Carnifex

by Tom Kratman

  Chapter Twelve

  "Katana wa samurai no tamashii."

  (The sword is the soul of the samurai.)

  Ancient Yamatan Saying

  24/1/468 AC, Bimali, Xamar

  No operation is perfect. Several score men from the butchered column made it back to Abdulahi with wild tales of frightful airplanes and equally frightful infantry swooping in to massacre his followers. None could say what had happened to their chief's heir and the uncertainty was an ulcer eating at the old pirate's innards.

  Uncertainty ended shortly thereafter as a single Cricket landed at Bimali's dirt airstrip. From it emerged three armed Cazadors and a legionary naval officer in dress whites. The naval officer was the same one, Tribune Puente-Pequeño, who had served as judge at Gedo.

  "Bring your chief, Abdulahi, here," was all the naval officer said.

  It was several hours before Abdulahi made an appearance. By that time, the Cazadors had set up a tarp and prepared tea. The naval officer and Abdulahi sat under the tarp and sipped tea for some time before the pirate chief spoke.

  "What happened to my son?" he asked.

  "Abdulahi, the junior? We have him."

  "I want him back."

  "Your son was captured while leading an armed band en route to prevent a legitimate action against piracy," the naval officer said. "As such, he is an accessory after the fact to piracy. Thus, he has been sentenced to death, along with all his men. They are being held pending review of the sentences. After review of the sentences, they will be hanged and their bodies dumped at sea."

  "You can't do that?" Abdulahi insisted.

  "Why not?" the naval officer answered. "Who's to prevent it?"

  Abdulahi's mouth opened to answer, but no words came out. In fact, there was nothing to prevent it. The enemy fleet, what he knew of it, was no great shakes as fleets went. But it was still infinitely superior to anything he had. The World League? No, there was nothing there. They couldn't even prevent his former country from dissolving into anarchy; they surely couldn't do anything now. The United Earth Peace Fleet? No, the Pig in Space, Robinson, had made it clear he could not intervene directly. Indeed, without the advice of the High Infidel, his main striking force would never have been destroyed. Yes, he'd have lost a village and the way in which he'd lost it would have terrified his followers. But he'd lost that anyway and his followers had been terrorized anyway.

  "What do you want?" Abdulahi asked, hopelessly.

  "That's simple. You must cease all piratical activity against shipping under our protection and return all hostages held. Your son will not be executed, though he will be held for some years, if you comply. Otherwise, he will hang, along with a number of his men, the very next time there is an attack at sea. More will hang with each further attack. When we run out, we'll grab more. After all, you're all guilty; we can take anyone we want. We also want your means of communication with the UEPF. We will know if you retain the means, I assure you."

  And what good did the supposed "intelligence" I got from space do for me? Nothing. I can give that up. But end our attacks at sea . . . ?

  "I cannot control my followers," Abdulahi answered. "If I once could have, that ability was lost to me when you destroyed my column. There will be more attacks," he mourned, "and then you will hang my most beloved son." His chin sank on his chest. Barely, the heartbroken old man restrained his tears.

  "I think," Puente-Pequeño countered, "that after the example we just set in your town of Gedo you will have less problem controlling your people than you suspect. Besides, we didn't say you must stop all piracy, only that you must never again touch a ship under our protection. Some shipping we want you to attack."

  "Eh?" The pirate's chin lifted and his eyes lost a part of their mournful look.

  Smiling the naval officer said, "There are certain shippers who have paid you not to attack their shipping, is this not so?"

  Warily the pirate chief nodded.

  "Good. Who are they?"

  Abdulahi rattled off the names. Mentally, the naval officer checked off all those known to have been buying off the pirates, plus some others who had been unknown. There was only one missing.

  "You forgot Red Star Line," the officer said.

  "Oh, yes. Sorry. It's just that they've been paying us so long . . . "

  "No matter. We want you to attack them, all those who paid you off, until such time as we say 'halt.' As you attack them, we shall make them pay a great deal for protection, all they should have paid us this last year plus interest and penalties. By the time they have broken, you should have enough of a ground force built up that you can maintain control in the future. Moreover, we will send some first rate infantry to protect you and your family, and to help you keep control, while you rebuild."

  Abdulahi looked wonderingly. He had thought himself powerful and ruthless. He had followed Mustafa because he thought he had found one even more powerful and ruthless than he was. But these mercenaries? They were beyond anything he or even Mustafa had contemplated. And their power, though small in the big scheme of things, was magnified by their callousness, lack of pity, mercilessness, cruelty and heartlessness to terrifying heights.

  Perhaps the deal is not such a bad one.

  25/1/468 AC, Commodore's Quarters, BdL Dos Lindas

  One of Kurita's ancestors, back on Old Earth in the early twenty-first century, had had an interesting theory. Possessed of an ancient sword, a family heirloom dating back to before the Sengoku Jidai, the Period of the Country at War, that ancestor had observed that the sword was old and "tired," as the Japanese said. It had seen too much use, had been polished too many times. It was thin and most of the high carbon layer had gone from it.

  "All weapons are living beings," had said this ancestor, "This is merest revealed truth. They have souls. Is my family's sword less alive because it has lost weight? I think not. I think that all it ever was is still contained within that weary core of metal. And yet, does it not look sad?"

  The ancestor had mused upon this, neither resting nor eating nor drinking, for three days. At last, with his mind free of normal mortal limits, he had had an insight. "We live as well. And we do not become different, or lose our souls, by changing our kimonos. Perhaps this sword merely wants a change of clothing."

  Kurita's ancestor had spent two years searching out the right swordsmith for the work he had in mind. In Japan's revival of its ancient art, many swordsmiths had appeared. Few were of sufficient artistry for his family sword, however. Of those few, none initially would undertake the job. Screams of "Heresy! Blasphemy!" arose wherever he'd tried.

  At last he had found one, a smith willing to try new things or—in this case—old things in a new way.

  For two more years this smith studied the Kurita family heirloom. Looking at the temper line, the little dots of pearlite and martinsite, he saw back to the technique used by the earlier smith, saw the painting on of the clay wash, saw the precise glow of the charcoal in the brazier.

  The smith took a gunto sword, a relic of Old Earth's Second World War, and experimentally attempted what Kurita's ancestor had wanted with it. He was disappointed to find that this really told him nothing, that the solid make up of the new sword did not replicate the problems of recladding a properly layered sword. Moreover, he found he had wasted much of the rare and expensive tama-hagane, the traditional steel produced from iron rich sands in the last remaining tatara smelter in Japan, in Shimane Prefecture.

  Next the smith had experimented on a worn out tanto, or dagger, though not one as old as the Kurita sword. This tanto, unlike the Gunto sword, had been made in the traditional manner. The result worked, for certain values of work. Still the smith was not satisfied.

  Armed with the insights gained from working on the tanto, the smith then obtained a sword forged in the seventeenth century and falsely labeled as the work of the great smith, Kunihiro. The forgery had been well made—how else could it even hope to pass itself off as the great master's work?—an
d much was learned from resheathing this.

  At length, the smith felt ready. He took several pounds of tama-hagane and from it forged a four thousand layer, high carbon skin, or kawegane. Using the old Kurita sword for the base, he forged around it this new skin, welding the two together with heat and the strokes of his hammer. Did he hear the sword scream under the pounding. No matter; I scream in the dentist's chair, too. Then he tempered it in such a way as to recreate a temper line, or hamon, essentially indistinguishable from the original.

  Last of all, the smith added every distinguishing mark found on the sword prior to recladding it. A warrior is, after all, entitled to the honor of his scars.

  * * *

  Fosa and Kurita sat opposite each other, cross-legged on a rice straw mat on the floor of the Commodore's quarters. The sword lay between them on a silk scarf. Though it glowed from the daylight streaming in through the portholes, to Fosa is seemed to glow with an inner light as well.

  "It's . . . beautiful," said a stunned Fosa, stunned because the Commodore had never before shown him the sword. He did not wear it aboard ship.

  "It's unique," Kurita corrected. "The smith who did this was hounded from the art for tampering with tradition. Eventually, he borrowed the sword and killed himself with it; so say the family legends. My father gave it to my care when I took over command of the Battlecruiser Öishi. I have no heir, and all my nephews are swine. I imagine I will send it to the restored Yasukuni when I feel my time is upon me. After all, though the shrine boasts nine and ninety rocks from my people's battlefields now, it has never had a rock from a naval battlefield. It does have that one forty-six centimeter shell but that was never fired, of course. A sword, however, should do well enough."

  "You should wear it," Fosa said. "Here on the ship. I think the men would approve." Hah, they'll think it's great.

  "Perhaps I should."

  "You still have people who make such weapons in Yamato, do you not, Commodore?"

  "Yes. It has experienced something a rebirth of late."

  Again Fosa looked at the sword, admiringly. "Is there one you might recommend?"

  "I shall enquire," answered the Commodore. "They live, you know? Swords, ships, rifles, too. All the weapons of man have their own souls, their own spirits. Thus the wise men of Yamato teach. And I have always felt it was true."

  * * *

  The sun had gone down and the quarters were empty except for Kurita and the sword. The sword was still out, though now illuminated only by the candles the commodore had lit.

  Is the sword my agent, the old man wondered, or am I its? It's a good question. Am I the Zaibatsu's agent to the Legion . . . or have I become the Legion's agent to the Zaibatsu? I do not know. I do, however, know that the mission here for which the Legion contracted is about over. Yet I have told my principals none of this. Why should this be?

  The commodore cleared his mind and concentrated on the dim glow of the sword before him. After a long time he looked up, with a smile.

  Ah . . . now I understand. It is because after all these years away from the sea and my calling, I am again at war and happy. And the Legion has made it so.

  * * *

  The next morning Kurita awoke, as always, very early. He dressed himself, as always, but added a sash. He prepared and encoded one message. Then he prepared another in plain text. Through the sash he stuck his family heirloom, taking a moment to look in the mirror to ensure it was adjusted to the perfect angle.

  Kurita's first stop was at the door to Fosa's quarters. He knocked and, when Fosa answered, passed over the plain text note and said, "Encode this and send it to the highest placed intelligence officer in your organization, Captain-san." Then he left a stunned looking Fosa and walked to the radio room to send the encoded message to Messers Saito and Yamagata.

  Most of the crew members barely noticed the sword. Perhaps it was just that, for the first time, Kurita seemed fully dressed. Of those who did actually notice it, the uniform sentiment was something like cooolll.

  When the message was received, in distant Yamato, and had been decoded and presented to the Zaibatsu representatives, a very confused Yamagata read it off for Saito.

  "I want a sword made, or bought, if one be found suitable." said the message, "Make it a katana. It should be made by a master smith, and in the old Bizen style. Full furnishings should be provided, with a blue lacquer scabbard and blue-wrapped tsuka. Inscribe on the blade . . . "

  26/1/468 AC, Casa Linda, Balboa

  Balboa had seen its share of rule-by-lunatic before. All things considered, rule-by-kleptocrat was to be preferred. Parilla's presidential campaign faced that, fear of political lunacy, as its greatest handicap.

  "It's not a completely groundless fear, Raul," Professor Ruiz advised. "Yes, we can and we have put a lot of emphasis into the public works the Legion has sponsored. Yes, we can show a lot of pretty girls to catch attention. Artemisia Jimenez, in particular, seems to be an attention grabber." Both Parilla and Ruiz unconsciously sighed, Ah, Artemisia . . . what a delight! "Still, you can talk the good fight, talk national rebirth, talk anti-corruption. But the longer the campaign goes on, the more people are exposed to counterpropaganda, the more a lot of people become afraid of you, afraid of the Legion, and afraid of what you might do with both the presidency and the military power. Most of them are middle class, but some are poor."

  Parilla shook his head, uncomprehending. "But we've done so much for the poor."

  Ruiz's mouth formed a moue. "Ah . . . no. You've made a minority of the poor fairly middle class by bringing them into the Legion del Cid. You've also left a much larger number behind. You've actually given very little and most of the benefits are either general, clinics and such, or indirect. Some of the support we had may have slipped away because you've never once mentioned creating a social democratic welfare state here."

  "Social democracy? Patricio controls the money and that he will never go for. I start talking welfare state and I'll lose his support. Come to think of it, I start talking social democracy and I probably wouldn't vote for myself. How bad are the numbers?"

  "It isn't that they're bad, exactly," Ruiz answered. "Just that they're down from where they were and where they should be. I don't like the trend. I also don't like the effect of the advertising campaign the other side is using. They're getting a lot of mileage out of comparing you to Piña. And then there is the number of people put to death by the Legion, starting with Rocaberti back during the initial campaign in Sumer and continuing through today. Forget the number of Sumeris we've strung up; how many legionaries have been executed for one or another crime?"

  "Maybe a hundred," Parilla admitted. "Or a bit less. But most of those were for crimes that would warrant death even outside the military."

  "Not here they wouldn't," Ruiz corrected. "And the idea of applying the death penalty here, if the government changes, has a lot of people scared. Piña had people killed; you and Patricio have had people killed. Some don't see fine distinctions like the fact that he killed political opponents and you've shot or hanged traitors, deserters, rapists, and murderers."

  Parilla bridled. "Now that is unfair."

  "Politics is supposed to be fair?" Ruiz asked, rhetorically.

  "Point taken," Parilla said with a shrug.

  "Another thing," Ruiz added. "The advertising the other side is using is sophisticated and, because there is so much of it, expensive. I think they're getting a fair amount of financial backing from the Taurans. Our ruling classes have two distinguishing features. One is that they're corrupt. The other is that they're cheap; cheeseparers, at best. They'd never spend this kind of money on their own, though they'd be perfectly happy to let someone else do it on their behalf."

  "Yeah, I know them," Parilla agreed. "What are the numbers looking like."

  Ruiz was actually an art—or, at least, cinema—professor. He'd run the Legion's propaganda program since inception. As such—with politics being as much about propaganda as about r
eality, and perhaps more—he'd been tapped for the political campaign. Starting with no real background in the subject he'd surrounded himself with other professors from the university who did have such a background. The numbers came from them.

  "We're expecting a relatively high turnout, on the order of eighty percent."

  "That is high," Parilla agreed. "We haven't seen a turnout like that since the vote on the Transitway Treaty with the Federated States."

  "Yes. Of those, right now we can count on maybe fifty-five percent, including absentee ballots, voting our way. That's down about nine percent from where we thought we were when this started. Another drop like that and we're toast."

  Parilla bit at his lower lip. "Worse, if the current party can show that kind of support no amount of bribery will keep them from outlawing the Legion, here."

  "High stakes, indeed," Ruiz agreed. "So what's left? Social democracy is out. More sensitive military laws and regulations are probably out."

  "I've got to discuss that with Patricio."

  28/1/468 AC, Firebase Pedro de Lisaldo, Pashtia

  His aide had brought three messages to Carrera while he visited the firebase before going out on a patrol with one of the platoons that shared it with the artillery. One was from Fernandez. It had been hand-carried in coded form, translated back at headquarters in Mazari Omar, then brought forward. The second was from Parilla. It, too, had gone through encode and decode. The last was from Lourdes. Carrera read the last first, smiling halfway through then laughing outright when Lourdes passed on some of the news of their son's latest antics.

  So I caught Hamilcar carting off one very unwilling kitten in his arms. As soon as he saw me he just opened his arms and let it drop to the floor. Then he put his head down like a man on his way to the firing squad and walked back to bed without a word. You should have seen it . . .