“When I ran for governor, was I ambitious? Yes. Anyone, male or female, who goes through the trials of a campaign must be ambitious.”

—Ambassador Madeleine M. Kunin

The house was full-to-overflowing with guests, and Loona moved between them fluidly, like she’d been doing this her whole life.

“So nice of you to come, Judicator. Really, lovely to see you. Professor, hello! I bet you never expected to see me on this side of a campaign. Kymie! Where’s your husband? Well you give him my best, and when he gets some shore leave, you’d better bring him around to visit.”

She rounded a corner, and grinned. “Naskia, dear! Lovely to see you! Thanks for letting me borrow your house!” she said sardonically, a laugh mixed in to the faux banter.

Naskia laughed. “Loona, I don’t have any idea how you do it.”

“I don’t mind it that much,” Loona said. “It’s kind of fun. I see why Pryvani likes it.”

“I tell you, when you got attacked over Nonah, I wanted to go hit that slag. Took Niall a while to talk me down.”

“Yes, it did. Thank God you aren’t running,” Niall said, slipping into the room – or at least, the Titan-sized avatar of him did. “Things going all right?”

“Very,” Ammer said, entering the room. “Boss, you can’t stop in the kitchen for long. Keep circulating.”

“I know, I know,” Loona said. “But as Dr. and Dr. Freeman are hosting….”

“You can take a two minute break,” Ammer said. “Just don’t make it a twenty-minute one.”

Loona gave Ammer an Imperial salute, but smiled as she did so. She paused, and looked back to her friends. “You did tell Sorcha to stay out of the soda, right?”

“And Lessy. Told them that there’d be no sleepovers for a Titan year,” Niall said. “That scared ‘em enough that I think they even listened.”

Loona smiled. “All right, good. I’m going, Ammer, I’m going.”

Ammer’s avatar tapped at his pad, and then looked over at Naskia and Niall. As much as he tried to hide it, he had to admit he was a bit star-struck. He’d only had the chance to meet the Freemans once before, and that had been brief; in the 13 Titan years that had passed since Niall forced his way into a job (with Loona’s considerable assistance), much had changed for humans, and much was lamentably the same. But he was one of the catalysts for the good. Well, Niall and Naskia both – her contributions to human rights were, if anything, more important.

“Thanks, again,” Ammer said. “We really do appreciate this.”

“Anything we can do to help Loona, we will,” Niall said. “I don’t think I can ever adequately repay her.”

“I know the feeling,” Ammer replied. “Frankly, we all owe her. But don’t tell her I said that, it’s hard enough to get her to listen to me as it is.”

“Bollocks. She listens to you fine,” Niall said. “You give her good advice, why wouldn’t she?”

Ammer smiled. “I know she does, but…Dr. Freeman, I have to admit, I’m not quite as confident as I let on.”

Niall grinned. “Who is, lad? You think it’s easy teaching college students the size of buildings? Even after eighty years, it’s daunting. But you do a good job of faking arrogance. And trust me, it helps…at times.”

“At times, it just annoys people, primarily your wife,” Naskia said.

“Aye, that it does. Now, Mr. Smit, would you care for some whisky, Scotch style? It’s a holo-creation, so the effects are psychological, not physical.”

“I tell you what, Dr. Freeman, I’ll take you up on that once the fundraiser’s over. And if that’s not convenient, after the election’s over.”

“Done,” Niall said. “Now, go on and do your job.”

Ammer exited the kitchen, and Niall sighed. “I can’t believe I was ever that young,” he said.

“You were. And just as handsome,” Naskia said, pulling him in for a quick kiss.

“’Just’ as handsome?”

“Okay, breathtakingly, spectacularly handsome,” Naskia said. “Now, you and I should probably mingle too.”

“Are you sure?” Niall asked. “I can think of other things we could do.”

Naskia grinned. “I know, sweetie, but you telling Sorcha about quantum mechanics can wait a bit. We have guests.”

Niall grabbed his whisky, and followed his wife out the door. “That wasn’t what I meant, petal. But you’re right, that can wait too.”

* * *

“So do you wanna do something tomorrow?” Sorcha asked, navigating through the sea of adults.

“Can’t. Have school,” the blonde-haired girl trailing her said.

“So do I, but I thought I might blow it off.”

“Sorcha, you can’t blow school off.”

“Can too, Lessy,” Sorcha said, eyeing the soda from a distance. “Just have to make sure mum and dad don’t find out. Besides, we’re just reviewing quadratic equations for the seven bajillionth day in a row. Bo-ring.”

“Yeah, but at least you have a school. You don’t have to learn from a video pad, with kids you don’t get to meet.”

“I’d love not to meet the kids at my school,” Sorcha said. She wondered if she could get a hold of the soda and not get too crazy. Just, like, a little crazy. Her dad would ground her if he found out, but on the other hand, she might get away with it.

“And why’s that?”

“They’re always slagging on us. ‘Humans are pets. They’re too dumb to do anything.’ Dicha told me that the other day. So I hit him. Got in trouble, but it’s okay, it’s worth it. Call me a pet, that’s what you get.”

Lessy rolled her eyes. “Sorch, you can’t keep hitting people when you get mad. You’re gonna get in real trouble someday.”

“I am not!” Sorcha said, tacking alongside a well-dressed woman toward the refreshment table. “When I get older, I’ll be smarter than them and they’ll have to admit humans are better.”

“But then they’ll think we’re more violent,” Lessy said.

“So? Maybe they’ll lay off you if the humans their size stand up to them. All right, you want gok’ma soda or mosa-soda?”

“You want neither,” a man said, cutting Sorcha off.

“Daddy, I wasn’t gonna have soda….”

“I believe you, Lessy. And I’m sure Sorcha wasn’t, either. Were you, Sorcha?”

“Uh…no, Uncle Dhan. I was just kidding.”

“Also, Sorcha, I’d advise you not to skip school,” he said, with a grin.

“How did he –”

“I didn’t know the listen-ins could work with holograms,” Lessy said.

“Neither did I, widget,” Dhan said. “Had to test them sometime. Both of you, take some Royal Berry juice and head for the living room, I understand she’s here.”

“Awesome!” Lessy said. “Does Aunt Loona know?”

“It’s a surprise. Go on,” Dhan said, handing the two girls softly glowing glasses of juice.

“What are listen-ins?” Sorcha said, as she edged away.

“Dad’s working on a new invention. Lets you pick out a conversation in a crowd. Titans have something like ‘em, but dad’s trying to make one that lets you pick out specific people, stay on just them without aiming or anything.”

“So he had them set to listen to us?” Sorcha asked, aghast.

Lessy shook her head. “Yeah, he can be a pain sometimes.” She wouldn’t admit, even to herself, that her dad probably was right.

The two girls edged into the living room, which had filled up quite a bit with the people at the reception. They craned their necks to hear the man speaking.

“Thanks for coming out tonight…funny, you all look a bit smaller, for some reason,” he said, to some sardonic laughter. “I’m gonna bring the woman you came here to support up in a minute, but first, we’ve got a special guest. Anyone who’s spent any time with Loona Armac knows she likes Tol-Bot.”

The friends of Loona, as well as her casual acquaintances, laughed at that. Loona liked Tol-Bot in the same way kids like birthday cake – ravenously, and with no regard for the consequences.

“Well, we got contacted the other day, boss, by someone who wanted to come out and help, and so it’s my honor to introduce, the defending Grand Tourney champion….”

“…no way!” Loona shouted.

“…Felltree!”

The crowd’s applause was rather more than just warm. Even the famous people in the room – and it included the first human to hold a professorship, several well-known pundits, a couple multimillionaires, and at least three doctors named Bass – were a bit starstruck as the drumbeat sound of Felltree’s intro filled the room.

“Hello Tannhauser!” Felltree called, bouncing through the doorway, as the crowd roared. “I want to thank you all for coming out tonight to support Loona Armac for Imperial Representative. I’ve been watching Loona’s campaign with interest, and let me tell you, everyone, she gets it. She’s exactly the type of legislator we all need in Tuaut….”

Sorcha rolled her eyes; she was interested in seeing Felltree because she was famous, but her speech was more politics, and it wasn’t like Sorcha was a big fan of Tol-Bot anyhow. She turned to try to talk Lessy into making one last valiant attempt at procuring soda, but she saw Lessy was enraptured by the speech. Sighing, Sorcha turned back.

“…so transfer your credits, volunteer your time, do what you have to do to – but give Loona Armac the support she needs to beat Hy Zapat! Thanks!”

The crowd roared again, and Felltree raised her arms, then motioned to Loona – the two posed for a quick picture, and almost before Loona could react, Felltree slipped away.

“Well!” Loona said, as the room cheered. “I had a few questions about last year’s final, but they’ll keep,” she said with a laugh. “Thanks for coming, everyone. I wouldn’t be here without you, and I won’t win without your support, so thanks, for everything you’re gonna do, and thanks for everything you’ve done, and thanks for everything you’re doing right now. At this point, I could give my stump speech, but you’ve heard it – so let’s have a nice rest of the evening!”

The crowd applauded, and Loona walked over to Ammer, who was grinning, and shaking his head. “What, I should have given the stump speech?”

“No, no,” Ammer said with a chuckle. “I just thought it was funny how in shock you were at Felltree.”

“Well, she’s a Grand Tourney champion! I mean…that’s a big deal!”

“Loona, before this is over, you’re gonna be a big deal too.”

“Maybe. But I’m never gonna beat The Executioner in the semis.”

“I don’t even know what that means,” Ammer said.

“Trust me, she’s awesome. Almost as good as Iron Maiden.”

“I’ll take your word for it. New polling data just came back,” Ammer said.

“Still too close to call?”

“Yup,” Ammer said. “But you’ve moved to a flat-footed tie. The new ads seem to be helping.”

Loona nodded. “I remember when you said all I had to do was run some ads, talk about change, hire a schmuck.”

“Yeah,” Ammer said, “I lied. You needed the push. But there are a lot of Titans who would have done a better job than I have.”

“Why do you say that?”

Ammer shrugged. “I feel like I’m getting in the way,” he said. “You had to go way out on a limb on human rights, and Zapat keeps using me as a saw.”

Loona knew what Ammer meant; Zapat had been withering in his attacks, hitting Loona for her statement that she believed Titans were bigoted against humans. His most recent attack had focused on Ammer, hinting darkly that he was behind Loona’s position.

Loona almost found it funny. It was incoherent as heck – Ammer was a brilliant puppeteer pulling her strings to make her say that humans were not inferior to Titans.

“Ammer,” Loona said, “you remember when I told Nonah I’d rather lose with my friends’ support than win without it?”

“Yeah,” Ammer said.

“That applies to you too.”

“I’m not here to be your friend, boss.”

“Too bad,” Loona said. “You can quit whenever you want, Ammer, I gave you my word on that, and I mean it. But if you’re quitting because you think you’re hurting me – believe me, quitting would hurt much more.”

Ammer gave Loona a smile. “All right, boss. Well, it’s your call. Might not be a good one, though.”

“Well then, I’ll just need my campaign manager to bail me out again,” Loona said. And with a nod, she was back working her way through the crowd, heading over to the Maris sisters, who’d flown up from Korafia to be here.

Ammer turned back to his pad. There had to be a way to get her ahead. And gorram, but he was gonna find it.