“I have the latest reports from Jupiter, My Lord,” Sharon said. She was an older woman, although she had once been a beauty in her youth. “The shipyard has been rendered completely unusable.”
Destroyed, you mean, Tiberius thought. He’d been shocked, then angered, by the news. Now, all he could do was push his feelings aside and gird for war. The family will not be happy.
Sharon flinched at his expression. It wasn’t uncommon in the Empire for the messenger to be blamed for the message. Even he had been known to snap angrily at messengers, even though they could not logically be blamed for the content of the message. Sharon had been with him long enough to know that he never meant it, but still…
Tiberius shook his head as he turned to face her, taking the datapad and skimming it rapidly. It was traditional to hire a personal assistant who was beautiful, rather than intelligent, but Tiberius had rapidly learned that such assistants were largely useless. Sharon might not be a beauty — now, anyway — but she was brisk, efficient and knowledgeable. And she wasn’t a distraction from his work. It would have been easy to sink into a life of luxury and ignore the outside universe. There were times when he found himself seriously considering abandoning his responsibilities and walking away.
“The Families Council has called a meeting,” Sharon added, when Tiberius had finished scanning the datapad. “They want a full meet in thirty minutes.”
Tiberius wasn’t surprised. It had barely been a week since the first tidings from Sector 117 had arrived on Earth, carrying news of absolute disaster. The Thousand Families had been stunned and angered, then they’d started looking to see what advantage each of them could pull from the chaos. But they would eventually have to start working together, wouldn’t they? The rebels had managed the impossible and pulled together thousands of disparate factions, creating the largest single threat the Empire had faced since its foundation. It’s rulers would have to work together too.
“Tell them I’ll be there,” he said, turning away from the window and walking towards his desk. “Call me five minutes before the meeting is due to start.”
His grandfather had designed the office himself, Tiberius knew, which might be why he hated it. The old man had been a ruthless grasping bastard, always struggling to put the family ahead of everything else; his office had been designed to show off his wealth and power. Priceless artworks hung everywhere, clashing together in a display that showcased the family’s possessions — and their master’s lack of any real taste. Charm and elegance might dominate the rest of the mansion, but not in his grandfather’s office. Tiberius had seriously considered redecorating as soon as he moved in, before deciding that it wouldn’t be good to become too comfortable.
He read through the report twice, looking for hope. But there was nothing. The core of the Jupiter Shipyard had been destroyed, leaving the family with an immense bill for repairs at the worst possible time. Reading between the lines, Tiberius suspected that it would be cheaper to build a completely new shipyard. The weasel words written by the bureaucrat who’d signed off on the report hinted as much.
It could be worse, I suppose, he told himself. The Roosevelt Family is screwed completely.
Once, he would have taken a small amount of pleasure in watching a mighty family brought low. Lord Paul Roosevelt was just as much of a grasping bastard as Tiberius’s grandfather, without the virtue of belonging to the same family. His push to take sole control of Sector 117 — and Jackson’s Folly — had alienated most of the other families. Now, with the rebels in control of the family’s investment, the entire clan was tottering and threatening to collapse into rubble. It would be nice to watch Lord Paul humbled…
… But not if the fall of one family brought the entire Empire down too.
His intercom buzzed. “My Lord,” Sharon said, “the meeting will take place in five minutes.”
Tiberius nodded and stood, walking to a sealed door hidden behind a large portrait of a woman with an enigmatic smile. It opened, once the sensor had checked his DNA, revealing a comfortable chair and an empty table. Few of the Family Heads would choose to willingly enter another’s mansion, even for a top security meeting. Instead, they sat in their rooms and projected their images to the others. One by one, they flickered into existence, only a faint shimmer betraying their true nature. Tiberius sat upright as one of the automated systems placed a drink by his chair. He was younger than the others, easily the youngest Family Head in four centuries. It was important that he be taken seriously.
Everyone knew that there were a thousand aristocratic families in the Empire. What everyone didn’t know — but should have been able to guess — was that some of the Thousand Families were more important than the others. The eleven most powerful families formed the Families Council, which was intended to deal with problems outside the remit of a single family. Tiberius scowled as he realised that, counting himself, there were only ten Family Heads in the room. The family that would replace the Roosevelt Family had not yet been identified.
If we vote, we could be deadlocked, he thought. Traditionally, a vote taken by all eleven families was binding. But a deadlocked vote was effectively useless.
“The meeting will come to order,” Lady Madeline Hohenzollern said. She was over a hundred years old, yet looked young enough to pass for Tiberius’s sister. He knew better than to turn his back on her. “The subject in front of us is the mutiny in Sector 117 and subsequent events. I call upon Grand Admiral Joseph Porter to brief us.”
She lifted a hand. Grand Admiral Porter appeared at the other end of the table, looking uncomfortable. Unusually, he was neutral, without belonging to any of the Thousand Families; he only held his post because none of the families wished to hand so much power to another family. But it also meant that none of the families would defend him, if they started looking for a scapegoat. And it was certain, Tiberius knew, that they would start looking for someone to blame.
“My Lords and Ladies,” Porter said. His voice was perfect, too perfect. Tiberius guessed he was using a voder to appear calm, despite the breach in protocol. “The situation is grave.”
He paused for effect, then carried on. “The first mutinies took place on the Jackson’s Folly Observation Squadron,” he informed them. “Led by Commander Colin Walker, the mutineers seized the squadron — and then the superdreadnaughts that were intended to spearhead the… occupation of Jackson’s Folly. Once the superdreadnaughts were under their control, the mutineers captured or destroyed the Annual Fleet, then started a campaign intended to undermine our control of the sector. This culminated with an attack on Camelot, which ended with the rebels in firm control of the sector. An attempt to regain control three weeks later failed.”
Tiberius scowled. It took six months to get a message from Earth to Jackson’s Folly. By the time they’d received word of the first mutinies, Camelot had already fallen to the rebels and the Empire’s control had been shattered. Presumably, the rebels would advance towards Earth — they had to know that the Empire still maintained an immense advantage in industrial production — and the time delay would slip, but it would still be hard masterminding the war from Earth. But did they dare trust someone with enough firepower and independent authority to stop the rebels?