TBntG-2 Chpt 29

=The Bull and the Genie=
==Chapter 29 - Book II - The Ninety-five Theses==
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==Interludes: 3030==
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===Dilemma in the Police Zone===
Office of General Cheng, Victoria, Capellan Confederation (Police Zone)
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Mary sat down in her office. Even if most of the Concordat forces were spaceborne, it had been decided the CO needed to be ground based, to avoid given hint that bombardments from above were not on the table. They only had a few hundred people on Victoria, mostly administrative, since the world hadn't faced much disorder.
 
Chancellor Candace's speech had helped, especially the parts about how Taurus also knew of the Davion menace. 
 
Which counts for everyone but all the start ups getting ready to ship Davion goods to our worlds and Taurian goods to the Davions. Mary remembered an editorial proclaiming that "soon it will be raining C-Bills." 
 
Which isn't my problem. I'm thirty. I shouldn't be doing this. Who thought I was a good idea for this? Mary closed her eyes, took a deep, calming breath, and turned back around to her personal trial. 
 
A member of the Taurus Multi-Faith Civil Rights association, standing in a banged up suit, flanked by a pair of Capellan cops, since the Concordat wasn't handling local law enforcement. 
 
"Explain this to me again." General Cheng said. 
 
"Our organization was founded to liberate the slaves of the Confederation, those groups called Servitors!" 
 
"Were you told this to a group of servitors?"
 
"Yes."
"And that was when they tried to lynch you." 
 
"Clearly, they are bound up by chains of dogm—"
 
"Stop," Mary took her "you idiot trainee" voice. "You recall the terms of this arrangement. We are not conquerors. We are not here to change their society. We are here to prevent these parts of the Confederation from being Annexed or invaded. You are in my office, not because the governor has to let me decide about your fate, since imposing our own rules for civilians in someone else's house is a Star League stunt, but because Governor Xiang felt that it would be better if I dealt with it." Well, sort of. More than a few officials had treated Mary like this was actually an informal occupation, which forced her to step really lightly. 
 
"You tolerate this?"
 
"I accept it is not our place to change it, and if you had bothered to check, you would have noticed that Chancellor Candace Liao has already issued a number of reforms that are taking place right now."
 
Because there are many in the upper strata who might be sympathetic to the old Chancellor, and helping those he hurt is both the morally and pragmatically smart thing to do.
 
"The delays are—"
 
"Housing, jobs, support. Did you think of that? Even under the old Chancellor, the children of servitors weren't servitors and so you threatened their parents with losing everything, once again, ignoring the fact that we are not occupiers."
 
Especially since one of your guards is a former servitor. Good relations or no, any Capellan coming into HQ was fully vetted. Mary didn't agree with the system, but it made a terrible kind of sense under Max. The kind of servitor who could climb out and become a citizen was the kind of person who might otherwise become a rebel, so how better to co-opt them than reward them? Intelligence said there was some grumbling, as far as they could tell, minor, among some of the ex-servitors about how this generation would become soft because they had it so easy. 
 
Mary had seen how all levels of the Confederation lived. They might be many things, but soft wasn't one of them. 
 
"Congratulations," she finally said. "As commander of the Police Zone AO, I am declaring you and your organization a threat to public safety. Enjoy your trip back to Taurus."
 
"The Protector will hear of this!"
 
"I'm certain he will," Mary said. "Have a nice day."
 
When the protesting minister was marched out of her office, Mary pushed her intercom. "Michael?"
 
"Yes, General?"
 
"See if you can book a scenic route for our missionaries."
"How scenic?"
"I wouldn't be upset if they returned to Taurus via, oh… Tharkad."
"Understood, General." 
With that Mary leaned back, closed her eyes, and after two minutes rest got to everything else that had to be done right that minute. Readiness reports regarding the newest relay charge station set up by a nameless Red Dwarf (the Navy: Everything is fine, ground pounder, so shut up and let us do our jobs) reports from Big Mac on several accidental border intrusions by the League, all repelled with enthusiasm, and yet another annotated plan on how the Big Mac could take a "tour" of League worlds to discourage future incursions. Mary paused on the Denied button and then changed it to "Forwarded to the Protector." Edward may not like it, but if we don't hit back Janos may decide he can go for us with a little more effort, especially to distract from his domestic problems.
The last was a report on how the Bic Mac, specifically Barton's Regiment, was working as an OPFORCE, which was mostly a tale of proud Taurian regiments marching in confidently and straggling out with a much more humble attitude. Barton had already come out with ways conventional troops could repel power armor, as well as several organized methods to keep them off 'mechs, to the point where the protector had authorized the loan of PAL units to Barton to help develop new tactics for their use and counters when other people used them. 
Some Taurians weren't happy.
 
Screw 'em, better to lose in training than on the battlefield. 
And last and not least, the report on the Canopian Pleasure Circuses that were making their way around the worlds. A request for support in case of a riot by the local morality league or a riot by everyone enjoying the party.
 
You know, on the one hand it's nice that they're the worst thing I'm having to deal with. On the other hand, we still haven't found Private Simmonds after he decided to investigate the "hall of famous drinks" exhibit. She shook her head. Nobody was shooting at each other in a big way. Right now. They might start up again tomorrow, but she'd take today.
 
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===Heated Discussions on Terra===
Hilton's Head Island, North America - Terra, Sol Star System
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"We must act to take back our position!" Waterly was ranting. She should be, by all rights, out, but right now, rocking the boat wasn't in anyone's interest. Not with Tiepolo barely functional after his stroke. The only thing keeping him in was a desire on some parts to keep Waterly out. 
 
"Really," Will said. "You know, I'd like to show you something." He held up a paper, a sticker on it reading John Williamson High School. "Do you know what this is?"
 
"Enlighten us, Will," Waterly said, her voice venomous. 
 
"A discussion on how we got HPG technology wrong, and that you should be able to build a station for a tenth our cost." He tossed it onto the floor. "It's wrong of course, my people went over it, and there's some higher level stuff they didn't understand—which is why this was done by a HIGH SCHOOL. But they still had enough data to make the attempt and understand the basic principle and by the time they're in college, yeah, they could make one, and not from rote—and again, this is a high school. Maintaining our position as it was, is done, over, the horse has left the barn. But that gives us an opportunity, Ladies and Gentlemen." He leaned forward. "The Inner Sphere is at peace, more or less. Kurita is outnumbered, the Free Worlds League are too unstable, the Capellans are neutralized and the Federated Suns and Lyran Commonwealth are busy digesting their conquests—but one are businessmen and the other one won't move without their allies. The Taurians are busy with their economic efforts in the periphery."
"Opportunity is a strange way of saying disaster," Precentor Atreus muttered. 
"Is it? Blake's will was to guide humanity to a better future, and he believed that it would only come after mankind was completely smashed, that we had purged our desire for conflict. I submit to you that that time may be now. We have just come out of one of the greatest conflicts since the Second Succession war, but no nukes were used. No bioweapons. The only true atrocity was one of our own making. Win or lose, the House Lords didn't go that far."
 
"Now, we can see prosperity returning. One day, the House Lords may be confident enough to go down the old route to ruin—unless we throw our weight, our full weight, behind peace initiatives, behind financial and cultural integration, use the Com Guards when we reveal them, to provide an impartial force of peacekeepers. Now, while people are occupied with rebuilding, and yet aren't so far distant from the consequences of war that they will casually decide to throw it all away. We're preserved the legacy of Terra—now maybe the time has come to stop preserving and start leading."
 
"You are denying the Will of Blake!" Myndo shouted.
 
The will you never believed in? Will leaned back. "Did he come to you as an apparition? Besides, I don't recall Comstar having a doctrine of statements being made ex Cathedra. We're facing the sand eroding from under our feet, and we can either sit and do nothing about it, until the tides come, or we can be like Blake, and take destiny in our hands." 
 
"I move that Precentor Taurus be removed for blasphemy and insubordination!"
"That is this body's right," Will said. "Though I must admit I haven't accidentally let my office be used by a House Lord to order the assassination of someone." He paused. "Amusing isn't it. You do realize that everything—the fall of Liao, the end of the war, the finding of the Helm Core, it's distribution… They all stem from that unfortunate error. So many coincidences. If I were superstitious I'd say it was the Will of Blake."
 
Myndo's snarl had no words in it. 
 
The motion failed. 
 
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 Outreach, Federated Suns
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The battlesuit seemed clumsier than Jaime remembered, likely because it was using less advanced components, those that could be fabricated by the refurbished factories on Outreach. 
 
Prepare the Inner Sphere. His orders. But the problem was, there was no timetable. No easy way to see if the Clans would ever invade—and just handing their technology over would have seen the Inner Sphere turn on each other. Tell Takashi Kurita or Hanse Davion about the Clans, and their first words would have been, "They must prepare, after they used the new technology to destroy their enemies." 
 
Do you preferred that excuse. Jaime wondered if he'd been too taken with the Inner Sphere, because he'd started to consider that maybe the Clans had changed their minds, the Crusaders discredited, the Wardens uninterested, and so they and the Sphere could just go their own ways. 
 
But now…
 
No. The Taurian anti-piracy patrols keep moving towards the Homeworlds, and everyone had unauthorized expeditions and bases, and the moment they hear about the Wolverines…
 
The fact that the ship had been found by pirates wouldn't help, because the Ghost Bears had reported that ship destroyed to the Council. If they had failed there, who knew where else they failed.
 
Jaime could hear it in the voice of the Smoke Jaguars, offering another reason for invasion to verify that the Not-named Clan was gone, and he bet the Ghost Bears would throw their weight behind them. 
 
So now it's a when, not an if, and so he had to prepare. Jaime just hoped that his name wouldn't go down next to Amaris, if the House Lords once again took the tools of the Star League and used them to destroy themselves.
 
On the other hand, at least battle armor won't be a complete surprise. There wasn't a single House that wasn't trying to prototype the Taurian armor, with varying degrees of success, while every unit was putting together their own doctrines for dealing with Battle Armor. They might be surprised, but Jaime doubted they'd be panicked…
 
And that was no small thing.
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