Ray Torra narrowed his eyes at the seven Princes standing before him.
"Sit. I have something I need to share with you all, and you might as well be comfortable while I talk about it."
He waved a hand at them, indicating for them to take their seats.
The men sighed and sat down. Ray Torra was a scary demon, but he was a reasonable man.
"Let me tell you boys something."
Ray Torra pulled from somewhere out of sight, a black pipe which he began filling with a clod of dried tobacco. A flame appeared at the end of his index finger and he lit the tobacco as he puffed on the end of the pipe.
The Princes rolled their eyes as they waited for him to take his first few puffs.
He looked up from his pipe, gazing into each of the Prince's eyes.
"The Avgo is all fun and games, all braggadocio and point-scoring to everyone." He cleared his throat and made a quick gesture with his pipe. "until someone died—a very crucial someone."
A chart appeared in front of everyone, collating the scores of the latest Avgo Event.
Candace had taken first place in the event, gaining 100 points, which brought her grand total of 390 points.
Second place had actually gone to Anaïse, giving her 260 points.
Jenna took third place, resulting in a still very respectable 310.
That left Valeria in fourth place which meant her total score was 220.
"The scores came in not too long before the glass girl fell to her death. She was someone who had actually won second place at the Abilities and Expertise Avgo Event just that morning."
"The result of this event pushed Valeria Marakesh out of the running, resulting in three finalists." He took another puff of his pipe.
"We have Candace, Jenna, and Anaïse, in that order." He shook his head. "Correction. We HAD Candace, Jenna, and Anaïse. We now only have Candace and Jenna."
He cleared his throat and looked away.
"The Galactic Organization has petitioned the Board of Directors to include Valeria Marakesh as the third contestant because Anaïse has died."
"What???"
"No!!!"
The Princes all began protesting, talking at once and not making much sense because none could be heard over the other.
"Shut up and sit down!" Ray Torra roared.
The Princes reluctantly gave up their stances and sat, just in time for the various servers to return to the dining room with trolleys of covered dishes.
As they began to be served, Ray Torra began to sing. He did not want to discuss anything while the servers were still in the room.
"C'est si bon
De partir n'importe ou,
Bras dessus, bras dessous,
En chantant des chansons.
.
C'est si bon
De se dir' des mots doux,
Des petits rien du tout
Mais qui en disent long."
By the time he finished singing his song, the servers had cleared the room.
"You all should eat while I go over what has happened during the time the Avgo has been in play." Ray Torra sighed.
"You have to understand that this Avgo competition goes far beyond just getting a bride for Byron."
Byron looked up, his red-brown eyes glaring.
"Even as the Avgo was starting, there were already border skirmishes between the birds and the bugs. It spilled into the Avgo when Olivia Faraday was hurt by Bethany Dresden, since obviously, Olivia is a bug and Bethany is a bird."
"What does the bird-bug altercations have to do with a girl made of silicon glass?" Byron stabbed his steak with a vicious jab.
"It has to do with the fact that the sandy world of Haribou provides much of the weapons which the bug world uses against the birds. Now, Haribou is a neutral world. They will provide weapons to whoever has the funds to pay for those weapons."
"So why didn't the birds pay for the weaponry from Haribou?"
"They do, but if you look at the demographics, there are far far more insects in the Universe than there are any other type of life forms. In fact, insects represent over half of all known living things in the Universe." **
"The insects outspend the birds ten to one in weaponry." He glared at the Princes. "You have to ask yourselves why they are not the dominant rulers of your individual galaxy."
"Take a look at the current rulers. The Emperor is a bat and the Empress is an ibis."
"So?" Byron shook his head with confusion.
"There were two birds in the Avgo Event this time around, Bethany and Valeria. That would have been a two-in-seven chance, or 28.57%, that a bird would have won and become the next Empress."
"That chance dropped to zero this morning when Valeria fell out of the ranking.
"The remaining candidates were a silicon girl selling deadly weapons to the insectoids around the galaxy, a spotted leopard in a jungle world that has been a natural predator of both the bat Emperor and the ibis Empress," he glanced over at Candi.
"And of course, an illegitimate human female on a backwards planet whose only claim to fame is their gorilla warfare tactics."
"So the birds want to keep a bird as Empress over this galaxy?"
"The birds were the ones who established the current Empress at the last Avgo Event."
"How is that possible?" Candi spoke up for the first time. "Isn't the Avgo won by the best candidates?"
Ray Torra laughed.
"My Dear, that's such a naive way of looking at things." He took a long deep drag of his pipe. "If the best candidate had won the previous Avgo competition, Byron here would not have been the Crown Prince."
"What???"
"You better explain yourself!!!"
"Unbelievable!!!"
"No way. That cannot be."
"Impossible!" Byron snarled. "Everyone can see the Avgo Events for themselves. Winners and losers have to go through seven grueling events to determine who wins in the end."
Ray Torra smiled.
"That is correct. We all saw who won the last Avgo Event."
He waved a hand and the shining moment of the past Avgo event flared up on a new virtual screen.
Plastered on the large screen for all the Princes to see was the beautiful face of a very young Anastasia standing on the dais smiling at the crowd, and wearing the unmistakable Avgo crown on her head.
==============
** Scientists estimate that insects make up to 90% of all species of animals on the planet Earth and more than half of all living things. This is not fiction.. This is a fact.
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