Black dragon

by Victor Milán

  By sheer reflex she raised her autopistol, emptied it at the legs of the man who had shot her. A bullet smashed his knee without penetrating. He fell onto his face. Cassie hauled herself up by force of will and lunged at him. He reared up, raising his weapon.

  She hacked downward across her body with the vibrokatana, the blade slicing through ballistic cloth, skin, and bone with equal ease. The operative's gun-hand sprang from its wrist in a spray of scarlet blood. A backhand stroke split his visor and the face beneath.

  Cassie staggered, almost fell. Every breath felt as if spikes were being driven into her chest. The burst from the machine pistol had cracked ribs. She looked around, trying to grasp the tactical situation. Everywhere was noise and muzzle flashes, 'Mechs beginning to move. She felt the immediate presence of danger, couldn't localize it—

  The very edge of her peripheral vision caught a dark shape flying at her. She spun, raising the vibrokatana.

  Not fast enough. Her attacker hit her and knocked her sprawling.

  27

  JumpShip Mishima, trailing Trojan point of Occidentals

  Orbiting Luthien

  Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine

  1 July 3058

  "Subhash Indrahar," Professor Isabu Tomita purred as the ISF Director's powered wheelchair rolled into the huge compartment. This space had once been a grand ballroom when the JumpShip Mishima had served as the luxury liner Lord Bateman centuries ago in the final years of the Star League. It had long been stripped of its splendid, not to say gaudy, appointments. The only visible remnant of its former grandeur was the parquetry dance-floor and the ten-meter transpex dome giving a view of the brightly lit slice of pink Orientalis, high "above."

  "You have come a long way to die."

  "You are candid, Tormta.-sensei" the Smiling One said imperturbably, ignoring the guards who stood ringing the compartment, machine pistols leveled at him. "What of your traditional Japanese circumlocution? Such forthright-ness seems most inharmonious, coming from the mouth of such a traditionalist."

  The Professor uttered a restrained laugh. "You understand at least as well as I, Subhash-sama, that what truly counts in our culture is maintaining appearance: the appearance of propriety; the appearance of observing ritual. We are men of the world, though, you and I. Surely there is no need for dissimulation."

  "Indeed not. Thus I feel no reticence in pointing out that the reality of treason overrides all appearance."

  The Professor beamed indulgently. The shaven-headed and uniformed man who stood by his side grunted impatiently. "So many fine words, chasing each other like birds in a cage," said Tai-sa Charles Ohta. He hacked air with his palm. "Enough! Have you come alone, spymaster?"

  "Why, no, Colonel," Subhash said, smiling. "I brought one hundred of my finest agents, who have truly mastered the ancient ninja's secrets of invisibility."

  Ohta's face fisted. "What's this? How did they get past our guards? I'll have the fools thrust naked out an airlock, if anyone slipped by them."

  "The angel of irony has clearly passed the Colonel by, Subhash-sawa," Tomita murmured. "Calm yourself, Charles. The Director arrived alone in his shuttle but for his flight crew."

  Subhash pivoted his chair clockwise. Magnets in its tires held it to the floor despite the absence of gravity, as did similar magnets in the soles of the shoes—and in Colonel Ohta's case, the split-toed tabi-style boots—of the men who confronted him. "And you, Hiraoke Toyama," he said to the third member of the trio. "It surprises me to find you here. I should think you would be in Imperial City to view the climax of your scheming."

  "I'll rejoice in the usurper's death," the old oyabun hissed in a voiceless raven's caw. "But I shall attend the executions of the foreign beasts who murdered my son in person. In the meantime, Kokuryu-kai has decided that I be here to keep an eye on our investment."

  " 'Investment,' " Subhash echoed. "In older times the epithet 'stinking of fish' was applied to merchants who tried to claim perquisites beyond their station. Yet for you it would be a compliment. When a common criminal speaks of investments he rises above himself no less—even when he uses the word as a euphemism for treason."

  Toyama's devastated face purpled. He pointed with a shaking, wasted finger. "You dare speak of treason, who murdered our Coordinator Takashi Kurita!"

  "I did not take the life of Takashi Kurita," Subhash said mildly, "although I tried my best to do so. Nor did Theodore Kurita—-except in the most literal sense—despite the lies spread by your propagandists."

  The files that had been kept from his eyes—as well as those of Omi Dashani and Ninyu Kerai—had proven quite comprehensive and detailed. They had been well-hidden, but once he'd set his army of specialists on the trail, it had not taken long to turn them up. The conspirators had been quite lamentably arrogant. Of course, their assurance almost proved justified....

  "Takashi Kurita died by his own hand. He performed sep-puku. He died quite bravely, as one would expect, completing the full three ritual cuts. Theodore served as his second, and struck off his head. But it was an act of love and filial loyalty, not patricide—as the Dictum Honorium recognizes."

  "Words!" spat the Colonel. "You are a criminal. The usurper is a criminal. You shall both pay with your heads."

  "We must kill the usurper quickly," Toyama said, his voice still clotted with rage. "Not so with you! You shall die in infinite pain!" His eyes bulged from his head and spittle flew from his desiccated lips.

  "No need for such melodrama, Toyama-san," Professor Tomita said, clucking and shaking his bald head so that his fringe of long lank hair bobbed like a dancing girl's.skirts. "Do you really think it would serve any purpose to torture Subhash Indrahar? He is a master of ki powers; he wouldn't feel anything we did."

  "Before we dispose of me," Subhash said equably, "might I see young Angus Kurita? I'm quite curious as to how he's turned out."

  Ohta opened his mouth to issue a reflex refusal. But Tomita gave a small smile. "We can afford to be generous, gentlemen," he said.

  The double doors behind the three swung open. The 05P Banzuin strode in, great-bellied and imposing in his scarlet robe and flared white collar. Behind him marched young Angus Kurita. He was clad in dress uniform white tunic trimmed in orange, gleaming scarlet boots, and black jodhpurs. His stand-up collar and shoulder-boards were devoid of rank or branch badges.

  "The flux of energies informs me that our presence is desired," the renegade monk declared. He bowed; shallowly to his three Combine-conspirators, more deeply to Subhash Indrahar. "Here we are."

  Subhash gazed intendy at the young man. He had a shock of dark hair with red highlights, wide cheekbones narrowing to a near-pointed chin, blue Kurita eyes. "Do you know who I am, boy?" he asked.

  The youth's eyes flicked aside to Banzuin. The monk nodded his hairless head. Angus started to approach the man in the wheelchair.

  "Wait!" Hiraoke Toyama rapped. "I don't like this. Why would he simply come here and present himself to die?"

  "Perhaps he entertains hope of negotiating with us," Tomita suggested. "Or perhaps he realizes his fate is inevitable, and wishes simply to get it over with."

  "He's a sick old cripple," Ohta barked. "How could he threaten us?"

  "He's clever as a devil," Toyama countered. "He breathes trickery like air."

  Subhash smiled. "You're wise to be wary, Toyama-ran. After all, perhaps my wheelchair will transform itself into a powered exoskeleton the way the Davions had me do in their amusing little holovid. I must say I coveted such an invention."

  "You possess substantial powers, Banzuin," Tomita said. "Can your ki not divine whether the Smiling One poses a danger to us?"

  "Of course," the monk said. "I am an Illuminatus of the Order of Five Pillars. Nothing is hidden from me."

  He strode forward to stand before Subhash. The Director looked up at him. Their eyes met.

  After a moment the monk turned away. "There is ... nothing. Nothing he can do."

  Oh
ta sneered; Toyama scowled more deeply still. "Well, that settles it, then," Tomita said, with a master of ceremonies air. He flicked his fingers at Angus. "Step forward, lad. Indulge the old man."

  Angus stepped up with the air of a man going to face a firing squad. Subhash gestured to him. "Lean down so that I may look at you, young man. Come on. I won't sting you."

  Hesitantly, Angus obeyed. Subhash reached up, examined the bone structure of the young man's face like someone thinking about buying a horse, briefly squeezed one biceps.

  "You're a strong, sound young man, and your spirit is clear," the Smiling One said. "Why then have you consented to take part in this treasonous scheme? Do you really think yourself fit to replace Theodore?"

  Angus stiffened to attention. "I have no ambition for the Dragon Throne," he said to a point above the Director's mosdy hairless head. "But my teachers showed me that this was selfishness. I am a Kurita; my duty is to the Dragon. My cousin murdered his father and has weakened the Combine with his reforms. It is my duty to supplant him, in spite of ninjo."

  "Is this what they've told you, boy?" Subhash asked with what seemed genuine pain. He sat back in his chair as if all but exhausted.

  "You could have served the Dragon well," he said. "The rest of us here have outlived our usefulness to the Combine and House Kurita. But your dying will be a tragic loss."

  * * *

  Ninyu Kerai Indrahar disliked to feel.

  He had been passionate in his youth, in his first glory days as an ace ISF operative and comrade to Theodore Kurita. And where had that gotten him? Estranged from the man who became Coordinator, because he'd often cared more about the welfare of Theodore than Theodore himself did. Feelings led to mistakes, oversights—such as the one that had left his current prey alive.

  Much more satisfying was devotion to duty.

  The streets of the pleasure-district of Yoshiwara were oddly deserted. Customarily the hour before dawn was fairly busy in the ukiyo, as the last patrons hurried to be home before the sun broke, and the less fortunate denizens of the Floating World, who had to work the streets, were dragging back from work. Today, though, the revelry had broken up early, in order that customers and servers alike might join the vast crowds gathered along Imperial Way and in Unity Square to breathlessly await the parade.

  Around him a picked platoon of the Sons of the Dragon and metsuke in mufti cycled in and out of the hostess bars, tea-shops, and flophouses along Perfection of Joy Street. Franklin Sakamoto was known to be a man of rather abstemious tastes. What vices he had he preferred to indulge in private, and he had inherited sufficient of his father's looks, confidence, and charisma that he didn't have to purchase feminine companionship when he cared for it. He had also demonstrated himself quite cunning in his days with the Strikers on Somerset, later prosecuting what had amounted to a one-man war against the Clans. Ninyu Kerai was gambling that Sakamoto might have chosen to go to ground in the ukiyo on the basis of sheer unexpectedness.

  His mind was carefully avoiding the phrase grasping at straws. He kept hearing in his mind his adoptive father's voice urging him always to confront the truth no matter how unpalatable. All the efforts he and a small army of investigators had put forth had been unable to turn up any leads at all to Sakamoto's whereabouts. Deep inside Ninyu, the conviction of failure grew like fast-forward cancer.

  My father thinks I'm ready to succeed him, he thought, pausing to survey the street, still laced with fog from the nearby Kado-guchi. Now he'll know otherwise.

  The personal communicator at his hip began to vibrate, noiselessly indicating an incoming call. He unhol-stered the device, which contained a highly sophisticated scramblerIunscrambler chip, flipped it open. "Kerai."

  "Ninyu, my son," came the voice of the Smiling One, dry and passionless as usual. "Return at once to headquarters."

  "Hai, my father." He closed the communicator and waved over an operator to take charge of the search effort.

  * * *

  Force Commander Kali MacDougall ran her 15-ton AgroMech, disguised as a Quickdraw, northward at its not-very-high top speed, paralleling the razor-wired fence surrounding the parked BattleMechs of the four Caballero battalions. The Eiga-toshi FX techs had achieved their own version of Clan weapons modularity; their launcher-racks, firing volleys of large but virtually harmless fireworks rockets, could be attached to almost any of the faux Battle-Mechs. In the case of her machine it had been dead simple, since the original already came with an SRM launcher in its chest, so that the fake already had a rocket-rack. Other racks had been strapped onto other 'Mechs regardless of whether the model they were imitating mounted missiles or not. The whole object was to distract the Black Dragon 'Mech jocks long enough for some of the Caballero MechWarriors to reunite themselves with their captive machines.

  Kali passed the battle-line of Black Dragon 'Mechs. She was part of the force winging wide on the west side, attempting to outflank the heaviest of the three enemy lances. Unfortunately—for anything except her continued prospects for survival—the bad guys had recognized the real threat. They were blasting away at the utility vehicles trying to make it through breaches in the wire cut by support personnel, most of whom had already been cut down. At least four vehicles had already been turned into pyres. As she watched, the final survivor of the phony "assault" lance that had come rumbling through the smoke at the onset of the attack, a "Charger" piloted by Don Pinnock of Bobby the Wolfs new Fourth Battalion, tried to interpose itself between the little vehicles and the enemy 'Mechs. The Black Dragon 'Mechs blew it apart.

  Don bought 'em some time, Kali thought, but it won't be enough.

  She felt a curious lightening, a sense of liberation. She had wanted to join the teams trying to get to the Caballero Battle-Mechs in some of the many small trucks, carts, and cars Takura Migaki—who definitely had champagne tastes— maintained for the use of his holovid companies. With her right arm still pretty immobilized, Kali didn't seem suited for that, nor for hopping and popping in a warehouse full of Black Dragon torpedoes and DEST commandos.

  But Kali, at core, had the same driving lust to close with and destroy those who would destroy her familia as Cassie did. And, as usual, the Dark Lady had plans of her own.

  Once past the enemy 'Mechs, she turned and raced her "Quickdraw" straight for the wire. Raven O'Connell, driving a false JagerMech, hung right on her left shoulder. Kali glanced to the side and grinned, sensing her friend was doing the same. They were almost to the fence—

  The Black Dragon jocks became aware of the new threat—you could win a little margin by getting behind a pilot equipped with a circle-vision strip, but only a little, if the jock was properly trained. The Guillotine twisted its torso counterclockwise, fired the extended-range large laser in its left arm.

  The AgroMech lacked a 360 view-strip. What Kali had was a crawling sensation in the back of her neck, an expectation of death at any moment—not an entirely unpleasant sensation.

  A crimson flash in the lower right quadrant of Kali's vision, a crack and sizzle as the laser beam ionized air and then sublimated metal away like ice before a blowtorch. The whole right leg of Kali's 'Mech went red on the status display.

  Its limb amputated just as its weight came onto it, the AgroMech toppled forward. It landed on its side with a jar that threatened to shake Kali's eyeballs loose from their socket and began to roll.

  * * *

  Cassie hit the side of a plastic rag-bin. Which went clattering away across the floor of the 'Mech hangar. She slid to the cement with the dead weight of her new attacker atop her. She was just struggling to bring the muzzle of her pistol against the ribs of whomever had tackled her when the left foot of Don Carlos' command 'Mech, now piloted by Tai-i Daw, clanged down on the hangar floor exactly where Cassie had stood half a heartbeat before.

  * * *

  "Chikusho!" Achilles Daw shouted as the Naginata's foot just missed its target. He would have liked to stay and deal with the sneaksuit-clad traitor—undoubtedly
one of Subhash's pampered Sons of the Dragon, sent to warn the gaijin of General Kiguri's scheme—but his long-range missiles were no good at this truncated range and he didn't dare light off the Lord's Light 2 extended-range PPC in his left arm. But he had more immediate business: making sure none of the money-troopers managed to get into any of the 'Mechs parked outside.

  Leave the bitch for later, he told himself. It's too late to stop us. He picked up the pace and crashed through the hangar's cinderblock wall.

  * * *

  Eyes still wide at her near brush with being crushed by the assault 'Mech, whose approach she hadn't heard amid the general din, Cassie looked up into the face of the person who'd knocked her out of harm's way. It was a familiar face, oblong and handsome, beneath tousled black hair.

  "Johnny Tchang?" she asked incredulously. His answer was a grin and a nod. "How the hell did you recognize me?"

  "Who else would be leading the Caballeros dressed as a DEST commando?"

  * * *

  Rolling furiously, whirling dust about it like a cloak as it shed its mostly plastic superstructure, Kali MacDougall's fake Quickdraw smashed through the fence, tearing out a fifty-meter section. It slammed into the legs of a Third Battalion War Dog. The 75-ton 'Mech, painted white with black splotches, rocked but didn't go down.

  Kali felt as if she'd been for a ride in a giant rock polisher. Her shoulder hurt as bad as if it had been dislocated again—some experimental shrugging proved it hadn't—her ribs felt as if she'd been used for a heavy bag, and the back of her head was tender. But she was alive, intact, and ready to rumble.

  She hit the quick-release pad of her shoulder unit, pulled herself out of the seat. The 'Mech had come to rest lying on its right side. Because preventing penetration by foreign objects, such as autocannon slugs, wasn't an issue, but getting out if the beast took a spill and fetched up in a compromising position in some arroyo was, your basic AgroMech had several easy-to-get-to hatches, such that virtually no matter how it landed one was bound to be clear. What did count in AgroMech design was structural strength in the cockpit, which was provided by a cage of titanium-alloy tubing. It had served its function, keeping its pilot safe during her wild tumble.