"I, Mengsk" - читать интересную книгу автора (McNeill Graham)

CHAPTER 3

SUNLIGHT RIPPLED THROUGH THE CANOPY OF treetops and made the landscape glow as the convoy of silver groundcars sped along the road to Styrling. Altogether there were six cars, one conveying the Mengsk family, another Ailin Pasteur and his daughter, and the other four bearing armed men.

The cars were '58 Terra Cougars, an older model of groundcar, yet a mode of transport favored by many of Korhal's senators, thanks to the heavy steel undercarriage and thick side panels that had foiled more than one assassination attempt.

Two of the cars were equipped with turret-mounted Impalers, and the convoy moved at speed along the wide strip of road. Half a kilometer ahead, three vulture hovercycles ran point, herding what little traffic there was on the road out of the convoy's path.

This time of the morning, traffic was light, but Achton Feld was taking no chances and had ordered his men to shoot first and ask questions second—assuming anything survived grenade barrage from the vultures. The Confederacy had already tried to kill Angus Mengsk once, and Feld wasn't taking any chances that they might try again.

Arcturus watched the countryside flashing past, lush greens and sumptuous golds as the autumn tones blended together in a swirl of color like a painting left out in the rain. The Mengsk summer villa was built sixty kilometers to the south of Styrling and the countryside separating the two was amongst the most verdant and lush of Korhal, yet it was shrinking every year as the industrial complex of the city spread farther and farther.

His father had chosen the site precisely because it was far enough from Styrling to feel like he could escape the day-to-day running of his many businesses and the politics of the Senate, but close enough that he was never too far out of the loop.

Arcturus felt his mood sour with every kilometer that passed beneath the groundcar and brought him closer to the academy. His father sat opposite him, his face unreadable, though he smiled whenever Arcturus's mother looked at him. Dorothy was on her knees on the backseat next to him. Pontius clutched tightly as she peered out the polarized, armored glass of the window.

He smiled at the simple joy on her face, wishing he could go back to a time when life had been simpler. All Dorothy cared about was Pontius, sugary sweets, and being close to her father. She didn't yet have to worry about disappointing anyone or being farced into role she didn't want.

Little Dot would be the apple of Angus's eye no matter what she did, and Arcturus felt a twinge of irritation, but quickly shook it off, recognizing that it was foolish to be jealous of a four-year-old.

Despite his mother's pleasant ramblings on the colors of the leaves and the beauty of the scenery and Dorothy's enthusiasm for the journey, the interior of the groundcar was tense. Arcturus and his father had not spoken since their harsh words in the dining room the previous morning, and no amount of calming words from his mother could bridge the gulf, which grew wider with every minute of silence.

Arcturus kept his gaze fixed on the landscape unfolding around them as the groundcar wove its way though the low hills to the south of the city. Despite the inevitable growth of business, Korhal remained a defiantly green world, the planetary authorities long ago having had the foresight to invest in renewable energy sources and enforce stringent clean air laws.

As a result, Korhal was one of the few planets in the Confederacy to be a thriving hub of trade and industry that was also actually a pleasant place to live and visit. Arcturus had not yet ventured off world, but he had ambitions beyond Korhal's skies. He longed to travel between the stars and explore new worlds and earn his fortune with his skills, instead of simply inheriting it as his father had done.

That his father had also worked tirelessly since he had achieved adulthood never occurred lo Arcturus. Not that Arcturus disapproved of inheriting wealth, title, and position —the dynastic traditions of Korhal were well established—but he wanted to be known as a man who had gotten to the top by virtue of his own abilities. He wanted people to look at him and know that he had achieved what he had through blood, sweat, and sacrifice.

His thoughts of the future were interrupted when he caught sight of a shimmering lattice of silver through the branches of the trees, the first signs of civilization. Despite his foul mood, he smiled as he caught tantalizing glimpses of Styrling through the wide canyons of the hills.

It was a huge city, a mecca of commercial interests and a glittering symbol of all that had been achieved in the two centuries since the planet's settlement. Arcturus loved the opportunities the city offered: the wealth, the entertainment, the bustle, and the sheer, vibrant humanity of it all. Everything a person desired, and more besides, could be found in Styrling if you knew where to look.

The groundcar swept over a ridge that curved along the road, and then the city was laid out before him.

No matter how many times he saw it, it never failed to impress.

Styrling was like the frozen aftermath of a droplet that had fallen into a petri dish of mercury, a silver crown of soaring structures that stood tall and majestic in the center and which gradually diminished in size toward the edges.

A dizzying web of flyovers surrounded and penetrated the bright metropolis, like a hundred threads of dark wool woven through it, and the city shone with dazzling reflections from the mass of neosteel and glass that made up the bulk of the buildings.

The architecture of Styrling was not subtle. Most of the towers and spires belonged to one of the megacorporations or to representatives of one of the Old Families, and each of the owners sought to outdo the others with the height and magnificence of a given structure. Graceful curving walls had once bounded the extreme edge of the city, but the pressure of commerce had driven a great deal of the city's infrastructure beyond them.

The wealthiest families of Korhal kept their headquarters within the walls of Styrling, and the Mengsks were no exception.

The Mengsk Skyspire was a mighty, fortresslike edifice that towered over its nearest rivals: the Continental Building, the LarsCorp Tower, and the Korhal headquarters of the Universal News Network. Arcturus hated the Skyspire, its angular lines and neo-Gothic stylings appearing at odds with the sleek, graceful designs of its neighbors.

As far as Arcturus was concerned, it was the architectural embodiment of his father: cold, stern, and uncompromising.

The city drew closer and the traffic grew heavier, the vultures drawing back to surround the groundcars like mother hens protecting their chicks. Arcturus watched the traffic flow like a living thing around them, moving to its own internal rhythms, and as he looked at the faces within each car, he wondered at the lives he saw passing him.

Each one represented a self-contained world, around which the universe revolved, and Arcturus idly tried to fit histories to each face—trying to imagine what lives these people lived. What were their dreams and ambitions? What made them rise from their beds each day to toll in the factories and offices of Styrling?

Love? Ambition? Desire? Greed?

Watching the people as they made their way to work, Arcturus saw all human life before him—laughter, quarrels, stolid silences, and a thousand other things. He saw conversations between men and women, fathers and children, lovers and colleagues, each small world with its own hopes and dreams for the future.

A young girl with a yellow ribbon in her hair sat in the passenger seat of a car two lanes over. She noticed Arcturus looking at her and waved to him. He smiled and waved back, feeling an unaccountable closeness to these people of Korhal, feeling that in some small way they were his people. He sensed a kinship with the faces he saw around him, a bond with the people with whom he shared his homeworld that he had never felt before.

The girl's car drifted away, vanishing down an off-ramp, and Arcturus returned his attention to the city around him as they were swallowed up by its glass and steel canyons.

The tense silence in the groundcar was broken only when their journey took them around the chaotic site of the new Korhal Assembly Forum.

Or what was supposed to be the new Korhal Assembly Forum.

Towering cranes and enormous earthmoving machines stood idle around a monstrous, half-finished building of concrete and exposed steel that looked as though it had been stripped by an army of looters. A number of prefabricated cabins were arranged around the perimeter of the site, but there appeared to be no men or robots working there.

Arcturus was no judge of aesthetic, but even to his untrained eye, the building looked as though it had been spawned in the worst nightmares of a demented architect.

“Look at that," said Angus Mengsk, jabbing a finger at the unfinished building. "If there's a more visible symbol of the moral decay and corruption at the heart of the Confederacy, I don't know what it is."

"Oh, please, not this again, dear," said Katherine.

But Angus was not to be denied venting his outrage.

"I ask you, why do we need a new building for the Senate anyway? What's wrong with the Palatine Forum? Granted, it's old, but it's got character and tradition behind it. This new fiasco of a building sums up everything that's wrong with the Confederacy: money siphoned off into the pockets of corrupt officials, perverse priorities, and an arrogant indifference to public opinion. Did you know that the costs have soared to over five hundred million and counting? Oh yes, and that's from an initial estimate of sixty-three million! And where's that money gone? On insane expenses like a Chau Saran sunwood reception desk or bribes to Confederate city officials. They've been 'working' on it for the last six years, and it never seems to get finished. Oh, they say it'll be finished later this year, but look at it.... Does it look like that's realistic?"

"No, dear, it doesn't," said Katherine dutifully.

"The truth is that the one thing people know about the Confederacy is that everything costs quadruple what it ought to, thanks to the bribes you need to pay to get anything done and the dozens of new 'taxes' that suddenly seem to apply to any project that isn't intended to line the pockets of the Old Families."

"Then you should be thanking the Confederacy for the ammunition," said Arcturus.

"Oh, I am, son," said Angus, forgetting the tension between them in the fiery heat of his ire. "This whole project has been a public relations disaster that, thank God, even the UNN isn't afraid to report on, and one upon which I fully intend to capitalize."

His father continued to list the many faults of the building and the process by which it was being built, or rather not being built.

Arcturus tuned the words out as the unfinished building passed from sight.

This deep in the city, the colossal scale of the towers was much more apparent. Shadows enveloped the convoy, and Arcturus felt a chill travel down his spine as the driver expertly wound the groundcar through the streams of traffic.

People thronged the streets, well dressed and healthy, but only a few turned to watch as the convoy sped by. To see such things on the streets of Styrling was not unusual, for many captains of industry or senators traveled in this manner.

His father reached over and activated the comm unit on the armrest beside him.

"Ailin," said Angus. "We're coming up to the academy to drop Arcturus off, so we won't be far behind you. Let's just hope he stays here this time."

This last comment was directed squarely at Arcturus, who ignored his father's barb, though his mother placed her hand on her husband's forearm and frowned sternly at him.

"Very well, Angus," replied Ailin Pasteur. "I shall await you at the Skyspire."

The comm unit was shut off and Arcturus sighed as they passed alongside the lush parkland and playing fields of Styrling Academy. Here, the buildings thinned out and became less vulgar in scale, for this was a district of culture and breeding, where the young minds of the future were molded into compliant citizens of the Confederacy.

Arcturus knew the area well, despite the fact that students were forbidden to venture from the walled, security-patrolled campus of the academy by Principal Steegman. That such petty regulations needn't apply to him was a decision Arcturus had long since come to, and he—and a select band of adventurers—had often visited the exotic, neon-lit depths of the city's night.

Of course, his mother and father knew nothing of this, but the less they knew of what he got up to the better. In Arcturus's opinion, it was best that parents know as little as possible about their offspring's doings, since they'd only try and put a stop to them if they had any idea.

The great clock spire of the academy loomed large over an immaculately manicured line of trees in the distance, and Arcturus sighed as he contemplated another six months sitting in sterile classrooms being "laught" by morons who knew less than he about politics and history, while blathering about the great destiny that awaited the school's alumni.

He shook himself from that bitter reverie as the groundcar slowed and turned down a graveled driveway that led to the academy's security checkpoint.

That checkpoint consisted of an old, brick-built gatehouse and a couple of wooden sawhorses that blocked the road to the campus proper, with a handful of plastic orange cones scattered in front of them. The car slowed as it reached the gatehouse, and Old Rummy emerged from within, leaning down to examine the occupants of the vehicle.

Old Rummy was the name the students gave to the venerable gatekeeper, and Arcturus had never bothered to find out his real name. He reeked of liquor from the middle of the morning onward and his swollen nose and puffy cheeks were rife with the ruptured capillaries of a professional alcoholic.

Arcturus could smell the drink on his breath, and wrinkled his nose.

He'd started early, Arcturus reasoned.

"Morning, Mr. Mengsk, sir," said Old Rummy, doffing his peaked cap as he saw Angus. There were few people on Korhal who didn't know Arcturus's father, thanks to reports on the UNN of his political grandstanding and near-constant berating of the Confederacy.

Angus was popular in most quarters of Korhal, but where his money was spent freely —and the academy was such a place—he was feted and fawned over like royalty.

Old Rummy shuffled over to the sawhorses, clearing them from the road with grunting heaves before picking up the cones and waving the groundcar through. The driver gunned the engine and the car passed onward.

"Ten million for 'enhanced security measures' to protect the sons and daughters of Korhal from rebel attacks," said Angus, shaking his head as they swept past the grinning, idiot face of Old Rummy and onto the grounds of the academy. "You remember the fund-raising ball the academy held to raise money to implement these security measures, dear?”

"I do indeed," said Arcturus's mother with a shiver of distaste. "That frightful Principal Steegman preened like some oily salesman, begging his betters for money. A most distasteful evening."

Angus nodded. "I pledged over half a million to that fund, and look at the security it's bought: a few planks of wood and some cones shifted by a fat man in an ill-fitting uniform. I'd wager the same again that the best part of that fundraiser went into Steegman's pockets."

Arcturus stored that nugget away and watched as the great mass of Styrling Academy hove into view around the perfectly maintained woodland and expanse of lush green grass. The finest examples of the topiarist's art decorated the lawn, and a number of youngsters were already practicing with foils and rapiers under the watchful supervision of Master Miyamoto.

"If it weren't for the quality of the tutors, I'd school the boy myself,” continued Angus, and Arcturus stifled a horrified laugh at that idea.

The building, nearly a hundred years old, had been built from polished gray granite and positively reeked of money. A grand, columned portico sheltered the entrance, and the triangular pediment was decorated with heroic individuals and symbols of academic and martial excellence.

Carved statues sat in niches along the building's length and elaborate carved panels filled the spaces between each of the tall, narrow windows. Though the building was old, amongst the oldest on Korhal, its eaves and roof were fitted with recessed surveillance equipment and sophisticated eavesdropping equipment though why the faculty should feel the need to spy on the students was a mystery to Arcturus.

The groundcar crunched to a halt on the gravel at the bottom of the wide stone steps that led up to the main doors of the academy. A liveried porter descended and opened the back door of the groundcar.

"On you go, dear," said his mother.

Arcturus nodded and turned to Dorothy. "See you soon, little one," he said. "I'll write you lots of letters and Mummy can read them to you."

"I can read, silly," pouted Dorothy. "I'll read them myself."

"Well aren't you the smart one?" he said, laughing.

Dorothy threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly. "I'll miss you, Arcturus."

He blinked in surprise. Normally Dorolhy had difficulty in pronouncing his name, mangling the syllables and calling him 'Actress' or 'Arctroos,' but this time she said it without fault.

Arcturus untangled Dorothy's arms from around his neck and handed her off to his mother, who smiled warmly at him.

"It's only one more term, dear," said Katherine Mengsk. "And then the world will open up for you, I promise. If not for yourself, do it for me. Please?"

Arcturus took a deep breath and nodded. He could disappoint his father without fear of guilt, but every time he felt he'd let his mother down, it cut him to the quick.

"Very well," said Arcturus. "I'll finish the term."

"You'd damn well better," snapped Angus. "Because I don't want to see you again until I'm watching you graduate. Understand me?"

Arcturus didn't deign to furnish him with an answer as he stepped from the groundcar, taking a small measure of satisfaction from the withering glare his mother shot his father.

As satisfying as that was, it was small recompense for the bitter seed planted in his heart.

Still, once he had graduated, he could go anywhere.

Somewhere that was as far away from Angus Mengsk as he could get.

Three months later, his promise to see out the term was being tested to the limit.

Principal Steegman had made it clear that Arcturus remained a student of Styrling Academy thanks only to his father's generous patronage of many of the school's facilities, and repeatedly informed him that he was skating on thin ice, walking a tightrope, balancing on a knife's edge, and performing numerous other well-worn cliches.

Lessons had continued much as they had before, and with all the extra attention being lavished upon him (no doubt at his father's insistence) Arcturus could not even find a way to relieve the crushing boredom of the academy by escaping into the city for an evening.

Arcturus Mengsk was, it seemed, a marked man at Styrling Academy, and even his former cohorts appeared to have been warned of the dangers of associating with him.

As a result, Arcturus spent the majority of his time during his last term at Styrling Academy in the school's library, reading and rereading every digi-tome he could find on geology, politics, psychology, and warfare. Many of these books he had already memorized, but each rereading brought fresh insight and understanding.

Arcturus wrote to Dorothy as promised and her return letters were among the few sources of comfort and amusement left to him. In these letters his mother informed him of the workings of the world beyond the walls of the academy, and he was surprised at the frankness of them, talking as they did of revolts in the outer colonies and fringe worlds (of which there was a growing number) as well as relating the latest society gossip. Her letters skirted carefully around the subject of his father, but Arcturus needed no letters from home to know all about Angus's dealings.

The UNN broadcasts were replete with stories of his fiery speeches denouncing the corruption of the Old Families and the Council. Though Angus publicly condemned the rising tide of violence engulfing Korhal, which had seen hundreds of Confederate marines dead in rebel bombings and ambushes, Arcturus knew his father had to be pan of it.

The objective part of Arcturus actually admired the skill with which Angus was able to distance himself from the violence while subtly implying that it was the inevitable result of the Confederacy's oppression and engendering sympathy for the rebel cause.

As much as he was now regarded as something of a pariah at the academy, this did not stop his fellow students from making their feelings about his father plain to him. Many of them came from wealthy families with close ties to the Confederacy, and were suffering dally embarrassment thanks to the withering scorn of Angus Mengsk's rhetoric.

Though Arcturus wanted nothing to do with his father's politics, he was savvy enough to recognize that what he said made a great deal of sense. Still, the retaliatory humiliations heaped upon him by his fellow students only served to further his resentment toward the Mengsk paterfamilias.

But Arcturus's resentment was made bearable by the stimulating diversions offered in the letters he was now exchanging with Juliana Pasteur.

Within a day of his arrival back at the academy, Arcturus had received a letter from Juliana, politely inquiring after his health and the possibility of setting up a meeting during one of the periods he was allowed off the campus. With the precision of a razor, Arcturus had dissected the true meaning within her letter and seen the naked interest beneath the platitudes.

Clearly the rapport established in the short time they had spent in the refuge of his father's summer villa had blossomed despite his absence. Or perhaps because of it.

In return, Arcturus replied with a missive brimming with the foibles of his fellow students, the foolishness of the masters, and his trials within the prisonlike walls of the academy.

His words were well chosen, witty, erudite, and filled with enough self-deprecation to puncture any sense of self-importance his letters might convey that might make him seem arrogant. That such self-deprecation was entirely contrived did not strike Arcturus as false in any way, and the effusive letters he received in return were proof positive of the success of his writings.

As they corresponded over the course of the term, it became increasingly clear that Juliana Pasteur was smitten with him. In marked contrast to their initially frosty meeting in the refuge, it appeared that Juliana now appreciated his brilliance and was assessing his suitability as a consort.

Though he remembered her intoxicating beauty, it had become a detached memory to Arcturus, and he indulged her letters as an outlet for his polemics and occasionally grandiose predictions of his future power. Truth be told, his desire to maintain the friendship had begun to wane, yet Arcturus continued to write to Juliana in the interest of eventually bedding her.

It would be the final act in the completion of a challenge that had once seemed difficult, but which he now knew had been simplicity itself.

The weeks and months passed in a gray blur, lectures boring him and insultingly easy assignments completed with barely a hint of effort. The end was in sight, and with only two weeks to graduation, Principal Steegman summoned the entire senior year to the grand assembly hall in the main block of the academy.

The assembly hall was a grand, vaulted chamber of cedar-paneled walls, gold-framed portraits of illustrious former students, high ceilings, and soaring oak beams. Every morning, Steegman would mount the stage to stand behind his lectern and address the entire upper school, announcing the results of the academy's sporting endeavors and notices of supposed importance.

Occasionally the assembly hall was also used for scrupulously chaperoned balls or played host to visiting dignitaries who would speak to the student body on the virtues of civic service or some other similarly dull subject.

The identically uniformed students filed drearily into the hall, and Arcturus briefly wandered what manner of speaker they were to be subjected to today. As he drew closer to the assembly hall's doorway, the excited hubbub of voices from within told him that whatever awaited them was something beyond the run of the mill.

He passed beneath the arched entrance to the assembly hall and the academy's motto of Alen Apisteyein, which meant “ever to be the best” in one of the dead languages of Old Earth.

The vast floor space in front of the stage was filled with uncomfortable chairs, each one occupied by an excited student. Principal Steegman was at his lectern, looking very pleased with himself, but it was the three hulking figures standing at attention behind him that captured Arcturus's attention.

They stood several feet taller than Steegman, their backs ramrod straight and their bulk enormous, thanks to the heavy plates of neosteel armor they wore.

Arcturus recognized the armor from the technical manuals he'd read in the library.

They were CMC-300 Powered Combat Suits, a brand-new design that was replacing the dated CMC-200 series.

Powered Combat Suits...

As worn by soldiers of the Confederate Marine Corps.