That method of ruling required the free and swift flow of information. By cutting that off, the lions had severed the links between worlds. Those who had power locally now assumed more and sought to guarantee it. I was certain some of those people were quite altruistic, but others, like Bannson, clearly were not. Anyone who assumed power and had a distrust of or hatred for The Republic would not return that power without a fight.

But The Republic had never fought against its own citizens. To do so now would be to unite locals against The Republic. Moreover, landing a force to stop Bannson before he’d done anything would weaken Republic forces. That, clearly, was what the lions wanted. The Republic then, mindful that the lions lurked out there, had to keep one eye on them and one eye on the jackals. As a result, of course, The Republic would get gnawed.

Whether or not it was gnawed to death was really the question.

I looked up at Consuela again. “My lady, what is it you desire from us?”

“We need fresh eyes.” She smiled with a hint of relief. “We have been here in the maelstrom and there are certain assumptions from which we’ve been operating. We don’t know if they are right or not. The two of you, having been away, have a new perspective. Assume nothing, challenge everything and, with luck, you’ll see what we have not.”

Janella nodded. “And if we’re not lucky?”

The Countess sighed. “Then the blind shall continue to lead the blind, and into perdition we will go.”

White Sands Training Ground

North America, Terra

Prefecture X, Republic of the Sphere

10 December 3132

I drove Ghost to the right, cutting the ’Mech through the contrails of Janella’s long-range missiles. The smoke blinded me for a half second—at least on the vislight level as I looked out through the Mad Cat III’s cockpit. The holographic display was on magres, so the smoke didn’t show up, and I got to follow her missiles as they slammed into the target.

A dozen and a half of the missiles actually hit, some of them slamming into the steel girder construct housing the data-display sensor. It was projecting into our sensors the image of a Centurion. As the missiles hit the datafield, they detonated, blasting armor from the BattleMech’s image. Sheets of the previously pristine ferro-ceramic armor glittered down in a rain of shards.

My right hand coaxed the red crosshairs on the holographic display over the Centurion’s outline. The dot at the center pulsed gold, so I hit the trigger. Ghost rocked back a bit as forty LRMs launched from the shoulder missile racks. I let the ’Mech hunch down on its birdlike legs, splaying the arms wide for balance.

As the ’Mech came back up and continued to the right, dozens of new explosions wracked the simulated Centurion. The right arm went whirling off to vanish in a haze of data dissolution. The left leg buckled at the knee and some of the hatch covers over its missile launcher went sailing off like playing cards tossed into a gale.

Janella punched Andrea, her Tundra Wolf, forward. Unlike my ’Mech, the Tundra Wolf is humanoid in configuration, though it has no hands. She thrust the right arm forward and four ruby beams of light stabbed out. They clawed through the ’Mech’s left knee, severing it completely. The shin fell left, the knee slammed into the ground and the Centurion plowed turf face-first.

“Nice shooting!”

Her voice came back a bit tight, but happy. “Thanks. On the right, coming up. Catapult.”

“I’ve got it.” I planted the ’Mech’s right foot, digging the clawed toes into the ground, and pivoted. As I brought the ’Mech around, the Catapult resolved itself on my holodisplay. It looked a lot like my Mad Cat III, save it lacked the arms. The forward-thrust cockpit did have two underslung autocannons, and they fired. A second later the shoulder-mounted LRM launchers blossomed fire and smoke.

While the Catapult was merely a figment of the range-control computer, it was able to project data into my ’Mech and it did so with a vengeance. A glance at my secondary monitor showed armor evaporating over Ghost’s chest and right leg, expanding a hole opened by an earlier tangle with a Panther. The autocannon slugs pounded my right arm and one of my small lasers winked out of existence.

Worse than all that damage was the computer kicking the gyros out of phase. This left me in a metal machine the size of a small building, moving about thirty kilometers per hour, suddenly out of control. It wasn’t as if I were on ice, but as if I’d been smacked with a twenty-five-ton sledgehammer. Ghost staggered back and sank lower, then the left foot clawed the ground and got a hold, which stopped me from going over backward.

Janella’s ’Mech sailed right through the space I’d occupied and cut loose with another salvo of LRMs. They streaked in, some corkscrewing down, and pulverized the Catapult’s cockpit. Ferro-titanium supports shattered, the cockpit canopy disintegrated—save for one rounded sheet that popped out intact—and fire shredded the interior. The crumpled nose came up, then the ’Mech fell over backward, with the cockpit burning like the mouth of a volcano.

Ghost came back up and I surveyed the damage. The ’Mech had weathered the attacks pretty well, with only minor reductions in speed. My targeting capability had been slightly degraded, and I’d lost that one laser, but otherwise the machine was in very good shape.

The rangemaster’s voice broke into the radio channel. “I’ve got all the data I need right now. You two want to call it quits here, or head into the Valley of Death? Holding others off the range won’t be that difficult.”

I shook my head as sweat stung my eyes. “Not today, but soon.”

Janella had turned Andrea to face me. Her ’Mech had been painted gray, with blue highlights on legs and arms. It didn’t have the fierce designs some other Mech Warriors favored, instead retaining the subtle tones that had belonged to the machine since a Wolf Clan warrior had brought it into Republic service nearly fifty years earlier.

“I’m done, too, thanks. We’re coming back in.” Her voice revealed a bit more weariness when she flicked over to the tactical sideband we’d been sharing. “It was good to get this workout, but I wasn’t focusing.”

Damn, woman, if you can shoot like that when you’re not focusing… I nodded. “Well, when they have your stats from this run worked up, I think you’ll find you blasted the hell out of everything here. Going back to your taking down my ’Mech on Helen, you have a nice string going.”

“Dusting that ’Mech on Helen was just varminting.”

“Ouch.”

“Sorry, my dear, but it’s true. You were running down an alley, couldn’t maneuver. Had you been standing still you’d not have been a much easier shot.”

“Given the way I was shooting here, even facing you down I’d not have been much of a challenge.”

She laughed, and it was good to hear those rich tones enter her voice. “Mason, you’re in a brand-new ’Mech. You’re the first pilot, and this is a new design and that was your shakeout run. We’ve run this course before and you might not have been hitting as you have in the past, but you handled that beast very well. It’s quite mobile and does have power.”

She was right. The Mad Cat III–which some wags had designated Miffed Kitty—was a variant on the very successful Mad Cat design from the Clans. Being lighter than its predecessor, it ran faster, which I favored. It did lack some of the punch of the Mad Cat II, but I’ve long been of the school that suggests being able to move and avoid damage is preferable to taking a beating to administer one.