I am Jade Falcon

by Robert Thurston

  "You can believe me or not. A warrior has no need to lie."

  "You are no warrior—you are a spy," Joanna hissed. "Deceit and lying are you bloodname. Only deceit could have gotten you here in the first place—a Wolf warrior among a Jade Falcon solahma unit on a world deep within the Jade Falcon occupation zone? How did you get here, if not by deceit? And how have you gone undetected so far, except by lies?"

  "True enough. I am here on a mission. Just like you, Joanna. Old or not—you are no solahma. You are nothing like the rest of the sorry specimens in the unit."

  Joanna laughed harshly. "Am I supposed to thank you or slap you for saying that?"

  "Slap him," Karlac muttered.

  “Tell me more, scum. The black DropShip—Wolf or Jade Falcon?"

  "Your insults do not harm me, Joanna. I know who I am. But to answer your question, sometimes it is one, sometimes the other. Can you imagine my reaction when I discovered that? I was sent here by the Wolves to find out what the Jade Falcons might be up to, only to learn that Wolf Clan ships are part of this whole filthy operation! Even worse, that Wolf warriors are being substituted for those of Jade Falcons for use in an experimental breeding program. An uncontrolled program, one for purposes defined by the scientists rather than the warrior caste."

  Alvar handed the pistol to Karlac. "I believe this is yours," he said. Then he looked Joanna straight in the eyes, holding her gaze for several moments, something a Clan warrior seldom dared do to another. There was a sudden shout somewhere in the cavern outside, and Joanna used it as an escape from Alvar's disturbing gaze. She gestured toward the door.

  "Karlac, have a look."

  "Right, Joanna."

  "See anything?"

  "Something. Techs are scrambling around all the aisles now. Frantic, I would say.”

  “They have found out.”

  “Found out what?" Alvar asked.

  "We left some debris behind us on our way here. Human debris."

  Alvar grunted in disgust. "Cannot you Jade Falcons do anything right?"

  Joanna strode toward him, for a moment intending to make him the next item of human debris. Then she realized his fate should not be her present priority. She holstered her weapon to remove the threat.

  "We do not have much more time to talk," she said. "But tell me one more thing, Wolf spy. If the Wolves know all this, then why send a spy to Dogg Station?"

  "Just as you assumed it had to be Wolf treachery, so we believed it could only be a Jade Falcon plot. After all, Dogg Station is one of your planets, quiaff?"

  Alvar shook his head almost sadly. "Only the mind of a scientist could concoct a scheme like this one. But no scientist could have persuaded the High Council of any Clan to approve these genetic experiments." He spat out the word as if he could not stand the foul taste.

  "The scientists of both our Clans, and who knows what others, have apparently placed themselves above the way of the Clans, have decided that only they know what is for the good of all. We warriors are bound by deep traditions and taboos, but the scientists are mere freeborns and they have no honor. We are supposed to be their masters, the warrior caste as the highest among the Clans, and yet these freebirths have been playing a monstrous game with the genetic legacies of both our Clans. It is shameless. It is chalcas."

  It was a lot to take in, yet Joanna believed this Alvar/Bailly, this Wolf spy, this warrior of another Clan. Among themselves, warriors had no use for deceit. They did not need it.

  "You are telling me it is not Wolves against Falcons, but an initiative from within the scientist caste," Joanna said slowly. "Scientists overreaching themselves, putting their own agenda above the way of the Clans. They are charged with creating the most superior warriors the universe has ever known, and they have become drunk with power. The end justifies the means—no matter how traitorous and disgusting."

  Karlac was shaking her head in disbelief. "Filthy freebirths," she said.

  The sound of the voices in the cavern grew even louder. Probably distorted by funneling within the narrow aisles, the sounds became eerie.

  "Karlac?"

  "They look fierce now. I am sure they have discovered the bodies of their comrades."

  "We will be sitting ducks in this office," Alvar said, impressing Joanna with his calm.

  "Aff" she said. "I do not think there is much more any of us can do here."

  "Agreed. It is time to get this information back to our own Clans."

  Joanna went to the door, roughly pushing Karlac aside. Obviously insulted, Karlac's eyes flashed with her newly revived anger. "I want you to do what I say," Joanna said to her in what she realized was her best falconer's voice. "It is important that—"

  She did not finish the sentence. A tech with a pistol seemed to materialize out of thin air. Slamming against the side of the doorway first, he rushed into the room, his weapon aimed directly at Joanna. With her own pistol still holstered, he had the drop on her.

  But not, as it turned out, on Karlac.

  "Caught you," the tech snarled.

  "Not yet," Karlac said and sent a beam through the tech's neck with the pistol Alvar had returned to her moments ago. "Where did this filth come from?" she said, stepping over the tech's fallen body.

  He must have been crouching by the door."

  "Listening? Good thing I killed him then."

  "I am impressed by your ruthlessness," Joanna said. "Maybe I misjudged you, Karlac."

  "You thought I was a spy, quiaff?"

  "Aff"

  "And when you stopped thinking that, you just wrote me off as a burned-out solahma warrior, quiaff?"

  "Aff. You were too cautious, and you showed no revulsion at having to wear tech clothing and—"

  "Enough. You are right. But sometimes I remember I was a warrior."

  "And you still are."

  "I hate to interrupt your mutual admiration," Alvar put in, "but I wonder how we are going to get out of here? There are armed techs like this one everywhere, and only one way out of the cavern. They will never let us leave alive."

  "We will escape," Joanna said as she turned for the door. "Do not doubt it. We have one advantage the rest do not."

  Joanna looked out and saw techs scurrying in and out of the main portal. The distance between here and the surface of Dogg seemed formidable. The way to the elevator would be as pitch dark as ever and the elevator the same monstrosity of a contraption. The odds were astronomically against her. Against them.

  "What possible advantage could you mean?" Karlac asked.

  "My advantage?" Joanna said, as she opened the door all the way and stepped through it. "Yes."

  "I am Jade Falcon."

  28

  Watch Command

  Jade Falcon Command Center, Wotan

  Jade Falcon Occupation Zone

  15 November 3057

  Kael Pershaw used his good arm to adjust the half-mask, which had slipped a centimeter or two to the side.

  "I cannot speak freely, Joanna, but I will say this: what you have discovered may go far beyond some genetic machinations perpetrated by our Jade Falcon scientist caste. I have for some time suspected a network of conspiracy linking the scientist castes of many Clans—perhaps every Clan."

  "But why? What are they up to?"

  "I am not free to discuss that, especially with so much still based on speculation. But I have begun to suspect the scientist castes of somehow setting themselves apart, almost as if they had formed a separate Clan of their own. Frankly, it turns my blood cold to think of it."

  Kael Pershaw's blood had always been ice, as far as Joanna was concerned. Turning any colder suggested temperatures that would make the icebound Sudeten Lake seem tropical.

  "But your discoveries at least give some substance to my suspicions, Joanna. The information that you uncovered in your mission, which I have passed on to the Khan, has been divulged only to select Council members."

  Steepling his fingers, he sat back in thought, making the expression
on his ruined face more disturbing than ever. "We have, of course, eradicated the filthy freebirth techs on Dogg who unlawfully dared to take up arms."

  Joanna's head still reeled at the implications of what she had turned up on her mission as Kael Pershaw's agent. She had no head for complicated plots, and the idea of a conspiracy involving the lower castes was almost beyond her comprehension. She was glad that her mission had been successful, but she was also glad it was over. It was time to return to normal, to the life of a Jade Falcon warrior, no matter where her fate would now lead. "What has been happening in the short time I have been away?" she asked.

  "Much has been happening. At this very moment our Clan is fighting a Trial of Refusal against the Wolves. The Wolves' arrogance and their rejection of the way of the Clans have earned them many enemies, even within their own ranks. Ulric Kerensky's traitorous batchall, which led to our defeat at Tukayyid and the truce we must now live with, has finally caused all true Clan warriors to clamor for Wolf blood.

  "Ulric was stripped of the office of ilKhan by the Grand Council. As is his right, he demanded a Trial of Refusal, and Clan Jade Falcon was elected to uphold the decision of the Council. Ulric has bid most of the Wolf forces and sent them swarming into our occupation zone. Some are offering honorable battle, while others are attempting to flee into the Inner Sphere. We are hunting down the Wolves throughout our space, wherever they are found. The battles will become great, and every warrior has a chance for honor or death."

  "And I will be sent back to the nurseries."

  "No, Joanna. This time fate appears to be on your side."

  "You wish me to remain with the Watch, then?" Her voice dripped with scorn.

  "No, Joanna, you will return to the Falcon Guards."

  "I wish that, Star Colonel Pershaw."

  "I thought you would. Be assured that your service on Dogg will be recorded in your codex. I will also brief Star Colonel Ravill Pryde, but not in too great detail, so that he may ease your reappearance among the Falcon Guards after assignment to the solahma unit. Otherwise, the success of your mission will remain secret for now. Others will not know of it."

  "That is fine with me," Joanna said. "I am not proud of being a spy."

  Pershaw's one visible eye seemed to widen.

  "But you were good at it. If the Falcon Guards did not need you right now, I would have you permanently assigned to the Watch."

  "The thought repels me. This is not warrior work, spying. I do not wish to die in the midst of a pretense."

  "As a Jade Falcon warrior, I understand and pardon the offense you give me. I too would prefer to die in the field. As you can plainly see the only display of my combat abilities left to me now is the wreck my body has become. But I also must serve the Clan, and as leader of the Watch, as spymaster, if you will, I do so. Yet my hands long to be at the controls of a BattleMech. Sometimes this mask I wear to hide the burn scars on my face becomes like the deception I must practice to do my job. The spy mask hides the warrior face, and I hate it."

  "I am amazed, Star Colonel, that you reveal these thoughts to me."

  "Why, Joanna? We are very much alike, quiaff?”

  "Aff. We are both mean as cave bats and twice as angry."

  "I do not know if I would put it that way, but that does sum it up. Are you sure that you would not like to return here the next time you are up for reassignment?"

  "Aff, I am sure. Are you trying to get me to show gratitude, Kael Pershaw?"

  "Far from it. The universe would explode if you did."

  "Do not tempt me. I might thank you then and welcome the explosion."

  "Do not thank me just yet, or fate either. I have not told you the planet where the Falcon Guard participation in this Trial of Refusal will take place."

  "What difference could that make? As long as there is a battle, I am happy. Where is the Falcon Guard battle going to be?"

  Pershaw looked briefly away. It was strange to see him collect himself before speaking. He usually had no difficulty stating things bluntly.

  'Twycross."

  "Freebirth!" Joanna blurted.

  Kael Pershaw nodded, but his twisted face was, as always, inscrutable. "Cursing does seem to be the logical reaction," he said.

  29

  Plain of Curtains, Twycross

  Jade Falcon Occupation Zone

  6 December 3057

  Joanna could not have easily explained to anyone, not even Diana or Horse, what she felt being back on Twycross. Although she took no stock in the supernatural, she almost thought she saw ghosts in the strange shifting lights around her. Because the fierce wind, the awesome Diabolis, never ceased, the sands of Twycross were, it seemed, perpetually in motion. The redness of the sands and rocks made what little there was of available light also seem red. Shapes in the distance were indefinable. A rock could look like a BattleMech, BattleMechs standing together could look like a forest. The result was an obvious need for caution, a situation that automatically rattled any Jade Falcon warrior, for whom caution was cowardice.

  For the moment the wind was too fierce and the swirling sand too dense for any engagements on the Plain of Curtains. Tomorrow the battle would be joined, but for now the Jade Falcons huddled in large geodesic tents and bemoaned their fate while trying to control their edginess at the inactivity. The Falcon Guards were particularly restless and more than a little irritable. Arriving on Twycross, they had discovered that they were the only front-line unit assigned to this Steel Viper-controlled planet for the Trial of Refusal. The other three units—the Fifth Talons, the Sixth Provisional Garrison, and the Eighteenth Falcon Jaegers—were essentially garrison units, with much less combat experience than the Guards.

  Ravill Pryde had been furious when he discovered how the Falcon Guards were being treated, forced to fight side by side with lesser units in what must surely be a minor part of the entire Trial of Refusal.

  "Some of the taint that has stained the Falcon Guards since the original Twycross conflict is obviously still attached to us," he announced in an unusually emotional moment. "They will not waste other combat-ready units here, and saddle us with untested allies. Not only that, see who commands against us. The ancient Wolf Khan Natasha Kerensky. The Wolves insult us by sending an old woman to lead the fight against us. If she were a Jade Falcon, Natasha Kerensky would be dead by now or"—he glanced resentfully at Joanna when uttering his next words—"tending canisters."

  Joanna chose to ignore the insult, but felt called upon to speak up for Natasha Kerensky. "Natasha Kerensky has displayed great skills as a warrior and a leader."

  "Great skills?" Ravill Pryde said. "As a spy?" It was, of course, another calculated insult to Joanna, but she could not respond since no one else knew of her secret mission at Dogg Station. The other warriors thought she had been returned to duty in a time of need because of her vast combat experience. "She was in the Inner Sphere for years, posing as a Wolf's Dragoon. Like all Wolf Clan warriors, she is skilled in duplicity and deceit. I would not dirty my hands with her in honorable combat."

  "Natasha Kerensky is a worthy opponent, Star Colonel. Wolf that she is, her accomplishments cannot be denied or belittled."

  "Joanna you are old and cannot see this Wolf for the surat that she is."

  After regarding her for a long moment, Ravill Pryde turned away while continuing to voice his complaints to the other warriors, who hung on his every word. Joanna had noticed differences in Ravill Pryde since her return. He was less cheerful, sharper to his subordinates, a bit melancholy around the eyes. Oh, he still pulled the smile and enthusiasm routine at times, but not so often and not so heartily. Was he nervous about the impending battle? Was he wondering whether he would test out in war as well as he had done in the Trials? Even he knew that warfare was more brutal and more complicated than qualifying tests and genetic legacy skirmishes. Joanna enjoyed her imaginings of a Ravill Pryde becoming tense and anxious.

  Tired of the company of restive warriors, Joanna left the
geodesic tent. She decided it would be better to suffer the brunt of the wind and the sting of the sand on her skin than be infected with even more impatience than she already felt. Diana joined her. They stood under an awning that was only partially effective against the ravages of the Twycross weather and stared into the patterns created by the whirling sands.

  "See anything?" Diana asked.

  "Nothing."

  "Does it look the same as last time?"

  "Truth to tell, I have tried to forget this damnable place. What is worth remembering? All this red sand, these rocks, this wind, and a crushing defeat. No, I would rather view Twycross as a place where I have never been."

  "How far do you figure we are from the Great Gash?" Diana asked.

  "Not far."

  It was known that the Wolves' Third Battle Cluster, 352nd Assault Cluster, and 341st Assault Cluster were camped between the Plain of Curtains and the Great Gash. The two sides had not made any agreement to take up these positions; it had just happened. Little was known of the exact Wolf Clan positions at present because the planet's atmospheric conditions made accurate detection impossible.

  "Will we have to go through the Gash, do you think?"

  "Maybe, but let us get into battle first, Diana, and see."

  "I am itching for a fight. All this waiting irks me."

  "Yes, I am eager also. Look at my hands. They are in permanent curl, as if already at the controls of my 'Mech."

  "How do you like it? Your new Summoner, I mean."

  "Well, so far I would say it is only a second-rate machine." Joanna hated the thought of going into battle in an unfamiliar BattleMech. She had been trying to become more familiar with the controls of the Summoner, but every time they refused to respond with the rapidity of her former 'Mech, she ended up so frustrated and angry that all she could so was pound at them with her fists. Joanna would have given her right arm to have her Mad Dog back. But the 'Mech had been assigned to Castilla while Joanna was away on Dogg, and Ravill Pryde would not reassign it to her.

  "It would be waste," he had said. "We are glad that you have returned to fight with us in one more glorious battle, but MechWarrior Castilla has redesigned and reconfigured the 'Mech in the course of its repairs. Since it suits her skills excellently, it would be wasteful for you to reconfigure it to your requirements, then have Castilla redo it all over again after you leave for the homeworlds. There are three BattleMechs currently in reserve, survivors of the Tukayyid battle, although their pilots were not. Choose one of them, Joanna. No, do not even argue the point. It is my decision, quiaff?"