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Overall I would say that the flight training went well. After the first week I wasn't able to devote more than a couple of days a month to checking the men's progress, but Visha had learned enough from that initial push that she was able to take over and do a fine job as an instructor in my stead. With only thirteen military grade flight orbs they were only able to train up to company-sized maneuvers. That was fine for working on fundamentals. By rotating the use of the orbs everybody was able to get a decent amount of training in.

Besides myself the Germanian Workers' Party had fifty-one aerial mages in its employ. The majority had been in the 203rd at the end of the war. The remainder were men who had served in the 203rd for some time before being rotated to other units as HQ tried to raise the performance of Imperial flight mages across the board. There were still quite a few alumni of the 203rd out there in the civilian sector. I never looked too deeply into why they hadn't signed up with us. I could only assume that they disagreed with my politics, or perhaps had already landed comfortable jobs. I liked to think that a few of them were, like me, men of peace who had been dragged into war and were now seizing the chance for a peaceful life with both hands. I wished them all the best in their endeavors.

It might seem strange that I would put such battle hardened veterans through remedial training. I'm sure many of the men thought so, although they were wise enough not to voice such concerns in my presence. The problem is that while constant warfare is good for training some things it's quite poor for training others. In economics terms it's an issue of time preference.

The concept of time preference has to do with how people value time. Somebody with a low time preference values their happiness in the future and is willing to make short term sacrifices that will pay out over time. On the other hand, somebody with a high time preference values their happiness right now and doesn't worry too much about what will happen later. In the story of the ant and the grasshopper, the ant has a low time preference and the grasshopper has a high time preference. Just like the story, people and nations with low time preferences usually do better in life than the people and nations with high time preferences.

You can't totally neglect the present, though. Especially in war. It doesn't matter if you have a wonderful new tank design that will start production next year if all your factories are being overrun today by your enemy's mediocre tanks. In a fight for survival it's only natural to focus on anything that will increase your chance of surviving to the next day and to neglect everything else.

Speaking of my men in particular, they were absolutely first rate in terms of any skill that could be honed in battle. Whether you talk about mental fortitude under pressure, quick and decisive action in combat, anticipating enemy actions, casting spells in combat, or anything of that nature, they were terrific. Where they had room for improvement was in the skills that required extended investment in order to improve. Taking a month or two in order to leisurely revise your fundamental approach to flying was a dangerous fantasy during a war. Exploring the advantage of casting for efficiency rather than power was also a bad idea when you risked having the enemy blow you up if our defensive screen was too weak.

I could only hope that extended peace time training would help them rise to new heights. We were the only aerial mages available for General Lergen to use. Relying on a single battalion of mages as a country's entire force was a complete joke. The Empire used to maintain three wings in each regional army group and another three wings with the central army. In peace time. Some of those units may have been under strength, but during the war they had been filled to the brim and whole new units had been created. And that's not even mentioning the mages assigned to the navy.

A single battalion obviously could not fulfill all of the duties that aerial mages used to handle. Even if Germania was smaller than the Empire had been, it was still large enough that it would have been fielding a much larger aerial mage corps if not for the treaty of Triano. Instead of a strategic tool, it would be better to describe our unit as a surprise weapon. General Lergen would be able to deploy us once to great effect by catching the enemy by surprise, but after that we would be overwhelmed. By training the men to a high standard I hoped we could accomplish as much as possible during that moment of surprise.

It was also sadly necessary to train the men to be able to cope in these new circumstances. Friendly artillery? Air support? A lovely dream. Instead they needed to be ready to cope with enemy artillery, enemy aircraft, and enemy numerical superiority.

All in all, while the training was going well the overall strategic situation remained grim.

There was also the matter of the economy.

The government remained committed to its policy of making ends meet by printing more money. It was possible that they sincerely thought that this was a good idea. If they believed there was a floor to the value of the mark then by continuing to print marks once they hit that floor they could indeed save the economy with the printing press. Even if some of them realized the truth that there was no floor and no salvation to be had by printing ever larger denomination bills, they were still stuck together with the rest.

As long as they held together they could look forward to two more years of control over the national government. If they were to splinter over, for example, what to do if they abandoned the status quo, then there would be a new set of elections. I had the poll data to show that an election would go poorly for them but even without such a scientific tool available they had to know that an angry population would use them as an outlet for their rage.

Accordingly, the country found itself in a strange place. Social stability was fraying at the seams. Inflation had reached the point where measuring an annual interest rate was meaningless. Instead, the best way to make sense of it was to track how long it took for the mark to lose half of its value. A time period that was getting shorter and shorter every month. While all of this was going on the government remained in stasis, locked into inaction.

I kept making public appearances as I always had. We were starting to see some interesting numbers in our polling. For one thing, the average supporter of the party was changing. During the last election we were overwhelmingly supported by voters who were concerned about foreign policy and the military. That's not to say that we captured anything like a majority of voters who were concerned about foreign policy-only natural, as our foreign policy prescriptions were insane-but rather that people who did vote for us were people who liked our insane foreign policy. Now, though, we were seeing more voters indicate that they supported us who had the economy as their primary concern. Apparently my prescience in anticipating the current inflationary crisis together with my vague promises to fix things had impressed some people.

The other noticeable change in our support was how it kept growing over time. I was pleasantly surprised when we hit fifteen percent. I was nervous when we hit twenty. I was downright worried when the polls showed us with twenty-five percent support with only six months left until the election. I was happy to accrue a few more seats in the Diet but fundamentally I was committed to the role of the crazy firebrand unable to change a corrupt system. If our vote totals got too high there was a real danger that my supporters would start to expect results.

What could I do? If I just repudiated all of our positions, the rest of the party would want to know why. I could hardly tell them that I wanted to drive voters away. I guess I could have cut off our charitable efforts, but we were doing some genuine good there by providing food for people who needed it. In the end, I decided that the best thing to do was to turn in to the proverbial skid.

Rather than put down our popular positions, I would magnify them to the point of absurdity. Instead of simply blaming the Francois for our troubles I began calling for an outright invasion if the Francois refused to cease their subversive efforts. Where before I had criticized the implementation of the money-printing policy as foolish, now I described it as criminal. I called for its architects to be dragged out and whipped in the public square. In essence, by appearing in public as a frothing madman I hoped to drive off sensible voters so as to be left only with the support of our base of lunatics.

In the end we won thirty-two percent of the vote.

All hope wasn't lost, though. Even though we had a large share of seats in the incoming parliament, it wasn't enough to form a majority government by ourselves. The other parties shouldn't be willing to join up with us after all of my crazy promises during the campaign. As long as they formed a government without us then I could settle back into my comfortable position as a powerless critic.

ooOoo

President-elect Kurt von Rudersdorf took a long drag off of his cigar. He held it in for a long moment, even as his lungs began to tingle, then burn. He was surrounded by two of his oldest friend in a luxurious sitting room in his personal estate after a surprise election win. By all rights they should be in the middle of a raucous celebration. Instead, when he exhaled a cloud of smoke it had more of the sound of a long-suffering sigh.

It was true that he probably would not have been elected without the crisis facing the country, but the crisis of hyperinflation seemed a more pointed threat now that he would be held responsible for it. Worse, a new crisis had come about as a result of the election results themselves. Tanya von Degurechaff's extremist party had won thirty-two percent of the vote, while the communist bastards had managed twenty-two percent support for their schemes. Simple mathematics dictated that no majority government could be formed without including one of those two parties. Further down the ballot, the previous majority coalition could hardly muster twenty percent between them; they almost reached twenty-five percent if one included their former center-right coalition partners. A newly prominent right-wing party that hewed to a more moderate tack that Degurechaff accounted for another twenty percent of the electorate. All in all, it was a mess.

The president of the republic was by constitutional design not involved much in the day to day matters of government. Although the position was elected, its duties were similar to those traditionally entrusted to a constitutional monarch. He was to use his abilities to facilitate the creation of a stable government and to dismiss the Diet and call for new elections if the government were to lose its way. He could exercise further powers in the event of an emergency, although the idea of kicking off his presidential term by declaring an emergency was rather distasteful.

"Damn those fools," Rudersdorf grumbled, "flocking to Degurechaff's madness."

Hans von Zettour regarded him from across the table with a small smile on his face, unmoved by the display of emotion. Rudersdorf's old friend had agreed to come out of retirement to provide what support he could offer during the campaign. As always, it had proved invaluable to have an adviser available who was perfectly willing to tell Rudersdorf when he was being a fool.

Erich Lergen, seated next to Zettour, couldn't quite maintain the same level of detachment. If Rudersdorf had to guess, the man was torn between being pleased to hear that Rudersdorf agreed with him and anguish at the reminder of Degurechaff's success. Still, even if the man had a hard time remaining objective on the topic of Tanya von Degurechaff, he was a brilliant officer and had been a fine choice to leave in charge of the much reduced Germanian military.

Old habits of deference to age and authority died hard, so it was Zettour who spoke first.

"If the people weren't so enamored of their retired warriors," he said, "I suspect we wouldn't be celebrating your own election today."

Rudersdorf nodded, acknowledging the point, while Lergen straightened up in protest.

"It's one thing to vote for somebody you admire," Lergen said, "but surely voters have a responsibility to consider the candidates' proposed policies as well."

Rudersdorf waved a hand in dismissal. "There's no point debating abstract theories or talking about what might have been. I need to decide what to do about this mess."

The two moderate right wing parties between them had about twenty five percent of the vote. Combined with Degurechaff's Germanian Workers' Party they would have more than enough to form a majority government. Both parties were at least tentatively open to working with Degurechaff, although they were nervous about her rather extreme proclamations during the campaign. The two parties had sent feelers out seeking Rudersdorf's opinion. Although they hadn't said so in so many words it was clear that they were willing to follow his guidance in this matter.

"The way I see it, you have two choices," Zettour said, his voice as calm as if he were simply describing his latest logistical plan. "First, you could lock the Diet into the stasis of a minority government and effectively rule by decree. Second, you accept the voters' decision and appoint Chancellor Degurechaff at the head of a majority government."

"Surely he can't accept Degurechaff as chancellor?" Lergen protested. "She all but promised to invade the Francois Republic!"

Rudersdorf held his tongue and listened with interest. He'd found during his time on the general staff that a vigorous debate between subordinates would often lead to valuable insights.

"Campaign promises are one thing, but political actions are quite another," Zettour replied, before pausing to puff on his cigar. "Degurechaff was never the kind of officer to throw her men's life away on a pointless charge."

"She's already violating the treaty of Triano," Lergen said.

"Oh?"

"She has control of a small computation orb production line," Lergen explained.

That made Rudersdorf sit up and take notice. He knew that Degurechaff employed most of her former aerial mage subordinates in her little group of leg breakers. From their storied performance in various street fights he had concluded that they were using civilian grade orbs to boost their fighting prowess. It stood to reason that she would want to get her hands on military grade orbs, but wanting and having were two different things. Despite all the rumors he had never seen any hard evidence that Degurechaff had managed such a thing.

"I'd heard rumors, but I was never able to discover anything concrete," Zettour said, echoing Rudersdorf's thoughts. "How did you find out so much?"

"Her damn secretary gives me a readiness report every week," Lergen said. "According to her latest report she's up to a full battalion of men who are adequately trained."

That was puzzling on two levels. First, it was strange that she would be so forthcoming about what was, in effect, a crime. Particularly with a stickler for the rules like Lergen. The more subtle puzzle was immediately apparent to men who were experienced with supervising the 203rd. They could vividly remember how in every after action report, no matter how glorious the victory described therein, then Major von Degurechaff had plead for more time in order to train her men up to snuff. It was hard to imagine what a battalion that she considered adequately trained would look like.

Zettour leaned forward and tapped his cigar against the ashtray sitting on the table. "I wonder if our President actually has two choices after all, then."

"What do you mean?" Lergen asked.

"Tell me this: if Tanya von Degurechaff were to declare the existence of her mage battalion and call for the overthrow of the elected government," Zettour began, "how much of the military would rally to her side?"

Zettour delivered the question in such a matter of fact tone that it took a moment for the magnitude of what he was saying to sink in. Rudersdorf found himself bristling in indignation, only for that feeling to subside into a sort of muted horror as he considered the matter in more depth.

If some jumped up corporal had had a bit of political success and decided to declare a putsch, Rudersdorf was sure he could have it put down. He did have years of experience in leading the Imperial military, after all. But a rebellion sparked by Tanya von Degurechaff was a different matter. She was a war hero and a leader of men. More than that, she had fought alongside her men in battle after battle, always pressing forward, usually to victory. The relationship between soldiers and the staff officers stationed at headquarters was necessarily rather distant. Rudersdorf wouldn't say that he could pull on the same bond of battle-forged brotherhood to which Degurechaff could appeal.

Ordinarily he would have liked to say that the traditions of state would keep the military loyal, but the previous government had spent years running the credibility of the federal government into the ground. In the face of a charismatic military leader-especially a leader who had the personal loyalty of a battalion of aerial combat mages-those chains of tradition binding the soldiers together were mere cobwebs to be brushed away.

"She wouldn't... no, she definitely would," Lergen said, his face falling as his own analysis seemed to run along the same lines. "Damn it, how did this happen?"

"Calm down. She's been willing to work within the system so far," Zettour replied, tapping his chin in thought. "I wonder just how far ahead she has been planning."

Lergen fixed him with a sharp glare. "Just what are you saying?"

"It's odd that she would tell the Secretary General about her own private army," Zettour said. "Unless she wants him to know... or wants us to know... what she could have done and still could do."

It was funny. The three of them had known Tanya von Degurechaff for more than half her life. For any ordinary young woman, you would say that they had seen her grow up. By all rights they ought to know everything about what made her tick. However, for some reason Degurechaff even at eleven had possessed a strong and fully formed personality. Even back then she had been the consummate Imperial soldier. Piecing together her thought process was more like determining the thoughts of a colleague than tracing the motivations of a youngster he had practically helped raise to an adult.

Even so, Rudersdorf thought he understood what Zettour was driving at here.

A message," Rudersdorf said, finally breaking his silence. "You play fair and so will I, something like that."

Rudersdorf still vehemently disagreed with much of Degurechaff's campaign platform. However, the picture Zettour was painting was very different from the maniac she appeared to be on the campaign trail. Anybody who could meticulously assemble such a potent force and then refrain from using it was too canny to throw away the country's future with a futile invasion.

Lergen turned to face him, clearly alarmed. "You can't seriously mean to-"

"Relax, General. I hardly intend to let her have everything her own way. If she proposes anything too outrageous I can always oppose her legislative agenda. Besides that, including some elder statesmen in her cabinet should help keep her impulses in check," Rudersdorf said, before turning to face Zettour. "I'll be troubling you."

Zettour smiled. "It will be my pleasure. After such masterful planning has brought her to this point, I can hardly wait to see what she has planned next."

Rudersdorf nodded in gratitude. In his heart he recited a couplet that he had repeated many times during the war: Tanya von Degurechaff was an unsettling existence. He could only thank God that she was on his side.