Mia and her Chancellor 2 - Another Romantic Short

Seitz Your Reward

Isabel Seitz sighed. She had done so too often lately, but couldn't help herself. "Man hat's nicht leicht."

"Aber leicht hat's einen. Whenever you start spouting Swabian 'wisdom', I know that things are bad. What's going on?" Margret asked.

"Clean up isn't going as well as it should," Isabel grumbled. She had started an international program to simplify laws and standards—one not connected to the EU bureaucracy, but bilaterally ratified between neighboring countries with amiable visions for a common future.

The principle was simple: compare different implementations of a certain subject, evaluate which one was best—or simplest—and then present a unified version for all interested states.

Essentially cleaning up the mess of European laws and standards and anything remotely related to it. And with legal traditions dating back to the Roman Empire—there was a lot to do.

It was a popular program—businesses that operated across borders loved it, further simplifying the common european market, and even average citizens found some merit in not having to worry about breaking a law just by doing whatever it was they usually did across a border that for all intents and purposes barely existed anymore anyway.

Chancellor Seitz knew how to sell her politics, and a global vision suited the modern, global human. Most definitely her Germans, and their European neighbors. No big trouble exploiting this.

But progress wasn't fast enough for her taste, and while minor victories here or there were nice, big, expensive topics like standardized rail systems just seemed too far out of reach.

Politics were tough.

"Smoke some of the weed you legalized to 'adjust our standards' to the Dutch," Margret suggested.

Isabel rolled her eyes. "That was a necessary concession. But I'd still rather not. I have enough vices already."

Margret sighed. "Look, I'm not telling you how to do your job, but you can't have expected that the French would just tear up thousands of kilometers of rail lines and build them to German standards because you said so."

"Of course not! Not that they'd have to. Well, the Spanish might. But the real mess are different power systems. They could have agreed that a selection of new lines would be build to our standard, along with a small portion of their network being converted each year. In exchange for money. The Dutch and Danes didn't mind and the Poles might soon agree, too." It was a very complex topic, Isabel could admit in her own mind. But she still felt that that was no excuse for dragging one's feet.

"So do what you usually do; sell your idea to enough of the small guys that at some point the big ones won't have a choice but to go along with it anymore. Worked for the European army, worked for that internet market thing you did a while back, worked for—well, you'd know better than I do."

Isabel slumped onto her desk. "But it's so tedious! If we did it the other way around for once, we wouldn't have to hold a dozen of meetings that just go over the same old topics a dozen times. It'd just happen naturally."

Margret chuckled. "Now you are just ranting. You know that's not how it works. If it did, there would be no reason for a Chancellor Seitz, and what would you do then? Someone's too tired and grumpy right now to think clearly."

"Maybe," Isabel grumbled. "Much as I like cleaning up our first world problems there's more going on in the world; and I don't like being too distracted back home. For all the bureaucratic crap in Europe at least we are at peace. Nobody's starving. Economy's doing okay. Planet's falling apart but not for a few decades yet. And we aren't currently committing any atrocities, for once in our history. I'd really like to pay more attention on more pressing, more serious concerns for a while, but nothing's getting done here without constant hand-holding." She paused. "And not even the gay kind of hand-holding!"

"I'd let you mope a while longer about politics being politics, but I actually came by to tell you that your 'love box' updated."

"Oh!" Isabel's whole face lit up; the tension leaving her posture. Even if she wished the cloud folder she shared with Mia would be called something less—embarrassing. But she wasn't about to gripe about that, now. "You should have said that sooner!"

"Pah. You need to grumble a bit occasionally, so I let you."

"Play it again," Sandy demanded.

"Just put it on loop," Isabel suggested, as Mia once again crawled across the screen. "I'm loving this."

"Brilliant idea, honey. Wouldn't mind watching a series of these," Margret added, keeping her eye on the screen. "Interesting act she picked, too."

"Wouldn't read too much into that. Little Mia enjoys playing with her cameras, no doubt about that. Doesn't mean she'd actually enjoy this sort of play," Sandy cautioned. A fantasy was just that, after all. Enjoying a hypothetical scenario didn't necessarily mean enjoying the actual act.

"Probably true." Isabel got up. She needed a moment for herself.

"Where you going?"

She already was crossing the room. "Where do you think? She deserves her reward. Now."

"Oh," Margret exclaimed. Then clapped applause. Some respect for Mia's achievement seemed warranted, even when she wasn't around to experience it.

The others joined in. Then they laughed.

Life was best when it was fun.

"Come on, press play already."