Surprises on all sides...
Will stared at Edward. The Protector had taken his message well. And I bet you don’t believe me about us having four warships. If Will was in Edwards place, he’d scale that up.
That was fine. The last thing Will wanted was Edward deciding Terra was an easy target.
I just betrayed the order. PArt of Will was happy that the Adept who pulled him out of the muck and mire was dead. But… If Myndo has graduated to killing her opponents… He shook his head. She couldn’t stop now. The orders had come back on the HPG, with Edward using Will’s cipher codes to read them. All of his people were to be recalled to Terra, with a new crew being brought out. Myndo’s people.
There had also been requests for information regarding every site with a core on it.
“What are you thinking, Protector?”
“I’m thinking about the economic damage Comstar can do. A full on Schism…” Edward got up and started walking in a tight circle. “And if Terra becomes a prize again…” He shook his head. “No house lord could risk another getting it. Even without what you told me.”
“True.”
“And I don’t trust you. Or, I think you’re loyal to Comstar, but well…”
“We’re not just the friendly phone company in your mind?”
“You never were that. But now I’m much more suspicious. What was Nicoletta thinking!”
“That it was the only way to keep the HPG network from being destroyed?” Will shook his head. “I could hand you the blueprints today, and you couldn’t rebuild it. That took more money in the system than we’ll have for years, maybe decades.”
“How soon before Myndo is formally invested.”
“Little over a month. Traditionally it doesn’t happen until the mourning period is over.”
“That’s not a lot of time I’m…Nicoletta! That’s it!”
“Yes?” Will asked.
“The Star League Council appointed Jerome Blake as the head of what would become Comstar.” Edward flew over to his console and started keying in data requests. “Let’s see, yes, we declared independence, but that was never recognized, the council dissolved, but ah! Here it is!”
“What?”
“They dissolved the council, but not the Star League. That was why everyone claimed the First Lordship.”
“With the exception of you and the Magistracy.”
“Well, we never wanted the headache,” Edward murmured. “But because the Star League was never officially dissolved, that means that the Council, if it reformed, would retain it’s inherent right to exercise oversight over Star League property, which the HPG network and Comstar is!”
Will opened his mouth. Closed it. Realized that he should apologize to his subordinates when he hit them with some strange historical fact.
“The High Council.”
“Right.”
The council that hasn’t met for centuries.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Edward, forgive me, since you’ve done so much for me in the last few days, but did you hit your head this morning? Ignoring the fact that we’re talking about a formality that even most historians don’t know, you intend to gather Hanse Davion in the same room with Takashi Kurita, who he invaded, both of whom claim the big chair, along with Janos Marik, who hates them both, Candace Liao, who hates Janos Marik, and Katrina Steiner who is an ally of Hanse Davion.”
“Don’t forget me. I’ll have to go to the people and explain why a Protector is going to see a Star League Council, along with the Magistrix.”
“And when someone declares himself the First Lord?”
“Takashi can’t—the Dracs couldn’t win a fight, and he knows it. Why do you think he’s putting so much time and effort into reforming his military, and buying every bit of production we have to spare? Hanse and Katrina are still digesting their gains, and working on setting the groundwork for the final merge between their states.” Edward shook his head. “None of those three states want a war. The Capellans have already resigned from the contest. And Janos? Janos is trying to deal with the last of the internal conflict, and TMI and MMI both agree—he’s broken, Will. He’s not going to start a war that has every one of his neighbors jumping in to eat him alive.”
“And if she says no?”
“Then we’re in no worse a position than we are now,” Edward frowned. “I’m not saying anything you don’t know, but if we look at all of your economic components, charities, banks, everything, I’d say that Comstar probably directly or indirectly controls about 10 percent of the Inner Sphere’s economy.”
“Eleven point five percent, actually.”
“Thank you. If Comstar blows up, even if person one doesn’t die off Terra, that’s potentially a bigger economic blow than the entire Fourth Succession War, and people WILL die from that.” Edward took a deep breath. “And yet, if I present this information to the House Lords, which I’ll have to do, since there’s every chance Waterly may try to pull something, they’re not just going to be satisfied with protests. They’ll want to take steps, which could see everyone diving in to grab their part of the HPG net before everyone else does, which gets us back to “economy, destruction of.” Imposing some level of control over Comstar, especially if its done in unison, is the best way to head this off.”
“And if Comstar Disagrees?”
“Then, we have a problem. Hopefully the Primus standing after the dust settles will see his way clear to not blowing everything up.”
Will shook his head. Me. He’s talking about Me. Christ, I’m too old for this. Should have just stayed a local adept. Then he sighed. And nobody would be here to do something about Myndo. Don’t bitch that the nice chair comes with some duties, Will.
But Edward was on his intercom. “Darcie? Get me the head of TMI. I’m going to need to send some covert messages to the House Lords. Which one? All of them, so we really need a secure spot for the meeting…”
