`Warrior Girls' by Bill Etem
Chapter 6. `In that day the LORD will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; the one who is feeble among them shall be like David, and the house of David shall be like God.' - Zechariah 12. 8-9.
After everyone and everything had been transported across the Dankole, they continued their march along the road heading north and slightly westward. At noon Seraphinaria decided to break for lunch, an informal affair where everyone threw blankets on the snow by the side of the road and then plopped themselves down while some of the kids began serving lunch. Heliomirabellisima and her kids were resting on their blankets by the side of the road, like everyone else. Being wakeful and energetic - 3 hours of walking was nothing to her - and with no need to shave her beautiful legs as they were already shaved silky smooth, Heliomirabellisima was in the mood for reading, conversation, and perhaps some idle contemplation and aimless daydreaming. Indeed she was soon half-asleep and daydreaming, as her mind drifted back to the most recent time that she, and the rest of them, their kids included, had conversed with the Queen of Avallonia. It was just two weeks ago, in the City of Rosen, just before the purchase of Al Mancini, when the Queen, Her Majesty Dr. Rabbi Brittany Cohen-Schwartz, the Beautiful, the Benevolent, the Most Merciful Sovereign of Avallonia, the Supreme Representative on earth of God and God's True Church, B.A., Ph.D., MBA etc., etc., was down on the carpet, sitting on her rump, while taking a break from her sit-up exercises. She was wearing a tightly fitting silver spandex t-shirt and tightly fitting black spandex short-shorts. Casilevatates could find some cellulite on Her Majesty's thick powerful thighs, and there was a very pronounced spare-tire of excess flab bulging around her mid-section. To be perfectly honest, this ring of flab round her mid-section was enormous. However, her Majesty’s face was extremely cute, and there wasn’t all that huge of a double or triple chin on the Queen, and, it has to be admitted, her mid-sectional embarrassment was something that could befall any slim girl who might cave in to temptation, who might treat herself to 1,000 extra jelly donuts over the span of a few months.
`As you know,' began Her Majesty as she sat on the carpet, as she looked up at all 31 of them surrounding her - again this was before Al Mancini joined them - `I was able to get rid of those regents 5 years ago and become Queen at the age of 17 by aggressively promoting a platform of cutting and running from these wars which have been raging for over five decades now. But, while I would advise you not to embark on this dangerous mission you are so intent on, nevertheless, as the hostility of our northern enemies seems intractable, and as you are resolved on avenging the deaths of your fathers and husbands, I feel it is not my place to forbid you from going. So I'll authorize your mission. And there are some political inducements which prevent me from ordering you not to go. Last year I thought the Pro-War faction was on its last legs and was about to collapse completely, but there has been a Revivification in the Pro-War faction, such that this crown which sits on my head, while it may look stable, is actually not so stable. I can't force you to stay home because the Revivified Pro-War faction would conspire with the Anti-Divine Right of Kings faction and they would soon have my head on a platter if I prevented heroes like you from fighting the enemies of Avallonia. But I wish you wouldn't go! If you do go however - then I want you to contemplate the horrors of war. I might seem like a silly woman doing her silly exercises, but face some simple facts for a minute. Our Hibernian enemies compound the usual horrors of war with their innate savagery and the accomplished barbarism of murderous fiends who refine their cruel methods ever more hideously from generation to generation: they pull men limb from limb with the aid of horses; they set women on fire and howl with the glee of demons as these women are slowly burned alive; they throw little children into cages full of huge hungry bears or the most ferocious tigers etc., etc. So, again, I plead with you to stay home! Don't go. I mean, who in their right mind would go? But, if you insist on going, I can only wish you good luck. Let me make one last appeal to you. For heaven's sake don't go! Stay here! Go back to school. Take a yoga class. Go to the beach and walk on it. I know you demand vengeance for your deceased husbands and fathers, but think how wretched and depressed you will feel when they toss you into a cage full of man-eating tigers that will claw you to pieces while they rip your arms and legs off in their jaws….I can see you are unmoved. You're brave women and children. Not to be rude but, do you think, maybe, you got more guts than brains? No? I'm wrong? You're not going to reconsider? Well reconsider it anyway.'
Her Majesty was still down on the carpet. She was on all fours now, and she was performing curious exercises whereby she would extend her left leg and her right arm, so both were sticking straight out, well above the floor. Then, while she arched her back as much as she was able to, she would start chanting, almost shouting, "Say no to flab! Say yes to a lean Queen! Say hello to a slim new Sovereign! Say no to big slabs of cheese cake! Say yes to yogurt! Say no to Boston Cream Pie! Say yes to carrots and celery! Say no to huge cinnamon rolls!" Then, after perhaps 30 seconds of chanting, she pulled in her left leg / right arm and extended her right leg / left arm, arched her back and began a new series of incantations: "Visualize Success! Make your dreams come true! See them materialize! See yourself in that bikini! Visualize It. Believe It. Achieve It. Do It For Me Your Majesty!'
When these performances were completed Her Majesty rolled over and sat on her big bottom, her thick legs extending straight out in front of her, her arms and hands behind her back now to prop up her belly roll and her plus-sized bosom. Then she began to do some crunches to strengthen her abdominal muscles, but she couldn't do more than 7 of these before fatigue did her in. Her Majesty again addressed the company of the warrior women and their 22 children.
`I want you ladies, along with you little girls and little boys, to do my bidding on some matters of seemingly minor importance, but au contraire, they are very very important. You are under strict military orders to keep up with your logs while you are in Avallonia. But don't take the logs with you when you leave the country. Cache them in a place where you will remember to find them later. If you are arrested in a foreign country we don't want any enemies finding these logs. More importantly, every night, before you go to sleep, while you are lying in your blankets or your sleeping bags or whatever it is you have to stay warm when you are in the wilderness, I want you to look up at the moon and the stars and say the Formula for Empowerment, and it goes like this: "I will be the best that I can be most certainly. I will give 100% effort every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year of every decade of every century." Say this Formula for Empowerment a few times before you go to sleep, and say it before you get out of bed in the morning. Also, promise me you will do one more thing. If you should hear a wolf howling at the moon, then you too howl at the moon. You don't have to howl too loudly - you could whisper your howl if you wanted to - I suppose a clever person could find a way to whisper a howl - but the important thing is to howl in your own unique and individualized way. Doing this will help you to feel more at home in the wilderness, and the success or failure of your mission might hinge on how much you feel at home in the wilderness. I mean if you are always bitching about the cold you might get so distracted you might get eaten by enormous cave bears. And getting eaten by cave bears would cause you to fail in your mission, and I don't want you to fail in your mission, though I still wish you wouldn't go on this mission. Why can't you heroes do something heroic here at home?'
Queen Brittany had by now gotten off the floor and was now trying to touch her toes, but her belly-roll / spare tire were causing her to fail in her mission. But she kept trying as she addressed her audience.
`I have a vertical management structure in my dominions,' Her Majesty was saying this while she was bent over, so all they could see was her upside down backside. `That means I am like an authoritarian Managing Director of a big impersonal corporation and you are my obedi
`Goodbye Your Majesty,' said Seraphinaria.
`Goodbye, keep me informed on everything.'
Everyone said good-bye to the Queen as they departed from her royal work-out room in the Royal Palace in the city of Rosen.
Chapter 7. `If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch, and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.' - John 15. 6