The hush that fell on the room erupted a second later into pandemonium.
“Quiet!” bellowed Marta. “Why wasn’t I told of an HPG comm?”
“It never happened, that’s why,” Dr. Penrose said, hastily checking another bank of recording instrumentation. “We might have been up to our asses working to salvage that cargo DropShip but I’d never let anything as important as an HPG message from off-world slip by. It never happened, Ms. Kinsolving. I swear it.”
“The lying bitch,” Marta growled.
“I want to hear what she’s saying,” Austin said. He stepped closer to the screens, but Elora’s words were drowned out by the tumult in the command bunker. He cocked his head to one side and listened hard. There had to be a way to turn her lies against her, no matter how clever she was.
“Prefect Radick has declared for the common citizen,” Elora went on, her voice aquiver with excitement now. “He will support a populist movement intended to depose tyranny. In this pursuit of maximum freedom, he urges every citizen to obey only Legate Tortorelli until the reins of government can be passed successfully to those more capable of leadership.”
“Civil war, that’s what she’s declaring,” Austin said. “She’s trying to get the populace to back Tortorelli—and her—when the two of them move against my father.” Austin closed his eyes for a moment and knew what would happen as surely as if he watched it unfold.
The military he had hoped to split into factions would be securely in Tortorelli’s command. Manfred was dead. Dale was dead. Sergio Ortega was being held incommunicado in the Palace. Lady Elora controlled the news.
The only credible opposition to the coup would be mounted by the MBA’s converted IndustrialMechs. As potent a force as they would be, Austin knew the combined might of an entire planet would be flung against them.
Austin saw nothing but disaster on the horizon. He lacked the experience of Manfred Leclerc or the charisma of his brother, but someone had to marshal the forces believing Mirach could survive and prosper under The Republic. His mind raced.
The people of Mirach had been told the net was working again—and would believe anything Elora told them.
“You look panicked,” Marta said.
“I… no, not that. There’s so much swirling around that it’s hard to decide what I ought to do. I’ve got to go to the Palace and get my father away. If he can prevent even a few of the soldiers from following Tortorelli, he must do it.”
“Your father has been mighty passive, so far. He might have other plans,” Marta said.
Austin felt nothing but contempt for his father. The old man’s finest days were gone and he now faced nothing but disgrace. His elegant words would not stop the missiles and lasers arrayed against him by the Legate. This was a coup, not a debate. The loser died.
“We’ve got to stop Elora and Tortorelli somehow,” Austin said. “Can you jam her newscasts? AWC probably built the equipment. Your technicians know it better than anyone else could.”
“You don’t understand, Austin,” Marta said. “Elora’s already told the world that she received an HPG communiqué from Radick. She is the anointed, as far as they are concerned. The riots came from fear of isolation, of not knowing what is going on throughout the Prefecture. She has established herself as the oracle who can tell them not to worry.”
“And what to do,” Austin finished bitterly. Marta was right. “Elora’s way ahead of us.”
“No one will protest when the Home Guard is sent to seize our companies, because the people think Radick is backing Tortorelli to the hilt. The power of belief that the HPG is up again will drive them to destroy us, unless we use the ’Mechs.”
Austin saw no way out. The MBA could negotiate now, hope that Elora was merciful, or they could send out their ultimate weapons in an attempt to break the Legate’s military power.
Elora would never be lenient.
Everyone lost. Everyone but Elora.
Marta snapped orders and began marshaling her forces and those of the Mirach Business Association. As her attention focused on the immediate needs of protecting her plants and workers from the mobs that were undoubtedly on the way, Austin backed away, then slid the heavy bunker door aside and stepped into the new dawn.
The ruddy sun lifted painfully above the horizon and promised rivers of spilled blood before it set at the end of the day. Austin commandeered the limo and roared off toward Cingulum and his father.
28
Palace of Facets, Cingulum
Mirach
4 May 3133
“Halt!”
For an instant, lost in thought as he was, Austin Ortega didn’t realize the guard meant him. He had lived in the Palace all his life until he moved to the FCL barracks for service with the unit. The situation had changed and Austin had foolishly ignored it in his haste to see his father.
“Austin Ortega, aide to the Governor,” he said, reaching for his ID. Austin was shoved back against a wall and looked down the muzzles of two rifles.
“Keep your hands where we can see them,” the guard said.
“The Governor’s my father. Don’t you recognize me?”
“Get the captain of the guard. We caught him,” the soldier immediately in front of Austin said.
Austin looked around and saw gun emplacements where none had been before just inside the southern entrance to the Palace. Rifle barrels bristled from behind massive carved stone columns, and from the distance came the click-click of heels marching along the marble corridor.
“What’s going on? I demand to see the Governor!” Austin knew his words fell on deaf ears. He only bought time to think. If the captain of the guard had been summoned, that meant he would be frogmarched to a cell away from the Palace. “I—my belly!” Austin screeched, doubling over and clutching his midsection.
As he bent, he got his head away from the rifles for a split second. This gave him the chance to drive forward, burying his shoulder in the gut of the soldier in front of him. The other two tried to cover him, to shoot him. Austin didn’t give them the chance. He knocked one soldier into another, spoiling her aim. Kicking out like a mule, he caught the third guard on the kneecap. Bone crunched like stepped-on plastic and then triggered a loud scream of pain. The confusion of this shriek gave Austin the chance to keep moving, spinning, grabbing, hitting with short, quick punches that dazed and bewildered.
By the time all three soldiers were sprawled on the floor, Austin had a rifle securely in hand. He fired the instant he saw an officer’s insignia rounding a column five meters off. The bullet ripped at the stone and sent sharp fragments flying like angry bees.
The brief, fierce scuffle had drawn the attention of the soldiers in the gun emplacements. They swung their automatic weapons around and opened fire, but Austin was already dodging among the pillars, using the massive limestone columns to protect his back. Even so, the heavy rounds whined past his head and kept him bent over until he reached a low railing. Without breaking stride, Austin vaulted the steel rail and fell almost four meters.
The landing jarred him, but he recovered fast. He had to if he wanted to stay alive. Their insignia indicated that these were Legate Tortorelli’s personal troops, and Austin decided they were under orders from Lady Elora, whether they knew it or not. He cursed his own self-absorption at barging in as he had done. He knew his father wasn’t allowed to communicate with anyone outside the Palace; people trying to contact him would be stopped, too.
The small passage took a right turn into darkness. Austin had come this way many times before, he and Dale having discovered the passage when they were youngsters.
Running his hand along the cool stone, he found it harder than he expected to find the depression he sought; then he remembered he had been only fourteen the last time he had used this secret route. Austin hunted lower on the wall, found the spot, and pressed hard until the wall slid back silently. Austin slipped inside as a hail of automatic fire rattled along the tight passage. He shouldered the door shut and leaned against it, breathing hard. He heard angry cries in the narrow passageway as the guards wondered how they could have missed him, quickly blaming one another for what had to be a mistake.