Zenith Jump Point, Ozawa
Lockdale Province, Terran Hegemony
15 January 2767
They hadn’t brought dropships with them, the mission was strictly reconnaissance, so at least Jones didn’t have to deal with the problems that had arisen at Tortuga. On the other hand, Moore had decided to detach three of the onboard fighter wings to reinforce the worried garrison on Mallory’s World, which Jones wasn’t happy about.
FSS Tancredi also wasn’t the first ship to jump into the destination system – that was what her escorts were for and the two destroyers had jumped ten minutes earlier. If all was well, they would have cleared the immediate battlespace around the jump point of all threats.
Actually, he thought as the universe lurched and Commodore Plains covered her mouth with a drawstring bag, if all went well there wouldn’t be any threats.
Then the transit was over and systems that had been locked down against the side-effects began to spin up again. Plains was bent over next to her console but long routine had her petty officers working around her for the thirty seconds it took her to get her dry heaves under control. The confirmation that nothing obstructed the launch axis of the ship came in before the little blonde had finished wiping her mouth with an absorbent cloth but she nodded to the questioning look from the man next to her and the first eight fighters streaked out into space.
The jump point was cluttered with traffic, mostly civilian boomers and the dropships they were carrying. The familiar icons of FSS Arthur Davion and her sister ship FSS Katherine Davion were amidst them, under one gravity of thrust and escorted by their own fighters.
“- aware armed jumpships among the civilian vessels.” Pyotr Antonov was senior of the two destroyer commanders. “One vessel engaged and destroyed, two others using civilians as cover.”
“Understood,” Moore answered crisply. “Form on our flanks and send us as much ID material as you have, we don’t want to cause casualties among the civilian shipping. Captain, proceed with caution.”
“Aye sir.” Jones spun his chair back to Plains’ station. “Air boss we need a search pattern for two hostiles. Possible converted pre-League merchantmen, possibly heavily armed. More detailed information to follow.”
“Search pattern, aye. Red and Blue wings on dorsal and ventral patterns. Holding Silver and Copper for response.”
Jones didn’t bother with confirmation – it was her decision and it was the right one. The first two wings she referred to by their colour-coded wing-tips were in Centurion interceptors – fast and agile which made them the best for finding the targets. The next two wings, not yet launched although they’d be out soon were in heavier Lightnings loaded with heavy autocannon. Not ideal for taking on enemy shipping but this was no situation to break out the nuclear warheads in the Tancredi’s arsenal.
Checking the data from the Arthur Davion he confirmed his guess: the ships were both built on the hulls of small pre-League starships that had been designed around compact jump-cores that had since been reserved to military function. About the size of a Merchantman-class boomer, but more slender and sporting a fusion thruster that pure jumpships – most of which never went in-system from jump points – didn’t need.
“If it wasn’t so packed, they’d stand out a wolf among sheep,” he noted. “Ships like that aren’t exactly common this near to Terra.”
“Periphery raider, perhaps,” Moore speculated. “It’s armed, though. The first sighted gave the Katy a real nudge before she could fire back.”
“Yes...” Jones looked at the data and then frowned. “They only fired with capital turrets, not with secondaries. They might have been holding them back until fighters were launched, of course.” He glanced at the tactical display. “Admiral, I recommend we make headway x-20, y-75 and get clear of the civilians.”
“That could leave them clear arcs to fire on us from among the civvies,” she observed. “On the other hand, with forty fighters combing through the area they’ll have to fight or run – Barry, have you got anything from the civvies yet? A lot of contradictory talk from them,” she added to Jones “I think our targets may be transmitting bad data when we try to get facts. Make headway, let’s see if it gets a response.”
“And likely the civilians are worried that if they’re near one of them they might be targeted for talking. Or just caught in the crossfire.” Jones turned to the helm and gave the necessary instructions.
Something was said on the flag-deck and Moore spoke up again. “They’ve been here two weeks, long enough to charge their drives.”
“Then they have an alternative to standing and fighting.”
“Target one sighted,” snapped Plains. “Position data being plotted, Silver – ah, hell – Silver Wing is going after it. We lost the fighter that spotted them but the rest of the squadron is closing in to reacquire.”
“Good work, Weiss.”
Silver-white icons threaded their way through the tactical plot, racing towards the orange-haloed blue marker of the lost Centurion. Hopefully the pilot had made it out but there was little chance of that if the thirty ton fighter had taken a hit from a weapon intended for use against ship massing hundreds of thousands of tons. The blue markers were also coalescing towards the same point, hunting the killer.
“Launching Gold Wing,” the air boss announced absently. “Green Wing is on hold for rearmament.”
Jones frowned. Green Wing were interceptors, they could only carry around sixty percent the external load of the Lightning wings and had no internal ammunition bins. Then again, they might need all the punch they could muster to take out the enemy ships without using the Davion-class destroyer’s capital autocannon. “Conventional warheads?” he asked her.
Weiss shook her head, short blonde curls surrounding her face like a halo. “Rocket pods.”
Jones arched an eyebrow. Weren’t those usually used for surface strafing? “Proceed then.” Second-guessing his Air boss could wait until after the fight – by which point her decision might have been vindicated.
The enemy ship popped back up onto the display as Blue wing reacquired it, skulking behind a flotilla of egg-shaped bulk-carriers almost as large as the shark-like starship.
Copper Wing arced away from the Tancredi, moving to intercept the enemy’s course as it realised it had been sighted again and lit up its main drive, no longer coasting. Before they arrived and before the ship could build any serious speed, Plains vectored Silver Wing around the Behemoth-class dropships and the twenty fighters slashed down on their prey, racing along its length from prow to stern.
Plains straightened. “Blue Wing reports the enemy navigational bridge is out, bow armour compromised.” A blue-white flash on her display. “Confirming three capital energy turrets in the enemy stern,” she added sourly as orange flashed around one of the silver fighters and it fell out of formation, tumbling. “Two lasers, one PPC, dual mounts. Amend attack patterns to avoid the aft arc.”
Silver Wing broke away behind cover, circling towards the nose of the enemy ship. Copper had reached position though and they drove in laterally, savaging one side of the bow. In response the ship rolled over and its much heavier massive autocannon sent trails of shells chasing after the Lightnings. None of them showed damage markers, but one of the trails of fire intersected with a Star Lord-class jumpship and blew it in half without the slightest effort. Escape pods burst away from the prow section.
“New contact, same class as before,” Plains reported and Red Wing began to converge before she scattered them sharply. “Keep looking, we don’t know there are only three. Green launching, Gold move to engage.”
“Hold that,” Jones ordered quietly.
Plains amended her instruction and then looked at him. “Captain?”
“As long as Red are still sweeping the area, they may not realise they’ve been spotted. They’re headed for our rear but we’re opening the range right now. Get Green out there and both wings can engage as a concentrated strike. In the meantime, it buys us time.”
She nodded in understanding.
Silver Wing was re-engaging the other ship, abandoning the earlier high speed pass and instead matching approximate vector and velocity, relying on their higher thrust-to-weight ratio to dance evasively around the enemy prow, weapons firing each time they spun their noses past it. Like a bull stung in the nose by a picador’s blade, the enemy returned fire with autocannon and at least one particle beam. At least, since it was pulling out of the civilian ships, there was less chance of them hitting another boomer.
That didn’t mean that Silver weren’t paying a price and they were short by two more fighters before Copper bled off their own previous speed and re-joined the fight.
“Moving Green and Gold in,” Plains reported. She careted way points on the tactical display. “No over thrusting, they’ll pick it up for sure.”
Compared to the rush to engage the first target, the two squadrons seemed to crawl across the battlespace. Jones took the time to launch recovery craft, both for the wreckage of their own fighters and for the civilian escape pods.
“Captain,” Moore called out. “I think I’ve got it through the civvies heads that the enemy are too focused on us to stop them jumping. We should see…”
“Multiple K-F fields building,” one of the sensor operators reported.
“Shoot it to the Air boss,” Jones snapped. If his fighters was in the wrong place when they ships jumped they could be torn apart by the jump-field.
Green and Gold accelerated sharply, over thrusting to get away from one of the building K-F jump drives.
“Target Two is accelerating.”
“A foolish decision,” Mary Kaga noted from the Combat Information Centre. “He should have held his position and jumped out. Our fighters couldn’t risk approaching him if he was about to jump.”
There were flashes of light and the battlespace began to clear. Hopefully the civilian ships would go somewhere safe.
“Engaging Target Two,” reported Plains. On the display, all forty aerospace fighters went across the bow of the ship, spreading out as they slowed and twisted away to avoid its return fire. The little woman gripped her console. “Their forward particle beam is out – the rockets did significant damage to sensor externals. That should hurt their accuracy.”
“Sir, target one is signalling.” The comms officer tapped his ear piece.
“On speakers.”
“They’ve ceased fire,” Plains noted, shifting attention back and forth between what were effectively separate engagements.
“-sel, this is the RWS Theban Legion. I request, terms of -”
The message, but not the transmission, was cut off with the retort of a gun and a second voice spoke up. “No surrender.”
Jones spun his seat to look at Moore’s face on the feed from the flag bridge. She was looking back at him with the same forced blandness he thought he was showing.
“The signal cut off, sir.”
“It seems as if they’re not of one mind over there,” Jones said out loud.
“Yes, and a Rim Worlds ship? Some of their fleet would be stationed in the Hegemony but I don’t recall anything like these in their listed forces.”
“A secret fleet to join the Periphery’s secret army?”
It seemed possible. Jones looked at Light Commodore Plains. “Continue the engagement. There are still civilians in the region, we’ll take escape pods if they launch them but I want those ships gone.”
“Aye sir. Pulling Red, Blue and Green back for a perimeter, with the pods expended they’re not adding anything to the other wings.”
Jones nodded. The modest lasers of the Centurions’ integral armament wasn’t intended for anti-shipping strikes.
A moment later, the first of the two enemy ships lit up with explosions, compartment after compartment gutting itself as fire spread along its hull. Jones winced – something must have ruptured the hydrogen fuel storage from inside the shop and it was venting into the personnel spaces.
“We’ll need a reload for Silver and Copper before they re-engage,” Plains reported.
Jones nodded. It’s an issue with carrier doctrines, he noted to himself. Death of a thousand cuts works for extended fights but we’ll need heavier fighters or better ammunition loads if we want to take out ships with a single fighter sortie. At least without the civilians we could use nukes now.
The Katherine Davion pulled away slightly from the Tancredi and began to rotate end to end.
“Captain Riley has a firing solution now that the civilians are clear,” Moore advised. “Pull your fighters back.”
He gave Plains the nod and saw the twenty fighters open the distance from the last enemy. All twenty? Yes, they hadn’t lost a single Gold Wing Lightning so far.
The destroyer opened fire with its forward guns, raking the Rim Worlds ship with heavy autocannon fire. Video feed from the fighters showed the hull being torn open by the heavy shells and Plains all but pouted.
.o0O0o.
Avalon City, New Avalon
Crucis March, Federated Suns
23 January 2767
Francesca Reznick stood in front of the Privy Council. The first shock had passed, for the most part. Now they could confront the grim reality.
“The FSN has made contact with the garrisons we loaned to the Terran Hegemony on jointly administered worlds and seven other Hegemony worlds,” she reported. “All four worlds lost their HPG stations to sabotage and in the cases of Ozawa, New Florence and Rio, the primary jump-points were interdicted by warships of the Rim Worlds Navy. All seven Hegemony world had some degree of Rim Worlds presence either on the ground or in space.”
“Carrier divisions Tancredi and Pleiades were able to break the interdictions at Ozawa and Rio and several hundred civilian jumpships were able to escape, but we don’t have a great deal of information about what’s happening deeper inside the Hegemony and the New Florence picket managed to destroy FSS Buccaneer, with her escorts hot-loading their drives to escape.”
“Weren’t there any captured personnel?” asked Benton Hasek, representing his cousin Rita for the Ministry of the Capellan March.
“A few enlisted personnel. The most Military Intelligence has established so far is confirmation that as far as they’re aware, their ships were acting under the orders of President Stefan Amaris as part of a general operation to isolate the Terran Hegemony – and that operations commenced on the morning of the twenty-seventh of December.” Reznick folded her arms. “We know from the last information to reach us from Terra that President Amaris was scheduled to arrive the day before but bad weather kept him from landing until the evening. Whether that had an effect on his plans is hard to say.”
“What about our people on Terra?” asked Joshua quietly.
“With relations at such a low ebb quite a number of Council Aides and senior bureaucrats elected to return to the Suns for Christmas,” his father advised him. “It was intended as a low key message to Richard, but there were still hundreds of staff members and tens of thousands of tourists on Terra. Across the entire Hegemony, counting tourists, business travellers and whatnot it’s likely hundreds of thousands.”
“This is going to be a disaster.”
“Yes.” Joel Parks looked over at Bennett Green of the Bureau of Star League Affairs, invited by John to sit in on the meeting. “On many levels. Administrator Green, did the January credit transfer arrive from Terra?”
The man – Thomas Green-Davion’s maternal cousin – shook his head. “Our first sign of problems was when we didn’t get confirmation of the end of quarter tax transfers.”
Parks looked up the table to John. “That will cripple BSLA operations,” he said quietly.
“But you said that tax transfers hadn’t been sent? Can’t those be used instead of the usual funding?” asked Joshua.
“It’s a different account,” Green explained. “Until the Department of Revenue disburses the funds we can’t touch it. In fact, the banks aren’t sure if it should still be credited against the local Star League accounts or the accounts on Terra. We’re stuck in limbo.”
“Banking regulations aren’t a suicide pact,” John told them. “Joel, issue an instruction to the banks that until and unless transfers to the Hegemony have been verified they’re to assume that they transfers have failed and advise their customers as such. There must be millions of private and corporate accounts with the same problem.”
“Secondly, as of tomorrow we’ll have been out of touch with Terra for four weeks. While there’s no specific provision for this under the Accords, in an emergency even a non-quorum of the Star League Council can issue temporary directives subject to later ratification. While one member is a fairly long way from a quorum, I think this qualifies as an emergency.”
Green considered and then nodded cautiously. “Within reason, your highness, and only for temporary measures.”
“That’s acceptable. In that case I’m temporarily appointing a committee to direct Star League civil activities within the Federated Suns, handling any decisions that would normally be dealt with on Terra until contact is re-established.”
“You said the magic word,” Hanse noted. “He relaxed the minute you said committee. All bureaucrats love those.”
“I hereby appoint you as chairman, Administrator Green, and the senior representatives within the Suns of each department are also summoned to New Avalon as members.” That wouldn’t be hard, since all of them had offices here and all but one was on-world already. “Minister Davion of Administration Services will also sit on the committee as a liaison to the Federated Suns government.”
Joshua opened his mouth, possibly to protest, but John glared at him. You wanted to improve relations with the Hegemony, son. Now put your money where your mouth is.
“Your first priority is to maintain normal operations in the short term, disbursing Star League revenue as necessary to your departments. Your second priority is to have the Ministry of Communications re-establish links to the rest of the Star League Council. I realise we can’t coordinate real-time meetings without the connections through Terra, but we can vote by letter if need be.”
“Of course, your highness.” Green pushed his chair back.
John held up his hand. “Finally, you’re to draft a plan for the orderly scaling back of non-essential Star League programmes and the prioritisation of funding to the SLDF. We’re still on a wartime footing and General Kerensky has a lot of expenses that need to be paid for.”
Thomas Green-Davion leant forwards, drawing attention from his cousin. “A fight in the Hegemony would get ugly in a hurry,” he warned. “No one’s ever seriously tested the defences Lord Jonathon ordered except in simulated combat but based on exercises ten years they’d be a formidable force multiplier and we don’t even know how strong Amaris’ forces are.”
Eyes went to Reznick who nodded. “His expected deployments were around seventy-five percent of the RWA’s reported strength which would have put them on par with the one Corps of First Army still in the Hegemony. We have to assume that those numbers are under-reported though, because they’d have had to neutralised the SLDF forces and the Hegemony’s militia forces to have got this far.”
“Surprise and ruthlessness could have cut those odds,” John told her. “It’s entirely probable that many of I Corps’ and the militia’s bases were targeted with nuclear or chemical attacks in the opening stages and stragglers could be mopped up in isolated groups. If there are holdouts, as I very much hope, they’re likely to be the exceptions which managed to get an organised resistance together. Still, we have to assume that Amaris’ forces are much larger than reported. It would be consistent with the other Periphery states’ forces.”
“And they’re still in the field,” Stopec noted. “So Kerensky can’t simply withdraw from the Periphery without leaving a hostile force to his rear.”
The First Prince shook his head. “That’s also not a given. If Amaris was moving in concert with the rest of the Periphery then he should have moved much sooner. A year ago you’d have been right, but since then the other three states are probably down to only a couple divisions worth of troops each – and not as formed divisions, most of them are scattered in regiment or battalion pockets, sometimes even companies and lances fighting guerrilla-style wars.”
“This is probably more of a matter for the High Command,” Green-Davion pointed out. “Will you be making a public address?”
“At this point, yes.” John looked around the room. “I know this is going to affect all of our ministries on some level. For now, my son’s office will act as our point of contact for any matters that would usually involve the Star League. Joshua, don’t actually try to resolve all them directly, set up lines of communication between departments and the relevant members of Administrator Green’s committee.”
He rose to his feet. “The Star League was built on the premise that we could work together, which was the basis for the Federated Suns, on a slightly more local scale. What we’re facing isn’t a crisis, it’s a challenge. A challenge that we’re going to rise to.”
With forced humour, he added: “The crisis is going to be Stefan Amaris’ cleaning bill when General Kerensky has the SLDF back on Terran soil. Because that’s going to be a lot of brown pants to get stains out of.”
.o0O0o.
Avalon City, New Avalon
Crucis March, Federated Suns
6 February 2767
The holographic image of Aleksandr Kerensky stood facing John across his desk, courtesy of the HPG channels between New Avalon and New Vallis. Damage to HPGs in the Concordat had forced the Commanding General to return to his previous command post for this conversation.
“Have you received any further communication from the usurper?” he enquired coldly.
John inclined his head. Stefan Amaris had broken the silence of the Terran Hegemony on 31 January, although it had taken time for word to spread. The President of the Rim Worlds Republic had announced his removal of the ‘Cameron tyrant’ and election as the Director-General of the Terran Hegemony. By the logic that the Director-General was the First Lord of the Star League, he also proclaimed himself the leader of the League – although he apparently preferred to style himself Emperor rather than merely ‘First Lord’.
“Not since he asked me to pass on his best wishes as Emperor to all his minions. His own words, in fact.” The First Prince shrugged. “I’m not inclined to do so. I can’t see any of the Council supporting him as Director-General, much less as Emperor. Bennett Green tells me that Duke Ueno ordered him to resume normal BSLA operations, including sending tax revenue to Terra. That isn’t happening and at least in the Combine and Confederation his colleagues are taking the same position.”
Kerensky lowered his head in a fractional nod. “I’m relieved to hear that. I will need time before the SLDF can respond. All of our communications will need to be re-arranged, thousands of functions that were handled on Terra or New Earth now have to be taken care of without their facilities or records. And… the men are shocked. Angry and fearful for their families.”
“I know.” John shook his head. “HPG communications are almost choked by families trying to contact relatives in the Hegemony. Have you heard from the other Council Lords?”
“Only Liao so far. She was reserved, assured me she would not support Amaris.” The general drew himself up. “However, she said that as Amaris is a Hegemony citizen, to act against him would be to interfere in internal Hegemony affairs.”
John winced.
“Yes.” The general nodded in agreement. “Kurita has had time to reply but has not.”
“I’ve had some unconfirmed reports from my people in the Combine,” John told him. Which was even true, albeit supplemented by Hanse’s information. “The Coordinator’s health is poor, and out of all of us he’s the only one of us with close family on Terra.”
“Us?”
John shook his head. “The Council, my apologies. You’re from Moscow, so…”
“We all have our hostages to fortune,” Kerensky replied coldly. “I will do my duty, Prince Davion. And part of this is that I must ask what will you do?”
“The AFFS is on a war-footing and I’m moving troops and ships to reinforce the seven worlds we’re garrisoning already – it’s a foothold for operations in the Hegemony once you’re ready. The High Council will be voting on war against the Rim Worlds Republic and, what did you call him, the Usurper? And with Stefan Ukris Amaris in whatever capacity, as soon as I can get them assembled. In the meantime, Administrator Green is handling Star League civil affairs within the Suns and Commodore Grec has been liaising him where those touch on the SLDF.”
“Janos is a good man, but his family are on Keid.”
“Fortunately not. I invited them to New Avalon for Christmas – it didn’t seem fair for them to be separated at that time of the year. Most of your senior staff’s families though… It’s a nightmare.”
Amaris will know who they are. And I could only get a handful of MI6 teams into the Hegemony, working against the League’s own security apparatus.
Kerensky made a helpless gesture. “You understand why I need time. You’re with us then.”
“To the end of the line, Aleksandr.”
“That, at least, is good news. I will need your support almost more than your soldier. You understand that I cannot continue operations in current warzones.”
“I agree completely. It would be bad enough if it was just adding the Republic to the problem but with the Hegemony…” John shrugged. “If the other Lords wish to make an issue of it they are welcome to send their own regiments to fight the rebels.”
“No.” Kerensky’s voice was like iron. “They would not be there to restore the League’s rule but to conquer worlds for their own realms. Soon they would begin to wage war with each other over the control of prized worlds -” He broke off and snorted. “Of such wealth as remains after two years of fighting. That must not be allowed. I will negotiate a ceasefire but it will be binding on the entire Star League.”
“The irony if you wind up having to send regiments back to, for example, the Alliance to defend them from the Inner Sphere would be painful.”
“I was not fighting against the territorial states, only the secessionists,” the general insisted.
John pinched the bridge of his nose. “Alright, General. I’ll coordinate with Second Army to see what supply shortages you’ll be facing with the Hegemony unavailable. Most of it’ll probably be hardware we can’t build for you but Commodore Grec may have some idea what we can substitute. In the meanwhile, I’ll freeze all Rim Worlds assets in the Suns for confiscation and on a case-by-case apply the same principle to Hegemony assets associated with Amaris’ supporters.”
Kerensky frowned but nodded reluctantly. “We can’t let him pull resources from the rest of the League,” he agreed. “I can’t withdraw from the area until I have the ceasefire, but as soon as possible as I’ll relocate my headquarters to New Syrtis to coordinate withdrawing from the Periphery.”
“Respectfully, I suggest you depart immediately,” John counselled. “Without headquarters, much of the SLDF’s cohesion relies on you and General DeChevilier. Amaris can’t have consolidated his position yet and it may still be possible to relieve pockets of loyal troops.”
“How would we even find them?”
“Based on the reports of refugees who escaped the Rim Worlds blockade on civilian ships, some SLDF vessels are still operating in the Hegemony, presumably operating from concealed fuel and repair stations.” He grinned at Kerensky’s chagrined expression. “I may not know where they are but the fact the SLDF has such stations isn’t a very well-kept secret I’m afraid. The 568th transport flotilla has volunteered to try to establish contact – actually, I gather it’s everything Janos has been able to do to persuade them not to try to hook up with whatever ground troops they could find and try to liberate the Hegemony immediately.”
“That’s insane. Nine warships and a few transports can’t possibly contest against the forces Amaris must be able to bring to bear.”
“And that’s assuming they don’t rush headlong into one of the Space Defense Systems. Those systems could effectively have full fleets guarding them if Amaris has control of the drones – or be wide open if he doesn’t. We just can’t tell.” John spread his hands. “To come up with a strategy against Amaris, you’re going to need information – and if there are loyal troops holding out on some worlds, then we owe it to them either to evacuate them or to reinforce them.”
“Reckless, very reckless.”
“Let’s see what we can find out. I can meet you on New Syrtis in a month and by then we’ll know better what we’re dealing with.”
Kerensky considered and then nodded. “I’ll have the location data for some of the stations sent to Commodore Grec, for relay to the flotilla’s commander. In the meanwhile, we both have much to do.”
“Then let’s be about it.” John stood and bowed respectfully as the holographic image winked out.
With a sigh he looked at Hanse. “You’re sure?”
The other man nodded. “Amaris’ control of the SDS networks won’t be complete for two years and at the end of that time he’d raised something along the lines of thirty divisions of admittedly under-equipped and trained troops from the Hegemony. Press him hard, now and in places where he hasn’t focused the bulk of his attention – like the worlds scouted so far – and cracks should start to show.”
John sighed. “Should. If Brasco’s flotilla shows the same then I’ll press on but if not then I’m not risking thousands of troops by moving in without the SLDF.”
“I can’t fault you for that.”
The First Prince picked up his phone. “At least I can relieve someone’s concerns.” He tapped the control, “Owen, get me Joel Parks please.”
A moment later and the Minister of Ways and Means responded. “How can I help you, sire.”
“It occurred to me that I’m very nearly late in getting back to you about those loans I took out last year.”
“You have been very busy,” the other man conceded, “All things considered.”
“Well, conveniently all of the banks involved have made very sizeable loans to Stefan Amaris,” John advised. “Before and after his declaration last week. That’s treason, and General Kerensky has concurred with me that the assets of Amaris supporters should be frozen and confiscated. So that’s one less headache.”
Parks narrowed his eyes very slightly. “Sire, did you by any chance expect this?”
“Joel, really! If I had evidence that Stefan Amaris was plotting treason I would have shared it with General Kerensky immediately.”
“Evidence. Indeed.” The corners of Parks mouth seemed to shift slightly upwards. It might have almost been considered a smile. “Sire, do you play poker at all?”
“No, or at least not since my military days. Not really my passion.”
“Good,” the Minister said with audible relief and ended the call.