It was midday on Volgograd, and the cloudy sky was a dirty, shimmering white under the harsh white sun of Omega-52. Snow fell lazily from the clouds, and the wind tossed it here and there - picking up stinging ice from the streets and sidewalks and throwing it into the mix in the subzero weather. A few people walked down the streets with whatever business they had to attend to. Their heads were bowed against the sun and hard snow, and none really paid attention to each other in their haste to get from building to building.
Alvarez had stopped at a corner newspaper stand of Его Слово - Ehgo Slovo, "His Word," the Coalition newspaper. It was run by a man who appeared to be in his fifties, wrinkled before he should be, and deprived of a leg through some horrible accident, perhaps in a war, perhaps in a machine shop. He wore a ragged ushanka on his head that looked as if it had seen about as much as the man himself had.
Alvarez didn't ask any questions - nor did they speak much as the captain of the Havana acquired his newspaper. It wasn't that he didn't know what was going on, but this routine gave him some small feeling of normality. Reading the newspaper was something that he'd made a habit of in days past, when Maria had been alive... when everything wasn't so crazy, when he wasn't the captain of the Coalition's most fearsome war machine... when he wasn't the "Coyote." It made today seem a little more normal, somehow...
Alvarez thanked the man and turned back to move through the unpleasant weather. He had taken just a few steps down the street when he was overtaken be an even older man, a fellow clutching a greatcoat around himself... and wearing an ushanka with a simple but peculiar badge on the middle - that of an eye. Alvarez knew immediately who it was without even looking at this badge, this seemingly innocuous man who had appeared out of nowhere, walking alongside him. It was His Watchful Eye. He had no official position, no rank, nothing that would distinguish him from anyone else unless you knew about him. And everyone knew about him.
"Comrade Ricardo, I have news for you," Medvedov - as his true, unwhispered name was - began. "Lieutenant Commander Petko Rodolubovich... who I assume you are familiar with..." he said this and projected the fact that he was perfectly aware that Alvarez had just parted company with Dimitrov some distance across the city, "... brought some information to my attention." He reached into his greatcoat and pulled out a diskette, keeping his head down against the wind as they walked. Alvarez received it, glanced over it, and placed it within his own pocket. Medvedov continued talking. "It concerns a search for salvageable materials for your project," he said vaguely, with a bit of a shrug. They continued walking for a few more seconds, silence between them.
"I do have more information along the same lines for you as well, straight from my birds." Medvedov often referred informally (and eccentrically) to his agents as "birds" or "crows" or other such things. "But first I must ask... are you familiar with a certain Colin Breen of the Molly revolutionary movement?"
Alvarez was surprised, he hadn't expected the appearance of the Intelligence Mastermind.
The Coalition's intelligence network was everywhere in Sirius, assets that worked for His Watchful Eye because they believed in the Revolution, or those that served him because of the seemingly inexhaustable vaults of 'leverage' the man could bring to bear. Leverage could take many forms, and Alvarez shivered his eyes flicking to the rooftops around him, knowing that somewhere up there, DAWN and EVE lurked. Ready to cut him asunder if he so much as blinked the wrong way.
His Watchful Eye never blinked, and if he asked a question, it was usually because he already knew the answer.
"Si, I know of him but I have never met him," He hitched his collar, glancing to the right as the pair crossed the slush clogged road, stepping around a trolly car.
Medvedov forded through the slushy street alongside Alvaraz, glancing back at the trolley as they stepped onto the next patch of sidewalk. He turned to face forward again. "Months ago, this Molly leader disappeared completely, without a readily apparent path to follow." He pulled his greatcoat around him somewhat tighter, turning to look at Alvarez for a moment. "My birds have followed his flight, at least as far as his destroyer's grave."
Alvarez shot a glance sideways to meet Medvedov's, surprised.
"Yes, it was his Scylla destroyer we found - crash-landed on Planet Waterford in the Leeds system. It appears that he met with some Bretonians for diplomatic talks, and they went... sour." He smiled bitterly and returned to looking forward - or more precisely, downward at the ground in front of him. The stinging snow was still blowing. "He damaged the vessel that the talks were to take place on and escaped in his own destroyer, though it was heavily damaged by antimatter weaponry. It seems that these negotiations were very high-level, and expertly concealed. Whether they were officially authorized by the Bretonian government or were a conspiracy between some of their higher-ups is unknown. Perhaps they were a trap made by one side for another." He let out a breath, smokey in the cold. "But... that is not what we are worried about." He spoke a little more loudly now, but his voice was still hushed. "We have found the hulk of his Scylla-class destroyer, and it appears to be in salvageable condition, although the reactor has leaked rather profusely, likely due to sabotage. The trail is cold after this point."
He produced another diskette - this one, however, was stamped with the insignia of the Intelligence Department. He handed it discretely to Alvarez. "It will be of use to you in your project as well, although retrieving it will be a most delicate matter, as I'm sure you know. Waterford is in the contested areas of Northern Leeds, in the warzone; and a leaking core of a destroyer is not to be trifled with."
A crashed Scylla, the parts would help tremendously.
With the desperate situation the Coalition had been plunged into after the bombardment of JiangXi, the lack of population and active factories meant that the Coalition was barely able to maintain the fleet it had. Diverting resources to the Redemption project was risky, if it failed then it would have a domino effect throughout Coalition production and war readiness.
The Coalition was already sacrificing it's Light Cruiser project for the chance of fielding the Du Gaulle, Alvarez didn't want to think what else would have to be given up before they were done.
He took the disks.
"I will get Santorini on this as soon as possible, she likes a challenge," he coughed in the chill air, nodding to a vendor that sold coffee from a small battered looking stall. "Would you care for a cup, holmes?"
His Watchful Eye followed Alvarez's nod toward the rather weather-beaten coffee stand. He smiled a bit and nodded twice - it was very cold - and they began to walk over to it. Medvedov smiled for a moment, glancing over at Alvarez. "I was going to suggest the same thing, you know," he chuckled - but just slightly. Then again, some did say that his thoughts weren't exactly confined to his brain. This bit of mythology didn't enter into Ricardo's head, though, and for a moment, Medvedov seemed almost... normal. Simple.
Alvarez paid using the Social Credit, the nominal form of currency in the Socialist Utopia they lived in. And as Alvarez handed a mug over to the old man, it dawned on him how instrumental he had been.
Were it not for His Watchful Eye's support, Katz's wild dream of over turning the Iron men of the Coalition and restoring Party rule would have died with the ideologist. It seemed so long ago that Katz had launched his purges, the Commissariat's hands guided by the very man who stood across from him stirring sugar into the murky cardboard cup of throat-stripping red-eye caffeinated tar that was all there was on Volgograd. And for a moment Coffee had become the unspoken constant between them. They were connected by the simplicity of drinking it.
"It's going to be a long week," Alvarez heaved a sigh as they began to walk again. "I have Commander Brooks and Commander Steeles combing over the Du Gaulle trying to glean what secrets they can from it... We have the populace of L'Acadia Islands resettling... and we have this..." he tapped the pocket with the two disks in it. "I will do what I can, but I am not an engineer... We are going to need more... specialized help."
Medvedov smiled and put a hand on Alvarez's shoulder for a moment as they walked. He was holding his cup near his chest and gestured slightly with it. "I will send you Nikolai," he said simply, "to be your aide. He is a good boy, he knows about machines, too." He then lowered his voice and inclined his head in a shrug, as if speaking parenthetically. "He is only eighteen, so he needs a little push here or there." He smiled and patted Ricardo's shoulder twice before removing his hand. "He is one of my..." he seemed to search for an appropriate word, "... Rooks." Rook was a bird-based euphemism that was used colloquially for a member of Taskforce Silver, the most shadowy and mysterious sector of the intelligence department. "And as for this Du Gaulle affair, I would give you the advice to let those two... work it out between themselves. Do not worry about it, comrade." He waved his cup into the air briefly in a wide gesture before taking a satisfied sip of it.
Alvarez nodded, falling silent as they wound up Tzvetloi Boulevard, still cleaning from the great military parade that had marched down it towards Red Square and the Kremlin. A show of power and of force, of a nation on the rise. The Coalition would recover from its difficulties, and gather strength.
Far on the horizon the statue of McIntosh towered over the city from above the Palace of the Soviet, giving his bold, universal gesture to the rest of Sirius. Elsewhere statues were being raised of Katz. The statesman and the Dictator. Night and day... and as the Coalition rose for the new day, it would stand proud.
They were far from weak, they had proven that. Their battle record was long and untarnished. They had turned back the Corsair tide, punished the BHG Core whenever they had struck. And so they would soldier on.
Alvarez turned his head, regarding His Watchful Eye.
There was genius there behind the visage of fear, the sheer magnitude of knowledge that Medvedov possessed. He had, on many occasions proven his mastery of numerous languages. Then there was the methodical way that the man hunted alien incursions. He used a combination of psychology, kinesiology, Coalition law, cryptology and classical literature like they were weapons of war. Tactically applying every asset he had at his disposal to utterly destroy his enemies.
It was the man behind all of that, which had Alvarez take pause. It was the first glimpse he had of that man... was he psychologically broken, like most in the Coalition high command were? Propaganda flowing through their veins like glass and salt, fostering infection, preventing catharsis...
He swallowed the last of his coffee.
"I must get back to my ship, Commander Brooks alone in command of our flagship... the thought is truly terrifying, mi hermano, when you consider what happened the last time he got bored."
Medvedov had been staring out at the skyline along with Alvarez, sipping his coffee reflectively. He was thinking along the same lines as Ricardo had been - how they had come from the old regime into this new age, what it had taken, and what he had done. As he looked across the statue of McIntosh, at the newer and smaller figures of Katz around the square and city, at the heights of the palace, and at the higher buildings of the city, he thought about the foundation the Coalition was built on - what this current Coalition had been built on. And he, of all people, probably knew the most. He managed to smile slightly.
He glanced over at Alvarez as the captain began to speak, his smile dropping back to a more neutral expression. He turned to looking out across the city, across this square that had so recently been host to the might of the Coalition, host to the lines of soldiers marching into the future. He chuckled slightly at Alvarez's joke. "Da, I understand, Comrade Ricardo. I will send Nikolai very soon. Good luck."
He breathed out slowly, letting his visible breath waft away in the icy weather. It seemed that more of a storm was blowing in, the white clouds of sleet eating up the edges of the city like fire licking at a page of Ehgo Slovo. Both were Medvedov's work.
Once safely away, Alvarez made his way to the space dock, making arrangements as he went.
Lt. Commander Santorini was waiting for him beside her Storm class gunboat the CPW-Dhokebaaz, as he mutely handed her the data files on the Scylla, boarding the ship and strapping into one of the passenger seats.
"Commander Brooks reports he is aboard the Du Gaulle," Santorini called, as she started her ships engines, to get them aloft.
"Take me to the Havana," Alvarez ordered, leaning back into his chair, watching as the ship shot skywards and off into the white space of Omega-52.