All was quiet in the corridor outside the Emperor’s office. A young sentry studied the elaborate floor tiles, trying to stay alert as his shift wound to a close. Across the waiting room the secretary was shuffling papers. The sentry, an up-and-coming officer named Bronzar, glanced at his watch. Fifteen minutes until someone arrived to relieve him. He was in no hurry; it was a great honor to be posted at the Emperor’s door.

A loud buzz came from the intercom, followed by two shorter buzzes. He looked up in surprise. That was the Emperor’s emergency signal. Bronzar’s lightning quick reflexes propelled him into the office before the startled secretary was halfway across the lobby.

Emperor Xeres was hunched over his desk, taking rapid, shallow gulps of air. He occasionally had asthma attacks, but Bronzar had never heard such strained wheezing. Xeres was clutching his chest and neck, his eyes shining with panic.

Bronzar rattled a string of orders into the tiny radio in his sleeve. The Emperor’s complexion was becoming distinctly bluish, but no amount of gasping would get sufficient air to his lungs.

"Try not to panic, sir." Bronzar came around the desk and put a hand on his shaking shoulder. "Help is on the way."

Later he found out it had taken less than two minutes for the medics to arrive, but at the time it seemed like hours. He tried to get the Emperor to tilt his head back while the secretary waved air in his face with a folder, but nothing helped.

Xeres convulsed with a fruitless gasp, making the startled secretary step back. A cough ripped his body, expelling what little air remained in his lungs. His eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped forward into the sentry’s arms, unconscious. Bronzar and the secretary were in the process of easing him to the floor when a full team of palace medics exploded into the room. They stepped into a corner and watched as the medics did their work. Vast cases of instruments and medications burst open and an assistant readied an oxygen tank.

"He’s not breathing," said one.

"Oxygen!"

"Here."

A medic strapped a plastic oxygen mask over the Emperor’s face, and a faint hiss indicated the release of air.

As this was being done, another medic announced, "Pulse faint and erratic."

Others began calling out measurements from other monitors. Bronzar wasn’t a doctor, but he could tell by their tone that the numbers weren’t good.

"Stretcher!"

Before the medic was even finished giving the order, the others had the Emperor’s limp form on the stretcher. As they prepared to carry him from the room, Queen Vizada raced in.

"Xeres! Oh, honey, no!" she yelled, rushing past the medics to her unresponsive husband. "Oh my gracious, what happened? What’s the matter? Is he all right? Oh, Xeres! Somebody do something! Xeres!"

Bronzar firmly but respectfully pulled her back from the stretcher. "They’re doing all they can, Your Excellency. Please, you must stay out of their way."

She squirmed, was unable to free herself, and began to sob hysterically.

The medics took only the necessary equipment and ran out of the office with the stretcher. Vizada, barely restrained by the guard, followed on their heels.

The Emperor’s wife dimly realized she was hysterical, but her only concern was her husband. The ambulance was doubtlessly going as fast as it could, but she found herself screaming at the drivers to hurry. They surely heard her despite the wailing sirens, but they gave no indication. Medics clustered around Xeres, shouting orders and using instruments she couldn’t identify. This certainly wasn’t the first time the Emperor had been taken to the hospital due to respiratory problems, but he had never lost consciousness. She struggled to catch a glimpse of him through the cluster of medics, but only his feet were visible. Black suit pants with tiny pinstripes, shiny black shoes, a glimpse of dark socks...

Helpless and afraid, Vizada closed her streaming eyes and issued the most earnest prayer she had ever made.

Vizada paced the length of the waiting room, defying all attempts by the guards to calm her. She had been unceremoniously thrust aside as the doctors worked on her husband. Now she and her worries were confined to a private waiting room down the hall. Sweat dampened her white blouse, her heart throbbed in her chest, and her limbs smoldered with adrenaline.

"He’ll be all right," she told herself again, like a mantra. "He’ll be all right. He’s had these attacks before. He’ll be all right. He has to. You can’t die. Oh, Xeres. You’ll be all right. Please, Xeres, be all right."

She stumbled shakily on a corner of the gray carpet, and an alert guard immediately steadied her. Renewed tears poured forth, and Vizada allowed herself to be lowered into a chair.

"Mother!"

She looked up to see her oldest child, Crown Princess Vazali, hurry into the waiting room. She must have made the trip from her country estate in record time. Her tall, slender form was dressed in a long-sleeved purple gown that floated around her ankles as she walked. Waves of chestnut brown hair framed her face and spilled down her back. She carried herself with such confident grace that she seemed older than her twenty-five years.

Vazali knelt and exchanged a tight embrace with her mother. Her face showed rivulets of recent tears, but she was composed now. Vizada clung to her daughter and shook with helpless sobs.

"What happened?" Vazali asked.

Through her tears, she managed to stammer, "He just stopped breathing, I guess. I mean, he had been having some problems this weekend, but I didn’t think--" She descended into uncontrollable weeping.

Vazali pulled a chair close and patted her mother’s heaving back. "It’s okay, Mother. You don’t have to talk. But please try to calm down. You’ll make yourself ill."

Vizada accepted her handkerchief and managed to quell the worst of her sobbing.

Vazali dabbed at her own cheeks with a tissue. "We’ll just have to be patient. I’m sure the doctors are doing everything they can."

But even as she said this, a grim-faced Lanarian in a white coat appeared in the doorway.

Vizada stared at him as he approached through blurry eyes. A madman with a knife could not have produced a more terrified expression on her face. Vazali put a shaky hand on her shoulder and watched the doctor with equal trepidation.

"I’m sorry," the doctor said quietly.

Before he could elaborate, Vizada lunged at him, shrieking, "No! Don’t you tell me my husband is dead! Don’t! Try harder! Do something! He’s not dead! He can’t be! There must be something else you can do! My Xeres is alive! He is! He has to be!" Vizada pounded her fists at the hapless doctor, but the guards pulled her back and held her in her seat. Vazali embraced her but gave the doctor a pleading look.

Shaken, he made a helpless gesture and stammered, "I-I’m sorry. He was gone before he got here. There was absolutely nothing we could do."

"NO!" Vizada screeched, tossing her head back. As she did so, there was a rushing in her ears, and sudden blackness closed in.

"Mother!" Vazali called as Vizada toppled forward. The guards’ watchful hands cushioned her fall, and the doctor knelt to examine her.

"She’s all right," he said after a few moments. "Just fainted."

Vazali sat back and closed her eyes in sorrow and denial. A crushing weight rested on her chest. Father...

The deep voice of a guard jarred her back to reality. "Milady?"

She forced herself to open her eyes. Six guards were gathered around, regarding her gravely. "What?" she said, her voice tight with barely restrained tears.

"You do realize what this means, Milady."

She breathed sharply in recognition as the guards moved as one, dropping to their knees. With bowed heads, they proclaimed, "Long Live Empress Vazali!"