51. Suffer No Tyranny (Patreon)

"The tumultuous situation in Myanmar took another strange turn this morning as a group of armed women stormed and captured the capitol building, which they are now holding against the Myanmar military," the news declares, causing me to drop my spoon into my cereal. "News out of the country is sparse, but the following images and video were captured just this morning as the battle broke out."

"Tara!" I yelp, elbowing her in the ribs as she dozes with her head on my lap. "Is this you?"

She doesn't respond, or wake up. Shit. That means yes, doesn't it?

"Yes," Tara says suddenly, and I let out a shriek of surprise.

"T-tara!"

"Sorry," she says, giving me an amused smirk. "I didn't mean to startle you. But yes, that's me. All of it is me, in fact. Both the insurgents and the soldiers, so no one is actually getting hurt. I've already performed a silent takeover of the military and the government, this little show is for the rest of the world."

"You went all the way to Myanmar!? I thought you were in Africa!"

"I'm everywhere, sweetie," Tara answers dismissively. "And I decided Myanmar was an ideal starting point because it's a crisis zone needing immediate attention, but it's also been recently conquered by a military despot in a quite public manner, which makes it the ideal time to perform yet another takeover without the United Nations getting too upset about it. A bunch of women rising up to take over a country that has been engulfed in ethnic civil war since 1948? It's free PR."

Dread fills my stomach more and more with every word she speaks. She's doing good, I tell myself. She's my Tara, so she's doing good. Or… at least trying. But she actually went and took over a country, just like she said she would, and in order to do that…

"How many people did you kill?" I ask quietly.

The look she gives me is… complicated, to say the least. Desperation, sadness, annoyance, regret, frustration… all of it seems to bubble inside her at once.

"Why ask a question you know you'll hate the answer to?" she asks tiredly.

"Because," I tell her, "I still think I should know."

Tara sighs, turning away from me but nestling her head further on my lap.

"Thirty-seven," she admits. "Most of which I silently replaced with copies. It's been… a harrowing process, because these people are all bigoted megalomaniacal murderers that slaughter people like sheep while thinking they're doing a world a favor, and I've had to pretend to be them. Get into their headspace. Fool the people that know them best, most of whom are either similarly monstrous or their most common victims, typically family. But in doing so I sabotaged the military from the inside, halted violent operations against innocents and now I have ended one of the most abusive regimes in modern history. Myanmar will change today. It will continue to change until none raise their hands in hatred against their own kind."

"That… that's going to take a long time, Tara," I whisper.

"Well then it's a good thing I'm immortal," she answers bitterly.

"You don't have to do this," I tell her.

"And you don't understand what it sounds like to hear you say that," Tara shoots back. "Imagine if you saw someone getting raped right in front of you and I told you 'don't worry, you don't have to help them. Don't even call the police. It's fine. It's not your responsibility.'"

"That's not what I mean," I say firmly. "There's a middle ground between letting people get away with anything and… and becoming a serial killer!"

Tara turns back to stare me in the face.

"...Is that what you think of me?" she asks. "Do you think I want to be a murderer, Evelyn?"

"No, of course not. But that doesn't mean—"

"I feel like a murderer," she snaps, cutting me off, "when I sit back and let them slaughter people by the dozens. If I choose to watch and do nothing while they order another mass execution? That makes me a fucking murderer, Evelyn. Because I. Can. Stop. Them. So I do, and I will, and I always will. I don't do it lightly, Evelyn. I don't fail to agonize over how horrid it is. I don't stop looking for opportunities to guide, to teach, to help, and to imprison if I can't truly correct a person's behavior. But sometimes there's no time, and I can't solve a problem by throwing someone in a cell and making them disappear. They need to rescind an order, or redirect a violent force, or publically abdicate, or else even more people die. I don't want to be doing godsdamn moral arithmetic with lives, but if I had a better way, I would use it!"

She takes a deep breath, rubbing her face in exasperation.

"It's just… I just… I know it's wrong," she continues. "I know it's thirty-seven too many. But I can't do nothing. I can't. I'd go mad. Please tell me you understand."

I hesitate, not sure what to say. Unwilling to lie, but still wanting to reassure her. She's… she's really trying. And as much as it feels wrong to me, how can I chide her for it without an alternative? I lean over, sandwiching her between my belly and lap as I wrap her up in an awkward hug.

"I'm sorry," I tell her. "I'm not there. I don't understand. But that is why I shouldn't be trying to judge you. You're trying. I know you're trying. So… I trust you. And I hope that's enough."

"I hope so too," she answers. "Here goes something."

With a heavy heart I continue to watch the news, updates about Myanmar's continued deescalation trickling in over the course of the month. The news is mixed, but mostly positive: the country is still under military rule, but seeing substantially less conflict: military drafts have been removed (because Tara bodies comprise most of the military anyway), food and shelters are being supplied more evenly (because Tara is rapidly creating more of them), and the main conflicts within the country are occurring almost entirely because the military is being used to enforce punishments for corruption in both the upper class and itself (which is also obviously possible because it's mostly made of Tara). This all seems like great news, but Tara has been refusing to speak publicly as the new ruler of Myanmar and news out of the country is still fairly slim, leading to a lot of people assuming the positive information is simply being maliciously misreported.

"I have to say, it's very annoying that humans just… expect each other to lie all the time," Tara grumbles.

"Not speaking publicly or allowing communication is pretty suspicious," I tell her.

"Yes, yes, I'm aware," she grumbles. "The borders are closed for a few practical reasons that should hopefully become obsolete fairly soon. As for the internet, it has been a low priority. Service is down in the country because I'm replacing the private internet corporations with one run by myself."

"And that is… extremely suspicious."

"I know!" she snaps. "I know. But I'm not going to censor it or anything. On the contrary, I want the internet to be more free. Restriction of information is one of the main things my government did to oppress my people, so I want to ensure internet access is universal in the same way that water, food, and housing are. It's just… obviously far less important than those things, so it's taking a bit longer to set up."

"And the borders are closed because…?"

"Because I'm rooting out and systematically destroying the human trafficking industry as well as all the foreign influence attempting to fund my enemies, both of which are frustratingly widespread and prone to hiding away in areas outside my official control," she answers flatly. "And I'm not yet ready to make waves in those places."

"Oh shit, you have foreign spies and stuff?"

"It's mostly business-related, frustratingly enough," she explains. "I'm still performing trade—mainly by forcibly liquidating the assets of the upper class and using it to import materials needed for construction projects—but that's all carefully monitored and lacking much of the usual fringe purchases. Most of the pushback is coming from how I'm no longer exporting materials from the mines. Because the mines are fucking deplorable, and so is everyone that has ever participated in the horrid greed spiral that sustains them. Every damn diplomat that comes in about hoarding ten percent of the world's rare earth materials just makes me want to scream!"

Ah! Oh no, she's super mad! I'm needed in my official capacity!

"Tara, how many cuddles do you need right now?" I ask.

"...All of them," she growls.

I am happy to deliver. We head over to the bed and I wrap around her, making sure I have free access to her head so I can stroke her hair.

"Are you succeeding?" I ask. "Are things getting better?"

"...Yes," she admits, sighing a bit to let the tension out. "Slowly, so fucking slowly. But yes. They aren't all things everyone likes—gods, but some people truly hate them. But the people that don't like it are generally those in power, or those who want to abuse, and see abuses as justice. It's not… it's not that black and white, of course. I don't want to make it seem like it is. I… I'm a tyrant, Evelyn. I have to be. I'm making unilateral decisions for an entire culture and of course it's going to cause damage in places, but…"

She trails off, groaning with an exhaustion I can only imagine.

"You have advisors?" I ask.

"I do," she confirms.

"You occasionally listen to their advice?"

"I do," she smirks.

"Well, between that and the free unlimited internet access, you're off to a good start checking the evil overlord list," I note. She stiffens, so I quickly continue. "...Which is a good thing, actually? I mean, kind of? In this case. Um, the list is a joke about tropes. Common idiotic mistakes evil overlords in fiction make and how to not fall for them."

"Ah," Tara answers dryly.

"Sorry, I was trying to make a joke," I assure her. "I just… I wish I could help."

"You are helping," she promises me.

"Well, I wish I could help more."

There's a pause.

"I do, too," she answers softly. "But it is what it is."

I carefully stop myself from freezing up so she doesn't know how much that hurt me to hear.

Another month passes. Myanmar denies offers for humanitarian aid and demands to return to the global economy. Elsewhere, standards of living in poorly-developed countries slowly start to accelerate higher as a hitherto-unknown source of labor, food, and medicine likewise accelerates, enough for the world to take notice. Something strange is happening on a global scale, and for once the conspiracy nuts that insist it's aliens are correct.

One singular alien, anyway. An individual multitude.

Tara, Alex, Sam, Sasha, Thomas and I all sit together in the university common hall, brought here at Tara's behest.

"So what's all this about?" Thomas asks.

"The ruler of Myanmar is going to break silence, border control, and internet restrictions today," Tara explains. "I figured you'd all want to watch the news when it breaks."

"Uh… and why do you know this?" Alex asks.

"Because she's the ruler of Myanmar," I explain with a sigh.

"Ohhhhh, holy shit," Thomas says. "Okay. That's… wow, okay."

Tara turns on the television without speaking, flipping over to a news channel that she no doubt knows is about to air whatever she wants us to see. As she has for quite some time, she just seems tired.

"—which has finally been lifted today, allowing reporters into the country which have, until now, been firmly repelled at the border," the reporter drones. "Through satellite imaging and what little information has been moving out of the country, it has been clear that Myanmar has been performing large-scale construction projects across the entirety of of its borders, but the videos we're receiving now are staggering. Massive infrastructure changes seem to have revitalized the nation, and many countries are now clamoring to learn how Myanmar managed to make such a large change in such a short amount of time. The new ruler of Myanmar is about to host a press conference, in which we'll hopefully get answers to these very questions."

"Will they?" Alex asks Tara dryly.

"They will," Tara confirms. "I intend to be upfront about almost everything, except the extraterrestrial thing. Mainly because I believe it would cause more doubt in my sanity than anything, and anything I do to prove it would be… poorly received, I believe. But we'll get there. Hopefully sooner rather than later."

My eyes stay glued to the television, stress pressing on me like a vice. I probably know more about what's happening right now than any other person outside Myanmar, and in some areas I know more than even them. Everything Tara has been doing makes me uncomfortable, but I still can't deny that it sounds like a net good. It's just so terrifying.

The news finally shows the conference, the camera centering on Tara's face. It's so strange to me, the way I can recognize her just by the way she carries herself, her determined stare, even when she wears the face of a completely different woman. None of her human faces are her real face, after all. …Except in much the same way, all of them are real.

"I am Tleshkinat Tarakanora," she begins, and I note with surprise she dropped the 'Se Ktahn-Hashlenesa' that normally goes at the end of her name. Probably to match our first name-last name structure. "I know all of you have questions about Myanmar, ones that I intend to elucidate today. Our borders are once again open, and in just a couple hours communications with the rest of the world should be back online, including unrestricted internet access to all citizens. I won't be the only person you can ask questions to for much longer. But before we can get into how the geographical region of Myanmar has changed, I think it would be best to discuss why it has changed."

I doubt most people will catch her wording there, but I certainly can't help but notice she said 'geographical region.' Not 'union,' not 'country,' not 'nation.' Geographical region. Tara doesn't intend for those other things to hold significance for much longer.

"Myanmar changed," Tara continues, "because someone had to change it. Someone had to decide that nonstop war and human rights violations would not stand. And yet the world ignored this. The people of Earth hid behind their borders and said 'this isn't my problem.' And so Myanmar continued to suffer, as countless around the world still do."

My lover sighs, the pressure of a planet escaping her breath.

"I decided," she tells the world, "that I could no longer stand by and watch it while still being a person I could respect. And even with all the work I have done here, that is still true. So I warn you, Earth: I will suffer no tyranny except my own. Each and every one of you will be decent to your fellow man, or else you will be made to be."

And with those words, the world changed.