Heir to the Dragon

by Robert N. Charrette

  "Your attitude validates my decision," Takashi announced, the harshness returning to his voice. "You are still too callow, too flighty, too unconcerned with the needs of the state. You have had it too easy."

  "It's not been easy with you as a father."

  Takashi reached under his tea tray and pulled out a Compdisk. "Look over this file. The girl is an excellent match. Her connections will benefit the realm."

  Theodore took the disk, his knuckles white as he held it before his face. He stared unseeing at the iridescent object. Suddenly he threw the disk to the side, where it shattered against the fine oiled wood of a support beam, scarring the finish. Theodore glared at his father.

  "Reconsider your decision," Takashi said. His face was expressionless, but his voice betrayed the leashed violence of his emotions.

  "No."

  Constance wished she were elsewhere, anywhere. She could feel the two powerful wills in contest before her. Neither would retreat. Neither would lower his guard enough to discuss the real issues.

  "Very well." Takashi reached under his tray again and brought out a sealed envelope. Constance recognized the form and colors of a document from the Bureau of Substitution, the military office that handled transfers. Takashi had been prepared for his son's response.

  "Tai-sa Kurita, you have a new assignment. You are to report to the Eleventh Legion of Vega on Marfik. They are misfits and malcontents; you should feel at home."

  Theodore said nothing as he reached out to take the envelope, but Takashi did not release it at once. "When you understand your place, you may return," he said, opening his fingers.

  Theodore stuffed the envelope into his tunic, eyes locked with Takashi's. Constance well remembered a similar moment six years ago on Kagoshima, but this time there was no pride on Theodore's face. Instead of a smile of pleasure, clenched muscles twitched in his jaw and his eyes were slitted with rage.

  Theodore heaved himself to his feet and stomped toward the door. He shoved the door open with such violence that it jumped from its track and clattered to the floor, tearing the delicate rice paper. Theodore walked on.

  Constance picked up the cap Theodore had left lying on the mats, the action recalling her to Takashi's attention.

  "I apologize for my son's behavior, Jokan Constance," he said gravely. "It seems our talk is no longer necessary. I am sorry to have taken your time."

  "Your apologies are unnecessary, Tono," she said. Unnecessary to me, she added to herself, but long overdue to Theodore.

  "Excuse my curiosity, Tono, but you called your son Tai-sa as you handed him the orders. How could you promote him at the same time that you banished him to the Legion of Vega?"

  "It would not be fitting to have a Chu-sa in command of a regiment, let alone the whole Legion."

  17

  Legion of Vega HQ, Massingham, Marfik

  Dieron Military District, Draconis Combine

  1 April 3025

  Theodore tossed the rag down and turned away. The "Revenant" had come through the three months of transit with minimal freeze-up. He looked for Kowalski, intending to commend him on his diligent maintenance, but the Senior Tech was nowhere in sight.

  He scanned the hangar. It was strangely quiet, the only noise coming from the bays housing the 'Mechs of his command lance. He rubbed sweat from his brow with his forearm and frowned.

  Theodore had seen the sorry state of the Legion's 'Mechs when they brought the lance's machines in last night. He had told Sandersen to post an order suspending the regular work schedule, accompanied by a request for voluntary maintenance work. When the Legionnaires arrived, he planned that they would find him already present, working on his own Orion. Theodore had hoped it would show the men he was on their side, and not some tight-assed, spit-and-polish martinet. He also believed it would be a good way to get to know the men of his new command.

  In a way, he had been right, but the lesson he was getting about his men was a sad one. Rows of Legion BattleMechs stood silent and unattended in their bays, a frozen carnival of shapes and colors. There was no pride here, he decided. No discipline, either.

  He walked to the next bay, where Tomoe's black Panther stood. She was fussing over an actuator linkage in the foot assembly. Though the pose did not show her to her best advantage, she was as beautiful as ever. And as alluring. When he reached out to caress her buttocks, she did not start in surprise, but simply slapped his hand away distractedly.

  "Have you seen Kowalski?" he asked her south end.

  "Not recently," came the muffled response from within the armored foot assembly. "Thought I saw him heading over to the supply shed to scrounge up a part."

  Theodore wondered how lucky the Tech would be. The documents Theodore had studied on the trip to Marfik had indicated the supply situation for the Legion was bleak. He remembered one particular complaint that claimed that the Procurement Department had forgotten the Legion's existence. If the documents were correct, Kowalski would need all his fabled scrounging skill to get whatever he needed.

  Taking a firm grip on Tomoe's hips, he tugged her from the dark confines of the Panther's foot. "We've put in enough time for today, especially with all the support we're getting. Let's knock off."

  She took in the quiet hangar, a slight furrow appearing between her brows. She shrugged off her reaction without sharing it and said, "I'm getting hungry. How about you?"

  "Now that you mention it, yes. Let's pull out the other two and head for the mess. Maybe we'll run into Kowalski on our way. Let's not take too long, though. I promised Hohiro we would be out to see him tonight."

  Hohiro. Theodore reflected fondly on the last night's parting. The boy was too young to understand the necessity of a nighttime landing at the Massingham starport and a hurried trip to a prepared safe house, but he had been a brave soldier when Theodore said goodbye. Already the boy was used to partings from his devoted, but far too often absent, parents. At least, Tomoe had been able to spend almost a year with him after his birth. The deceptions were complicated, but with the aid of the O5P and a few favors from Subhash Indrahar, they were managing to keep the boy's existence a secret.

  Theodore squeezed his wife's hand before walking down to the next bay. His call was greeted by the plastic smile of Ben Tourneville. Theodore smiled back as though he didn't know that the man was an enemy, a spy for the Coordinator.

  Tourneville continued to be the biggest threat to their secrets, but Theodore saw no good way to replace him without arousing suspicion. The man's proximity to their daily lives was a constant danger, but the ever-loyal Sandersen, privy to the secret, helped immensely in distracting Takashi's spy.

  Hirushi Sandersen had heard the call as well and appeared from behind the half wall separating the bays. The tall man grinned pleasantly as he said, '"Bout time you decided to break for food, Theodore-sawa. Those sandwiches Kowalski hauled in for lunch weren't enough to fill the belly of one of the local microlizards."

  "You always say you never get enough food," Tourneville griped. "Even when you eat twice what I do."

  Theodore just shook his head and continued toward the hangar door, where the little group came to an abrupt halt when he nearly stumbled over a huddled, sobbing shape.

  "Kowalski?"

  "Sir," the Tech mumbled as he struggled to his feet, pain obvious in the way he moved. Kowalski was bruised, his uniform torn and smudged. Dried blood crusted his hairline, making his normally immaculate gray hair stick up haphazardly on one side.

  "What happened?"

  "They said I didn't have the authority to requisition parts. When I told them I was your personal Tech, they laughed. They said my word wasn't enough. They offered me a chance to establish my authority. I didn't do very well."

  "Who were they, Kowalski-san?"

  Kowalski turned away from Theodore's gaze, his shoulders slumping. "I can't say, sir."

  Theodore's eyes narrowed. "I'll find out who was responsible."

  "No," the Tech protested, twist
ed back to face Theodore. "Sir, please don't. That's not the way it works here."

  Theodore could not ignore the naked plea in the Tech's eyes. "All right, Kowalski-san. I'll do nothing for now, if you'll report to the infirmary. You are off-duty till further notice."

  Kowalski bowed awkwardly and limped away.

  "He's right, you know."

  The four Kuritans spun to face the new speaker. The tall, strongly-built man leaned against the wall of the shed. A thatch of red hair bushed out from under his black uniform cap to shade a freckled face wearing a relaxed grin. The man wore a MechWarrior's jumpsuit with a Tai-i's blue katakana "5" on his left collar. His cap insignia identified him as belonging to First Company, Second Battalion, of the Second Legion of Vega.

  "Ninyu!" Theodore exclaimed, recognizing the face he had first seen in a dark alley on Kagoshima. "I haven't seen you since that commando scare on Al Na'ir."

  "It's been too long, my friend. Still keeping up your kendo?"

  "Not as much as I would like. It's hard to find an opponent of Subhash-sama's caliber," Theodore said as he stepped up to shake his friend's hand. "What are you doing here?"

  "This is my station," Ninyu replied, tapping the insignia on his cap. "Loyal MechWarrior among the scum of the Combine."

  Theodore nodded. He knew Ninyu was a fellow member of Indrahar's Sons of the Dragons, and unlike himself, well-versed in subterfuge and the dark side of the military. If Ninyu was here, there would be a reason, quite possibly one not to be pursued before witnesses. To cover what was becoming an awkward pause, he said, "Let me introduce you to my lance."

  Theodore indicated each of his companions with a gesture and each made a formal bow of greeting to Ninyu. "Tai-i Tomoe Sakade, my exec. Chu-i Hirushi Sandersen, operations specialist. Chu-i Benjamin Tourneville, comm specialist."

  "Chu-i Tourneville and I are old acquaintances," Ninyu said.

  "So ka," Theodore acknowledged, understanding by Ninyu's remark that he knew of Tourneville's other occupation. "This is Ninyu Kerai, an old friend." Sotto voce, he added, "Be careful around him. He's ISF."

  Ninyu grimaced in mock annoyance, from which Theodore gathered that the man expected the others to know that already. "You'll find that quite a few people here are ISF," he said. "Watching the malcontents, and each other."

  "We were headed for the mess hall," Sandersen reminded them, patting his belly.

  "A man with his mind on important business," Ninyu laughed. "Come on. I'll show you the way. I wouldn't want you strangers to get lost trying to get to the most wretched hive of scum and culinary disasters in the Combine."

  Theodore was glad to have Ninyu for a guide. In the daylight, the scramble of buildings and huts did not seem to correspond to the orbital photographs he had studied. The walk to the messhall was mercifully short; Sandersen's continual grumblings about the lack of food were beginning to get old.

  The hall was crowded, the noise and smoke combining to give it the air of a seedy cantina on some backwater planet. Most of the men and women were already seated, many halfway through their meals. Theodore wondered briefly what they had been doing all day.

  The trip through the chow line was frustrating. The servers and the few others still in the line met Theodore's attempts to be comradely with ill-concealed hostility, answering his questions with the absolute minimum response and perfunctory politeness. Comments were ignored in the surly atmosphere.

  "What's going on?" Theodore asked Ninyu quietly as they left the chow line.

  "You're new, an unknown quantity," he replied. "They only know what they've heard and most of them think you're a wimp, a disgrace to the Dragon. It's true most of these hardcases don't give a fart for the Dragon, but neither do they like papa's boys. You've got yourself a kettle of hot water, hotshot. Let's see you make tea."

  Ninyu drifted off in search of a place among the crowded tables.

  Theodore spotted two open spaces and nudged Tomoe toward them. They put down their trays and sat down while their new table companions traded shifty glances.

  "I don't feel very hungry anymore," a sallow-faced woman announced, standing up with her half full tray. The others at the table grunted agreement, and in a moment, Theodore and Tomoe sat alone.

  Two tables down, a man stood and said something to his companions. Coarse laughter followed as he strode across the space between the tables.

  "Here comes the welcoming committee," Tomoe whispered.

  "Let me handle it."

  The man approaching them was huge, over two meters tall and heavily muscled. Despite the fact that the fellow wore a shabby MechWarrior's jersey, Theodore found it barely credible that the man's massive body would fit inside the cramped cockpit of a BattleMech. His lower face was covered with dark, bristly stubble, except for a line running from chin to his left temple. The scar stood white against his swarthy skin and did nothing to improve his sinister look. That look was obviously cultivated, as indicated by the gold stud through the lobe of his left nostril and the blood-red scharacki feather dangling from his right ear.

  "Olivares is my name," the man said in a voice that rumbled up from his broad gut and through his barrel-chest to erupt from his full-lipped mouth. He plunked down his tray on the table, pulled up a stool, and sat. "Sho-sa Esau Olivares. I'm ramrod here. You get along with me, you get along with them."

  "I was under the impression that I had been given command of this regiment."

  "Listen, pretty boy. This here's the frontline. Them Elsies could come dropping in any old time. When Steiner 'Mechs are falling on our heads, we ain't got no time for a wet-eared academy boy getting in our way. I been fighting Elsies for ten years. I know 'em. We get company, you just curl up at HQ with your books and your bimbo. I'll take care of business."

  Theodore raised a quizzical eyebrow. The gesture was lost on the Sho-sa, who continued on.

  "We hear you think you're real hot, been burning up the sim tanks with your tactics. But you ain't in the classroom now. This here's the real world. It ain't anything like you think. Your Kurita name ain't gonna make the Elsies bow down and kiss your behind. So if them Steiner MechJocks come to call, stay out of my way. You can sashay back to HQ, and stay safe and sound with the other pretty boys. You should have lotsa fun."

  "An interesting comment from someone with a feather in his ear."

  "You calling me a poof?" the burly man roared.

  "Could be."

  Olivares snarled as he stood, kicking his stool over backward. The man threw his shoulders back, a motion that emphasized his massive muscles, and raised his clenched fists.

  Still seated, Theodore drew his gun and fired. The scharacki feather floated to the table, its gentle motion almost audible in the sudden shocked silence that pervaded the hall. Olivares stood, mouth open, in shock.

  Calmly, Theodore holstered his gun. "On the other hand, maybe I was wrong. After all, you don't have a feather in your ear."

  Olivares reached up a beefy hand to feel his ear. He looked astonished to find no blood on his fingers. He collected his stool and sat.

  "Some more soy sauce, Sho-sa?" Theodore said casually, offering the bottle.

  As Olivares took the bottle, the clatter of conversation, cups, and plates, resumed around the hall. Theodore felt Tomoe relax. He snagged a morsel with his chopsticks and popped it into his mouth. Ninyu was right, the cuisine was wretched. That too, Theodore vowed, would change.

  18

  Unity Palace, Imperial City, Luthien

  Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine

  1 December 3026

  The two armored men circled cautiously, weapons held before them. Each searched for an opening in his opponent's guard. The taller suddenly shifted to high speed and advanced, his point seeking the other's throat. His target swayed slightly to the left, leaving his point to strike only empty air. A sharp, rattling crack filled the air as his opponent's shinai struck home on the taller man's do.

  "Well-struck," said Takashi Ku
rita, stepping back to salute his opponent with his own slit-bamboo sword. Pulling off a glove by trapping it under his arm, he reached up and flipped his men, combined fencing mask and throat protection, from his head. "It is good to test your shinai against mine once again, old friend."

  "Most pleasant," Subhash Indrahar agreed, removing his own mask. "With more practice, you may improve your men thrust."

  "Improve?" Takashi questioned suspiciously. "You are not able to deflect it when I focus."

  Subhash inclined his head, smiling the while. "But you do not always focus."

  Subhash could see Takashi considering the second meaning in his words. Occasionally, as now, Subhash found it useful to speak in phrases whose second meaning was a gentle rebuke to the Coordinator, inciting him to improve in the performance of his duty. It was almost a game between them.

  "And today's focus is the strategy session, is it not?”

  “It is as you say, Tono. Yet you are distracted. Theodore again?"

  "My constant trial," Takashi conceded. "He has spent more than a year with the scum of the Vegan Legion. One might think he prefers those ruffians to the courtiers on Luthien."

  "You have given him little chance to know the court here on Luthien."

  "It is not safe. There are too many intrigues, too many unscrupulous villains who would dupe him into their treasonous plots as he was duped in Rasalhague."

  "He is not a boy anymore, my friend," Subhash ventured. "He needs to learn how to survive here at court."

  "He needs to rid himself of his battlefield fantasies first," Takashi snapped with sudden heat. "The only communications I receive from him are wild plans for the conquest of the Lyran Commonwealth and curt refusals to consider any woman I suggest as a suitable wife. The reports from Marfix show him to be content with pretending he is in command of soldiers, happy to play with his concubine. After all these years, he still does not understand the demands of the realm."

  "Those demands are great indeed, Tono," Subhash said in a placatory manner.