Reka's Point of View
Dressed rather more conservatively than was usual for her, Reka led Brad by the hand to their meeting. She didn't find her outfit disagreeable, far from it; that said, the understated women's business suit with knee-length skirt made her feel a bit stuffy. The secret part of her, the part that got a naughty thrill from showing skin and stoking Brad's desire, would just have to bear with it today.
Pausing at the threshold of Janos Magyar's office, she turned and checked on her husband, er, soon-to-be husband. Reka had been calling herself Brad's wife in the privacy of her own thoughts months before it would be official. Surely, no one could fault her for indulging thus.
Brad looked neat and tidy, more than presentable for meeting the Prime Minister, though they had made love that very morning. Reka cupped his cheek and surreptitiously checked that the earpiece Galiban provided was discrete and secure. She trusted Brad to mostly be able to follow the Hungarian conversation, but it never hurt to make sure.
The doors were opened for them and attendants pulled out chairs and laid out refreshments. Janos Magyar rose to his feet.
"Your graces," he said, inclining his head politely.
Reka smiled and gestured for them to be seated.
Janos Magyar was a nondescript man of medium height and build with brown hair and rimless spectacles. He could've been anywhere from early thirties to early forties as the people of this world reckoned age. The fellow came highly recommended by Galiban for his loyalty, was one of her most ardent defenders on Natter, and had been a civil servant prior to being recruited to lead her party.
"I am pleased to inform your grace that Orszag's cowardice before the election facilitated his coalition's total collapse. Your Loyal Future party shall have the supermajority we require to alter the Fundamental Law as you see fit," he informed her.
Reka squeezed Brad's hand in triumph. It was as she foresaw, queen without a shot fired. The "Fundamental Law" or "constitution" had provisions for a prime minister who actually governed as well as a president who acted as a ceremonial head of state, carrying out the duties of a temporary "constitutional monarch" in most respects. It would be a simple matter to replace the office with a hereditary queen. With Janos handling day to day affairs, she could even maintain the "constitutional" fiction for a time.
"I congratulate you, Mr. Prime Minister, though I suspect our plans will not be easy to implement all at once. While all is arranged I can begin providing crystals immediately. The necessary tooling is still in my possession, thankfully," Reka said.
Janos looked a little uncomfortable. "Your grace, with the recent chaos, I'm not certain we are in a position to pay you. We'll have to pass a budget before any reform of the Fundamental Law, and the reports from the United States are disturbing. All your company's assets were seized."
That wasn't precisely true, though she didn't bother gainsaying him. "Yes, I'm afraid Regency, my old company, is quite lost. You need not concern yourself overmuch; my household has sufficient funds for the foreseeable future, and I wasn't planning to charge for the crystals in any case."
The Prime Minister leaned forward. "You would simply give them away?"
"For my country, my people, why not?" Reka asked rhetorically.
Janos adjusted his glasses and held his chin in thought. "Still...transitioning our electrical grid will come with costs, even if the crystals were free."
This wasn't America, Reka realized. Americans had infinite dollars to throw at things like this. The Hungarian forint, sadly, was not quite on that level. What to do?
"Have you ever been to Norway?" Brad broke the introspective silence. They both turned to look at him. His accent was still quite thick but he was understandable. Reka was pleased to see that Janos was shocked Brad could speak Hungarian at all.
"I've been to Denmark once, but never Norway, your grace," he said politely, taking care to speak slowly and clearly.
"It's a rich country," Brad said. "When I was a sailor we'd stop there sometimes to buy fuel for our backup generator, just in case the nuclear reactor ever went down. The whole country is rich because of oil."
Janos stared at him blankly. "I'm not sure I follow, your grace."
"They have a...have a..." Brad searched for the right word, "sovereign wealth fund," he whispered to Reka in English. She immediately translated and Janos Magyar's eyes lit up.
He stood up excitedly. "I hadn't even considered that. We are also a small country with a low population that has access to a huge amount of energy. It could be an investment, not just for Hungary but all Europe! So our king is wise!" he praised.
Reka didn't particularly like that he sounded so surprised at Brad's wisdom but this wasn't the time for acrimony.
"Not just fusion," Brad continued, looking at Reka, "but robots, drugs, everything Regency used to do. They could be national industries run for the benefit of everyone, just like how Norway uses oil." He lowered his voice and spoke the next part in English just to her. "Honey, maybe we've been thinking too small. You don't need a company when you have a country. They're about to put a crown on your head. Think about it."
She leaned over and kissed him, heedless of what the Prime Minister might think. Brad was right, of course. A plan was already forming in her head. Once Galiban was able to arrange the smuggling of her old team out of America they'd all have jobs to do.
Stacy, their accountant, could be assigned to the "sovereign wealth fund" while Julie could continue her pharmaceutical research with Galiban. They hadn't actually managed to get a product to market but that might've been to the good. Weight loss pills would provide solid returns, and Reka had been informed the formula could be easily reworked to target cancer. The world would wonder at their miracle cures!
Perhaps mind acceleration pills? She wanted to tightly control the number of people who knew she could do magic so Reka couldn't risk performing the ritual for everyone who worked for her. Mind pills would provide acceptable cover.
Their engineers, Andy and Olivia (and perhaps Brad if he got bored), would be assigned to a robotics development program to enhance the productivity of Hungarian industry.
With practically unlimited fusion power and a robust focus on robotics and automation, Hungarian manufacturing would be the most competitive in Europe, perhaps the world.
Brad could be assigned to negotiating foreign direct investment; he was so talented at making proposals. Everyone would want to build factories in her country! Her love had mentioned something about Chinese electric vehicles competing with Elron Trask's junk. That might be an avenue worth pursuing.
"Send out a call for volunteers," Reka instructed the Prime Minister. "My team will forward a plan to you for completely transitioning Hungary to fusion power. We'll need labor, skilled and otherwise. Once things are in motion we can discuss constitutional reform and from there my coronation."
She looked at Brad fondly. "And the royal wedding, of course."
*******
Brad's Point of View
"Andy, my man!" They hugged on the tarmac. He was the first of their team Galiban was able to bring here.
"Things are crazy in America, dude," Andy said, looking around at all of Brad's guards in bemusement. "My parents had to move back to Korea, good thing Galiban was able to hide most of the money in crypto; they would've taken everything otherwise."
Brad had heard. The robot factory in San Guillermo was gone, sitting idle in legal limbo while Rainforest and Maxwell lawyers fought over it. It wouldn't be nearly as productive without Galiban running critical systems but it was still a big loss. It sucked to realize how much had been taken from them and how they really had no way to strike back.
Since that magical day in Stardust City Reka had produced approximately seventy fusion crystals. That would amount to seventy gigawatts of cheap, clean energy, though about half of that went towards replacing old coal plans and not new capacity. Still, the American economy was booming off of all that energy and the new AI systems that were running on it.
Just have to do the same here, Brad thought, but the right way, not the greedy way.
Reka had shown him how she made the crystals, which was crazy. From what she said, having sex supercharged her magic. Brad didn't know how he felt about that, but he was about to be married to a succubus, so this was just one of those things he'd have to get used to, like being the King of Hungary. Seriously, how could he possibly explain his current life to his past self? There was just no way.
After sex Reka focused all the energy into her engagement ring, which glowed so bright he couldn't look at it directly. He could've sworn he'd seen her ring glow before but usually wrote it off as the big diamond catching the light.
Guess I wasn't imagining it, he thought.
Then she would dip the ring into a little black box, the same one the ring came in, as a matter of fact. Once the box was "full" she'd put one of the crystals they'd made at Stardust City inside and use the magic to stabilize it. The stabilization ritual looked like a psychedelic storm raging in the palm of her hand, totally surreal.
Four a month, Reka had told him, more after they got married and she could also use her wedding ring.
Needless to say, making enough crystals for tiny Hungary, a country the size of Indiana, took no time at all. They left the conventional nuclear power alone for now and focused on replacing the coal and natural gas. It was too easy.
"So who are all these Asians?" Andy asked as they toured a new plant. "Koreans?"
Brad laughed. "Sorry dude, Chinese. We made a big deal with China. They're helping us make plants designed specifically for the fusion crystals, no more repurposing old coal plants. The grid itself has to be reinforced, too. We're gonna need a lot more juice."
The whole world had come to them, hat in hand. No matter what Blimp or Trask said on Natter, no matter the bullying or the threats, Reka had the crystals, and everyone wanted them.
Changing the constitution and scheduling Reka's coronation took months so they had plenty of time to really build. The energy of it all was intoxicating. People really had hope now, hope that tomorrow would be better than today, and it was all thanks to his wife.
Sample crystals had been sent to China as well as Germany, Poland, Austria, and Czechia so far. Any ruffled feathers about Reka overthrowing Orszag (who had been lowkey hated by the rest of Europe) were easy enough to smooth over with such a powerful incentive. Hardly anyone objected when the day of her coronation was finally set.
When the day came Brad was sitting down in the ancient Mathias Church, wearing a pseudo-military uniform and surrounded by all manner of foreign dignitaries.
"Looking forward to the ceremony?" asked an old man in excellent, if accented English. Brad had mostly been speaking Hungarian in his day to day activities at this point so the English gave him a bit of a jump scare.
"Er, yes," he agreed. "Brad Regis," he introduced himself, offering a hand. "I don't think we've been introduced."
The old man smiled but it didn't reach his eyes. "No introduction needed," he said evenly, shaking Brad's hand. "Ivan Leonev, Minister of Foreign Affairs." The old man looked at him knowingly. "For Russia."
Brad wanted to let his hand go but the Russian held on.
"Strange, isn't it?" The Russian said conversationally. "Henrik Orszag, a friend of Russia, is overthrown and replaced by a woman married to an American Sailor. Now all of Europe is looking to replace Russian oil and gas. Curious."
Brad didn't like the old man's tone. "And?" he questioned sharply.
"And America wants the world to believe you are at odds with Washington." He dropped Brad's hand. "The Anglo Saxons are clever, but Russians are hard to fool. Enjoy the ceremony, Brad Regis." He walked off, not bothering to wait for Brad's reply.
The old man left a bad taste in Brad's mouth, but this was Reka's day. Ivan Leonev wouldn't ruin it.
After a little more waiting his beautiful fiancee, his queen, approached the altar. She was wearing a gorgeous golden gown with a royal mantle on her shoulders. The priest, or maybe a bishop, handed her a scepter to hold in one hand and an orb in the other. He raised the crown aloft for all to see.
There it was, the crown, the Szent Korona, the Holy Crown of Hungary, the Crown of St. Stephen, with its distinctive cross hanging at an odd angle.
Brad had learned a lot about it in his few months here. Every King of Hungary had been crowned with it, with an exception or two if he recalled the history correctly. Normally, even women were crowned "king" in Hungary but Reka had insisted on "queen" in the new constitution.
Her voice, resonant in Mathias Church's perfect acoustics, took the coronation oath and he could hear every word clearly. She swore to uphold the constitution, the liberties of the people, and the territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Hungary. She never looked more beautiful.
At last, the bishop placed the crown on her head and she rose to her feet. This was right. This was good. This was how she was always meant to be.
She turned to the cheering crowd, favoring her subjects with a slight smile.
This is the woman I'm going to marry.