March: A Tale of Salmon and Swedes (The Glothic Tales Book 4) Page 14

‘With the wealth acquired under the agreement, of which Mr. Diddle has already paid thirty percent upfront, and will make four additional annual instalments to clear the balance, I have approved stage one, so the upgrade to the force field will begin in about three months I believe, followed by the entry port about a year later. I have advised Tryskolia Munchk of the details, so she can take the appropriate action with her contacts there.’

  ‘About salmon I suppo …’

  ‘I have received the long term economic forecasts from Glothic treasury, and when all of the data is factored together, the current eleven percent, year on year loss, should improve very quickly over the next three to four years and see an annualised Earth profit of nearly twenty percent. This should increase over the following five financial years to close to thirty percent, and at that rate, Gloth will finally achieve a break even on the whole Erdean project in less than one hundred and fifty years. So all said and done, a good deal.’

  ‘It would seem….’

  ‘Well done, March. Your voyage to Earth was a resounding success, and I’m very proud of your achievement and how astute you were in recognising such a profitable opportunity. This augurs well for your future.’

  ‘So more missions if I….’

  ‘Look, I just wanted to bring you up to date. Now, I’d better get back to this problem with our Naepic-Silt supply. Thank you for coming,’ he said, as he stood and reached across the desk to shake his son’s hand.

  ‘Um, yes, ok,’ March said, but really didn’t know what to say, or in fact, if it was even worth saying anything. Instead, he decided that when he got home, he would have a Draft Sunk – or three.

  He checked his Q’muniktor as he left the building. There was one new message.

  ‘Thank you for the music. D. D. Diddle.’

  The First, First

  Life, as the heir to the Supreme Potentate is a very difficult assignment, with little to do other than wait, act important, even if one definitely knows that one is certainly not, avoid suffering an unfortunate or ill-timed accidental death before the big day arrives, guard one’s back against jealous siblings or worse, evil second cousins, and generally add to one’s collective experience by making as many productively foolish mistakes as one can in order to acquire the wisdom that is necessary to be properly equipped to fulfil the responsibility of running the entire Glothic Empire – should the opportunity ever arrive.

  A little over a year after March’s return from Earth, and rather luckily for March, yet a little less than fortunate for his father; a quick trip to Sun System Seven by the Supreme Potentate to attend a gala dinner in honour of the one hundred and fiftieth birthday of the President of Alpha Andredda was so tightly squeezed into his busy schedule that the trip necessitated using a Noorlac class Interceptor, to ensure he arrived back in time the following morning to chair a Grand Council meeting.

  On the return journey however, the Noorlac carrying February the Twenty-Ninth, the Supreme Potentate, experienced a minor problem with one of its light compression thrusters, which quite quickly turned into a major problem when the Noorlac spontaneously exploded and disappeared into its very own self-created black hole.

  By good fortune though, the newly created black hole, which was later named the February the Twenty-Ninth Black Hole, quite logically, was located quite some distance from any commercial navigational routes, as the departed Supreme Potentate had been in a hurry on the day of his demise and had ordered his pilot to take a shortcut.

  *****

  March stood tall on the dais alongside the President of the Grand Council at the front of the Grand Council Hall. It was filled to capacity with thousands of ambassadors, ministers and delegates from every habitable planet in the Twelve Sun Systems of Gloth, along with every single member of the Glothic royal family. There was however, one unrepresented habitable planet, Earth, which no one noticed of course.

  However, the planet Earth was there in spirit, because in the very front row of the hall sat Tryskolia Munchk, who had decided that her work was done on Earth and had returned to take her retirement a few months earlier. She looked up at March proudly, giving him a warm smile and a little wave when he noticed her. He returned her smile, but thought that a returned wave may not be appropriate given the circumstances, and in any event, his waving hand was in his pocket, twiddling with his Earth coins, which he now carried with him at all times, as a constant reminder of the insane value, of value.

  The Grand Council Hall fell silent when the President of the Grand Council raised his hand, and waited a few moments before continuing.

  ‘In accordance with the articles of succession and the royal statutes of the Supreme Potentate of the Twelve Sun Systems of Gloth, it is my duty as President of the Grand Council to conduct the investiture of March Gregorian as our next Supreme Potentate.’

  He turned to March. ‘I ask you sir, to swear the oath of the Supreme Potentate and take your place, as March the First, Supreme Potentate of the Twelve Sun Systems of Gloth.’

  March took a deep breath, raised his hand and stated, ‘I, March Gregorian, pledge to work and die in the service of the Twelve Sun Systems of Gloth and its loyal populations.’

  The assembled crowd stood, clapped and cheered their new Supreme Potentate, and while March was pleased that the ceremony had gone well, he was feeling more relief than happiness. Relieved that he had simply survived, as not a single March before him had, to become the very first, March the First, the Supreme Potentate of the Twelve Sun Systems of Gloth.

  The next day, taking his seat for the first time behind what had been his father’s desk, a rich, red leather folder sat in front of him. In gold letters on the front it read, ‘Decrees’.

  He opened the folder, knowing from his briefing by his Under-Secretary that each decree required his approval, seal and signature. When he opened the folder, March started to read the preamble of the first decree.

  After deep consideration, and due process, undertaken by the Grand Council subcommittee on Earth Control, over four arduous sessions of deliberation, and in close consultation with related sub-subcommittees, and after seeking external advice from nomenclatural experts, it is the unanimous recommendation of the Grand Council subcommittee on Earth Control that the proposed Southern entry port, which is to be installed in the fullness of time in the Earth force field, be named, The March Gate.

  From the convoluted, non-committal wording, March instantly knew who had written the text for the decree, yet readied his seal and pen to approve the decree.

  ‘Oh, dear Major Errst Humff, you really are such a grovelling little swine!’ March murmured, as he proceeded to sign and seal his first decree.

  The End

  A Note From The Author

  I had always planned to write three books about Gloth, and after writing February, Hal and Septimity, I was satisfied and pleased that I had reached the very end of my near three year-long Glothic Tales Trilogy project.

  However, in the two years since I finished the last book, Septimity, in which the infamous planet, Erde, successfully destroyed itself, there has been a question and an inkling of an idea burning away in my mind. ‘Right, ok, so then what happened?’

  I resisted the temptation for quite some time, but finally I had no choice other than to write a fourth book in the trilogy. My biggest problem though was in deciding whether to rename what would become a four-book trilogy by its correct name, a tetralogy. As it is such an unusual and rarely used word, I decided in the end to simply ignore all the mathematics and keep calling my Gloth Tales series a trilogy. I mean, readers are reading and not counting, are they?

  So with that problem solved, I moved to my next dilemma, which was to decide on a new main character. This was easy, as since February the Fifth, I hadn’t used another month of the year. I chose March because my daughter’s birthday is on the first of March. This clever decision also opens the way for me to write more Glothic Tales, as I have ten months of the year left to choose from.


  The Glothic Tales may one day break the world record for being the most numerous trilogy of all time.

  It may be worth mentioning here that I used quite a few cunning anagrams in March. If you failed to notice, here are a few examples of what you may have missed. Naepic-Silt – plasticine, Centre coil book - electronic book, Draft Sunk – drunk fast, EdErg – greed, Lepta Scions - plastic ones, Ranting Teensy – instant energy, Dotsigh tree – dog shit tree, Outcrop Simmer – music promoter, Amnya Trimli – military man, Padnag Inor – grand piano and Sali Houri – hilarious. Well, I had to occupy my mind with something, while I waited for the next chapter to develop in my head.

  Thank you for reading March, and see you again in another month perhaps.

  Also by Derek Haines

  Louis

  Dead Men

  Milo Moon

  One Last Love

  Eyes That Could Kill

  My Take Away Vampire

  February The Fifth

  The Adventures of Hal

  Septimity and The Blood Brotherhood

  The Glothic Tales Trilogy

  The Sons of Cleito

  The Few

  Cut In Three

  About The Author

  Derek Haines is an author of quite a number of books, however, he spends most of his time blogging, making technology go horribly wrong, and being a rather senior ESL English teacher.

  Born in Australia, but now living in Switzerland with his wife and his black Cocker Spaniel, he passes many hours, trying to make technology work again, after inadvertently breaking it. It's a painful process, yet it’s such an effective self-study method in acquiring new technological skills.

  As I’m a writer – I can change adroitly from the third person into the first person, and say that I love what I do and where I live, and also, that I am a Douglas Adams fanatic, bordering on a tragic. So much so, that by some spooky coincidence, my street address is 42. That’s so much more impressive than simply owning a towel and having ready access to peanuts and beer.

  However, peanuts and beer are extremely important, as they provide essential sustenance during my bouts of obsessive writing, which although rare, usually take place in a horizontal position. I should mention here that I am very fond of acronyms, anagrams, allegories and alliteration, also.

  In addition, I quite like commas. The Oxford type, or otherwise. However, quite perversely, I am not enamoured by quotation marks. I use them, singularly if possible, but even then, only under sufferance. As for semicolons; who really knows how to use them?

  Aside from my never-ending punctuation conundrums, I enjoy life, good food, wine, beer, and I take each day as it comes – thankfully.

  www.derekhaines.ch