“All I’m saying is . . . well, there’s time for that later. Never mind, son. Never mind.”
Still, Harrison chuckled to himself for a few moments, long enough for the engines to light off and gravity to suddenly press both men back into their padded chairs. Gravity slowly climbed up toward a full, Terran-standard G as the DropShip fell down over mankind’s birthworld, trapped now by the planet’s irresistible pull. The meridian between night and day—or, actually, twilight and true dark—slid by as the DropShip powered through its deceleration burn and easily, smoothly, rolled onto its back. The darkened sphere dropped out of the ferroglass window, leaving only a handful of stars peering through the faint blue-black of upper atmosphere.
And a bright white-hot flare, like a tiny sun, drifting along the same entrance vector.
“Coming in awfully close to us.” Julian reached for a switch on the comms panel. “I’m surprised Streng is allowing that.” Riccard Streng, Harrison’s spy master, usually concerned himself with security service demands as well.
Harrison caught his wrist in a large, strong hand. “No need to bother Riccard.” He nodded at the drive flare of bright, eye-searing fusion flame. “That’s ours.”
Julian looked askance at his uncle. “The Ribald Song? Came after us from New Hessen?” Except for a lance of damaged vehicles, the only other thing aboard the Song had been salvage from the Hiritsu left-behinds.
“Not exactly. No. I sent the Song back to New Avalon. That would be the Markeson Pride.”
Julian leaned back, staring at his prince with a certain amount of caution. “That is a DropShip from the First Davion Guards.” Julian’s honorary command.
“Yes. I believe so.”
And it trailed along with the prince through Republic space? With no hint of its presence? Harrison’s calm, confident gaze told Julian that the prince was neither reckless nor witless. But an answer certainly escaped the champion. “Should I know what the Pride is doing here, dropping onto Terra?” he asked carefully.
Harrison simply raised pipe to lips and puffed more cherry-blossom tobacco over his private bridge. “I believe you should,” he said.
Secrets were indeed a game for princes.
14
News of The Republic’s death has been greatly exaggerated!
Paladins are on top of the panic on New Aragon, and, I assure you, the exarch is well and Geneva still stands. As does Terra. This April Fool’s campaign was not only ill conceived—it also was reckless and criminal in the extreme. Suicides and riots notwithstanding, the least charge I would level at the perpetrators of such a fraud would be aiding and abetting the enemy, to sow discord at such a time as this!
—Knight-Errant Raul Ortega, A Public Address, Achernar, 4 April 3135
Terra
Republic of the Sphere
8 April 3135
Jonah Levin stood in the window alcove behind his massive desk, waiting on the arrival of ComStar’s First Precentor. Hands clasped behind his back. Shoulders braced up. Swallowing dryly as he stared down at the tent city that had claimed Magnum Park for the past two weeks.
Today, one way or another, it ended.
From this height the people were not much larger than ants come to a picnic. A dangerous view; better if he could be down among them. Talking to those he ruled, as he might have tried to do only four months before when he had been a paladin, and not exarch. Perhaps he’d have tried it anyway. Today, even, if not for the new security concerns.
Reaching out, he traced a circle on the cold, smooth glass around a flaw chipped against the outside. In a vehicle windshield, it would have looked like a rock chip. But he knew it for what it was. He’d been standing here two days ago when it happened, after all. And Jonah had seen bullet scores against cockpit shields enough times to recognize this one.
Someone had tried to kill him. Again.
A shot from the trees, half a kilometer away. One hell of a shot, really. The assassin hidden among the press of demonstrators, protected in his escape by the inability of Jonah’s people to secure a perimeter. How did one contain a mob thirty thousand bodies strong?
Very, very carefully.
“Come on. Here I am again.” He looked out over the formerly peaceful expanse. “Take your best shot.”
Nothing. So Jonah relaxed, and watched over the preparations as Geneva’s public security force took their places at several strong positions around the park. Platoon-sized units with their backs against the capitol building, against the Terran Archive Center across the way, against one of the many forested stands making up the park’s famous walk of the Trees from Every World. They wore black riot-squad uniforms and full-body shields. Carried water cannon. Tear gas canisters and rubber-coated billy clubs hung from their belts. It didn’t take much to imagine tomorrow’s headlines.
Exarch’s Stormtroopers.
The Battle for Magnum.
It was all coming apart at the seams. The Republic. Devlin Stone’s dream. A solution had to be found to patch things back together, if it was not already too late.
“It’s not going to be easy,” a powerful, deep voice shattered the silence, “what you have to do.”
Jonah had left the door to his office open, but still the sudden arrival of Brian May startled him. Steeling himself against any show of nerves, the exarch glanced back over his shoulder as if merely checking the time of day.
First Precentor May stood next to Jonah’s chief of staff and all-around majordomo, Héloïse Montgolfier. Two people could not have looked more different, regardless of the difference in sex. Héloïse’s red hair was bobbed just beneath her ears in a sensible cut that needed little attention. Her pale green eyes and milky complexion always left Jonah believing the woman needed more time in the sun. She dressed conservatively in a dark blue pantsuit and red choker scarf, and wore a minimum of jewelry. Gold studs in her ears, and the engagement ring her fiancé had given her just last week. Subtle. Nonconfrontational.
Political.
And for a man who moved so silently, almost eerily so, Brian May made quite the opposite impression. Pushing seventy years of age, there was nothing frail about the second-most powerful member of ComStar’s organization. Two meters tall if a centimeter, he towered over Héloïse. Built like a BattleMech with his broad shoulders and a thick, muscular neck, his dark skin was only a few polishes short of flawless ebony. Iron gray shot through his dark hair, worn long and braided, with the braids pulled back into a thick ponytail. He dressed in the voluminous white robes once so common to ComStar and recently coming back into favor. His were embroidered with a gold brocade that twisted around the hem and up the lapel in arcane mathematical symbols.
First Precentor May stepped further into the office and Héloïse closed the heavy wooden door behind them.
“Not much is easy, these days,” Jonah said by way of greeting.
“There is no other way?” the ComStar representative asked.
Jonah left his window alcove, coming around his desk to shake hands with May. The man had a firm, encompassing grip. “That depends on what news you’ve brought me. Not to put too fanciful a spin on this, Precentor May, but I’m desperately looking for a silver bullet. Something that can kill the monster quickly and completely before it devours The Republic entire.”
Héloïse gestured the first precentor to a seat on the leather-wrapped divan. She continued to stand while the exarch took a seat across from May on one of the office’s two chairs. “The Senate refuses to budge,” she said. “Some on ideological grounds. Others because they sense the opportunity to gather power. Not even the paladins have had any luck bringing pressure to bear.”
“I read a dispatch yester-week. Senator Therese Ptolomeny suffered a no-confidence vote by the people of Park Place.”
Jonah frowned darkly at the reminder. “It was a narrow margin. And the world governor, under direct order from the Senate, has refused to acknowledge it. If I want to make it stick, I’ll have to order the Seventh Hastati
Sentinels off the front lines with Liao and send them home.”
Héloïse shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “Obviously the exarch does not want to do that.”
“Obviously,” May agreed. “And you cannot arrest Ptolomeny herself.”
Another point that left a sour taste in Jonah’s mouth. “No. Conner Monroe stole a march on us there, as well.”
In fact, Jonah had put armed forces around Ptolomeny’s Riviera estate. And then was forced to back them off when Sir Conner led in a double squad of the Senatorial Honor Guard to “secure” the area.
“The Senate polices its own,” Monroe had said in a short press statement. “That is how Devlin Stone set things up. We will guard Senator Ptolomeny until an honor court establishes her guilt or innocence.”
And the Riviera was not all. Conner, drawing from the garrisons and a large reserve of personal “guards” kept by most nobles, had forced border closures in England and in India. The Senate, through their newest member, all but controlled the entire nation-state of Germany, and the Siberian proving grounds were under a new communications blackout now as well—presumably under Senate orders.
It was a hot-button situation, one that had forced Jonah to discuss more extreme measures with his ghost paladin. The Republic, according to historical files to which Jonah was now privy, had handled similar situations in the past. And not always with above-board tactics. Was it time to remove Conner Rhys-Monroe—the former Knight of the Sphere—completely from the equation?
The ghost paladin had not recommended it one way or the other. He’d simply told his exarch, “It can be arranged.”
Jonah Levin had not slept soundly in the last three days since that meeting.
“I’m not sure what ComStar can do for you,” May said, his deep voice revealing a measure of uncertainty. “We’re hardly in a position to come between the exarch and the Senate.”
“Don’t dissemble, Precentor.” Jonah leaned forward, his gaze biting hard at the other man. “ComStar has a long and mostly infamous history of involving itself in just this kind of trouble. I’m simply inviting it on behalf of the exarch’s office.”
Héloïse played the conciliator. “We understand ComStar was forced to dismantle its primary intelligence-gathering operations after the Jihad,” she said. “No government trusted an organization proven to pry into interstellar communications at their own discretion. At the same time, no one believed they could completely restrict such activities either. A devil’s bargain if ever there was one.”
“And an image we’ve worked very hard to overcome,” May said. His face hardened into an unreadable mask.
“I’m not asking for the keys to Pandora’s box,” Jonah pressed. “But if there is anything you can give me to help get a handle on the situation, ComStar owes it to The Republic. Devlin Stone stood by you when every Great House stood ready to pull your organization apart. He gave you a home on Terra again. He lent to you from his own credibility. Now the walls of Camelot are beginning to crumble, Precentor, and you are on the same side as we are.”
“ComStar appreciates that, sir. I am to extend the personal awareness of Primus Koenigs-Cober as well. And her pledge of assistance, such as it comes.” He spread his hands open, as if to emphasize their emptiness. “But I think you do not appreciate ComStar’s current situation, Exarch. We are failing.”
“What do you mean, ‘failing?” ’ Héloïse asked for the exarch.
“Three years without reliable HPG service? Without our primary income potential? We’ve tapped our reserves to the limit, but ComStar is quickly and officially heading toward bankruptcy.”
“Preposterous.” Jonah thrust himself to his feet. He paced once across the great seal inlaid into his office carpeting, and back. He felt the walls pressing in from all sides, weighing on him. “ComStar must have diversified its operations long ago. Centuries ago! The Blackout cannot have crippled so large a body.”
When the exarch stood, no one sat. Precentor May rose, hands balled into fists. “It can! And believe me, sir, it has done so.”
Then he calmed himself with visible effort, tucking each hand into the opposite sleeve and exhaling his frustration in one long breath.
“Of course we have diversified,” he said. “ComStar owns real estate and resources on a thousand worlds, Exarch. We are the second-largest investor in interstellar markets, behind House Steiner’s Lyran Commonwealth. We own a large percentage of the shipping industry in every Successor State and most Periphery realms as well.” He sighed again. “Of course we have.
“But the Blackout . . . it’s like an arterial wound. ComStar is hemorrhaging capital and confidence at a rate that would sink most medium-sized realms. We’ve liquidated resources at incredible losses in our efforts to research the cause and to rescue operations. All to no avail. A prudent corporation would have amputated the damaged limb a year ago or more! Instead, we’ve risked the life and livelihood of all of ComStar in order to save the corrupted flesh.”
Jonah looked to Héloïse Montgolfier, who stared back, wide-eyed, as the implications settled home.
“But if ComStar fails,” the exarch said, stumbling through the minefield of disastrous possibilities, “then we could lose even the working HPG stations. And who could ever bring back up the entire network?”
Mankind cast adrift among the stars. Not even the “pony-express” routes being implemented by most Great Houses could keep a nation tied together strongly enough. They had all grown so dependent on interstellar communication. It would take the rise of strong, local warlords to keep everything in line. A decentralization of power.
As The Republic was finding out, that way disaster lay.
May nodded slowly when the exarch gave voice to his concerns. “We are not far from that now, Exarch. Only the working stations and our A hubs are fully staffed at this point.” He huffed out more frustration. “In some places, adepts have begun praying to the machines again!” He withdrew one hand from a sleeve and plucked at the brocaded cuff. “ComStar is dusting off its robes, Exarch. Prayer may be our final hope.”
“I cannot accept that,” Jonah said. Though some part of him asked can’t? Or won’t?
“Accept it or not, Exarch, that is the way of things at this moment. I am here on behalf of the Primus to offer whatever assistance we can in these dark times, but also to ask for your aid as well. ComStar, too, stands at the brink.”
Allies in sickness and in health. This was the kind of situation where drowning men might climb up each other’s backs in order to be the last one breathing.
“Wait, wait.” Jonah snapped his fingers, clutching at a memory from an earlier briefing by the ghost paladin. “What about the savant you rescued off Wyatt? The one who fixed the local HPG? Don’t you have him at your Australia facilities yet?”
Héloïse looked sharply at the exarch, but remained quiet. She knew many secrets as his chief aide, but not all of them.
May frowned, showing a bit of worry at the breach in security. “Your network is still very good, Exarch.” He tucked his hands away, and shook his head. “He is not in Australia at this time, and I am not authorized to tell you where this adept has been taken. We had hoped for him to be our silver bullet.” May’s expression was carefully neutral. “Our investigations are ongoing.”
“So what you are saying,” Héloïse began in her gift for summation, “is that ComStar is our willing ally but we should not rely too heavily on your ability to remain a credible resource. You might even become a weight around The Republic’s neck that will drag us under with you.”
“Not the most flattering analogy,” May said darkly, “but accurate.”
And instead of finding a lifeline in the troubled political waters, Jonah Levin now had more worries to heap onto the scales against him. Against his Republic. Was there nothing left, then, but the fail-safes planned so long ago by Devlin Stone as The Republic’s last-stand strategies?
Were they so desperate as that?
> “You have nothing for us, then?” he asked, still looking for a way out from under the blade.
“Nothing helpful,” the first precentor replied. But he did reach into a fold in his robes, and draw out a data wafer. The thin circle of black silica was marked with the Greek letter rho, the insignia of ComStar’s supposedly defunct intelligence-gathering agency: ROM.
Hesitant to pick up the small wafer, Jonah watched as May set it on the edge of the low table. Héloïse eyed it warily as well, as if it might uncoil into a tiny, poisonous viper.
“What is it?” Jonah asked.
May shrugged, as if hesitant to say. Then: “Answers to some of your recent questions regarding Victor Steiner-Davion’s methods of investigation. The material he unearthed. And the resources he tapped in the process.”
“You say that as if Victor had something to hide,” Héloïse said.
“He did. Believe me, he did. And that something will come out in the next few days. Which is why we turn over the information to you now, before it leaks to the public in such a way that will only strengthen the Senate’s case.”
Jonah picked up the small data-storage device. It was cold and smooth to the touch. Not much larger than a quarter-stone coin and half as heavy, he knew it could contain gigabytes of data. Likely it did. He felt the looming presence of the sword’s edge, held up only by the thinnest of hairs.
“And if I orchestrate its release first?” he asked.
“As I said before: ‘It’s not going to be easy, what you have to do.’ You may be able to salvage something from this disaster, and give us all time to look for new options. Perhaps this summit of Inner Sphere leaders will bring about new ideas, new answers. Regardless, you’ve been a military man long enough to know that when war is inevitable—”
“It is always best to strike the first blow,” Jonah finished.
Which was when he felt certain he heard the thread of hair finally snap.
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