Natural Selection

by Michael A. Stackpole

  But Nelson had allies in inertia and the moon itself. As the Stinger slammed into the ground on the right side of its chest, the medium laser in its right hand flew up and away in pieces. The 'Mech itself, with armor shards dropping away like scales from a lizard, rebounded from the collision and almost became upright again. The pilot, had he remained alive or conscious after the landing, might have been able to stabilize the 'Mech and brace it against the dolmen into which it had sailed. As it was, the 'Mech smacked straight up against the huge rock, then both rock and machine wavered and fell down, toppling onto their backs like mirror images.

  Throughout the crater Nelson saw other bandits shooting at Wolf Clan 'Mechs. Some of the Wolves had advanced, but most had ended up like the two that charged at the Red Corsair. One core group of heavy 'Mechs was shooting back without moving, but only their beam weapons had any effect. The missiles and projectile weapons, not having been recalibrated for the lower gravity, consistently shot high.

  The Red Corsair hit a button on her console. "Corsairs, pull back."

  Nelson hit his intercom. "Pull back? The battle hasn't even begun."

  "Unless the Wolf commander is even stupider than you could imagine, the battle is over." She stepped her 'Mech backward into the canyon as a missile impacted against the crater walls high above her. "I am turning now. Watch our back."

  Nelson used a round dial to spin the holographic view so that their rear area appeared dead-center on the display. "Covered. Both rear lasers operational. But why is the battle over?"

  "The commander knows that we will pick his forces apart if he follows us into the canyons. This is not the sort of battle he bargained for. He has lost some light 'Mechs, but they can be repaired. If he presses the attack, he might lose more substantial machines and we might even sneak in and take some of the damaged machines away from him. He could never stand to have that happen."

  "It sounds like you know the Wolf commander well."

  She shook her head. "Never even heard of him, but I know his type. We tricked him here. We will not get the better of him in this way again, but we will best him. He will be wondering what we are up to in the future, and that will count for a very great deal."

  29

  DropShip Lugh

  Apex Recharge Station, Santana

  Federated Commonwealth

  3 August 3055

  Khan Phelan Ward frowned at his cousin. "I think I am missing something here, Chris. Your reaction to my denying your request to send your battalion to Yeguas is grossly out of place."

  "Is it?" Chris pointed to the holographic display of the Yeguas system hovering above the briefing table. "When the bandits arrived, the Wolves reported that they had showed up at a pirate point near both Cue Ball and Yeguas III. You yourself said they were going to be burning in too fast if the bandits should decide to skip out instead of letting the Wolves ground for a battle. Had you permitted, my battalion could have jumped in and kept them from getting to their JumpShip. It seems like you don't want the bandits caught after all."

  Phelan said nothing and forced down his anger. When he spoke, the words came in a neutral tone, but he bit them off sharply, giving both Dan Allard and Christian Kell ample warning of his darkening mood. "First off, cousin, I did not prevent you from going. I am not in command of this operation. Colonel Allard made that decision, but he gave weight to my request to let the Thirty-first handle most of the problem. When we drew lots to see where we would station ourselves, they got Yeguas. Had you gotten Yeguas, I am certain the Thirty-first's request to help you would have been similarly denied."

  The Wolf Clan Khan rose from his seat and stared at the other man across the table. "I do not like the implication that I am not anxious to catch these bandits. I want them destroyed more than you know."

  "That is not apparent by your action, or inaction, cousin." Chris folded his arms across his chest. His shirt sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing a riot of tattooed colors decorating his left forearm, but Phelan could not make out the full design. "I think you are operating from a hidden agenda that will ultimately culminate in the resumption of war between the Clans and the Inner Sphere."

  Phelan shook his head vehemently. "That's ridiculous. I am here to do just the opposite."

  "Are you?" Chris turned to where Dan Allard remained seated at the head of the briefing table. "Fact: the bandits are making our military units look stupid. Fact: they're using tactics against us that we used against them with great success. Fact: all that's needed to reignite the war is for a Clan unit to pass over the truce line, and these bandits are halfway there—with another Clan unit hot on their tails."

  Phelan slapped his right hand flat against the table. "There is no proof the bandits are a Clan unit."

  "Ha! Look at their equipment. Look at their tactics."

  "If we look at equipment, Chris, the Kell Hounds are more of a Clan unit than the bandits. Unity, the Hounds have better equipment than the Thirty-first Wolf Solahma. " Phelan leaned forward and the computer painted part of the Yeguas system on his throat. "You yourself said the bandits employed Inner Sphere tactics, which makes them highly atypical of any Clan unit. I'll not deny there are Clan renegades among the bandits—and they may even be running the operation, but this pirate band is no Clan unit."

  "Is not, or just that you don't want it to be?"

  Chris's question caught Phelan off-guard and sent a little jolt through him. Could the Red Corsairs be Clan and on a covert mission to disrupt the truce? If so, why masquerade as bandits? Even as he pondered the question, an answer slowly formed in his mind. If the unit pretended to be bandits, they could continue their raiding spree while the rest of the Clans built up a desire to fight against the Inner Sphere again. When the unit crossed the line they could openly declare themselves Clan, fracturing the peace. The Inner Sphere would respond en masse, never believing the fake bandits had operated on their own. If, on the other hand, the bandits had come in as a straight military unit, the ilKhan could have repudiated them and forced the offending sponsor Clan to disown them or else face trouble in the form of a Grand Council.

  And the Jade Falcons say the bandits originated in Wolf Clan space. If the raiders are Clan, the Wolves will be blamed and the UKhan's efforts to keep the peace will look like the most hideous betrayal of the Precentor Martial and the Inner Sphere.

  Phelan shook his head. "Your question has no meaning, Chris. The bandits have not declared themselves Clan, we have no evidence they are Clan, nor has any Clan claimed them. To decide, in absence of fact, that they are Clan is to complicate matters unnecessarily."

  "I don't believe that is true. Look, the raids are helping promote the general impression that Victor Davion is not effective as a ruler and that he cares more about the Federated Suns than he does the Lyran Commonwealth. Ryan Steiner is gathering together a coalition able to exert considerable pressure on Victor. There is nothing that would better serve the interest of the Clans than instability in the government of the Federated Commonwealth."

  "Chris, listen to yourself." Phelan sighed heavily. "With the evidence you've just presented, we should surmise that Ryan Steiner is behind the bandits because he benefits more from their raids than even the Clans do. In fact, with the bandits making the Wolves look like morons, you'd think that would bolster up the morale of the Federated Commonwealth and its people."

  "Gentlemen, I think you are ranging far afield here, and it does us no good." Dan waved both men back to their chairs. "Chris, Phelan had good reasons for denying the request. Because of the movements of the other moon around Yeguas III, the nearest pirate point you could have jumped into was two days out at a two-gee burn, and that's only if your navigator could have sold Janos on letting a ship try for that one. And even if you could have gotten in, you couldn't have jumped back out for a week after that. The safer and better site would have been four days out, but in either case, the bandits could have returned to their ship and jumped out without you ever getting a sho
t at them."

  "Chris, it would have been worth a shot, if the Thirty-first Wolf Solahma had not been there to see you get tricked."

  "Our being there might have prevented them from being chewed up."

  Phelan shook his head and laughed, "Chewing did them some good."

  Chris stared at him and Phelan wondered if he'd suddenly grown horns and a tail. "My God in heaven, you have truly become one of them, haven't you?"

  "What are you talking about?"

  "You. You're one of the Clans." Chris shivered. "You let warriors die on Cue Ball as though their lives were worthless."

  "The Thirty-first only lost two pilots."

  "But you couldn't have known that going in." The mercenary looked at his cousin with disbelief. "Do they know you consider them disposable?"

  Phelan stiffened. "Certainly, in just the same way you told Zimmer's Zouaves they were meant to be flypaper." He saw Chris wince as the remark hit home. "I don't consider the men and women of the Thirty-first Wolf Solahma expendable any more than you see any of your people that way. Yes, they may be warriors reduced to hunting bandits, but they are people. Even if they believe dying in combat is a fitting end to their lives, I do not."

  "Then how can you say gnawing is good for them."

  "You are right, Chris, I misspoke." The image of Conal Ward floated before Phelan's mind's-eye. "Their commander is an old adversary of mine. All the things you attributed to me a moment ago you can tattoo on him and he would not mind at all. He did everything he could to prevent me from winning a Bloodname, including cheating in a sacred Clan ritual. As a result he was forced to resign from his position as Clan Loremaster, and had to accept duty as the head of a bandit-hunting unit. Because his hatred for the Inner Sphere nearly equals his hatred for me, he was assigned to destroy the Red Corsair and I was assigned to be his immediate superior."

  Phelan chewed his lower lip for a moment. "I doubt that Conal learned humility from being embarrassed by the Red Corsair, but I can hope. What is important is that he had his shot and he missed." He took in a deep breath and looked at Chris. "So, if you think I'm working with a hidden agenda, I guess I am. I want to see peace maintained. And the best chance for it is if the Kell Hounds dust these bandits while Conal's folks prove ineffective. That will weaken his position and help discredit his allies—all of whom oppose the peace."

  Chris frowned in puzzlement. "I am not sure I understand."

  "It is simple, actually. The Clans are split into two factions—the Crusaders and the Wardens. The Crusaders want to take over the Inner Sphere and become its rulers under a reborn Star League. The Crusaders are a minority in the Wolf Clan, but Conal is one of them. The Wardens, on the other hand, believe their mission is to protect the Inner Sphere. Though we predominate in the Wolf Clan, we are the minority in Clans such as the Jade Falcons and Smoke Jaguars."

  "For all that your ilKhan is a Warden, he seems to have almost accomplished the Crusader goal." Chris punched up a larger star map that showed the wedge the Clans had driven down into the Inner Sphere. "The Wolves were the cutting edge."

  "And the ilKhan negotiated the peace with ComStar. He had to be in front to stop the juggernaut, and he succeeded." Phelan traced the border area between the Federated Commonwealth and the Jade Falcon occupation zone. "The same kind of unrest you report here in the Commonwealth is happening within the Clans. The ilKhan faces pressure to abrogate the truce and press the attack. The bandits seem determined to show how weak the Inner Sphere is. If the Kell Hounds can crush the bandits, we'll put a lie to the myth of the Inner Sphere's vulnerability. It may not be enough to stop the pressure, but it will bleed much of it off."

  Chris looked at Phelan curiously. "You said 'We'll put a lie to the myth.' Does that mean you consider yourself one of the Inner Sphere now?"

  "By 'we' I meant those who realize the insanity of renewing the war." Phelan offered his cousin his hand.

  "And, just so you know, joining the Clans did not include repudiating my family. You can trust me, Chris, as I trust you."

  Chris shook the offered hand, but Phelan still saw doubt in his eyes. You're too suspicious, Chris, but maybe that is what kept you alive in the Combine. Phelan thought for a moment and nodded to himself. If Conal is playing some sort of game, your suspicion might keep us all alive.

  Dan Allard smiled as the two men broke their grip. "I assume, Phelan, that you had more in mind than a family reunion when you originally asked for this meeting."

  The Wolf Clan Khan nodded. "Aside from giving us solid readouts on the Red Corsair's 'Mechs, Yeguas showed us two things. The first is that the bandits don't seem to have aerospace assets. They did not use any to cover their DropShips headed out to get the tribute, nor did they use any to maul the Thirty-first. That leaves them very vulnerable, especially if we can ambush them as they come in on a run on a system."

  Chris nodded, but his expression changed to a frown. "We could hide aerospace fighters in a DropShip in an asteroid field or behind a moon, but that would require knowing in advance where the Corsairs are going to be and where they will appear in that star system."

  Phelan smiled triumphantly. "That's the second thing. Using the data we've collected concerning their arrival points, cross-correlating it with system data and the catalog of their pirate points that Janos Vandermeer has put together, we've isolated what is probably the program they are using for navigation. By running selections through a copy of that program, and selecting targets based on the parameters they appear to have used before, the list of candidates for their next attack gets damned tiny."

  Dan leaned forward. "How tiny?"

  Phelan stabbed a finger into a star in the starfield map. "Zanderij is their next target. And when they come in, we'll be waiting."

  30

  Solaris

  Federated Commonwealth

  17 August 3055

  The assassin briefly debated whether or not he would have to kill Judith Calley. Though she knew him only as Chuck Grayson and apparently suspected nothing amiss, she might have picked up unconsciously on clues that could come back to haunt him later. After the time he had spent as Karl Kole, keeping so much to himself, the intimacy of their relationship was a welcome contrast. All the passions he had kept pent up as Kole erupted in their affair.

  He realized that continuing to spend time with Jude was dangerous, but he forced his worries away and locked them in the dark recesses of his mind. He was not working, so his normal level of caution was not necessary. He could fully devote himself to becoming Chuck Grayson. He got pleasure and a sense of belonging unlike anything he had ever known when he made his approach to Kai Allard-Liao's managers and was rebuffed. Ronda slowly began to sour on Allard-Liao because of the way they treated Chuck, and John accepted him into the fold once his failure meant Grayson was no longer a threat to John's domination of the group.

  He felt normal and even more than that. He could, of course, never forget who and what he was, but it was becoming easier to distance himself from it. He willingly engaged in heated debates about who had really been behind the death of the Archon and whether or not Prince Victor had killed his father. After seeing the first of a series of interviews Victor gave the media, he even took to defending the Prince. This did not make him overly popular with some folks from the Lyran sector of the Federated Commonwealth, but those from the Federated Suns area often bought him drinks and invited him to visit them in their homes if he ever got out that way.

  For nearly a month he thought very little about work. Indeed, he had earned enough from the hit on the Archon that he'd never need to accept another assignment. That had, in fact, been his motivation for taking on the Archon's assassination, but as time went by, he began to feel the urge to work again. He was definitely enjoying his time as Chuck Grayson, but he was not Chuck Grayson and the person he was needed another job.

  The same part of him that had urged caution at his slipping into the Grayson persona shifted and immediately began to argue
that he should not look for a new job. The assassin realized that part of his urge came from all the theories concerning Melissa's death that were running wild. Everyone, from a mad florist to organized crime, to Kurita assassins to Recom-terrorists, had been credited with the kill—everyone except for him! That buffeted his ego, yet revealing his identity to soothe his bruised ego was a short road to ending up dead.

  On the other hand he knew that performing another hit might give those in the know, the Intelligence Secretariat and other similar governmental bodies, enough clues to realize that a very good assassin was at work. Actually, he told himself, it wouldn't be the clues, but the lack of them that would key them to the fact that the Archon's assassin had struck again.

  Ego overruling logic, and thumb covering the camera lens that would record his picture, he called a message drop from a payvis. He'd compiled an identification code based on the combined date, time, and temperature divided by a constant that only he and the computer at the other end of the line knew. He punched in that code, then hit two buttons on the visiphone console, feeding the computer the access number for the booth where he sat. He then severed the connection, looked at his chronometer, and waited.

  If he had any messages, the computer would call back. He would have to enter a new check code and he would be given the message or be connected with one of his contacts who could give him details of any prospective employment. If no call came within five minutes, either he had no messages or it was not possible to make a connection with the other party wishing to speak with him.

  He glanced at his chronometer, then read the public access newsbytes scrolling up on the idle screen. Kai Allard-Liao had successfully defended his title yet again. His string of victories had long since eclipsed the mark set by his father and even the one established by his father's mentor, Gray Noton. As with almost all the stories concerning the Solaris champion, the writer speculated that he might be leaving the Game World soon to pursue other endeavors.