Cox bowed his head. “I am glad that you are pleased.”
“There is more I would discuss with you,” the leader of the Spirit Cats added. “You fought bravely against and with a Knight Errant of the Sphere. You have won in battle both enlightenment and honor. You made difficult choices, and chose your alliances carefully while in the heat of battle. Star Captain, you must now accept what you deny yourself.”
“I do not understand, sir.”
“You will take the Bloodname you have already earned. It is time. From this point forward, you are Cox Devalis, Star Captain of the Spirit Cats. Your Bloodname has been earned in test and trial.”
Star Captain Cox Devalis bowed his head again. “I do not know what to say.”
“No words are required,” Rosse replied. “You have won this honor. Any taint you placed against yourself has long since been purged. You will do this for our people.”
“It shall be done, then.” The Star captain found himself grinning, not from pride, but for the honor he now held. A Bloodnamed warrior of the Spirit Cats.
DropShip Deathclaw
Orbital Approach
Amur, The Oriente Protectorate
His fingers hovered over the keypad as he considered how to cast the facts of his defeat on Wyatt. Captain Casson now preferred to think of his mission as a successful fact-finding sortie, and that’s how he planned to present his results to Jessica Marik. The information about the HPG, Tucker Harwell and the status of Wyatt was enough to keep him in her good graces. The intelligence he had gathered on ComStar, especially the images captured on his battlerom, could vault his career to a whole new level.
ComStar Secret Research Facility Omega One
Luyten 68-25
Exact Coordinates Unknown
Prefecture X
As Precentor Kerr stepped off the DropShip gangway onto the obviously old ferrocrete runway, she at first thought the planet was a desolate wasteland. They had landed in a crater, she could tell that much, surrounded on all sides by what looked like an endless ring of steep, jagged hills. The air was thin, forcing her to breathe deeper to avoid feeling lightheaded. In every direction she could see ragged clumps of lush foliage, occasionally interrupted by twisted, rusted pieces of steel stabbing the sky, but mostly the bottom of the crater was blasted rock and debris. She didn’t recognize any of the scrubby trees and brush fighting to grow on this world.
Precentor Malcolm Buhl stepped out from a small, bunkerlike structure that was covered with thick vines, and greeted her with a strong handshake. He was accompanied by a woman wearing a grayish-white military coverall that bore the symbol of ComStar on the left chest. “Welcome to Luyten 68-25, Svetlana. Or, as we call this place, Omega.”
She looked around. A technical crew was already draping her DropShip with a holotarp to help camouflage it. “What is this place, Malcolm?”
The older man smiled and invited her to the doorway, pausing to complete a retina scan for entry. “A relic from the Jihad. ComStar terraformed parts of this world ages ago. Our Explorer Corps ships brought back the plant life you see here, what’s left of it. The world is more desert than anything. But here, a little life blooms.”
“Does The Republic know of this place?”
Buhl cocked an eyebrow. “Yes and no. The Word of Blake took over the facility from ComStar and used it as a base of operations, then the Com Guards routed them out near the end of the war. At one time, the shipyards in orbit were quite extensive, used for building WarShips. Now that capacity has—changed—somewhat.
“For years, The Republic patrolled this world, ensuring that no one came back to set up operations. But after a decade or two, they became lax. Eventually, they wrote this off as a dead world—their mistake. We smuggled engineers here to begin refitting the underground facilities that had survived the fighting, then we waited; but The Republic never bothered to check up on the planet. So we set up base. Thanks to some well-placed viruses, we were able to delete the majority of references to the world in the star charts.”
“And we use it for?” she pressed.
“Let’s just say it’s home to many secrets of ComStar.”
The door hissed open and Buhl gestured for her to enter. She entered a well-lit corridor, the logo of the Com Guards emblazoned on the wall at nearly the size of an average human. The corridor sloped down and opened up to a series of rooms. People moved busily through the hallways. She could guess that the underground facility was vast in scope and size.
“I assume you have reconstituted the Com Guards?”
Buhl smiled but didn’t immediately answer. Instead, he took her elbow and steered her down the hall. “I needed a place, someplace beyond prying eyes, where the real work of ComStar could be conducted. This world suited my needs. The Com Guards are simply one of many projects here.”
“Should I ask where this world is located?”
Buhl smiled again. “You don’t want to know. Suffice it to say, the best place to hide something from The Republic is right under their noses.” Svetlana wondered, not for the first time, why Precentor Buhl was sharing this secret with her. She wondered who else shared Buhl’s confidence. Did the primus know of this facility and the projects it contained? How big was the group—dare she even think the term cabal?—that supported this particular effort? Were there other facilities like this hidden in plain sight?
She wasn’t sure just where she stood on the concept of factions within ComStar, though the existence of Buhl’s secret project proved they were alive and well. Any good historian would point out that factionalism is what brought down the organization once before. She did know this: she would have to watch her step. For all that her superior had presented this trip as an opportunity to observe Tucker Harwell’s progress, she now understood that there was much more at stake in her relationship with Precentor Buhl.
They walked down several corridors, descending short flights of stairs between each new hallway, all lit in such a way that seemed to leave darkness rather than cast light. Passing through a set of heavy doors, they arrived at a window draped in blue curtains. Providing no explanation, Precentor Buhl pulled back the drapes.
The window was revealed to be a one-way mirror looking in on a well-lit lab. Technicians in long, white lab smocks moved about on the other side of the glass. One sat at a table, a tall man with spiky black hair. The others moved in and around him, seeming to defer to him. Svetlana Kerr leaned toward the one-way glass. “Harwell, I presume?”
Buhl shot a quick glance at his aide. “Yes. I have relocated the DeBurke Institute here. The facilities on Terra are really just a blind to keep The Republic’s Knights in the dark about our operations. Tucker is helping us train a new breed of technicians who will find a way to lift this communications blackout. We’re very close to quantifying what he did on Wyatt. But the most exciting element is that we may be able to use his knowledge to find a new way for ComStar to communicate between worlds. Something, perhaps, beyond the HPGs we know today.”
She looked at the man through the glass, and something about him gave her the impression that he was more than just a technician. There was a gritty quality about him, as if he might be tougher than expected. “How does Mr. Harwell feel about all of this?”
“He serves ComStar—as our family has done for years,” the woman at Buhl’s side replied. “He does what he is ordered to do.” Her voice held no inflection.
Kerr looked at the woman, then at Buhl. The precentor feigned politeness. “Svetlana Kerr, this is Demi-Precentor Patricia Harwell of the Com Guards, First Division, The Avenging Angels.” Patricia clicked her heels and bowed her head in Kerr’s direction, then turned back to look at Tucker.
“You’re his sister,” Kerr added.
“Yes.”
“How has he held up after his success on Wyatt?”
Patricia looked at her, devotion and duty clearly written on her face. Then she looked away again. “The affairs on Wyatt changed Tucker. I have expressed to Pr
ecentor Buhl that all this may be a mistake.”
“A mistake?”
Buhl cut in. “Patricia feels that the events Tucker experienced on Wyatt changed him, perhaps encouraging him to identify with The Republic.”
“He is not the same man we sent to Wyatt,” Patricia continued. “Tucker has seen too much of the real world, experienced too much of the harsh realities of life and war. I know my brother. He has changed.”
“How?” Kerr pressed.
Patricia shook her head. “In many ways. He is less open, more cunning. His attitude is less optimistic, and certainly less naive. When we talk, he tells me what he thinks I want to hear, and that makes me suspicious. I’d say he no longer trusts me, and if he doesn’t trust me, he doesn’t trust ComStar.”
“None of that matters long as he does what we want,” Buhl said impatiently.
Patricia cast Buhl an icy look. “His loyalty is an important factor in his performance—sir. It may merit strong methods of interrogation to discover what my brother is up to.” Her voice was cold as a winter breeze. This was not just a military officer, this was someone willing to strike out at her own flesh and blood.
Buhl waved away her words. “What is important is not how Tucker feels, but that he does what he’s told. Besides, he’s been given every resource imaginable, access to research on interstellar communications that dates back centuries, and the personnel to help build whatever he wants to create. For a man of his technical background, this is heaven.”
“Heaven with airtight security,” Precentor Kerr commented.
“As I have told Mr. Harwell himself several times, all of this security is to protect him. With his help, ComStar will usher in a new era in The Republic . . . in all the Inner Sphere.” As they watched Tucker, he looked at the two-way mirror and appeared to smile at the people standing behind it. Patricia averted her eyes, but Buhl smiled back. Kerr wondered at that moment who was really pulling the strings.
* * *
Tucker handed the noteputer back to Adept Sorrenteno after updating it with his new set of calculations. The formulas weren’t complete. He never told his keepers everything, reasonably sure of his fate the moment they understood the sum of his knowledge. As soon as I’m of no use to them, I will become a liability they can’t afford. He reminded himself of that every day.
“Sir, you adjusted the harmonics rate on my algorithm,” the adept said questioningly.
“Yes,” he replied. “You’re really close to grasping what I did on Wyatt, but your calculations are still slightly off. Study those modifications, and I think you’ll see where you need to go next.”
“Thank you, sir,” the adept replied. He stood there for a moment, then added, “Sir, that mirror. Does it bother you knowing that someone is watching us, even if it is for our own protection?”
Tucker bit back on his impulse to explain in the most scathing terms possible how many kinds of a fool Adept Sorrenteno represented. The problem was that, only a few months ago, he had been just like Sorrenteno. It’s amazing what a few months in the real world can do for your outlook on life. Tucker knew that the security was there to keep him in, not to keep unwanted visitors out. They were all prisoners, including Adept Kursk, who was working in another wing of the complex on a prototype HPG for which he had created the specifications.
Tucker knew he was in control of his own destiny. The crucible of war had taught him how to take responsibility for his own actions, and for the lives of those who depended on his judgment to survive. He was taking advantage of the opportunities Omega provided him, and working his people hard to help them reach their full potential. When the time was right, his team would usher in a new era for ComStar.
He thought about the Knight Errant rank pip he fastened under his collar every morning when he dressed, and knew he had a friend waiting on the outside for his signal.
He smiled at Sorrenteno. “No, Adept. It doesn’t bother me at all.”
About the Author
Blaine Lee Pardoe lives in Amissville, Virginia with his wife Cynthia, his son Alexander and his daughter Victoria. During the daytime hours, he works at Ernst & Young LLP as an Associate Director. An armchair historian, he is completing his first military history book on Count Felix Von Luckner. Blaine has written eight other books in the BattleTech and MechWarrior series. This book is his first in the MechWarrior: Dark Age era.
Contents
Prologue
Book One Penance 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Book Two Blake’s Blood 12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
Book Three The Peace of Focht Be with You 22
23
24
25
26
27
Epilogue
About the Author
Target of Opportunity Page 29
