by Mike Moscoe
“That’s the tax scam your client used to scoop up most of the big wealth here. No, this is little scum grabbing crumbs. Their offer is one you can’t refuse. Some did and got hauled off to jail. The lucky ones got beaten. Others ‘died trying to escape.” ’ Grace paused, then tossed all the corn to the geese. That set off a racket as they fought for it.
“Angus Throckmorton has been a friend of my family since my grandpa ran the mine. He’s a lawyer,” she said softly, gazing into some middle distance that might be less painful than where she spoke from. “Angus believed in the law and lived by it. Like lunch with your sergeant, there are Some Things That Aren’t Done. He wrote up a request for habeas corpus and went to court. Black and Reds stopped him at the door, demanded to know why he was there. When he told them, they beat him. Beat him and kicked him down the courthouse steps.”
Grace faced L. J. He met her eyes and tried not to show a caring his contract did not allow him to act on. “When I was a kid and bored while Da and Angus were in court, I counted those steps. Forty-nine. They kicked him down forty-nine steps and left him. An old lady took him to the hospital. He died there today.”
“I’m sorry,” L. J. said, hearing how hollow his words were. “I hadn’t heard.”
She shook her head. “No surprise. There’s not a lot making the news these days. But there are other ways of spreading the word. I could send you copies of what I get.”
“I don’t think my client would be happy about that.”
“And we know what happens when your client isn’t happy. Loren, your client is a bloody murderer. Does your Colonel know what’s going on here?”
“I doubt it. However, he signed the contract, and it will be in force for another four months.” The duration of his contract was classified. Still, he gave it. Maybe the clash could be held off until he could march his mercs back aboard ship.
“In four months there won’t be a planet left,” Grace said. “Ben warned me that we’d reach this point—me wanting you to leave, you held here by your honor.”
“Honor is all a merc really has.”
“But you’re backing up a thief and cold-blooded murderer!”
“If a client can’t count on a merc to fulfill his contract, what do I have to sell?”
She stood, sending the geese scattering. The sunlight lit her hair afire. L. J. doubted he’d ever meet a more beautiful woman. He tried to measure the strange currents millions of years of evolution had woven into him that made this woman so attract him. She desperately needed his help, and that drew him to her. But there was also a power about her that challenged him to match hers with his own. Seductive stuff. But he commanded a battalion of mercs, and evolution was small stuff against the honor of the regiment.
“When next we meet, we will be enemies on the battlefield,” Grace told him formally.
“We’ve been there before,” he pointed out.
“Yes, but this time, only one of us will survive the fight.” There was an absoluteness in her words that brooked no argument.
“Whatever the outcome, it will be a loss for both of us.”
“You could be right,” she said, and turned away from him.
L. J. scanned the street. No sniper. An old woman selling flowers shook her head at him. He walked for the square, but Topkick met him halfway. “From your face, I’d say the talk didn’t go all that well,” the Sergeant Major said as L. J. settled in the jeep.
“Now it starts, Sergeant Major. Send the word out to the NCOs through your private channels that the gloves will be coming off the locals in the next couple of days. Forget the candy ass and the white gloves. From here forward, it gets real.”
“Kind of figured it that way, sir. Don’t worry, Major, the battalion’s solid. The Colonel will be proud of us.”
“Didn’t doubt the battalion was solid, Sergeant Major. Just wish we stood with a more solid cause at our side.”
The Sergeant Major had no answer for that. They drove back to the post in silence.
12
Allabad, Alkalurops
Prefecture IX, The Republic of the Sphere
16 August 3134; local summer
L. J. did not like being out of the local news loop—not the way things were going down the tubes. His time in Allabad had been short and sterile, leaving him no contacts he could trust. There had been a chambermaid with raven hair and olive skin who worked at the LCI Manor House. She could drop a ton of interesting local tidbits in the time she took to change linens.
L. J. found her Net address and sent off a chatty note about how his present hotel had a definite lack of staff and he might be looking for a maid. He ended with a “How are things going for you?” which he hoped might get her talking.
The next morning, things began to get interesting.
L. J. was enjoying his second cup of coffee when his ’puter beeped in four-part harmony with Mallary’s, Art’s and Eddie’s. L. J. slapped his first and found himself looking at Lieutenant Brajinski, presently occupying Kerry, a small town between Allabad and Little London. “Sir, four of our MechWarriors woke up this morning to find daggers in their pillows and notes saying ‘MechWarriors, go home while you still can.” ’
The dagger the lieutenant waved looked more like a restaurant steak knife, but “dagger” certainly sounded more dramatic. L. J. raised an eyebrow to his staff. “You’re billeted in a former hotel?” Eddie said, checking his ’puter for the answer.
“Yes, sir.”
“Still using the hotel’s support staff?” L. J. asked.
“Yes, sir. They’ve been very grateful for the work, sir. No problem at all. Frees our troops from—” The young lieutenant trailed off. “I see your point, sir. I will let them go.”
“And see if those knives are similar to those in any local eateries,” Mallary said.
“If I locate the people who did this?” the lieutenant asked.
“Let me know what you’ve found out,” L. J. said firmly. “Take no action until I order it. Understood?”
“Yes, sir. Clearly, sir.” The screen went blank.
“So it starts,” L. J. said to his team. “Raise the alert level, XO. Mallary, have your intelligence staff try to get me some solid analysis on what’s going on here. Since the news went all nice and fluffy I don’t know shit about what’s happening.”
“I’ll try, sir, but we aren’t getting much hard data.”
“Those knives looked pretty hard to me.”
“Yes, sir,” Mallary said, standing. “I’ll get on it.”
“Eddie, start looking into concentrating the battalion.”
“Sir,” St. George said, “if I may point out, that would make us an even easier target and make it even harder to track what’s going on outside our line of sight.”
“Good points all, Art, but there’s more firepower at Falkirk than I have here. If they start moving, how much of the battalion will they overrun before we know it?”
“We’ve got the satellite feed, sir.”
“They know about it. They only show it what they want it to see. If they move their ’Mech MODs from one barn to the next south, will we know they’re here before they start shooting up Dublin Town? Damn the shoestring budget,” L. J. snapped. They’d deployed without a single air spy vehicle. It was as if the guy funding this mess had no idea what a good team needed. Well, it wasn’t as if Santorini knew a lot about what he was getting into.
Or did he?
If Santorini got in trouble, would a lot of Stormhammer or House Steiner stuff come running? It wouldn’t be the first time in history that a small troop of soldiers were set up to fail so the bigger guns could gallop to the rescue.
“XO, Adjutant, you have your orders. It looks to be a busy morning. Let’s turn to.”
At his desk was a chatty note from Betty, the maid. She rambled on about how the place had changed since he left. “Some of the new guys seem to think a maid is there to help them get the sheets dirty as well as change them,” answered one of his questions
. “Cook says she can’t buy good fresh fruit, vegetables and meat. The farmers’ market just doesn’t have anything like it used to.” This told L. J. to look out for trouble around the food supply. Betty was also hunting for a new place to eat. Her old standby had changed hands and was now owned by an off-worlder. The cook had mouthed off to the new owner and been fired. “The new cook can’t boil water.” So Grace was right that junior scum were taking their own chunks and making a bad situation worse.
L. J. had not liked the looks of the Black and Reds the moment he’d seen them. The ’Mechs marched like trainees. The guys in the gun trucks looked like the thugs a real police force would put away for a very long time. What prison bottom had Santorini dragged to get a collection of gutter scrapings like these?
Betty finished her note saying she’d gotten a raise that doubled her pay, putting her ahead of the rising prices, and she probably wasn’t looking to change jobs. L. J. printed the note for Mallary and her intelligence crew just as she appeared at his door.
“We’ve had our first attack, sir, outside Banya.”
“Any casualties?”
“None, sir. Some bunch of locals planted a mine for a hovertank patrol. They guessed low on the amount of pressure one of those things puts out, and the mine blew before the tank got there. Real goobers, sir.”
“Even goobers can learn, Captain.”
“Think it was by that group up north? The Falkirk group?”
“Not likely. They have a hovertank, and the ’Mechs working with them would never make a beginner’s mistake like that.”
“How’d they get a hovertank, if I may ask?”
L. J. started to say, “Ask Sergeant Godfrey,” but that moron was among the missing. “I’ve got this letter from someone I trust in Allabad,” he said, handing Betty’s note to Mallary. “Synopsize this so no one can recognize where it came from and get it out to our occupation platoons. Tell the lieutenants this supports the rise in alert status.”
“I’ll do that, sir,” Mallary said.
“Then let’s—” he started, but his com was buzzing and blinking a red light. His client. L. J. positioned himself behind his desk and tapped the com. “Yes, Mr. Santorini.”
“I understand someone tried to bomb one of my tanks today,” he said with what some might mistake for a smile of glee.
“An amateurish effort,” L. J. said dismissively.
“You are launching a punitive action.”
“I am taking appropriate action.”
“And what do you consider appropriate for the attempted murder of my troops in their sleep last night?”
“We are investigating to determine what action to take.”
His client frowned. “I would already have people hanging from lampposts. I see your Colonel sent me someone who has trouble making a decision.”
L. J. nodded noncommittally and said nothing.
“I am having trouble and require a military operation,” he said, as if uttering the magic words that would instantaneously turn a valley red with fire, blood and smoke.
“What trouble, sir?” L. J. said, trying to sound concerned.
“Farmers are withholding produce from market. I require you to conduct a sweep of land around Allabad and bring the farmers and their produce trucks in at gunpoint. If they resist, kill the first few. The rest will follow.”
L. J. gave Betsy another mark for quality intel. “That’d be quite an operation, sir.” About equal to killing the goose that laid the golden egg, but L. J. didn’t say that. “Unfortunately, it is not covered by our contract.”
“Not covered!”
“Our contract is to seize and hold this planet. We seized it rather faster than expected and held it for the month while you were in transit. You relieved us from holding the area around Allabad and other cities. You will have to use your own police to do that, sir.”
L. J. considered suggesting he lower the tax rate on food sold at the market since it was pretty clear food was making it through back channels to other food providers. If the man couldn’t figure out why meat was not on his own table, L. J. certainly wouldn’t be the one to paint him a picture. Messengers for guys like Santorini tended to get killed for carrying what otherwise looked like useful bits of information.
It didn’t matter. His com went dead immediately. “I don’t think our Leader is happy,” he told Mallary.
“Then he’ll be even less happy when he finds out what I just did while you were on the phone.”
“Which was?”
“A patrol inside Lothran was attacked by boys throwing rocks. I told the patrol to withdraw.”
“Good order for today. Eddie, get in here, we’re redeploying the battalion,” he shouted. “One company here in Dublin Town and the others here, here and here,” he said, tapping small towns in an arc between Dublin and the mouth of the Gleann Mor Valley.
“That our threat axis?” Mallary asked.
“It’s the only real threat we face.” Eddie ducked his head in L. J.’s office and listened to the new deployment. “Again, I want to remove everything with the regiment’s stamp, seal or brand on it. Leave nothing behind.”
“And you want it all done yesterday. I understand, sir.”
“No.” L. J. smiled. “I don’t think you do, Captain. You see, while a unit is redeploying, it loses some of its ability to react to new orders. Its commander might even have to tell his client he was temporarily unable to perform a requested mission, if you take my meaning, Captain.”
“Moving could be considered a reason to temporarily not do some things that you might not want to do,” Eddie said.
“No, no, no,” L. J. said as if to a particularly slow child. “The regiment is always ready to execute its orders. That is our tradition. It’s just that in a redeployment, it might have to complete one order before doing another. And since we must be very meticulous about this move . . .”
“Yes, sir. Understood, sir. The battalion will always be ready for orders, sir, and I am about to set a new record for redeployment—just not one I’ll mention on my next résumé.”
“I think we misunderstand each other perfectly,” L. J. said.
“Major,” Mallary said once Eddie was gone, “in your next command, if you need an ops officer, I sure hope you’ll skip my name.”
“Mallary, my friend, unless we’re careful, all of our names will be entered on the rolls of the regiment with a little note to ‘pick this one last.” ’
Grace had a new intelligence source, thanks to a couple of Jobe’s boys. They had rigged a search on the Net—not the public side that was about as exciting as cold potatoes, but the personal side with its notes and letters. It painted an ugly picture.
The Black and Reds were spreading out from their five main towns, demanding that farmers sell them produce, crops and meat at a discount to cover the cost of taxes. That amounted to near confiscation, but since it was at gunpoint, objections were limited to notes and mail among farmers.
The Black and Reds were still buying homes, businesses, farms—anything they wanted. Those who resisted didn’t go to jail; now they just died right there in front of their families. Sales resistance dropped to nil even as the mail got hotter and hotter. At least the people who were bought out were allowed to live in their homes and run their businesses. The thugs had a big appetite but didn’t seem to know what to do with what they stole.
Unfortunately, they knew what to do with women.
Alkalurops had never made a cult of a girl’s virginity, but here girls decided. Grace could still hear Ma’s instructions. “When you make up your mind, I know I won’t be able to stop you, but don’t let a boy be making up your mind for you. You decide. You call the shots.”
Now Black and Reds were calling the shots.
In Lothran the new rules ended in a shoot-out between a family and the Black and Reds. The boys couldn’t stop the police squad that took their sister, but they knew the town and how to use their gopher rifles. From first rep
orts, it looked as if the boys were winning, almost a dozen Black and Reds down and screaming for medics. Then the ’Mechs stomped in.
The boys were dead, their father and mother as well. The sister was found with her throat slit. To keep Lothran from thinking about doing this twice, the ’Mechs shot up and trampled the eight blocks where the shoot-out took place.
Not all of it, though. The Black and Reds had bought up a house here, a business there. They stood among the rubble.
Alkalurops was a powder keg, waiting for the spark.
Two days later the spark came.
A gun truck of Black and Reds was out making sure farmers got their produce to the now government-owned packing plants. They must have been getting plenty careless. They didn’t fire a shot when a farmer and his two sons nailed them with their AgroMechs. The farmer shredded the Black and Reds. Shredded them down to blood and scraps.
Now the farmer was running north with his sons, their wives and children, trying to make it to the Gleann Mor Valley. Grace hoped they would. She hoped and she feared.
If they made it, the war would surely start.
L. J. found a note on his ’puter that morning from Betty. He enjoyed her chatty rundown on life in the big city. The woman couldn’t seem to shake her small-town amazement at what went on. “But the B and R types have sure put a lid on the nightlife—not that a maid has much free time at night, but it’s gotten so a girl can’t walk the streets. Mr. Santorini gave me a pass that he says will make anybody who stops me let me go. Mr. Santorini is such a nice man.” Betty had to be the only person on the planet who thought so.
The cook had plenty of food, but Betty said the meats were the absolute worst she’d ever seen. Why was L. J. not surprised?
“I hear the B and R are recruiting at the local jails.” That confirmed L. J.’s own suspicion. “A B and R field marshal confiscated a gaggle of ’Mechs from all kinds of places and ordered a couple of the local ’Mech service and repair centers to come up with a plan to hang lasers on them. The repair guys tried telling him the dinky engines on a worker ’Mech can’t power a laser, but he just got mad, pulled out his knife, and shouted threats. They got real agreeable and said they’d have a plan for him in three months. He said six weeks and that was that.”
