Rafael Samuels had proven to be a useful addition to the Directorate, despite the failure to bring down the Marine Corps. But he was off in the Dakota Foothills, managing the development of Plan C. That was far too important to interrupt. Plan C was the future…Stark wasn’t going to allow anything to interfere with that. It would be his final revenge on those accursed Marines…and it would give him the tools he needed to seize total power.
Alex Linden had been his closest ally since Dutton’s death, but she’d been off-planet for more than six months, trying to get intel on the restructured Marine Corps and navy. Alex was the sister of Sarah Linden, chief of staff of the Marine hospital on Armstrong…and the longtime lover of Erik Cain. Sarah believed her sister had died as a child, and Stark had planned to use a surprise reunion to get Alex into the inner circle of the Corps. It was a perfect setup for espionage, save for one inconvenient fact. Alex had run into Erik Cain on Carson’s World during the war and, with her tremendous resemblance to Sarah, he was sure to remember. Stark thought of Cain as a stubborn, pain-in-the-ass jarhead, but he knew the Marine wasn’t stupid. He had to be patient and wait for the right time to send Alex in. The time would come…indeed, he thought, it may have come already. It appeared Erik Cain was heading out to the Rim to deal with the mysterious attacks. With Cain gone, there was nothing to stop Alex from making contact with her sister…and then she would not only sabotage the Marine Corps…she would be in position to rid him once and for all of Erik Cain.
Rodger Burke was also deeply involved in Plan C. He was Number Seven on the Directorate, but Stark had promised him a position in the top three if he successfully shepherded his section of the plan to completion. He’d anxiously accepted, even though it meant virtual exile from Earth for years to come.
There were vacant Seats as well. Several Directorate members had made moves against Stark when he was at his weakest. But even with all his problems, he was too clever to fall into their traps, and three of the conspirators met with very unpleasant ends.
With his most capable people committed elsewhere and the Directorate otherwise nearly vacant, Stark was forced to look to other means to investigate this new situation. He still had Troy Warren, though Warren wasn’t really a spy. An enormously successful Corporate Magnate, he’d bought his way onto the Directorate. Still, Stark trusted him as much as he trusted anyone, and there was no question that Warren was smart. Stark would find a way to use him.
He had to figure out which power was launching the attacks, and he had to do it now. He’d been thinking about it for days, and his mind kept working its way back to the CAC. They must have found something themselves on Carson’s World, he thought. Stark couldn’t imagine any other way for one of the Superpowers to leapfrog so far in technology so quickly.
He suspected Li An was involved. She had called a meeting of representatives from the RIC, the empire, and the Caliphate. She thought she’d kept the whole thing under wraps, but Stark had an informant there…one she would never have anticipated.
Mahmoud Al’Karesh was the Chairman of State Security for the Caliphate and a relative of the Caliph himself. He was also the mastermind behind a 30 year campaign of graft and theft so extensive that the Caliph would have his head if the true extent of it was ever discovered. Unfortunately for Al’Karesh, Gavin Stark had quite a little file on his escapades…enough to blackmail the Caliphate security chief into working for Stark, at least as an informant. Stark had refrained from asking Al’Karesh to spy on his own nation…he just wanted to know what the Caliphate knew about the other powers. And that included Li An’s secret little meeting.
He hated the little midget, as he called her, but he had to admit that she was the closest thing he had to a rival. Brilliant, cunning, and as reptilian as he was, Li An was the enemy he worried about most. If anyone slipped alien technology out of Epsilon Eridani under his nose, it was probably Li An. And now she was trying to persuade the other Powers to mobilize on the Alliance’s borders. The more he considered it, the more he convinced himself she was behind the whole thing.
He reached out for the com unit and pushed the button for his assistant’s line. “Jamie, call Peter Hillman. Get him in here immediately.” Hillman was the chief of intelligence gathering on the CAC.
“Yes, sir.” Like all of Stark’s assistants, Jamie Larken never questioned the chief’s orders; she just carried them out. The fact that it was well past midnight meant nothing to Stark. Intelligence was a 24/7 business, and he expected his people to be on the job whenever he needed them.
Stark leaned back and looked out over the skyline. “I don’t know what you’re up to Li An, but I’m going to find out if I have to burn every asset I have in Hong Kong.”
General Isaac Merrick walked down the hall, his boots echoing loudly off the polished marble floor. His uniform was impeccable – perfectly tailored and neatly pressed. It was the only thing in his life that was as it should be. Merrick had been the federal commander on Arcadia, charged with using any means necessary to defeat the revolution and return the planet to its status as an obedient colony. He’d fought a war and almost won, but he’d refused to inflict institutionalized atrocities against the rebels, as federal commanders had done on other worlds. He was a soldier, not a butcher, and he knew he would make the same choices all over again.
Unfortunately, in the wake of an embarrassing defeat, Alliance Gov looked for scapegoats, and Merrick’s refusal to torture and murder civilians had been recast as incompetence and weakness. There were even whispers that he had sympathized with the rebels. Ironically, that had not been the case at all when he’d been fighting on Arcadia, but in the aftermath of the conflict he’d come to look at things in ways he never had before….thoughts that turned his entire way of life upside down and forced him to question everything he believed.
His family was very influential, and they had expended the money and political capital necessary to save him from any serious problems. He kept his rank and avoided any official reprimand, but he knew he’d never again see a serious command or meaningful assignment. His career, both in the army and in politics, was, for all intents and purposes, over. He could remain a well-dressed figurehead, carrying some made up title and walking the halls of one army base after another, or he could retire and live comfortably and quietly on his family’s resources. Or he could emigrate.
That last option was unthinkable to a member of the Political Class, especially one from a family as highly placed as Merrick’s. But Isaac Merrick was thinking about it nevertheless…he was thinking about it very seriously.
He’d been unsettled since his return to Earth. At first he thought it was stress from dealing with the intense criticism, but all of that had passed by now, and he was as restless as ever. He’d seen things on Arcadia that had challenged everything he’d believed all his life. He had been disgusted with the casual brutality and ineptitude of many of his officers…all Political Academy graduates and members of the privileged class. He began to have serious questions about the system that created such people. At the same time he’d been impressed with many of the colonists he fought against. They’d had their share of closed-minded fools too, but their ranks produced some truly extraordinary people.