Die Standing

by John Jackson Miller

Georgiou had preferred ruling from the shadows; parades and statues were for those who had nothing left to accomplish.

If the Federation’s namby-pamby officials ever opened their eyes to the brutality that took place on Thionoga, she expected they’d burst with self-righteousness, immediately ending their participation. But by delegating the bothersome details to Leland and his team, they could remain blissfully blind.

From recruitment to deployment was only a matter of days—but more than enough time for the emperor to decide that she hated Leland’s guts.

“Harmony in the ranks is a priority right now. We’ve just finished a war that a lot of our allies say was started by a human who defied orders!”

Much like when public opinion was against helping the Romulans, the Federation made sure Picard was shut out with no hope of redress. The UFP never lived down Michael's actions, not even to mention the almost as costly Dominion War much later, simply adding to a fully rattled Federation for generations to come.

And the Michael Burnham of this continuum certainly wouldn’t approve. But neither was she present to object.

Georgiou nodded. “He debases himself for currency outside a Martian mining compound. Normally, I wouldn’t have heard of such a person, but there’s a disease named for him.”

Georgiou sneered. “Especially for a so-called secret organization that has its own ID badges—and whose leader takes orders from a computer program!” Cornwell’s eyes darted to Leland, who shuffled uncomfortably in his seat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Cornwell spoke coolly. “You’re just a big bundle of hate, aren’t you?” She retrieved her chair and sat down. “Such rage. Do I need to find you a counselor? Someone to hurry you along through your stages? You seem to be stuck on anger.” Georgiou glared. “What are you talking about?” “Stages of grief,” Cornwell replied, picking up her slate and speaking matter-of-factly. “It was an old psychological construct. More of an aid to understanding than an actual progression.”

For most of her life, that was more than enough; critically, it had brought her to the attention of the Trill Symbiosis Commission. The Dax symbiont, having resided inside legislator Lela and mathematician Tobin, had longed to be paired with someone more physically active. Emony fit that bill perfectly.

She’d encountered a young medical student there, whose unconcealed interest in her made Leizu’s pilot seem like a smooth operator. But Leonard McCoy had also thought highly of her intelligence, poring over texts with her in an antiquarian bookstore on the Oxford town square. “If you ever get out of this racket,” he said in his Mississippi drawl, “consider medicine.”

Dax nodded—only to turn to the ambassador. “Wait. Did you just say ‘emperor’?”

“That you still exist, which means something. It helps that you’re a lot more attractive than a lot of the aliens out there. It’s an evolutionary aid not to be gruesome. You also mind your own business better than just about any race we’ve encountered.” “Another helpful trait, I guess.” “Or maybe you all just have something to hide.” She looked keenly at the woman, who had gone pale. “You’re always acting furtive about something.”

The real reason Leland—and possibly his digital overlord, Control—had taken such an interest in her: the future. Their future.

It was a good bet, however, that Section 31 and Leland knew at least as much as the Federation did, if not more. She suspected he’d been more involved with time-travel research than he’d been letting on. It was all a farce. Leland wanted her around for what she knew, not what she could do—and he had figured she’d be more likely to spill her guts outside a prison cell.

What had mattered in her universe was the immense power of Defiant itself, and the technological secrets its records held; knowledge about locations and species not yet visited in her universe also had been useful. But most of that information had already been acted upon by her predecessors.

But it is not me—and it never will be. Georgiou’s anger rose. Wrath, at Leland, at Cornwell, at the Federation. At Michael, for bringing her to this misbegotten universe. And abandoning her to it.

His first precept of the qeS’a’, in fact, drew upon the story of the feuding warriors of Kopf’s Cliff, who ultimately needed one another when the fires came. I can see a day when the Empire might need to rally to the Federation’s aid, or vice versa.”

A trader was a traitor to himself: a coward. The man before her, though, was something more. Might he have succeeded, had he followed a different path? And could she ever succeed in his?

Leland had wanted Georgiou to play secret agent. In her universe, that recalled images from old Terran video dramas where heroic masterminds fought to prevent scurrilous enemy spies from interfering with their plans for domination. No children ever wanted to play the spies, who usually died horrible and deserved deaths, often staged with exotic creative flourishes.

She turned again—and put her hands to her ears to shut out their words. But they pierced her brain, and she felt her entire existence peeling away. She screamed, but no sound could blot out what they were saying. Georgiou snapped up in bed, sweating. But even as she panted with exhaustion, somehow she knew the truth: she was just in another dream.

“If Michael told the captain about it, she was certain of it,” Georgiou said. “And I believe her. She’s brilliant—far too smart to have made such an error.”

“I get it,” Dax said, standing behind her. “By the lights of people in this universe, you’re a bad person, from a bad place—and you don’t see any reason to prove otherwise to anyone. The only person I’ve ever heard you speak of with any respect is Burnham. You don’t want anyone to identify with you at all.”

“I could have kept competing, but it wasn’t worth it to me to beat children. My sport was mostly for the young. I mean, I had as much right to be there as anyone—but I’d done it.”

Dax stepped away—only to pause. She looked back, guarded. “My people know more about starting over than you could imagine,” she said. “There’s no pain in it. Only excitement. Adventure. The chance to live life again, as someone else. But you’re not living it as someone else. You’re trying to be the same person you were in a place that’s not meant for her—and it’s going to eat you up.” I’ll be the judge of that, Georgiou thought.

The emperor’s mind raced. The portal seemed tied to the planet’s geology, but it had something else at work—perhaps the crystals.

Georgiou stared at her. “Is it?” Several of Dax’s recent accidental statements combined with the things she’d always wondered about Trills. “Umyda, is she two beings?”

“But I am fighting. I desired to seal the shrine. That desire is the lock—the Oastlings have seen to it. Only Philippa Georgiou can open the lock, and only if she wants it opened more than Philippa Georgiou wanted it closed.”

“Empire…?” Quintilian froze. After a moment, he looked back at her, his face gripped with hatred. “You Federation people. You’re unbelievable.” “The Trills are nonaligned.” “So was my colony!” Georgiou had never heard Quintilian shout before. But now he was looming over Dax, yelling. “Federation, Klingons, Romulans, Gorn—all of you, with your states and empires, always butting up against one another. Testing one another. And who gets crushed?”

“From what I know of your reality, I’m not surprised.” Stalking the landing field in his armor, he gestured to the gathering forces. “I don’t want to be an emperor. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in all my studies, it’s this: Empires fall. Everyone else gets sick of them and rises up. Sometimes they fall to barbarians—and sometimes to plague.”

A blood devil from Oast was indeed the source of Farragut’s woes; there was a fair chance it was the one from Jadama Rohn. But the Oastlings had the pool locked down, perhaps forever, and with Troika space opened to trade—the one, immutable deed of Quintilian’s—the Casmarrans and Dromax were able to look elsewhere for food. No one ever needed to approach Oast again, and Section 31 surveillance would ensure no one did.

“But here’s a piece of advice. If there’s no reason to keep it a secret, come clean. Someone will use it as a weapon against you—someone besides me, that is.” Dax agreed. “And besides, people don’t like being lied to.” “I haven’t heard that.” She watched Dax join her companions.

She would never get her revenge on those who had ended her rule over the Terran Empire. The conspirators were dead, disintegrated—with no graves to mark them, and a universe away. But she could avenge herself: her different self. Philippa Georgiou of this universe had fallen. And while she once hadn’t wanted to claim her, to cross one Georgiou was to cross them all. What better way to scream defiance at fate than to live and work in this universe as Philippa Georgiou, the woman death could not stop?

“A negative result. Such a fine phrase for a potential war, killing billions. You’re talking like Control again.”