Austin knew he had to be careful answering this. He knew a fraction of his father’s plans, and they seemed to involve Manfred training in the MBA’s modified ’Mechs.

“The Mirach Business Association? What does a trade group have to do with Manfred?”

“Now you’re insulting my intelligence, Lieutenant.” Borodin looked as if he wanted to spit.

“Never, Master Sergeant, never. Fill me in.” Austin glanced over his shoulder to the open doorway to be sure no one eavesdropped on them.

I’m getting too paranoid, he thought. He turned his attention back to the sergeant and tried to quash the feelings of being spied on.

“Well, sir, rumor has it that the MBA is outfitting IndustrialMechs. Lots of them. Like the AgroMech that almost did you in. It had missiles, didn’t it?”

“I can’t say if there are more than a few refitted IndustrialMechs, but the one that attacked me was packing. But I refuse to believe Manfred was piloting it, no matter what Tortorelli or the Ministry of Information say.”

“Some say that he was in the cockpit, sir. Some.” Borodin fixed him with a gimlet stare. “You wouldn’t go against your own father. I know that, but the grapevine says maybe you and the head of the MBA are conspiring to overthrow him.”

“I am loyal to my father, to Mirach, and The Republic,” Austin said forcefully.

More than this, he couldn’t see Manfred doing anything but supporting The Republic. If the captain drove a ’Mech for the MBA, it had to be with the Governor’s full approval and for some reason other than overthrowing the government.

Austin felt a small shiver when he realized other schisms were possible when Lady Elora and Calvilena Tortorelli were mixed into this brew of conspiracy. Austin was sure something Hanna had told his father about Lady Elora had brought about her death. Elora had made little secret of her contempt for the Governor, but how far would she go to oppose him? Would she be willing to kill him?

How did he find the right threat to follow? Too many factions meant Mirach stood on the brink of a vicious civil war that could split it into several blocs, each fighting the other. It could take decades to pull such a politically sundered world back together.

“Yes, sir, it’s possible the captain was out there on the test range when you tried out the MiningMech. The MBA gave orders for him to kill you.”

Austin had to laugh. “Then that probably means Marta Kinsolving knew nothing about the attack. She saved me.”

“She saved you by ramming the AgroMech, didn’t she? Now that’s a poser, unless there’s argument in the MBA ranks about how to seize power.”

“That doesn’t make much sense, does it? Too many rumors and not enough facts is the real problem, Master Sergeant.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” the sergeant said, his forehead furrowing at the complicated situation. The problem with conspiracy theories was the myriad possibilities inherent in them. Anything could be proved—or disproved. Lack of evidence became proof.

“I’m glad one rumor is put to rest.”

“That doesn’t mean the MBA isn’t getting ready to field all those converted ’Mechs. Who’d be a better pilot to lead them than Manfred Leclerc, especially considering how he’s been treated?”

“One man in a ’Mech, no matter how good, cannot stand forever against trained infantry and battle armor,” Austin said. “It would be a hard fight, but sheer numbers would eventually overwhelm a BattleMech.” Many of their unit maneuvers had been designed to prove this, not only to the soldiers of the FCL but also to Tortorelli. “Has the MBA been recruiting pilots for their refitted ’Mechs?”

“Not really,” Borodin said. His tone didn’t convince Austin he was telling the truth.

“Not that I’m interested, but where might the MBA approach a soldier about strapping down in the cockpit of a ’Mech? Think of the firepower compared to what we use! Autocannon, missiles, what a weapon that would make.” He saw the dreamy expression on Borodin’s face. Such a romantic vision appealed to the sergeant.

“They wouldn’t find any recruits here,” Borodin assured him. Austin waited. Heavy silence fell until the sergeant grew uneasy. “Not that I know anything, mind you.”

“You’re a topflight tech, Master Sergeant. Getting your hands on a refitted ’Mech would be a dream come true. Almost as big a dream come true as me piloting one.”

“Might be, if you have a thirst, you might stop at the Borzoi after midnight some night.”

“Some night,” Austin said slowly. “I’m usually busy.”

“Might be a good time to go tomorrow night,” Borodin said. “For a nightcap. Nothing more.”

“Nothing more,” Austin said. “Unless I chance upon an old friend so we can reminisce.”

“You might do that, too,” Borodin said uneasily. He buried his nose back in the tech manual, then turned away so his back was to Austin. If he had written it across the wall in meter-high red letters, the sergeant couldn’t have signaled the end of their conversation any more clearly.

Austin left the no longer garrulous Borodin, made a circuit of the adjacent rooms without finding any others from the FCL, then returned to his car and drove back to Cingulum. This time the drive was slower to give him time to think as three of the planet’s four moons snaked across the dark sky above.

Borzoi Tavern, Cingulum

Mirach

2 May 3133

The Borzoi Tavern was decorated as a Russian hunting lodge, complete with stuffed animal heads on the wood-paneled walls and long oak tables stained with beer. On closer inspection, Austin Ortega saw that the stains were designs embedded permanently into a plastic surface and the animal heads were as artificial as the Russian motif. A bear of a man with a bushy beard worked behind the long bar, his dark eyes roaming endlessly as if they were radar dishes searching out enemies. He kept his hands below the level of the bar, making Austin worry a bit about what he might be holding.

“Good evening,” Austin said to the barman, who only nodded to him. The bartender kept his hands hidden from sight. “Stormy night, isn’t it?”

A stunstick was one thing, but a large-caliber pistol was something else, if the huge man chose to fight. Austin could outrun a man intent on stunning him but had found dodging worked better than running when his opponent carried a firearm. And that was the way Austin felt inside the artificially cozy tavern—if not surrounded by enemies, then by suspicious people who were not in the least friendly.

Or it might just have been that he was so keyed up that everyone looked suspicious. He tried to calm down, but it wasn’t easy.

“Seen worse storms this time of year,” the bartender said. Austin decided conversation wasn’t too likely and went to the back of the long room to sit at an empty table. Both bartender and barmaid ignored him.

He wasn’t here to drink. He was following the hint given him by Dmitri Borodin. He shrugged off his coat and draped it over his chair.

He lounged back and found his mind drifting. He smiled as he remembered better times with Dale, when he had been a recruit standing before Manfred for the first time and, in his haste to dress, had forgotten to zip his fly. He recalled the terror and outright exhilaration he had felt in the MiningMech as he battled the AgroMech on the test range. Those memory fragments were peculiar ones he couldn’t quite fit together. Extreme fear and equally extreme gratification. He might have been killed at the ’Mech plant, but he had been doing what he had been trained to do. And he had been in a ’Mech, even if it had not been modified to carry weapons. Austin had felt complete piloting a real ’Mech.

When the stroll down memory lane began to stumble into such odd paths, he grew restive. Austin forced himself not to look at his watch, but he was sure he had been in the Borzoi for at least fifteen minutes. Past midnight now.