Not Quite the Right Thing: Governor McLaughlin orders his granddaughter to go to war after the destruction of a colony.Mugging the Monster: The terrorists at the beginning think it's a good idea to take a Hand hostage.Karma Houdini: The Agent who carried out all of these atrocities gets away scott free at the end.Oh, and his college girlfriend is in charge of the force that's probably committing the attacks. It's Personal: Damien's home planet might be committing piracy and mass murder.He never succeeded because he was her subordinate. Honey Trap: Captain Wayne turns out to have been trying this with Grace McLaughlin.Both are so used to thinking of themselves as sovereign nations that it doesn't really sink in. Heroic Neutral: Damien keeps pointing out the Protectorate isn't about to let two member states go to war.It is but one of many such operations currently in place. False Flag Operation: The raids were organized by Legatus in order to drive two Protectorate systems into war in order to weaken the organization as a whole while also occupying the Martian fleet.Because they're all nihilist assholes, they tend to execute their subordinates before they die, just to make sure no one gets to live. Explosive Leash: All of the pirate officers have cranial implants that will explode if someone higher up decides they might be captured.He was also working for a Ax-Crazy Legatus agent.

Big Bad: Michael Wayne was the secret master of the pirates all the time.Normal mages can't survive vacuum, but Damien as a Hand of the Mage-King is powerful enough to create a shield for their air supply while Grace recycles carbon dioxide into oxygen. Assassin Outclassin': An enemy attempts to assassinate Grace and Damien by planting explosives in the Commodore's space-station-based office, casting the two of them into deep space.He is forced to shuttle repeatedly between the systems, struggling to keep the first civil war in the history of the Protectorate from breaking out.Īnd throughout it all, the pirate ships have some very suspicious technological abilities. Both sides have anecdotal evidence that the other is engaged in piracy and murder, and are fighting over a rich mining system in the middle.ĭamien fights to discover who to trust, but with every turn he finds proof of more atrocities perpetuated by both sides. Damien Montgomery, Hand of the Mage-King, is called back to his home system of Sherwood in order to prevent a war between Sherwood and the neighboring system of Míngliàng.

Voice of Mars by Glynn Stewart