Ambition (25 page)

The golden youth knew nothing of fear, yet he recoiled all the same.

“You want me to stand by as two million people die, women and children among them?”

“If this civil war drags on any longer, even more people than that will die. And if the nobles should win, this kind of tragedy will occur many times. And so, by letting the entire empire know of their brutality, we’ll show they have no right to rule the universe …”

“So you’re suggesting I turn a blind eye?”

“Do it for the sake of the twenty-five billion citizens of the empire, Your Excellency. And furthermore, for the swift establishment of your hegemony.”

“… I understand.”

Reinhard nodded. His face had lost its characteristic glow. If only Kircheis had been at his side. He would never have advised such drastic measures.

There were more than fifty oases scattered across the surface of Westerland. Excluding those, only mountains of reddish-brown rock, pale-yellow deserts, and white salt lakes—terrain where no soul resided—stretched to and beyond the horizon.

This meant that hitting it with nuclear missiles could achieve the complete genocide of the planet’s two million inhabitants.

On that day, a meeting was taking place by one of those oases. Though they had driven out the nobles by their own strength, the insurgents had no plans in place for what to do next. Where should they go from here? How could they ensure the peace and happiness of their people? These were the main questions on their agenda. To those who had not engaged in independent debate for such a long time under noble rule, the meeting was an enormous undertaking and therefore something to celebrate.

“Is not Marquis von Lohengramm an ally of the people? Let’s ask him to protect us.”

When that opinion was offered, voices of approval arose from the crowd. It was their only hope. When the talk settled down, a small boy being held in his mother’s arms pointed up to the sky.

“Mommy, what’s that?”

The people looked up to see a beam of light running diagonally across the cobalt sky.

A pure-white flash bleached the entire scene.

Immediately thereafter, a red dome rose up above the horizon, expanding rapidly to a height of ten thousand meters before forming a mushroom-shaped cloud of superheated ash.

The shock wave came at them as a tsunami of intense heat, traveling at seventy meters per second and surpassing temperatures of 800 degrees celsius, scorching the topsoil, the scant vegetation, the buildings, and the people’s bodies. Clothing and hair burst into flames, and keloids formed on bubbling skin.

The screams of children burning alive hung in the searing air, then suddenly thinned out to silence. The voices of mothers calling out their children’s names, of fathers fearing for their families, were cut short soon after.

Massive amounts of dirt flew high into the air, becoming a cascade of sand that poured down on the earth, providing a burial for two million charred corpses.

The young officers watching the monitor stood up from their seats, their faces pale as they heaved over and began to vomit onto the floor. No one could blame them. Everyone was silent, their eyes glued to the images being sent back by the reconnaissance probe. Only now did they realize that there was nothing that sullied the laws of the universe more than the strong preying on the weak.

“We will beam these images throughout the empire. Even a child will understand that righteousness is on our side. The nobles have signed their own death warrant,” von Oberstein explained in his usual monotone, to which there was no immediate response. “What’s the matter, Your Excellency?”

Gloom hung heavily over Reinhard’s expression.

“You told me to avert my eyes. And this tragedy is the result. There’s nothing to be done about it now, but was there really no other way?”

“Perhaps there was, but it was beyond my means to come up with one. As you say, there’s nothing to be done about it now. We must make the most of this situation.”

Reinhard stared at his chief advisor. It was unclear whether the hatred swelling in his ice-blue eyes was directed at von Oberstein or at himself.

Images of the Westerland tragedy were transmitted over FTL, causing outrage and trembling in every corner of the empire. Popular sentiment swiftly began breaking away from the old aristocratic regime, and even the nobles began to foment the view that Duke von Braunschweig was done for.

Kircheis, who had conquered the frontier stellar regions, made for Gaiesburg to rendezvous with Reinhard. Seeing those images, he too felt renewed anger toward the exalted nobles. But then, one day midvoyage, Wahlen’s fleet captured a shuttle. It carried only a single officer, who said that although he had been forced to participate in the Westerland nuclear strike as a subordinate of Duke von Braunschweig, he had deserted en route. That was well and good, but there was one thing he said that Kircheis couldn’t shrug off. Hardly believing his own ears, he questioned him further.

“I’ll say this as many times as I have to. Despite being informed that the noble forces were to massacre the two million inhabitants of Westerland, Marquis von Lohengramm let them die, and all for the sake of propaganda.”

“That must have been because he didn’t believe the intelligence. Is there any proof that the marquis intentionally let the people of Westerland die?”

“Proof?” said the officer with a derisive laugh. Weren’t the images they were broadcasting throughout the galaxy proof enough? Were they really recorded by chance, taken from only a short distance above the planet, somewhere in the stratosphere?

Kircheis silently dismissed the defector and put a gag order on his troops. It was unbelievable—something he didn’t want to believe. But was it possible this was the truth?

“I’ll be meeting with Reinhard very soon. And when I do, I’ll confirm the truth for myself.”

And if he did, Kircheis asked himself, what then? It was fine if this was a false rumor. But what if it
was
the truth?

There was no clear answer.

Until now, Reinhard and Kircheis had shared one and the same sense of justice. Would the day come when they might diverge, even if one could never exist without the other … ?

Boris Konev, the young independent
trader of Phezzan, couldn’t hide his sullen mood. He had braved the dangers of traversing a battlefield to transport the band of Terraist pilgrims, but his earnings had been meager, and once he’d cleared up his debts, paid his subordinates’ wages, and docked the
Beryozka
, the amount left after subtracting living expenses was scarcely enough to buy ten square centimeters of spacecraft hull.

“You look like you’re in a bad mood,” said the deep-voiced man standing before the desk.

Konev, flustered, explained it away.

“No, this is just my normal expression. It has absolutely nothing to do with being in the presence of Your Excellency.”

The latter statement was clearly saying too much, and the speaker quite regretted it, but the man to whom it was said—Landesherr Rubinsky—took no visible offense.

“You transported the followers of the Terraist faith to Earth, correct?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think of them?”

“I don’t know much about them. But as for religion in general, I think it’s an awful contradiction for the poverty stricken to believe in a just God, given what’s more likely—that God is unjust, and that’s why the poverty stricken exist.”

“There’s some reason in that. You don’t believe in God, then?”

“Not in the least.”

“Aha.”

“Whoever came up with the bill of goods called God was the greatest scam artist in all of history. The creativity of it is admirable, if only in terms of business savvy. In every nation, from ancient times all the way up to our current age, isn’t it true that the ones with wealth have always been the aristocracy, the landowners, and the priestly orders?”

Landesherr Rubinsky gazed at the young independent trader with interest. Konev felt a prickly sensation. The landesherr was a virile-looking man in his early forties, but there wasn’t a single hair anywhere on his head. It was only natural that being stared at by this unusual man was nothing like, say, being stared at by a beautiful woman.

“That’s quite an interesting viewpoint. Is it your own original one?”

“No …”

Boris Konev made this denial with a tinge of regret. “I wish it were, but most of it is received wisdom. From my childhood. It must be sixteen, seventeen years ago, already.”

“Hmm.”

“I grew up traveling star to star with my father, but at one point, I got to know another kid in similar circumstances. The other boy was two years older, but we became friends. We only spent about two or three months together, but he was a kid who knew a lot of things and did a lot of thinking. All those were things he said,” Konev explained.

“What was his name?”

“Yang Wen-li.”

Konev’s expression was that of a magician who has just pulled off a new illusion.

“I hear he’s now found work in the little-esteemed field of military service, for which a free man like myself can’t help but pity him.”

The young captain was somewhat disappointed, for the landesherr did not show much surprise. After a few moments of silence, Rubinsky solemnly opened his mouth.

“Captain Boris Konev, the government of Phezzan has settled on delegating a momentous duty to you.”

“Huh?” Konev blinked, more out of caution than surprise. Called the “Black Fox of Phezzan” by both by empire and alliance, this landesherr carried, within his broad, robust physique, calculations and stratagems rolled and folded in upon themselves like a piecrust—so went the ubiquitous rumors. Konev himself could find no grounds whatsoever to negate these rumors. For one thing, this lowly trader didn’t even know why he’d been summoned by the landesherr. It hadn’t been for the sake of hearing his reminiscing. What sort of duty did he mean to delegate?

When he finally left the governmental offices, Konev rolled both his arms in wide circles, as though he were trying to throw off invisible chains.

A puppy being walked by an older woman began to bark shrilly at him. Konev brandished a fist in the direction of the pup and, to the woman’s reproachful cries, made his departure with a rather sullen gait.

When Konev returned to the vessel, a broad smile was spread across the aging face of Officer Marinesk. There’d been a notice, he said, from the Energy Commission, stating that they’d no longer need worry about fuel for
Beryozka
.

“Just exactly what kind of magic did you use, sir? For a small-time trading ship like us, this is nothing short of a miracle.”

“I sold myself out to the government.”

“Eh?”

“It’s the bloody Black Fox.”

It was Marinesk who, in a panic, cast his gaze all around; the speaker himself made no effort to lower his voice. “He’s hatching some sort of foul plot, no doubt about it. But to drag an upstanding citizen into it …”

“Just what went on over there, sir? You say you sold yourself out to the government. Have you become a civil servant?”

“A civil servant?!”

On hearing the officer’s unique way of expressing the situation, Konev’s angry expression softened.

“No question—I’m a civil servant. I’ve been made an intelligence operative and have been told to go to the Free Planets.”

“Oh-ho!”

“Let me tell you something about the Konev clan … We’ve been proud to say that for these last two hundred years, our family has never produced a single criminal or a single politician!” Konev started shouting. “We’ve been free private citizens. Free private citizens, I tell you! And now just look what’s happened—a spy, he says! So now I’m both of those things at once!”

“It’s
intelligence operative
, sir—
intelligence operative
.”

“Changing the words doesn’t fix anything! Does calling cancer a cold turn it into a cold? If I say a lion is a rat, will that spare me from getting my head bitten off?”

Marinesk didn’t reply, but to himself he thought,
Well, those are some gruesome comparisons
.

“He’d already dredged up the fact that I knew Yang Wen-li in my childhood. This is not amusing. Maybe I’ll just clue Yang in on every last bit of this instead.”

“But that probably won’t be possible, sir.”

“Why not?”

“Not possible, sir. I’m telling you—his making you an intelligence operative isn’t the sum total of all this. Someone’s eyes will be watching you from behind. Someone to watch and to dole out punishment.”

“So let’s hear all the details, please, sir.”

Marinesk had made coffee. It had an unpleasantly strong acidity; it was clear without asking that it was the cheap stuff. Savoring every sip, Marinesk made it last twice as long as Konev did, as he listened to how things stood.

“I see. But if I may say so, Captain, there was no need to go mentioning Yang Wen-li’s name in front of His Excellency the Landesherr. Of course, it’s likely that if you hadn’t brought it up, the other party would have broached the topic in any case.”

“I know.
Loose lips sink ships
. I mean to be more circumspect in the future.”

Disgusted with himself, Konev acknowledged his mistake. Still, this didn’t mean he was justifying or accepting Rubinsky’s directives. Even if they were invisible, chains were chains, and being unable to make money was nothing compared to the discomfort of being bound by these.

If Boris Konev’s existence as a human being had any sort of worth, it lay in his being a free man, independent and unfettered. Rubinsky, landesherr of Phezzan, had heedlessly trampled that source of pride underfoot. What was even worse was that Rubinsky thought of this, perversely, as a favor he was dispensing!

Human beings possessing power apparently thought it a great privilege for a citizen to be peripherally involved with the mechanisms of that power. It appeared that even so formidable a man as Rubinsky couldn’t get free of this delusion.

And so … why not let him believe that delusion for the time being? Konev smiled sardonically.

Marinesk, gazing at his young captain with a thoughtful eye, picked up the kettle.

“How about one more cup of coffee?”

In early August, Yang Wen-li, who had arrived at the outskirts of the Baalat Stellar Region, positioned his fleet and watched for an opportunity to advance upon Heinessen. The distance to Heinessen was six light-hours, approximately 6.5 billion kilometers. For a fleet that astrogated interstellar space, this could be called shouting distance.

That Yang had advanced to this range held not only military but also political significance.

It meant the Military Congress for the Rescue of the Republic, which occupied Heinessen, wielded no political power beyond the planetary level and was unable to exert effective control over even the Baalat Stellar Region. With the defeat of the Eleventh Fleet, they had lost their military capability in interstellar space. For the above reasons, the wholesale defeat of the Military Congress, the failure of the coup, and the restoration of order under the Charter of the Alliance were all just a matter of time. Through his actions, Yang had flaunted these realities to the entire alliance.

The effect was profound. Yang’s renown—he himself would call it empty fame—served, of course, to amplify that effect. Those who had until then been undecided as to whether to support the High Council or the coup had one by one made their allegiances clear, flocking to Yang’s side from various planetary guard corps, local garrison patrols and retirees, officers and enlisted, and even civilians hoping to participate in the volunteer forces under Yang.

Naturally, the organizing of volunteer forces didn’t go smoothly. Yang disliked involving civilians in warfare. He felt that the psychological makeup of civilians who wanted anything to do with war was questionable, but he couldn’t deny them their freely chosen intentions. They went so far as to trot out the “Right of Resistance” provision of the Charter of the Alliance—the right of citizens to use force to resist unjust uses of power—to overrule the hesitation of the young commander.

At that point, Yang decided to add age restrictions to the requirements for joining the volunteer corps. He attempted to exclude persons under eighteen or over fifty-five years of age, but older people who looked not a day under eighty insisted they were fifty-five and, on the other extreme, seventeen-year-old hopefuls who’d seen Julian and could by no means believe he was older than themselves all turned on the officials in charge, forcing a wry laugh out of Lieutenant Frederica Greenhill as she said, “Well, this is not easy.”

It did give Yang pleasure when retired marshal Sidney Sitolet, former director of Joint Operational Headquarters, proclaimed his support. He had been headmaster of the Officers’ Academy when Yang was a student. On one level, Yang admired him, but he also retained an impression of Sitolet as a tough nut to crack. Yang was thus all the more glad he’d avoided making an enemy of him. Having that happen with Admiral Greenhill was already more than enough trouble.

There were even a lot of people who had previously shown sympathy in word or deed for the Military Congress for the Rescue of the Republic who came to join. This was in part a result of the Stadium Massacre becoming known; these voices grew conspicuously loud in criticizing the coup d’état faction. The earnest Chief of Staff Murai caustically criticized their defection and opportunistic behavior, but Yang said, “Everybody tries to secure their own physical safety. If I were in a position of less responsibility, even I might have thought about siding with the faction that held the upper hand.”