The Law is Passed
30 June 2024
Tyberian Palace, Bingol, Packilvania
The beige facade of the Tyberian Palace and the lush greenery that filled its manicured gardens made the edifice seem more comforting and less imposing. As birds sang in the trees and visitors sat on the benches, the day seemed jovial.
In reality, the day was not as jovial within the Palace’s walls. The chambers of the Legislative Council were abuzz as the vote on the Friendship Act was called. In the lobbies, some members of the Iganarian and Ashurian delegations (the self-styled Conservative Caucus) tried to convince members of the other delegations to vote against the act. Despite Princess Yadika and the Dicastery of the Conviction’s attempts to convince them, both in the public hearings and in private discussions, the Conservative Caucus was resolutely opposed.
Last minute attempts to add amendments and convince other delegations to vote this way and that came to a halt as the Secretaries of Parliament summoned members to vote. Unlike other laws, the Sultan did not explicitly express an opinion on the law, distancing himself from its implications. This allowed the Legislative Council and the Executive branch to debate the act within themselves and between each other without his interference.
This gave the delegates the space to address the act without bias or imperial pressure, enabling the law to stand on its own merits. With that in mind, the executive and conservative delegates negotiated amendments to the law from the form that was initially proposed (see here for the summary of the original proposal)
Minor changes were introduced such as requiring that only people who had known each other for at least a year and had witnesses to their friendship were eligible to register as best friends. This would make it complicated for Prince Abuyin and Jasper as most of their relationship had been a secret and the majority of the witnesses were arrested, disappeared or dead. But that was a constraint that the Department of State Security would figure out and a compromise that Princess Yadika could live with.
Prince Ajhar, the Chairperson of the Legislative Council struck his gavel against the wooden block on his desk, calling the delegates to order. He read the title of the act and called the vote. Some delegates had not attended so as to avoid being associated with either position or because of other circumstances such as personal leave and business trips. But fortunately there were enough members present to make sure that the session was quorate. Despite absentions and rejections, the law passed with 56% of the votes, a tight call by Packilvanian standards.
The law was sent to Sultan Thumim who signed it that very day, with enough time for the law to be published in the Government Gazette, making the act official. Now the Department of State Security had the difficult work of proving that Prince Abuyin and Jasper Ray were friends. The first problem was getting Jasper to be proven innocent of attempting to assassinate Sultan Thumim and pin the whole plot on Prince Kujil.
Proving that Prince Kujil had orchestrated the assassination plot was not difficult. The Imperial Procuratorate had the evidence that he organised the bomb that destroyed the Behayeen Bridge, hired the assassins, and bribed military officials to give the assassins access. What the court also needed to know was motive. Although his outrage at Thumim not pardoning him for corruption was a likely motive, the reality was that he had agreed with the rest of the Farayn, a club consisting of himself, Prince Lohadek (Minister of State Security) and other powerful people to do it so that they could get Abuyin to inherit the throne before he came out as gay with the intention of removing him from the throne quickly.
For Prince Lohadek, this admission would expose the fact that he was complicit in trying to get the Sultan and Prince Abuyin killed. This was a prospect that he could not allow. But the situation was too delicate for him to just kill all the witnesses involved and be done with it. It was also unlikely that anyone would believe that he had pretended to agree knowing that he intended to foil the plan.
The State Security Department decided that they needed to admit some of the truth. Firstly, they needed to admit that Jasper and Abuyin met each other at a beach party in the Oan Isles. They needed to admit that they tried to start a business together. They would have to get Prince Abuyin to pay a civil settlement with the Oan government for violating its laws when trying to do so.
They would have to admit that Prince Abuyin and Jasper Ray met up in Kuter Kebir, Free Pax States. Luckily, it would be impossible to prove that any of this amounted to homosexual activity. They were reasonably sure that the government of the Free Pax States would not cooperate with the Imperial Procuratorate’s requests to interrogate citizens or collect evidence if it decided to open a case on the grounds of homosexuality should Prince Kujil include that as one of his motives for plotting the assassination.
Even if the homosexuality charges, assuming they arose, didn’t stick, it would cast a pall over Prince Lohadek and remove whatever trust existed with the Sultan. Although he revelled in the victory of passing the law and his department’s competent handling of things, it was becoming apparent that he would have to fall on his sword to save everyone else; his time in the government was coming to an end.