by Victor Milán
SCORCHED BY THE DRAGON'S BREATH
As bullets slammed into Cassie's ribs, red light lances seemed to flash from her chest to her brain, and she sat down hard. By sheer reflex, she raised her autopistol and emptied it at the legs of the man who had shot her. A bullet smashed his knee without penetrating it, throwing him on his face. By force of will, she hauled herself up and lunged at him, killing her opponent.
But Cassie was staggering, losing consciousness. The gun burst had cracked her ribs, and every breath felt as if spikes were being driven into her chest. She tried to grasp the tactical situation, taking in muzzle flashes and BattleMechs beginning to move. She felt the immediate presence of danger, but couldn't locate it.
And then the very edge of her peripheral vision caught a dark shape flying at her. Cassie spun, but not fast enough, and someone knocked her sprawling....
BATTLETECH
LE5528
BLACK DRAGON
Victor Milán
ROC
Published by the Penguin Group
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New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England
First published by Roc, an imprint of Dutton Signet, a division of Penguin Books USA Inc.
First Printing, November, 1996
10987654321
Copyright © FASA Corporation, 1996 All rights reserved
Series Editor: Donna Ippolito Cover art by Peter Bollinger
Mechanical Drawings: Duane Loose and the FASA art department
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To Joseph Reichert II
Heaven and Earth are not humane.
They regard all things as straw dogs.
—Sun Tzu
This World of Shadows
Those who err on the side of strictness are few indeed!
—Confucius, Analects, 4:23
Prologue
Moons Viewing Pavilion, outside Deber City
Benjamin
Benjamin Military District, Draconis Combine
10 June 3058
"We must have revenge!"
The speaker, whose fervently hissed words chased one another like rats up the square-sectioned wooden uprights and on among the exposed rafters of the great Moons Viewing Pavilion outside Deber City, was no young man. But a greater weight than years alone stooped his thin shoulders and bent his back.
His spare frame was draped in a heavy robe like an acolyte of the Order of the Five Pillars. His cowl was thrown defiantly back, revealing a long haggard face with graying hair drawn into a topknot. This was Hiraoke Toyama, powerful oyabun of the Dieron District, but none here would dare call him by name.
With burning eyes he let his gaze travel over the score of men kneeling around the long, low table. Like him they were robed, but their hoods were in place and so hid their faces.
The cowls were pure formality. These men controlled substantial resources, not least in the gathering of intelligence. Each knew who the others were. They were leaders of the Draconis Combine's still tightly regulated business community, of the Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery, and of the yakuza crime organizations which constituted— in the yakuzas' minds at least—the Combine's shadow government. Together they formed the ruling council of Kokuryu-kai, the ancient Black Dragon Society. The organization was an ancient one that had resurfaced in recent years to combat the social and military reforms its members regarded as a grave threat to the fabric of Combine society. The current regime outlawed the Black Dragons, and the black-clad agents of the Internal Security Force were rathless in sniffing out and extirpating its members. Hence the masks, to serve as constant reminder that discovery was death.
Behind each man, still and silent as statues along the shadowed walls, stood a single bodyguard. By ancient usage, firearms were prohibited within the precincts of the Pavilion. Each guard was an adept at both the armed or unarmed variety of hand-fighting: karate, jujutsu, taekwon-do, ryukyu kobujutsu, savate, shorinji kempo, escrima, and ryu-bujutsu, the Dragon's Warrior-Techniques that were the official hand-to-hand combat form of the Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery. Each had taken at least one life in face-to-face combat, and each was implicitly trusted to be ready at an instant's notice to lay down his own life for his lord.
Outside the stressed-cernent walls, the twenty moons of the planet Benjamin marched across the sky, huge and red as bloodshot eyes. These were not actual moons, but vast reflectors placed in orbit to augment the feeble shine of the planet's type-M sun. They strewed multiple oblongs of light like fanned cards across the floor and occupants of the cathedral space, and the shadows they cast were tinted green.
Toyama stared at each of his compatriots in turn, as if to see past their cowls into the depths of their souls. Then he turned to face the head of the chamber, and gestured with a small black controller in his hand.
In a large holotank filled with color and movement, a magnificently muscled man with blond hair hanging unbound around great shoulders, clad only in the cooling shorts of a Kurita MechWarrior, knelt before the bulk of a fallen BattleMech. He stared contemplatively down at the naked wakizashi in his hand. Behind him stood a slender young woman holding a drawn katana, her hair seared short and smoking like the black garments she wore, and her face burned red by intolerable heat.
The watchers gasped in sympathetic reaction as the kneeling man plunged the steel into his washboard belly.
""The full three cuts," murmured a man the others affected not to know was a ranking officer within the Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery. Despite Coordinator Theodore Kurita's popularity among the Combine's soldiers—he had been a distinguished MechWarrior and Gunji no Kanrei before ascending to the Dragon Throne—many in the military still objected to his liberalization of Combine society.
The young woman struck.
"Tai-sho Kusunoki knew how to die like a man," the DCMS officer said. The blond man's head sprang from his shoulders as blood spouted from the stump of his neck. Toyama froze the holovid display. General Jeffrey Kusunoki, a high-ranking military man and war hero of the realm, had recently led several regiments of Black Dragon and renegade Combine troops in an attempt the seize the Davion planet of Towne. The world had become ripe for the taking when the planetary governor fled for his life as the whole region of space went up for grabs during the recent Marik-Liao invasion. The Black Dragons had de
cided the chance to strengthen the Combine at the expense of the Davions, their ancient rivals, was too good to pass up.
But Theodore Kurita had refused to assist Kusunoki for fear of offending Prince Victor Davion, with whom he had lately allied in the war against the Clan invaders. The result was humiliating defeat for the Black Dragons and the death of one of the Combine's greatest heroes.
* * *
"Untold lives were lost in the fighting on Towne— including that of Tai-sho Jeffrey Kusunoki, whose death we have just witnessed in a shameful broadcast to the whole planet. Four regiments of DCMS troops were disarmed and sent back to the Combine in disgrace; two regiments of our own Black Dragon kobun were virtually wiped out. I myself lost my son, Taisuke, and my most trusted advisor, Edwin Kimura, who committed honorable seppuku after transmitting a hyperpulse message describing the catastrophic end to our heroic undertaking."
The withered old man held up his left hand. The little finger was absent. "I myself have performed yubitsume, offering my finger to this Council to atone for my own role in this shameful failure, and if the Black Dragon so demands, I shall give over my life as well. But blood cries out for blood. I beseech you, my brothers, permit me to live long enough to see the shedding of so many Dragon's Tears avenged!"
"Your, ah, your fervor is noted, Brother," said another man, turning his cowl nervously this way and that as if to try to gauge his comrades' reactions from their postures, "but avenged against whom, precisely?"
He was an important industrialist whose business was the manufacture of vital BattleMech components. Like many Combine corporate magnates, he believed Theodore Kurita's reforms were sapping the morale and productivity of Combine workers—not to mention the near-feudal prerogatives of privileged people like him.
"Against the traitor Chandrasekhar, who dishonors his noble surname, which I will not speak in the same breath as his given name," rasped another hooded figure. Like Toyama, he was a noted oyabun. "Not to mention his gaijin hirelings—like this one whose filthy claws besmirch the Tai-sho's sword." Chandrasekhar Kurita was the rich and powerful businessman who had hired the mercenary scum to defend his interests on Towne. It was those same mercenaries who had managed to defeat the Black Dragons.
" 'Besmirch' may be too strong," the DCMS officer spoke up. "She wields a blade like a warrior. She severed the neck at a stroke, which not many can do, even with a blade as fine as poor Jeffrey's. Her style's not much to speak of, but her makoto is impeccable." Makoto meant, roughly, sincerity, and was the artistic attribute prized above all. It signified a work, such as a painting or bit of calligraphy, that was executed directly from the heart, without self or thought interfering.
"Still, she must pay—she and her money-grubbing comrades, and their fat paymaster!" Toyama cried, his voice ringing like a temple gong.
"And why," a voice asked from the entryway, "do you not name the party ultimately responsible?"
Hooded heads snapped around. A figure stood in the open doorway, a shadow edged green in the light of the false red moons. It wore a floor-length black hakama and a padded gray jacket with great flared shoulders, making its exact height and build impossible to distinguish. Its head and face were concealed in a black cloth mask such as those associated in the popular consciousness with the ancient ninja. Its voice was a highly sexless baritone, obviously run through some sort of speech synthesizer.
"Who are you?" demanded the seated oyabun. "How dare you interrupt Kokuryu-kai?"
"As to who I am," the figure said, "you may think of me as Kaga, the Shadow. As to how I dare—"
It gestured with black-gloved hands. Two figures slipped inside to stand flanking the Shadowed One. They were clothed in form-fitting black, and from behind the left shoulder of each protruded the hilt of a ninjato, the straight-bladed ninja sword with the square tsuba, or hand-guard. Each wore a helmet of some black synthetic, and their faces were obscured by red visors. The uniform was unmistakably that of the dreaded commandos of DEST, the Draconis Elite Strike Teams.
"ISF!" somebody shouted. "We're betrayed!"
Laughing, the Shadow held up its hand. "Do not be disturbed. Had I wished you dead, none of you would still be breathing. Not all within the Internal Security Force are under the sway of its leader, the archtraitor Subhash Indrahar."
The council members settled back to the floor, exchanging hooded looks. The intruder had just given definite corroboration of his—or her—sincerity. For an internal security agent to refer to the Smiling One, head of the ISF and possibly the most feared man in the Inner Sphere, in such a way would mean death if Indrahar ever learned about it.
"What do you want?" Toyama asked.
"The same thing you want. To return the steel to the Combine's spine and to remove the traitors who weaken the Dragon. You know who they are as well as I—the Smiling One, his red-headed whelp Ninyu Kerai, and the real author of your miseries—the Coordinator himself, Theodore Kurita."
The men gathered around the table gasped, and not just the council members. The nervous manufacturerer of BattleMech components shot to his feet.
"I won't hear such treason!" he shouted.
The Shadowed One turned its hidden face to him and nodded. "So ka, Durkovich-san?"
The hooded Black Dragon sagged at use of his real name.
"Yes, I know you," the Shadowed One said. "I know much about you. Perhaps more than you know yourself. For example, Park, your bodyguard there."
The intruder nodded again at the square-bodied and square-jawed man who stood behind Durkovich. "He is a member of Tosei-fan, the Voice of the East Syndicate." The Voice of the East was the confederation of Korean gangs operating in the Draconis Combine. They kept neutral in the gang wars, but on a day-to-day basis they often served the yazuka as mercenaries.
Durkovich's hooded head turned briefly back toward his guard, then toward the Shadowed One. "What of it? Lots of industrialists and oyabun use the Koreans for security. They're known for loyalty and impartiality."
"Impartiality in the petty struggles among gang leaders, yes," the Shadowed One said. "But the Korean dogs believe they owe their greatest loyalty to the Coordinator, who has given them much of what he stripped away from the Dragon's true servants. Your man there is a pipeline to ISF. You are lucky indeed to have a friend in position to divert the flow from the eyes of Indrahar and Ninyu Kerai."
Park glared, dropped into fighting stance, blocky fists raised. The Kaga laughed again and whipped out his right hand. A seven-pointed shuriken leapt from his fingers and spun toward the Tosei-kai bodyguard. The Korean leapt back with a litheness belying his bulk, leaving the throwing-star to rebound from the wall with a musical clang.
But the bodyguard's leap took him in front of a window, and at once his chest exploded in a geyser of blood, wine-dark in the light of Benjamin's moons.
"I have honored the prohibition against bringing weapons into the Pavilion," the Shadowed One said as Park collapsed to the ferrocrete floor. The delayed report of a Zeus Long Rifle shot rolled like thunder through the window. "But my sniper, located a kilometer from the grounds, is under no such judicature."
Durkovich jumped away from the sprawled corpse of his guard. His hood fell away, revealing a jowly, panic-stricken face.
Once again the Shadowed One turned to him. "You are careless, Durkovich-san," it said in its neutered voice. "That makes you an unacceptable liability."
A black-clothed figure dropped to the floor behind Durkovich. Before the magnate could move, it had encircled his throat with the curved blade of a kyotetsu-shogi, the traditional ninja weapon resembling a knife crossed with a sickle and attached to a rope.
The figure in black stepped back. Two more descended from above, holding the ring on the end of the rope attached to the kyotetsu-shogi, which had been looped over a rafter. Their combined body weights jerked Durkovich's body into the air. His blood showered his comrades as the blade bit into his thick throat.
The Shadowed One gazed up until the
blood-spray and kicking had subsided. The figure nodded to its operatives who released the rope. The corpse fell across the table with a sodden thump. The operatives retrieved the weapon and stepped back against the wall.
"Now that we have winnowed weakness from our midst," the Shadowed One said, "permit me to tell you a tale— rather, a truth. The story was put about that the old Coordinator, Takashi Kurita, Theodore's father, died in his sleep of heart failure. This was a lie.
"There is a conspiracy, coiled like a serpent around the Dragon's heart. Its members presume to call themselves the Sons of the Dragon. In truth, they are no more than servants to the will of the demonic spymaster Subhash Indrahar.
"Among their sworn number is Theodore Kurita, Coordinator of the Draconis Combine."
The Black Dragons stirred uneasily, their cloaks rustling like autumn leaves. "I have heard rumors to this effect," the DCMS officer said in half-grudging tones.
"Those rumors are true. Look at what has befallen the Combine during the rise of Theodore Kurita, and you will see the hand of the conspirator on every side. A conspiracy to gnaw the Dragon's heart out from within!
"Takashi Kurita was a bushi. More than a mere warrior, he was also a samurai who devoted his whole being to selfless service of the Dragon, and the Dragon is greater than any individual—greater, indeed, than the Coordinator. Takashi-sama stood for the traditional virtues of the Dragon. He grew sickened by the way his son was drawing the spine out of the Draconis Combine with his so-called reforms. He intended to put a stop to them once and for all. But before he could act, the Smiling One, Subhash Indrahar, and his devil-pup Ninyu murdered him—with the connivance of Theodore Kurita."
Deadly silence filled the Moons Viewing Pavilion. "How can we know you're telling the truth?" the hooded DCMS officer asked in a subdued voice.