The paladin exemplar paused, chewing his lip in thought. Thaddeus had never seen him do that before. It gave the eldest paladin an aged and feeble air completely at odds with what he knew of the man.
Pulling his eyes from whatever inner vision he'd been considering, McKinnon looked to Levin.
"We may need to make some adjustments," he said, then nodded once, slowly. "But pending any discoveries to the contrary, I see no reason not to pursue this course."
Thaddeus could tell the old soldier wasn't sold on the idea. However, McKinnon would continue to give his exarch the best counsel he could—which in this case meant keeping an open mind.
"Too bad you didn't come forward with this earlier," McKinnon said to Thaddeus, his tone cold. As rebukes went, Thaddeus knew he was getting off lightly.
"I did not anticipate anything like Fortress," he repeated. Truthful, though the next was a blend. "I had scheduled this meeting before the vote to discuss this as an option in dealing with a civil war I didn't expect to reach crisis level for another six months."
McKinnon nodded—not pleased, but accepting the explanation on face value.
The exarch relaxed visibly—not the posed relaxation of a moment before—and rose from the wingback chair.
"Tea?" he asked his paladins.
13
Sportsmen's Club, SolarisCity
Solaris VII, LyranCommonwealth
22 October 3135
Tommy Gunn thumbed the credit chit the waitress offered. ignoring the shot of cleavage she'd bent an extra ten degrees to offer along with it. Tips were included in his membership fees and it was going to take more than a half acre of valley view to pick up an extra percentage. Unaffected by her parting flounce, he leaned back, fingers idly turning the glass by its rim on the little table built into the arm of his chair as he surveyed the room.
The MechWarriors had their Valhalla Hall, where they did whatever it was MechWarriors did when they weren't strutting about in their great machines. The gamers of Solaris VII—the owners and agents who made the world work—had their Sportsmen's Club. The gambling public saw the arenas and thought that was what Solaris VII was about. Those who understood knew the Sportsmen's Club was the true heart of the Game World.
Around him on shallow tiers rising in gently concentric arcs were similar chairs, some arranged in pairs or small groups, facing a wall of holovid screens. The central screen showed the key exchanges in real time as they unfolded—that was the feed that went out to the hotels and subscribers and lesser gambling centers. Smaller screens ringed around the central screen tracked individual scrappers or developing—potential side bet— situations. Stats for scrappers on each team flanked the wall of images, while a ticker across the top ran continuously updated odds and side bets.
Tommy could have seen all these data and images from his office terminal and been really relaxing in his much better chair. But then he would have missed the important information.
He sat a few rows back, able to keep an eye on the action around him as well as the screens. Stable scouts, bookies, serious money bettors, and other agents in similar chairs watched the match run its course, arranged singly or in pairs or small groups. No tourists here; everyone in the room was in the business. Some, like Tommy, feigned relaxation; others leaned forward, tracking the action and the stats closely; a few spoke quietly, comparing notes.
Behind him were the team owners, guys and gals who didn't have the vig for a full stable but sponsored individual teams. Or even, in some cases, individual scrappers. Solo matches were scheduled for after the current match. Low-level ownership was the poor man's entry into the glamorous world of gaming. Tommy never looked their way. He wasn't interested in the poor man's entry into anything.
He did nod to Simien Fox. Professional, no smile; the old guy hated suck-ups. Fox was seated by himself, as always. Or always now that he had driven off all the agents and promoters who'd courted when he arrived a few months back. And there'd been a few. The man's credit checked out six ways from golden and story was he was looking to do some heavy investing. But so far he hadn't parted with a sou.
Dismissing Fox and his unattainable wealth, Tommy watched the watchers, taking note of who was taking notes on whom.
On the big screen was a jungle setting, part of the original Liao Arena soaking under typical SolarisCity monsoon weather. After the Blakist destruction of the pyramid that had once housed their arena, the Capellans had chosen to repair only those sections that shielded spectators from the elements. Tommy didn't know if the jagged, half-ruined structure was supposed to be a monument or a warning—either way he didn't like it.
Five of the Liao Arena screens that should have been showing individual scrappers had overviews of the terrain. That was five scrappers out, four of them with Hombres Stables.
Prime-time scrapper match and his boys and girls were doing good.
Squad-on-squad infantry matches were not the big moneymakers—nothing without BattleMechs was. But matches like this one, an ad hoc team of scrappers showing their stuff against an established stable team, were the bedrock of the sport. Or maybe the nursery, because this was where careers began.
Yulri and Jazz were the core of this squad of young turks—all new clients Tommy was bringing up into the pro ranks. The current mix wouldn't last long as a squad; too much testosterone in some of the bucks to let them cooperate. But all of them were looking at futures with established stables.
And every stable contract provided a finder's fee and a guarantee of one percent of the scrapper's lifetime earnings to the agent who brought him in. Individually it wasn't much, but after thirty years of hustle. Tommy was doing all right.
Maybe not all of them were ready for the stables. Tommy winced as one of his new boys fell for a misdirect and took a burst of automatic fire in the chest. Too eager by half.
No such problem with Jazz. She'd learned her lessons the hard way.
Tommy nodded as she rose out of a hole the Hombres' scout had just cleared and slit his throat. Okay, drew a bright orange line from below his left ear to his right with the edge of her marker blade, but the effect was the same.
She'd come up with the slash, right in front of him inside the arc of his assault rifle. A moneymaking move, sure to be on the daily highlights coverage. From the look on the corpse's face, he was going to need new underwear before he met the public.
That knife work was new, something she'd picked up from the Clanner. With her small size Jazz had always been a shooter, keeping her distance. The Clanner had taught her some inside moves, stunts like the one she just pulled, that most scrappers couldn't pull off. Because most scrappers didn't have her speed.
With five Hombres scrappers down. Tommy didn't even watch the screen. Hot side bets were on how many kills Yulri would rack up. He could have made some money there if he'd been willing to lose his license over some inside betting. He'd asked his two stars to hold back a bit so they could evaluate the new talent.
He'd already turned down a couple of very solid offers on Yulri and Jazz—individually and as a pair. The two had had some good write-ups in the gaming press. Some idiot had tagged them "Cat and Mouse"—thank God that hadn't stuck. A good nick could boost play, and more importantly betting, by boosting fan recognition. A bad one like that could cost money for the same reason.
He had no intention of parting with those two. He was going to keep them independent—at least through next year's championships. They were going to be the core of a new scrapper team—them and maybe one of the kids in the match with them now. Get a team together—no ownership, no out of pocket, strictly agent's commission— nursemaid them through a championship win, then negotiate a juicy contract with one of the big stables. That was the plan. The road to comfortable retirement was paved with good package contract residuals.
The Lynch Stables scout was hot on Petrie. The kid was a hell of a sniper—or would be with some polish. And Lynch Stables would be just the place to give him that needed luster. About time fo
r a long-term contract.
Tommy rose languidly, leaving his untouched drink. Adjusting his cuffs as he strolled, the agent moved in for his own kill of the day.
* * *
"I keep meaning to ask," Jazz said, throwing herself down on the imitation mohair couch he'd allowed the decorator to talk him into renting. She propped herself on her left elbow, her right leg stretched across the cushions, the other foot on the floor.
No way she was getting up fast from that position, Tommy thought, which made her the most relaxed he'd ever seen her. Until he noticed her right arm draped casually down her hip. Her wrist had to be resting on the butt of that damn hideout twelve.
No sudden moves, Tommy boy.
"Ask what?" Tommy asked. He let his eyes rest for a moment on the framed two-d portrait of his nieces as he settled behind his desk. Those two smiling faces always relaxed him. As did the memory foam of the executive chair as it conformed to his aching back, its heaters kicking in to suck the tension away. This he had bought.
After his traditional prowl of the perimeter, Yulri had seated himself in one of the winged neoleather guest chairs. Some Clanners put on the laid-back and arrogant air; this guy went for the alert and attentive pose. At least with his feet under him he didn't try to pretend he was relaxed.
"Are you called Tommy Gunn because you talk fast?" Jazz asked. "Or do you talk fast because you're called Tommy Gunn?"
"My name is my name and I talk like I talk," Tommy gave his standard answer. "No connection."
"Tommy Gunn?" Yulri asked.
"A five-kilo submachine pistol," Jazz explained. "Threw eleven-millimeter slugs; subsonic."
"A cumbersome and inefficient weapon," Yulri observed.
"The Thompson submachine gun was the first of its kind; the original assault rifle," Tommy said, aware he sounded defensive. "Twelve hundred years ago it was the meanest thing on the street."
"Ah." Yulri sounded unimpressed.
Tommy could see the wheels turn as the Clanner worked out the connection between an automatic slug gun and his own speech patterns, then dismissed the entire topic.
"Tommy, we make our second million and I'll give you an original," Jazz promised.
"You'll give me twenty percent," Tommy corrected. "You want to buy me anything out of your cut, that's up to you."
"It is time we became more serious," Yulri said. "Arrange combat in the full-contact arenas."
Whatever Jazz had been about to say died on her lips. She swung her right foot to the floor, coming up straight and ready on the edge of the couch, her eyes fixed on Yulri.
She didn't see that coming.
"Why?" Tommy asked. "Sure it's more money if you win. but it's not worth the risk. That's for flash-and- burn performers, not talent with the long-term career potential you two have."
He didn't bother to add that he didn't represent the wackos who played full-contact. Twenty percent of dead wasn't worth his time.
"There is no benefit in testing myself against athletes in a sport," the Clanner answered. "I am not encountering warriors."
"Jazz here—"
"Enters every match ready for death," Yulri finished. "She is a warrior."
"Good to see you pay attention," Tommy said. "What you're talking about you see in the top contenders, the kind of contenders you two are. You're not going to find it in the desperados and hard cases who go for the snuff matches. Stay the course you're on and you'll be up against the kind of opponents you're looking for soon enough."
"How soon?"
Tommy thought for a long moment. Not that he needed to—he had the rosters and spreads calculated at all times—but he wanted to remind the Clanner who was the authority in the room.
"Four months," he said, adding two to his estimate. "Five, tops."
"That is not soon enough," Yulri said. "I must test against the best Solaris VII has to offer now."
"It doesn't work that way," Tommy said, uncorking hothead legend-in-his-own-mind reality-check speech number one. "If you want to prove yourself in the arenas of Solaris—"
"I have no need to prove myself," Yulri answered. "It is the warriors of Solaris VII I must prove."
Tommy felt his jaw unhinge. Of all the damned Clan- ner arrogance—this took things to a new level. He turned to Jazz, wanting a witness to the overwhelming hubris, and got another shock. She was staring at the Clanner, too, but with eyes bright like the joker had just revealed some shining truth.
"You want to run that by me again?" Tommy asked, turning back to Yulri. "Slowly."
"I am trueborn Wolf, a MechWarrior," Yulri answered with some of the sincerest arrogance Tommy had ever seen. "I was a Star captain of the Steel Wolves before leaving them to come here."
Tommy's negotiator reflexes caught a note in the Clanner's voice, a slight deflation of the ego in that last phrase he couldn't quite place. He glanced at Jazz and was not surprised to see her still rapt.
"I was told this was a world of warriors," Yulri was saying. "But I find too many games players. I need to know there are true warriors to be found. That I have not . . . wasted myself ... in coming to Solaris."
With that he seemed finished. He sat, feet flat, hands on chair arms, and looked for all the world like he'd just stated the obvious.
"Let me see if I got this straight," Tommy said. "You don't need to prove yourself in the Solaris VII Games. Solaris VII needs to prove itself to you."
Yulri didn't twitch, which Tommy took as confirmation that he had it straight.
There you have it, folks. Clanner attitude in a nutshell.
"Then the answer's the same," he said. "Stay the course you're on and in four months you'll have earned your way into—" What was the Clan term? "The circle of warriors." Close enough.
"If that is the course I am on," Yulri answered, "then I did not choose wisely."
Tommy didn't say a word, giving the big man time to add two plus two.
"I am a MechWarrior," Yulri repeated his earlier claim. "Is the way to this circle of warriors quicker if I were to fight in a BattleMech?"
"Sure," Tommy answered. "Once you earn your way in. Which is impos—"
"Arrange a Trial of Position." Yulri cut him off.
"Say again?"
"A Trial of Position," Yulri repeated. "Against the champion of one of these stables of warriors."
"You mean an audition," Tommy answered. "Those alone aren't easy to come by."
"The local name is not important." Yulri dismissed the objection. "And I have come to respect your bargaining acumen."
"It will take time to arrange," Tommy said, rather than point out the foolishness of the Clanner's position. "In the meantime . . ."
"We shall continue as we are," Yulri agreed, rising.
"Jazz?" Tommy stopped the girl from following him out.
Murmuring something after the departing Clanner, she strolled back and took the neoleather wingback chair he'd left.
"No," she said.
"No what?" Tommy asked.
"No, I didn't know he was going to say that. No, I didn't know he was a MechWarrior." She counted the items off on her fingers. "No, I don't think losing him as a scrapper will ruin your dreams of the thirty-six championship. No, I am not really a MechWarrior, too."
She grinned, which—surprisingly—looked pretty. "Did I leave anything out?"
Tommy shook his head. He didn't want to spoil her fey mood, but he didn't see any way around it. She was a contender and he was her agent. She'd already had enough rocks thrown at her and, for both their sakes, he had a responsibility to warn her in time to dodge another.
"If I didn't know better," Tommy said, "I'd think you had more than just the hots for that Clanner."
"Trying to figure how to get twenty percent of that?"
"Nah. Just don't want to see a good meal ticket screw herself up."
Jazz looked at him with both her eyes. Hard. "Meaning what?"
"He's a Clanner," Tommy said as though that explained everythin
g. "Trueborn. He got hatched from a bottle along with a dozen other copies."
"What the hell does that mean?" Now her eyes weren't just hard, they were mean.
Tommy adjusted his position, like that would help, and pressed on. "Those military types that bugged out on the Star League when things got tough needed raw labor when they set up their new worlds," Tommy said, knowing he was repeating common knowledge, but buying time, giving her a chance to see the setup. "They couldn't have done it naturally, even if they'd spent all their time rutting like rabbits."
"In vitro fertilization, artificial wombs," Jazz supplied. "Cut to the chase, Tommy."
"Even picking and choosing which sets of DNA got together, probability would have turned out a random mix of individuals, just like real people," Tommy said, careful not to rush. "Not the uniform uberrace they got. I don't care what they say about cloning being taboo or whatever. The only way that bunch of deserters became all those Clan supermen is finding some they liked and turning out clones in gross lots."
"And you are an expert on Clans how?" Jazz asked, her voice dangerously low.
Tommy flicked a glance at the portrait of his nieces to steady his nerves.
He knew it would take more than telling Jazz a truth she didn't want to hear to push Jazz over that edge. However, he could see some soft-tissue damage in his immediate future if he couldn't make her understand he was helping her.
"I'm here because my grandparents saw the way the wind was blowing," he said. "They got their daughter off Unzmarkt before Yulri-boy's Wolf Clan hit.
"They had people on Solaris VII and sent along what should have been enough money to take care of her. But Free Rasalhague scrip was worthless after the Clans finished with the Republic. And the people here weren't as good as they'd hoped.
"My mother grew up working the streets of SolarisCity." Tommy kept his voice level, letting the words work. "And she grew up an orphan because the Wolf Clanners slaughtered the Unzmarkt Free Rebels after they had surrendered.
"Not just the soldiers. They destroyed a dam, drowning thousands of civilians after they had won as an object lesson—to prevent further resistance."
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