelfth Planet Press in July 2015

Kaleidoscope Table of Contents including Tansy’s story Cookie Cutter Superhero



What Culture Have we Consumed?

Alex: finished Fringe; Orphan Black season 2; Europa Report; Hugo reading: finished the novelettes, most of the novellas and shorts. Bikes in Space vol 2

Tansy: The Two-Hearted Numbat, Ambelin & Ezekiel Kwaymullina; Romanitas by Sophia McDougall, The Machine; The Musketeers;

Alisa: ON HOLIDAYS AND ONLY KNIT And Orphan Black, random PhD update of sorts

Thanks to Patreon supporters so far – we’ve hit our first milestone! To keep us Going!!! Our next milestone: quarterly spoilerific book/media club episodes become a regular feature.

Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook, support us at Patreon and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!

ROBOTECH REWATCH 5: Saturn Ahoy!

Welcome back to the Robotech Rewatch! The space opera that put the melodrama into shiny shiny mecha…

The humans have a giant ship they don’t understand, are under attack from giant aliens who want their giant ship back, and accidentally teleported themselves to Pluto. Meanwhile, Rick Hunter has manpain and his sort-of-girlfriend Minmei is oblivious.

I know what you’re all thinking. You’re thinking that up until now, the series has been short on reference to ladies’ underwear. Well, worry no longer!

This weekly rewatch of classic animated space opera Robotech is brought to you as bonus content for the Musketeer Space project. Thanks everyone for your support!

Episode 6. Blitzkrieg

It’s months later, Macross City (the spaceship edition) has been repaired, and Rick Hunter is a proper military recruit now, all trained up thanks to the ancient military technique of montage.

On his first leave, Rick finds himself co-opted by Minmei to perform proper boyfriend duties such as carrying her shopping and standing awkwardly in lingerie shops.

So, it’s time for another anti-meet-cute for Lisa Hayes and Rick! Lisa, Kim and Sami are examining undies in the shop when they spot him awkwardly hiding behind a display. Given the awkward hiding, they assume think he’s a weirdo creep and leave. I’m sure this won’t in any way have an adverse effect on his career or reputation, considering that Lisa is his superior officer.

Meanwhile, aliens Breetai and Exedore scheme away behind the scenes as the humans approach Saturn. The rings, apparently, will enable them to hide and then jump out and say ‘Boo.’ They’re quite looking forward to it.

“Even though you have a room that doesn’t mean you can fool around.”

Roy Fokker, Lifestyle Guru

Now Rick is a proper fighter pilot, Roy is actually paid to give him encouraging pep talks rather than doing them on his own time. Some time after the lingerie shop incident, Roy is telling it all like it is when the two of them run into the bridge crew women, including Lisa Hayes who gives Rick the side-eye.

“You’re that loudmouth pilot, aren’t you?”

Lisa Hayes, Excellent Judge of Character.

Obviously Lisa hasn’t in fact been paying much attention to human resources, as she is surprised to learn that Roy’s new wunderkind pilot is the same former civilian who stole a military vessel by accident back on invasion day. She’s unimpressed but seems to enjoy Rick’s discomfort as he remembers calling her an old sourpuss.



“You’d better watch your mouth from now on because she’s your superior officer.”

Roy, Advisor to the Stars



“Lecher.”

Sami sums up.

Despite the underwear comedy banter, it’s all getting a bit serious, with a counterattack planned against the Zentraedi (doesn’t it just count as an ‘attack’ if you plan it this far in advance?). The night before battle, the pilots are sent off to see people that matter to them before they all die horribly. Rick attempts a date with Minmei but she missed the memo about it all being Really Quite Serious, and can only spare a minute to wish him luck before running home.

Important note: Minmei appears to be fickle and flighty (from Rick’s POV) but she also says that she’s not allowed out late at night with boys. Add this to the alarming revelation in the next chapter that she’s still attending school and I can’t help wondering – just how young is this girl that Rick is trying to crack on to every chance he gets? What is the actual age difference? because yes, he acts about fourteen, but is old enough to join the military.

There’s a cute world-building moment when Rick calls over a CCTV camera in the fountain (that apparently is normally just lurking there) to take a picture of Minmei’s pretty dress. These cozy day to day interactions with technology are always appreciated.

Rick ends up back in his bunk, dreaming of Minmei and not sleeping. Roy gets him up early and performs yet another pep talk.

“Don’t worry, losing a night’s sleep won’t kill you.”

Roy, not really getting how war works.

Supported by Lisa’s commands through their headsets, the Skull squadron sets off to fight the bad guys. My daughters reacted thus:

Ms 4: Stop distracting them! Stop talking!

Ms 9: No, she’s telling them what to do.

Lisa loses her temper at Rick for flying recklessly which comes as a shock to him – he thought he was the sensible one and everyone else was flying dangerously. She corrects him. I have to say, I felt a lot like Rick when I was first taking driving lessons. But when it comes to military expertise, I’m always going to be on Team Lisa. Listen to Lisa!

Exedore and Breetai are gobsmacked by the sheer ballsiness and naiveté of the Micronians in this particular battle – is it not OBVIOUS that the Zendraedi are holding back nearly all of their troops? They kind of thought it was obvious.

Undeterred, the humans try to fire the Main Gun of the SDF1, only to realise it doesn’t work because of their own pinpoint barrier. This is a cool piece of tech, actually – a group of operators (all women again!) dance their hands over motion detectors to move around the “pinpoint barrier,” tiny shields which protect the main ship from direct hits. It’s like a game of table tennis with lethal consequences.

Clearly outmatched, most of the human troops except Skull Squadron take heavy casualties. After crashing his way on to a Zentraedi ship, Rick comes face to face with an enemy soldier out of armour and cant’ bring himself to kill him – he worries about this afterwards, and what it means for his role as a fighter pilot.

Lisa earns her salary yet again by coming up with a brilliant plan to use the pinpoint barrier offensively rather than defensively. They punch through the alien ship with the “Daedalus” aircraft carrier which is stuck on the end of the SDF1’s right arm, and insert troops on the alien ship that way. It has massive success, so yay Lisa!



“Perhaps we’d better call in reinforcements.”

Breetai, slightly concerned that the Micronians have beat the pants off them despite the Zentraedi holding their hands behind their back during that one.

After this valiant battle, the Skull squadron receive military commendations. There is no mention of whether Lisa is likewise commended for her excellent strategy. Pheh.

The narrator is so bored by Rick’s angst and Roy’s pep talks, that he reports it to the viewer rather than making us watch it. Saves time.



Previous Posts:

1 – So Much For World Peace

2 – Who Put Pluto There?

3 – To Be In Love

4 – Welcome to the First Chinese Restaurant in Space

ROBOTECH REWATCH #5: Saturn Ahoy!

Welcome back to the Robotech Rewatch! The space opera that put the melodrama into shiny shiny mecha…

The humans have a giant ship they don’t understand, are under attack from giant aliens who want their giant ship back, and accidentally teleported themselves to Pluto. Meanwhile, Rick Hunter has manpain and his sort-of-girlfriend Minmei is oblivious.

I know what you’re all thinking. You’re thinking that up until now, the series has been short on reference to ladies’ underwear. Well, worry no longer!

This weekly rewatch of classic animated space opera Robotech is brought to you as bonus content for the Musketeer Space project. Thanks everyone for your support!

Episode 6. Blitzkrieg

It’s months later, Macross City (the spaceship edition) has been repaired, and Rick Hunter is a proper military recruit now, all trained up thanks to the ancient military technique of montage.

On his first leave, Rick finds himself co-opted by Minmei to perform proper boyfriend duties such as carrying her shopping and standing awkwardly in lingerie shops.

So, it’s time for another anti-meet-cute for Lisa Hayes and Rick! Lisa, Kim and Sami are examining undies in the shop when they spot him awkwardly hiding behind a display. Given the awkward hiding, they assume think he’s a weirdo creep and leave. I’m sure this won’t in any way have an adverse effect on his career or reputation, considering that Lisa is his superior officer.

Meanwhile, aliens Breetai and Exedore scheme away behind the scenes as the humans approach Saturn. The rings, apparently, will enable them to hide and then jump out and say ‘Boo.’ They’re quite looking forward to it.

“Even though you have a room that doesn’t mean you can fool around.”

Roy Fokker, Lifestyle Guru

Now Rick is a proper fighter pilot, Roy is actually paid to give him encouraging pep talks rather than doing them on his own time. Some time after the lingerie shop incident, Roy is telling it all like it is when the two of them run into the bridge crew women, including Lisa Hayes who gives Rick the side-eye.

“You’re that loudmouth pilot, aren’t you?”

Lisa Hayes, Excellent Judge of Character.

Obviously Lisa hasn’t in fact been paying much attention to human resources, as she is surprised to learn that Roy’s new wunderkind pilot is the same former civilian who stole a military vessel by accident back on invasion day. She’s unimpressed but seems to enjoy Rick’s discomfort as he remembers calling her an old sourpuss.



“You’d better watch your mouth from now on because she’s your superior officer.”

Roy, Advisor to the Stars



“Lecher.”

Sami sums up.

Despite the underwear comedy banter, it’s all getting a bit serious, with a counterattack planned against the Zentraedi (doesn’t it just count as an ‘attack’ if you plan it this far in advance?). The night before battle, the pilots are sent off to see people that matter to them before they all die horribly. Rick attempts a date with Minmei but she missed the memo about it all being Really Quite Serious, and can only spare a minute to wish him luck before running home.

Important note: Minmei appears to be fickle and flighty (from Rick’s POV) but she also says that she’s not allowed out late at night with boys. Add this to the alarming revelation in the next chapter that she’s still attending school and I can’t help wondering – just how young is this girl that Rick is trying to crack on to every chance he gets? What is the actual age difference? because yes, he acts about fourteen, but is old enough to join the military.

There’s a cute world-building moment when Rick calls over a CCTV camera in the fountain (that apparently is normally just lurking there) to take a picture of Minmei’s pretty dress. These cozy day to day interactions with technology are always appreciated.

Rick ends up back in his bunk, dreaming of Minmei and not sleeping. Roy gets him up early and performs yet another pep talk.

“Don’t worry, losing a night’s sleep won’t kill you.”

Roy, not really getting how war works.

Supported by Lisa’s commands through their headsets, the Skull squadron sets off to fight the bad guys. My daughters reacted thus:

Ms 4: Stop distracting them! Stop talking!

Ms 9: No, she’s telling them what to do.

Lisa loses her temper at Rick for flying recklessly which comes as a shock to him – he thought he was the sensible one and everyone else was flying dangerously. She corrects him. I have to say, I felt a lot like Rick when I was first taking driving lessons. But when it comes to military expertise, I’m always going to be on Team Lisa. Listen to Lisa!

Exedore and Breetai are gobsmacked by the sheer ballsiness and naiveté of the Micronians in this particular battle – is it not OBVIOUS that the Zendraedi are holding back nearly all of their troops? They kind of thought it was obvious.

Undeterred, the humans try to fire the Main Gun of the SDF1, only to realise it doesn’t work because of their own pinpoint barrier. This is a cool piece of tech, actually – a group of operators (all women again!) dance their hands over motion detectors to move around the “pinpoint barrier,” tiny shields which protect the main ship from direct hits. It’s like a game of table tennis with lethal consequences.

Clearly outmatched, most of the human troops except Skull Squadron take heavy casualties. After crashing his way on to a Zentraedi ship, Rick comes face to face with an enemy soldier out of armour and cant’ bring himself to kill him – he worries about this afterwards, and what it means for his role as a fighter pilot.

Lisa earns her salary yet again by coming up with a brilliant plan to use the pinpoint barrier offensively rather than defensively. They punch through the alien ship with the “Daedalus” aircraft carrier which is stuck on the end of the SDF1’s right arm, and insert troops on the alien ship that way. It has massive success, so yay Lisa!



“Perhaps we’d better call in reinforcements.”

Breetai, slightly concerned that the Micronians have beat the pants off them despite the Zentraedi holding their hands behind their back during that one.

After this valiant battle, the Skull squadron receive military commendations. There is no mention of whether Lisa is likewise commended for her excellent strategy. Pheh.

The narrator is so bored by Rick’s angst and Roy’s pep talks, that he reports it to the viewer rather than making us watch it. Saves time.



Previous Posts:

1 – So Much For World Peace

2 – Who Put Pluto There?

3 – To Be In Love

4 – Welcome to the First Chinese Restaurant in Space

Friday Links is Feeling Neglected…

…largely because Tansy is busy editing a book with one hand, and typing space melodrama about Musketeers with the other. But I have linkses! Some of them have been waiting patiently for far too long.

Natalie Luhrs collected her tweets (including the conversational additions of others) about speaking out and community support, which are well worth reading.

While the media goes into meltdown about the possibility that Harrison Ford’s leg injury might mean Han Solo won’t be in enough of the next Star Wars movie (really, can we not just have Leia doing the same things he was going to do?), I wanted to point to this lovely interview with Carrie Fisher about being a bit melted, and other things. What she has to say about Leia as a character is pretty cool and brings me back to – why AREN’T they just giving Han Solo’s scenes to her, again?

Kari Sperring wrote two really important posts: Living as a Woman in a Science Fictional Future, and the follow up, Collateral Damage. The first is about the narrow types of femininity we usually see in SF (and the joy of finding examples of a woman like yourself in the fiction you love) and the second is a much angrier, fierce and personal piece about how the older women in science fiction (especially the writers) get left behind while their male counterparts only increase their profile and prestige.

What it comes to is this: most women who are now over about 40 have been told their whole lives to be good, to keep their heads down, to keep on working away quietly and to wait their turn. And now, within sff, at the point when their male contemporaries are celebrated, these same women are being told, No, it’s too late for you, you don’t matter enough; that space is needed. Get out of the way.

Bitch Magazine did a lovely review of the Lizzie Bennet Diaries, relevant not just because there have been two recent updates (Squee!) and the DVD is out, but also because they have written a Lizzie Bennet novel. Reader, I bought it. (yes, I know that’s a Jane Eyre misquote, the point stands)

Jason Heller talks about nostalgia and the Dragonlance novels.

Whatever happened to Toby Froud, the baby from the Labyrinth? Surprise surprise, he grew up surrounded by goblins and is now an artist and filmmaker in his own right.

Hijinks Ensue managed to capture pretty much what I thought when I heard the Turing Test had been beaten by a computer pretending to be a teenage boy…

Very good article about how sexist it is to present The Fault in Our Stars as the heroic saviour of YA fiction – when the genre has been consistently successful for many years now, thanks in substantial part to the brilliant work of many, many bestselling female authors.

Musketeer Space Part 6: The Wrong Sort of Duel

Welcome back to Musketeer Space! I’ve had a wild writing week, getting several more chapters under my belt, which is something of a relief. I’ve also been watching and rewatching the BBC Musketeers series, for an upcoming review. It’s a bit wonderful, just saying. If you ever felt a Musketeer adaptation lacked sufficient leather, this one will make it up to you.

Thanks to SF Signal for linking to the project and bringing new readers along. Hello, new readers! I hope you like swords and spaceships.

Start reading from Part 1

Missed the last installment? Track back to Part 5

Main Page & Table of Contents



PREVIOUSLY IN MUSKETEER SPACE: Dana D’Artagnan is starting to think that Paris Satellite is out to get her. She missed out on her dream job, she failed to catch up with her nemesis Ro, and now three Musketeers are trying to kill her in a computer-generated meadow. With sharp bits of metal! How retro.

Now Read On…

This chapter is dedicated to Finchy, who has been waiting for us to get to the swords since the beginning…

PART SIX: The Wrong Sort of Duel

Dana stood in the Artifice meadow, frozen in the moment as she stared down the tip of the Musketeer’s sword.

Athos stared implacably back at her, waiting for… for what? For her to draw a sword of her own?

That was only one of the many things wrong with this scenario.

“You duel with swords,” Dana said slowly. “That’s – why do you even have a sword?”

“It’s called a pilot’s slice,” Porthos contributed from where she was very comfortably seated on the artificial stone. She tossed her own baton from hand to hand. “Official issue – smartsteel. It shapes itself into any blade length or width that we require. Essential in emergencies. Designed to be our final option if we’re trapped in wreckage or need to hack our ship into a rudimentary shelter.”

“So of course you figured out a way to use it as a casual weapon against each other,” Dana said with heavy sarcasm.

“A hundred and one uses,” said Aramis with a warm smile of her own. She sat on the grass beside Porthos, unpinning her dark hair so that it fell loosely down her back. None of them were taking Dana remotely seriously.

She was a joke to them.

“I thought you meant to Duel,” Dana exploded, looking back at Athos. He did not lower the sword pointing directly at her.

Athos glared at her along the thin line of metal. “You mean with pilot drugs and computers and seedy betting circles? Of course not. We couldn’t fly straight if we were doing that to ourselves every other day.”

“Whereas fighting each other with metal spikes, perfectly sane!” Dana snapped back. She shook her head at him, stepping back out of range. “I don’t understand you. Any of you. You have the best fucking job in the world, and you act like bored teenagers. Metal swords, and honour duels and – that beard!”

Athos looked almost hurt, and did lower the sword this time. “What’s wrong with my beard?”

“IT’S RIDICULOUS!” Dana howled. “Long hair is against every regulation there is – you can’t possibly say it’s not a flight hazard. But that beard of yours is just taking the piss. It’s like a mad concoction of all the other beards that the male pilots shave off every morning. It makes no sense at all. You make no sense at all!”

There was a long, thoughtful pause, and then Athos tilted his head at her with an odd sort of smile. The other two weren’t nearly so restrained – Porthos laughed so hard she was nearly sick, and Aramis leaped up to smack Athos between the shoulders. “Some of us have been telling him that all year,” she declared, tugging at his locks. “But only when drunk. And he never believes us.”

Athos stroked his long beard, frowning. “I grew it for a bet. Ten months I’ve had it, waiting for Commander Treville to order me to shave it off. Someone spoiled the surprise ahead of time – thank you, Porthos…”

“Not guilty!” protested Porthos.

“…And so Treville refuses to acknowledge it, pretends she’s never even noticed I have a beard.” Athos sighed deeply, as if this was a deep tragedy to him. “I suppose she imagined I’d get bored of it soon enough, or strangle myself with the ship cables.”

Dana frowned at him. “So you lost the bet?” She still wasn’t ruling out the possibility that these three were making fun of her.

“Of course not!” Athos said, sounding completely serious. “I bet she wouldn’t crack. Let that be a lesson to you here in Paris. Never bet against Commander Treville.” He looked Dana over, from her own regulation shaved head down to her sturdy and serviceable boots. “You don’t actually have a sword, do you,” he said finally. It was not a question.

Dana shook her head slowly. “That’s how you were wounded,” she realised. “You actually let some rival stick a blade into you?”

“Well, I was trying to stop him,” he said as if that made it completely reasonable. “I’m not completely irresponsible. And I can’t help that dangerous men with questionable politics flock to me. It’s a curse of sorts.”

“You could stop actively encourage them to murder you,” Porthos suggested.

Athos rolled his eyes at her. “The weight of past evidence does suggest otherwise.”

“You’re all crazy,” Dana interrupted. “How do you even have time to do your jobs? I haven’t got a blade. I haven’t got a ship, either. I – washed out of the Musketeers. But if this is your idea of honour, then put down the swords and I’ll take you on with my bare hands.” She held herself in boxing stance, determined that she wasn’t going to leave this meadow without hitting at least one of them very hard in the face.

There was a brief pause in which the expressions of all three Musketeers barely changed. Athos raised his blade for a moment in something almost like a salute, and then flicked it back into the shape of a baton.

“Well then, D’Artagnan,” he said reasonably. “We’d better get you fixed up with a job, a blade and a ship before we try to kill you. It’s only sporting.”

They got drunk instead. Fiercely, companionably drunk. Somehow, Dana had ended up classified as a mate rather than an upstart, simply for her willingness to shout at Athos.

Surely making friends wasn’t this easy? It had never been so easy for her before.

She might be more suspicious if she wasn’t really completely far too drunk.

The bar was called the Abbey of St Germain, which meant that the staff were dressed as medieval monks, a source of great amusement to all three Musketeers because of some joke lost in the mists of time.

Dana could not understand half of what they said to each other, but she rather liked that they never bothered to explain. It felt as if she was already one of them.

They had convinced Athos that the beard had to go. He resisted, until Dana noted that the joke had gone on so long, Treville would probably be more disturbed by its absence than its presence. Aramis seized upon this premise, and Porthos had plied Athos with wine until he agreed to it.

“I’m sure this is a robot’s job,” he said dourly, sitting lengthwise on the bench. Aramis sat astride the bench behind him, running the sonar clipper slowly and thoughtfully across the back of his head until only a thin layer of stubble remained.

“You don’t trust robots,” said Aramis, concentrating. A nearby bar android hovered, but only to suck up the hair that had fallen in snippets all over the polished floor.

“I don’t trust you,” Athos said, not as if it was a fact, but as if he was trying the statement out for size.

“Liar,” said Aramis, turning his head so as to tidy up above his ears. Dana watched Aramis’ hands, gentle and competent as she played barber for her friend.

When she glanced back at Athos, though, Dana discovered that his eyes were on her. He surveyed her as if he was still trying to work her out, all at once. A puzzle to be solved.

“So what did you do, baby pilot?” he asked, not slurring nearly enough for a man on his third round of a golden elixir called Valorous Grain. “To earn three duels in one day.”

“It just sort of happened,” Dana admitted. She had given up on trying to moderate her own drinking on the grounds that being sober would make it even harder to communicate with these reprobates. “Didn’t it?” she applied to Porthos and Aramis, who both laughed at her.

“You offended my chest,” Athos said sternly. “My poor, damaged chest.”

“Your pride,” Dana corrected.

“And yours.”

She shrugged, slightly ashamed of herself. “Granted.”

“But my two lady friends here…”

“He only calls us ladies when he’s drunk,” Aramis put in.

“It’s the only time he remembers,” Porthos added.

Aramis elbowed Athos to make him turn around again, so she could start on his beard.

“These ladies are the pinnacle of grace and excellence and forgiveness,” Athos said grandly. “How did you end up enemies?”

Dana looked over at Porthos, who was pouring herself more wine. “I don’t need a reason to fight,” Porthos said, looking as embarrassed as Dana felt. “I fight to fight.”

“We argued about fashion, I think?” said Dana. They were sharing jokes now, rather than the older Musketeers lobbing them over her head.

“Fashion, that was it.” Porthos winked at Dana. “Don’t tell him, pet. He’ll only make fun of us.”

Athos had moved on from them already. “But Aramis,” he said. “No one has ever quarrelled with Aramis… she is perfectly amiable in all ways.”

“You dickhead, you quarrel with me constantly,” said Aramis, buzzing away at the line of his chin.

“And yet you have the patience of a saint,” Athos told her. “And yet…”

Aramis sighed. “And yet.” She gave Dana a wary look before returning to her task. “Our new young friend and I argued over a matter of theology,” she said. “You know me.”

“Too much religion,” said Athos. “It always gets you into trouble.”

“If you lived a more devout life, your soul would thank you for it,” replied Aramis.

That made Athos go very serious for a moment, a dark expression falling over his newly-shorn face. “The very opposite, I think,” he muttered.

An attractive “monk” cleared the empty bottle from the table and opened a fresh one for them. She tipped Aramis a wink as she did so, and managed to flash some leg despite the large brown robes.

“Oh,” said Athos, cheering up. “That sort of theology. Makes more sense.”

“Can we stop talking about this now?” begged Dana. She was still kicking herself about the faux pas with the photosilk.

“The only proper way to change the subject is to toast the best boss in the skies,” said Athos, coming to his feet suddenly in a dramatic change of subject. “Commander Treville!”

“Treville!” thundered Porthos.

“You clown,” snapped Aramis, pulling Athos back down to the bench. “I almost cut half your chin off.”

None of them noticed that Dana had failed to join in the toast to their boss. What exactly had Commander Treville done for her?

The door of the bar swung open, and a Sabre officer walked in, resplendent in a red and gold uniform. She was accompanied by three red guards, all in uniform with the Cardinal’s cross shining brightly on their scarlet jackets.

Athos looked a different man, all jokes gone. Aramis had left a thin layer of beard close to his chin, thinner the stubble on his head. There was a scar running over the top of his scalp, as if his head had once been cut open with an axe. He leaned in to Dana as the Sabre and her underlings approached. “D’Artagnan. If the very sight of them makes you want to draw a sword, or at the very least swing a chair in their faces, then you are a true Musketeer and no one would dare claim otherwise.”

Then he winked, one long-lashed blue eye.

Dana knew it to be true. Other children were trained by their parents to love particular TeamJoust colours, or to nurse a deep patriotism for the station or planet on which they were born. For Dana, since she was a baby, it had been Team Musketeer all the way.

She had never met a Sabre to talk to, and yet she hated these guards on sight.

Their leader was a short and stocky white woman with a spiky mohawk, and the bars of a major gleaming on her lapel. Her attention was drawn to Athos rather than the others. “Drinking at mid shift?” she said in a low drawl. “Sad, Athos. You used to be someone.”

“Claudine Jussac,” Athos replied, lifting his glass as if toasting her health. “I note your uniform still fits. Strange, as you seem to be losing height every year. Perhaps it’s the artificial gravity. You need to get yourself dirtside for a holiday. Suck in some sun, get laid, and then maybe the terrible shrinkage will abate.”

She scowled at him. “There’s been a complaint, Athos.”

“I wouldn’t take it personally,” he said in a reassuring tone. “Some people are just never going to like you, Jussac. I think it’s because you’re not very friendly.”

Jussac’s eyebrows drew in even closer. “Athos. You’re not helping matters. Mouth shut.”

“Now talking is forbidden by the precious Cardinal!” Porthos interrupted, drumming her hands on the table. “What next, are they taking our wine?”

Aramis looked deeply unimpressed with both of her friends. “How about you state your business and get out of here, Claudine?”

Jussac smiled at Aramis with all her teeth. “The complaint was that you three have been fighting again, on church property, behind the Luxembourg. Which, as you know, is in our jurisdiction.”

“Lies,” said Porthos immediately. “What would your mother say if she saw you hassling poor innocent Musketeers, Claudine?”

Jussac bridled. “I’ve been in service to the Cardinal for seven years, Pol. I outrank all three of you. Don’t you think it’s time to take me seriously?”

“We would, baby doll,” said Aramis . “But it’s hard for us to keep up with all you bright young things, with your freshly pressed uniforms and your busywork.”

Jussac folded her arms, and she really did look like a sulky teenager, Dana decided. “We have security footage of Athos baring swords behind the Luxembourg.”

“We didn’t even fight,” Dana burst out. Aramis gave her a warning look and placed one finger to her mouth.

Athos stood up, turning to face Jussac. She came up to his collarbone, just about. “I thought it was illegal to monitor within the bounds of church property,” he said calmly.

Jussac tilted her head back, obviously hating to do so. “The Cardinal has made a new ruling,” she snapped. “Given that so many unsavoury types had been taking advantage of the Church privacy laws to play their dangerous games.” She let her red jacket slide open to show the baton of a pilot’s slice on one loop of her belt, and the glittering red chrome of an arc-ray on another. “Guess what, Athos Bloody Smartarse Musketeer? You’re under arrest.”

Dana watched, holding her breath. Athos looked at the major up and down quite deliberately, as if he was preparing to pick her up and throw her bodily through the nearest window. “No,” he said after a moment. “I don’t think I am. The Luxembourg and its grounds may be under the Cardinal’s jurisdiction, but this is bar is on Crown property and I’m wearing the blue and white. I don’t think I’m under arrest.”

Jussac barely even blinked. She flexed her hands once, and in response to that signal, the door of the Abbey of St Germain was flung open and a dozen more red guards entered the bar. It all looked very official, right up to the point that they drew blades instead of stunners.

The saucy monks and other customers melted back into the far corners.

“You don’t have a sword,” Aramis said in an undertone to Dana. “You’d better hide under the table until this is all over.” Before Dana could react to that, Aramis was up and over the table, her pilot’s slice baton extending into a wicked gleam of a sword.

Porthos roared and turned over the table in the same moment, leaping towards her friends.

Dana paused in horrified amazement as the bar erupted into the most fearsome brawl.

“Fuck this for a joke,” she decided, and dodged around the fallen table to punch the nearest Sabre in the kidneys and take his slice off him.

Paris Satellite, the centre of elegant civilisation. Not entirely what she had expected.

But not boring, Dana thought, grinning wildly as she ducked and punched and figured out very quickly how to get the most effective use of a pilot’s slice at close quarters. Most certainly not boring.

You have been reading Musketeer Space, by Tansy Rayner Roberts. Tune in next week for another chapter! Please comment, share and link. Musketeer Space is free to read, but if you’d like to support the project for as little as $1 per month, visit my Patreon page. Pledges can earn rewards such as ebooks, extra content, dedications and the naming of spaceships. My next funding milestone ($200 a month) will unlock a special Christmas story.