The Phoenix Project (54 page)

    
“I could use one,” Elliot said and stood up
to follow Madison
from her quarters.

    
Nadine felt an odd sense of guilt as her
small shuttle touched down on a landing pad of MERA headquarters. She realized
that the guilt was not for having betrayed her nation more than once now, but
for having in some sense betrayed Elliot. She turned off the engines of the
shuttle and exited onto the tarmac, where an acolyte of MERA waited to greet
her. It was an unusually hot day with a strong wet wind blowing in from the
ocean.

    
She gave a curt nod to the young man who
waited for her outside the shuttle. He fell into close step behind her as befit
his rank and status within the organization.

    
“Catherine wants to see you in her
apartments.”

    
“Thank—you for the message, you can return
to your duties.”

    
“Yes Ma’am,” the man said and walked back
in the direction he had come from.

    
Nadine entered through the large double
doors of the building and then walked up the main staircase to the third floor.
She proceeded towards the set of doors leading to the Prime Council’s
apartment.

    
Two armed guards stood on either side of the
mahogany doors. Nadine rang the subtly placed electronic bell. The buzzer
sounded and the set of doors opened.

    
Nadine entered into the living room of an
apartment that comprised the largest private dwelling in the entire complex. The
furniture was simple but elegant. Plain, blue drapes hung from the windows and
extended all the way to the fifteen foot ceiling. The more Spartan approach to
the room suited her mother well.

    
“I believe it’s been sometime since you
have been to my apartments,” Catherine said, entering the room from her private
study.

    
“You have always preferred a more
professional approach to teaching. It was something that I always appreciated.”

    
“Well said. But this is a special occasion
that I think requires a more personal approach,” Catherine smiled and hobbled
on aging feet to one of the blue couches matching the drapes. “It isn’t every
day that one of my children is pregnant.”

    
Catherine sat down on the couch and patted
the space next to her. Nadine obediently took the indicated place. She noticed
that even within her apartment the dark habit of Catherine’s office stayed on
her person.

    
“Are you sure that I’m pregnant?”

    
“Let me see,” Catherine said. She placed a wrinkled
hand an inch from Nadine’s stomach. She closed her eyes for a moment before the
smile returned. “I’m sure. You are with child, my daughter. I can’t tell you
how happy I am.”

    
“Are you happy because your daughter is
pregnant or because you may have a new breed of soldier at hand?”

    
“Why, both, of course,” Catherine replied.
“Are you unhappy with either side of this?”

    
“No, of course not, Catherine. I’m just not
sure about bringing some sort of new being into the world.”

    
“I know it is quite a change, Nadine. It is
your first pregnancy and that alone brings some uncertainty. On top of that,
you have the prospect of this incredible new life of unknown capability,”
Catherine said.

    
“Yes, I suppose so.”

    
“We’ll have you see a doctor in the
morning. In the meantime you need to rest, it’s getting late. We have quite a
surprise for you in the coming hours: a reward for everything you have done for
us.”

    
“I look forward to it,” Nadine lied.

    
“Good. We have arranged for an apartment
for you on the first floor. It’s apartment twenty—six. I trust you know your
way around?”

    
“Yes Catherine, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

    
As Nadine left Catherine’s apartment she
could feel the concerned stare at her back. Nadine knew that Catherine sensed
something different in her but at this point she didn’t really care. She
already felt as though she had been given a prison sentence within these walls
that she had once revered as full of wisdom.

    
She walked down the corridor and the narrow
stairway to the first floor to find her newly assigned apartment. Brass numbers
proclaiming apartment twenty—six were fixed to the door. Nadine found upon her
entry that Catherine had decorated the apartment in a manner nearly identical
to her own. The only difference was the size of the residence as well as the
choice of a forest green for the drapes and couches, rather than the blue of
Catherine’s.

    
Nadine felt a deep fatigue from the day’s
events that threatened to paralyze her body. She didn’t bother to change her
clothes and simply fell into bed. It was comfortable, but she found herself
awakening to familiar feelings within this building. Before she realized it,
she was crying. She couldn’t stop and soon found the timepiece on the wooden
night stand marking the passage of the second hour in the morning. For the
first time in months, she cried herself to sleep.

    
All eighty battle groups of the Alliance and one hundred and twenty of the
Coalition battle groups had maintained (with few exceptions) the same positions
for nearly seventy years. Soldiers on both sides were astounded to find
themselves not only moving to different positions within their home systems but
even saw the stars elongating to tiny dashes as many battle groups transited to
other star systems.

    
One imagines that nearly all
of them would have feared the coming days.

Insights on the Battle
of the Inner Sphere

by Conrad Harrison

Chapter XVIII

Nadine received
the invitation to the exclusive dinner early in the morning after only a few
hours of fitful sleep. The dinner was officially voluntary, but she knew her
absence would be noticed and spent much of the afternoon choosing the
appropriate eveningwear. If it was another party with Lathiel and Ranik, she
would have chosen something comfortable and possibly revealing to tease both
Elliot and Ranik, but this event called for something elegant but muted.

    
After much indecision, she chose a simple
black gown that went past the knees and had a high v—neck. She chose unadorned
silver for the earrings and a necklace with a small medallion sporting the MERA
coat of arms. It was suitably patriotic for the other attendees who would be members
the upper echelons of the Coalition.

    
She was punctual for the six o’clock
appointment at one of the outer complexes on the MERA headquarters grounds. The
ballroom had wooden fittings of a much lighter finish than within the main
building. Long tables sat row after row, extending all the way to a raised
stage with identical tables for the VIPs that would be in attendance. At least
half of the guests for the night had already arrived. She looked at the
carefully arranged seating plan at the entrance to the ballroom and found to
her disappointment, that she would be sitting at the head table on stage.

    
She hid the sense of panic she felt and
began her journey to the back of the room to find her seat. To her chagrin a
Coalition general recognized her before she managed to get more than ten feet
into the crowded room.

    
“General Hanover,” the middle—aged man in
black said. At least a dozen medals adorned his left breast in showy
pretentiousness.

    
“General, how may I help you?” she asked,
and managed as much of a smile as she could. Nadine was certain that someone
here would see through her facade of loyalty and would know what she had done.

    
“I just wanted to congratulate you on the
completion of that whole Ferine mess. I’m glad those cats are gone. I
understand that they have below average intelligence. How did you deal with
them?”

    
“Who told you that?” Nadine asked in
surprise.

    
“It’s common knowledge. I understand that
you personally relayed that information to the government,” the General replied,
smugly.

    
“Well if you say so. Excuse me, I’m expected
at the head table.”

    
“Of course, of course.”

    
Nadine shouldered her way past him and
through the crowd. She was stopped by at least another five people on her way
to the table. Nadine tried her best to give simple yes or no answers to them
but found it difficult to hide her shock at the supposed facts that had been
dispensed to them concerning the Ferine and the Alliance.

    
“How horrible for you to be with those
socialists all this time.”

    
“I heard those cats were terribly violent.”

    
“Weren’t you subjected to constant
searches? How awful.”

    
“That Ranik and Lathiel: despicable
animals. I don’t know how anyone can use the word intelligent life in the same
sentence when talking about them.”

    
Nadine finally arrived to the back of the
room to discover the function of this main table. Here in front of her were
half a dozen seats on either side of the podium. Now she was able to match the
faces to the names she noticed when she was looking for her seating assignment.

    
The other eleven seats were already
occupied by the most elite of MERA. They were second only to the members of the
Council itself.

    
There was Patrick Tate at the far end of
the table. He was said to be the most likely successor to Louis. Word was he
had already chosen to take the same name once he was a member of the Twelve
after Louis had passed on.

    
Next to the podium on the other side of the
table was Tabitha Rhys, the apprentice to Alexander also said to eventually
replace him. It was said she was eyeing the seat of Prime Counsel just as
Alexander was. The difference was that Tabitha’s ambition was matched only by
her intelligence.

    
She looked down the table of people and
knew that these honored guests were all on the short list to become members of
the Council. There was her reserved space on the other side of the podium from
Tabitha. Now she knew the reason for this luncheon: This was to introduce the
next generation of Council Members. It would show all of MERA that, on the eve
of war, the Coalition would be victorious for here were the people that would
allow the Council to propagate into the future.

    
This was a rally, one to bring smiles to
the faces of children and assure them that the Coalition was a rock that would
only grow in its resilience.

    
Eventually they would have to reveal
Nadine’s true nature, but it would be done slowly over time and by the time she
was a councilor, people would have long since forgotten that she had ever
served in the military. That fact would be carefully buried and then erased
from history.

    
But this gave no comfort to Nadine. She
felt Elliot’s concern for her even as he tried to transmit confidence to her in
order to reinforce her will.

    
She thanked him in her mind despite the
knowledge that their bond would not allow such a message to be broadcast across
the gap that separated them. His emotional reinforcement helped her to calmly
radiate the confidence of an heir—apparent while she took her seat.

    
Inwardly, she wanted to scream at the
thought of how this evening would progress. After a brief round of quiet conversation,
a dignified man with the rank pin of an elite MERA operative took the podium.
The remaining members of the crowd still standing quickly took their seats and
waited for him to begin.

    
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our
celebration here tonight. As many of you are unaware of the purpose of this
function, I shall inform you,” he stopped and waited for the obligatory polite
laughter before continuing. “Tonight, we congratulate the heroes of MERA with
this dinner. All of them have been loyal and have demonstrated that loyalty to
this organization time and again over the last decade.”

    
“Indeed, they have demonstrated such
courage that the Council of Twelve has decided to award them the Order of the
Coalition.”

    
Loud applause followed and the speaker took
out a dozen small, black jewel boxes from a shelf in the podium and placed them
one by one in front of each of the VIPS at the main table. As was tradition,
they each opened the box containing a necklace with a glittering star hanging
from it. The twelve pointed star had a small circle at the center symbolic of
the never ending status of the council. She took the necklace out of the box
and placed it around her neck. The pendant felt as though it weighed fifty
pounds.