That did make her smile, big and unreservedly, and he could not help but smile back.
"That would be wonderful! I've always wanted to—" She blinked and shook her head. "No, this isn't about me. This is wonderful for Vega. With real 'Mechs, we'll finally be able to start rebuilding, have some hope of taking over our own defense and security again. That would be a great day for us."
"That will be a great day for everybody. But these 'Mechs still put you a long way from planetary security. Even our combined forces aren't enough to stabilize the major cities on North Nanturo continent. We haven't even begun the job of securing and rebuilding the original capital in Neucason."
She frowned slightly. "You make it sound like you could be here almost indefinitely."
He glanced at her. "Are you that eager to be rid of me?"
"No! Of course not. It's nothing personal, Conner. It's just that my MechWarriors and I have been working so hard, for so long. We're eager to begin really carrying our weight, to take back responsibility for the safety of our own world. It's a matter of pride. Just for a minute there, I let myself hope that we could be close to that. You just dumped a big load of obvious reality on that hope."
"That was not my intention."
"Nope"—she pouted slightly—"just good old Clan bluntness."
* * *
Taylor Bane sat in the back of the car, absentmindedly inspecting a cigarette burn in the seat cushion, as they bounced slowly down the broken pavement on one of Nasew's secondary streets. He glanced up at the back of Bruno Vic's head where it towered above the driver's seat. "Hey, Bruno, do you have to actually aim for the potholes?"
"No, boss. You just point the car down the road, and it falls into 'em naturally."
He thought maybe Bruno was making a joke, but you just couldn't be sure with him. Anyway, he knew the rough ride wasn't Bruno's fault. Even in the more civilized parts of the city, the roads had not been patched since the warlords first took over. "How much farther?"
"If I read this note right, just a couple more blocks."
The note proposing a meeting had been delivered to their hotel. There was no indication of who the note was from, though it was written on the stationery of one of the city's top law firms. Of course, the fact that the warlords had purged most of the lawyers made this a dubious distinction. When Bane had called the firm for more information, they had been willing to say only that the message came from an important client.
Bane looked around. They were in the financial district, just north of the primary security zone. He could occasionally see the security wall and watchtowers equipped with gun emplacements when he looked down the north-south cross streets to his right.
At last the car slowed in front of a medium-height office tower, its simple Bauhaus-style facade still bearing scars from the recent conflicts. The car turned onto a down-sloping ramp leading into a parking garage.
An armed guard stood at the locked gate. He approached and tapped on the window with a billy club.
Bruno held the note up to the window. The guard inspected it for a moment, then walked back to an electronic box mounted on a post. He inserted a key card, punched in a code and the metal gate began to roll back.
They pulled into a dimly lit and nearly empty parking structure of a type that could have been on any office building on any planet. Bruno drove around randomly for a while. They had been instructed to look for a green door and to drive through it.
Near the back of the building they finally located it, a large overhead door that opened at their approach, revealing a relatively tiny room. It took a moment for it to dawn on Bane that it was a freight elevator.
The car pulled inside, clearing front and rear with only a few inches to spare. Bruno's hands flexed on the steering wheel as the door rolled shut, and with a lurch the elevator began to move up. Bane watched the numbered lights flashing on a panel mounted on the side wall until the elevator stopped with another lurch on the tenth floor.
There was a short delay, and then the door rolled open. Surprisingly, since it was daylight and they were on the tenth floor, the area beyond the elevator was mostly dark. A man appeared, casually carrying an assault Needler in his hands. He walked up to the rear passenger window of the car and bent down. "Mr. Bane, please come with me."
Bane unlocked the door and stepped out.
Bruno started to open his door as well, but the man quickly pointed the muzzle of his weapon at the big man. "I'm sorry, but only Mr. Bane is invited to this meeting."
Bruno obviously didn't like this, and he scowled up at Bane, looking for orders.
"It'll be fine, Bruno. I've got a better feeling about this guy."
The man with the Needler let Bane go first. They walked out into a large space, as though the entire floor had been gutted. Here and there shafts of light cut into the space, but largely it was black. Bane got the impression that most of the windows were simply boarded over. There was a noise behind him, and he turned to see the rolling door close again over the elevator.
"Mr. Bane." said the man with the gun, "I'm certain that you're armed. I'd be grateful if you didn't make any sudden moves for those weapons during your meeting. It would be awkward if I had to shoot you."
He smiled slightly. "For both of us. Which way?"
The man directed him with a sweeping motion of his gun barrel.
Bane dutifully trudged into the darkness. As his eyes adjusted, he became aware of a dim red light set over a windowless, office-style door. Needler-guy directed him to open the door, and followed him inside.
The room was small and functional, perhaps a former construction office. The bare walls were painted white and the floor was industrial laminate tile. A small plastic table had been set up in the middle of the room, and there was a chair on either side of it.
In one chair sat an older man, hawk-nosed, nearly bald. He was thin, almost frail-looking, but Bane could immediately tell that he was not weak. The man held himself with the confidence of a fighter with countless bouts under his belt.
Bane had seen men like this before: gang leaders, CEOs, union organizers, patriarchs, leaders of seasoned mercenary units. Men who had remained on top of the heap long after their prime, and kept younger and stronger men and women in their thrall.
The man looked up at him and smiled, his expression a strange mixture of pleasure and contempt. He did not stand.
"Mister Taylor Bane, I presume. Very little happens in this city that I'm not aware of; I knew almost immediately when you landed, and I know the identity of your employer. If Jacob Bannson is seeking alliances here on Vega, we should talk." He waved at the other chair. "Please, sit down."
Bane spun the chair around backwards and straddled it, crossing his arms over the high back.
The old man watched him carefully. "Not an unnecessarily formal man. A man who likes to feel he's in charge of his own situation, especially when he isn't. I like that."
He stuck out his hand, and Bane took it. The hand was bony, the skin like dry parchment, but the grip was surprisingly strong. He shook once and then released.
"My name is—"
"Chance Elba," Bane interrupted, "senator and Speaker of Labor to the Provisional Congress."
Elba looked at him steadily.
"I've been reading the newsfaxes since I got here, watching news broadcasts. My reason for coming here is to make contact with people of power and authority, so naturally I've needed to identify who those people are. I've got to say, figuring out who those people are here is a lot more difficult than on most planets I've been to."
Elba smiled. On him, the expression looked slightly poisonous. "Then I'm glad we could meet, Mr. Bane.
Vega is a very complicated world these days. It wasn't so when I was a boy. Things were very different. Some would even say idyllic. But I'm a 'the glass is half-full" sort of person, so let's just say that it was boring."
"You don't impress me as a man who's lived a boring life."
He laug
hed heartily. "You should have seen me ten years ago, Mr. Bane. I was quite fit for a man my age. I still had a full head of hair. I'd made my fortune in ways that let me sleep at night. I raced novaboats off New Egypt. You know what those are? Ocean-racing boats powered by surplus high-time fusion cores pulled from BattleMechs when they're too old for service. Even when they are used and nearly worn out, it's impossible to use full throttle on the boats, because you'll just tear the hull apart.
"So the question is always just how close you can go to the edge. And, of course, these days they don't swap a 'Mech's fusion core until it's on the ragged edge of exploding anyway, so it's like driving a runaway monorail with a bomb in the back."
Elba laughed. "God, I miss those races. But who knows now when or if they'll ever run them again? New Egypt has remained relatively stable, but most of the racers, and the money, came from North Nanturo." The man looked sad, almost wistful.
"The tensions were already there when Devlin Stone abandoned The Republic and allowed it to fall apart. Did you know our hyperpulse generator was one of the first in The Republic to fail? Whatever happened to the rest of the HPG network, the attack on ours was special. It was destroyed in the same wave of suicide attacks that took out the capital. We were cut off from the rest of the Inner Sphere. It was like somebody pulled a switch on chaos. It all went to hell."
Bane nodded, saying nothing.
Elba looked up as though suddenly remembering the other man was there. "I'm boring you. You didn't come here to hear about history."
"Actually, in a way I did. The information that has come out of Vega since the HPG net fell has been sporadic and contradictory. And, of course, the Rasalhague Dominion has tightly controlled access by the media since they entered the picture. I've listened to several versions of the story of the fall since I've arrived, but from common people, merchants, hotel workers. None of them have the perspective you do."
Suddenly Elba looked annoyed, and he leaned forward. "Well, you may have all day to chat about these things, but I didn't come here to educate you about planetary history. I will educate you a little about me. I lost my fortune in the bank collapse of 3131 and '32. During the reign of the warlords I negotiated trades, pacts and surrenders between many of their enclaves by day, and worked with the resistance and refugee relocation the rest of the time.
"I was declared an outlaw by Jedra Kean two years ago, and I was one of many resistance fighters trying to form a shadow government when the Ghost Bears arrived. When they decided to go through the motions of creating a puppet government, they had little choice but to turn to me." He laughed. "To their eternal regret.
"Have you noticed I use a lot of contractions? You know why? Drives the Clanners crazy. I'll, I'll, I'll, don't, can't, won't." He leaned a little closer. "You want to know how to really get to them? Y'all. Lord, they hate that. Y'all."
Bane wasn't amused. "I'd think you'd be more favorably disposed toward the Clan people. Seems to me they rescued you from a dangerous life as an outlaw and installed you in a public position of power, when they certainly didn't need to."
Elba looked at him critically. "The Ghost Bears—I dislike calling them the Rasalhague Dominion; that's a smoke screen, like sugarcoating a horse apple—have come here for the same reason so many others have throughout history. We have resources. We have mines.
We have factories. And we have skilled workers who are the best in the Sphere, and have never been given their due. They've come to take advantage of our weakness, to rape our industry and enslave our workers, just like they did on the planets of their so-called Dominion."
The corners of Bane's mouth curled down in disapproval. He had a good feeling for when a person dropped out of stating their core beliefs and lapsed into rhetoric. Elba had just done so. "Mr. Elba, I'm not sure we can do business here."
Elba blinked at him in surprise. "What? You're making a mistake, Mr. Bane. If you really want to deal with the key people on Vega, you need to start with me."
"The Labor Party? From what I can see, you're important, but you don't even hold a political majority."
Elba smirked. "As I was under the warlords, I am still the focus of many powers not immediately visible." He nodded at the dusty room around them. "It isn't unusual for me to be meeting people in places like this. I've got clandestine locations all over the city, and even scattered elsewhere on the continent.
"The government the Ghost Bears have put together is a sham. Those of us granted even marginal freedom to speak are those they somehow imagine to be less dangerous, and less offensive. They're quite wrong in my case, but that was their intent.
"Though it pretends to be a democratic body, many of the Vegan people lack true representation. Some of them dare not even speak their minds in public. Many of those people talk to me."
"Terrorists?"
"Freedom fighters, some of them. Not all."
"They share the ideals of the Labor Party, then?"
Elba frowned. "Not exactly. But we're united in our opposition to the Ghost Bear occupation."
"Brothers in the principle of biting the hand that feeds you." Bane stood. "My employer greatly values loyalty.
Favors returned for favors done. I don't think we can work with you or your people, Mr. Elba."
The guard tensed, raising his weapon slightly, looking to Elba for guidance.
There was a polite knock at the door.
The guard glanced sideways at it, conflicted as to his next action.
Bane carefully kept his hands in plain sight, raising them slightly above his shoulders, palms forward, so the guard could see that he offered no threat.
The guard slid sideways and opened the door, pushing the muzzle of his weapon into the opening.
A meaty hand reached in to grab the barrel and yanked the guard who, unfortunately for him, had the weapon's heavy strap over his shoulder, out into the darkness.
Elba leaped to his feet but found himself looking down the barrel of the snub-nosed Needler Bane had pulled from under his jacket.
Bane sniffed. "This is rude, I know, but I didn't want there to be any misunderstanding about our leaving, and you've made it clear to me that you're not a man who can be trusted."
Elba glared at him, his eyes like black diamonds. "I wasn't eager to let you run off so quickly, but you were in no danger."
"So you say. Me, I like some insurance."
There was a thud, like a body falling against an outside wall, and then Bruno Vic stuck his head through the door. "You good, boss?"
"I'm good. Just finishing up our conversation."
A hint of fear crept into Elba's expression. "You won't get away with shooting me."
Bane smiled, enjoying the moment. "Yeah. The Clan paramilitary police will be all over me if you go down." He chuckled. "They'd probably make me a Star colonel." Then he raised his weapon so that it no longer pointed at Elba. "I'm not sure we can be friends, but I hope there's no reason we've got to be enemies." He looked at Bruno. "You kill anybody, Bruno?"
Bruno shrugged. "Busted a few heads." He shrugged again. "Probably not."
"Good." He looked back at Elba. "You just send us a bill for the expenses."
"This is outrageous! You'll regret this."
"Probably less than you will." He considered for a moment. "There is one opportunity to keep the lines of communication open. Just help me out on a little thing. Get me a private audience with Galaxy Commander Bekker."
Elba laughed. "Even if I wanted to, you know there's no love lost between Bekker and me. I can do many things. That isn't one of them."
"How about Provisional Governor Florala?"
"That turncoat? Same difference. Bane. He's sleeping with the enemy. Literally. That isn't happening."
Bane frowned. "Too bad, Elba. Or can I call you 'Chance'? See, I know your kind of operator. Enemies or not, I don't doubt for a minute that you could put that meeting together to happen an hour from now, if you really wanted to. But you won't do that, becaus
e you're afraid that we'll do an end run around you if we make contact with them, which now"—he flashed a sour little smile—"is exactly what will happen."
* * *
Isis pulled her fur-trimmed coat tighter against the cold of the howling wind. Snow blew into her face and stuck, freezing to her numbed skin, building up like leaves falling on a grave. There was just light enough to see, but the sky was so dark and gray that she could not be sure if it was dusk or high noon.
Her gloved fingers tightened around the wooden shaft of the spear, and she held it ready, marching steadily through the maze of passages between the jagged slabs of broken pack ice and dark gray outcrops that marked the boundary between the frozen land and the frozen sea.
She stopped suddenly and kneeled, reaching down to put her hand in the footprint she had just spotted. Her hand was lost in the track, a deep oval depression in the snow nearly a meter long. She could see the outlines of the huge toes, and the gouges where its saberlike claws dug in as it walked.
Ghost bear!
Then she heard the roar.
It was deep, terrifying, haunting. It echoed through the maze, so that it could have come from a kilometer away, or ten meters. She couldn't tell.
Ahead, she saw another track. She stood up and began following the trail.
She tracked the bear for what seemed like hours, sometimes losing the trail on bare rock, but always able to pick it up again.
The trail seemed to end at a frozen lake.
She scanned the far shore, looking for the bear, but saw nothing.
Then came the roar.
Behind her.
This roar did not echo. It was close.
The bear had doubled back on the ice. Tricked her.
The hunter was now the hunted.
She turned to face the bear, a big male. He looked at her, reared up to his full five-meter height, and roared. The sound hit her like a shock wave, so that she felt it shaking inside her rib cage, vibrating in her chest.
She was in the open, exposed. This was no place to stand her ground.
Trial by Chaos Page 14
