Part 793: Let's Read Warrior: En Garde - Part 3

Let’s Read Warrior: En Garde (part 3)

Book 1
Chapter 5
Solaris VII (The Game World)
Rahneshire, Lyran Commonwealth
15 January 3027

We’re introduced to Gray Noton (who’s getting fat, and lamenting it) and Tsen Shang (who’s not really that bad a guy). They’re in Thor’s Shieldhall, which is a pretty awesome bit of world-building: a bar for Solaris champions and the extraordinarily rich who want to pay money to be seen in the same room as a Solaris champion. Noton is creeped out by Tsen Shang’s hands, which have ten centimeter fingernails (lacquered, painted, and reinforced with carbon fiber so they’re razor sharp) on the last three digits. Shang is also described as ‘foppish,’ but I’m really not sure Stackpole knows how to convey that with a Chinese noble so it gets glossed over pretty much immediately.

Shang is also shown as an addict of Opium the Kincha fruit, native to a planet the Capellans lost to the Free Worlds League, but this is ancillary beyond passing the knowledge that Max Liao has banned consumption of the fruit since losing the world that grows it was a stain on Capellan honor. There’s actually a fair bit of subtlety here, since it implies either Tsen Shang is an idiot (which Noton says flat out he isn’t), an expatriate, or powerful enough that he doesn’t really fear Capellan spies. Shang congratulates Noton on his failure, and gloats about the defeat of Justin Allard’s maiming.

Noton was unaware that he’d injured Justin so badly that he’d never been able to pilot again, and quietly regrets not putting a large laser through Justin’s cockpit because he hated having maimed a warrior so badly that warrior would never be able to fight again. This is a running theme in this era, and it’s one I wish they’d kept even if it is a bit shortsighted.

We then learn that Tsen Shang is fixing fights with Capellan `Mechwarriors. Oooh sinister. He then tells Gray to keep his ears to the floor regarding Andrew “Clueless” Redburn, since an officer that green really shouldn’t have been able to organize thirty six `Mechs that well. Chapter over.



Book 1
Chapter 6
Solaris VII (The Game World)
Rahneshire, Lyran Commonwealth
15 January 3027

Noton then has a meeting with Enrico Lestrade, Baron von Summer, and his girlfriend, Contessa Kim Sorenson. Noton immediately insults Enrico for being a moron, and comments offhand that he’s surprised Enrico’s uncle hadn’t had Enrico assigned as the Lyran ambassador to Luthien.

Enrico then outright tells Noton he wants to hire Noton to help him steal a JumpShip. Noton bluntly asks for 300,000 plus a personal fee of 50,000 c-bills for himself (PTN’s note: waaaaaaaaay too little money), and Enrico balks because that’s way over budget.

… Really?

Anyway, Enrico leaves and Phillip Capet (the `Mechwarrior that Justin had kicked out of the AFFS) walks up and establishes himself as a jackass by taunting Noton. Noton politely tells him to go fuck himself, and that if he doesn’t “Legend Killer” (Noton’s Rifleman) will be his death. Forshadowing!