Threads of Ambition

by Loren L. Coleman

  8

  DropShip Dainwu

  Zenith Jump Point, Harloc System

  Sian Commonality, Capellan Confederation

  18 September 3060

  In the freedom of null-gravity, Aris Sung drifted along one of the horizontal transship passages that ran through officer's country of the Overlord Class DropShip Dainwu, House Master Ty Wu Non's command vessel. Capable of transporting the Warrior House's entire 'Mech battalion, it currently carried only the command company, while the two Unions also docked along the spine of the JumpShip Tao-te carried the rest. Aris' company, still under the command of Raven Clearwater as Aris pursued his security duties, traveled in the Union Class Lao-tzu.

  Drifting up to the door of House Master Non's stateroom, Aris caught one of the many handholds recessed into the right-hand bulkhead and anchored himself. A klaxon further along the main corridor sounded three times just then, harsh, grinding peals that warned of the impending jump from Harloc to the Hustaing system. Aris paused briefly, staring at the klaxon as if it were somehow claiming credit for that impressive event.

  Despite a DropShip's apparent strength—well armored, heavy weapon bays, and the ability to shuttle BattleMechs planetside— they were still dependent on the slender, almost effeminate-looking JumpShips that rarely ventured into star systems but whose Kearny-Fuchida engines could tear a hole in space and transport themselves up to thirty light years in an instant.

  Deploying solar sails or, if available, accepting the faster microwave feed from a system's recharge station, JumpShips could recharge for the next jump in anywhere from three days to a week. The Tao-te, meaning the Way of Power, was one of the newer designs equipped with lithium-fusion batteries that allowed it to jump twice on the same recharge. It was a feat that still often boggled the mind of Aris Sung.

  He rapped on the teak knocking panel set into the steel bulkhead next to the door. A faint "Enter" sounded from within, the door opened with a soft hiss, and Aris went in.

  "Company Leader Aris Sung, reporting to the House Master," he said. He held himself at some semblance of attention in the null gravity by keeping one hand behind his back to grasp a handhold welded next to the door.

  Ty Wu Non glanced up from his work. Efficiency reports, by the look of the data displayed across his hand-held noteputer. "Please take a seat, Aris Sung." He waited while Aris buckled himself into one of the two empty chairs.

  "Your duties are being amended," Master Non said flatly, omitting all the usual pleasantries.

  Blinking his surprise, Aris nodded once. "The will of the House Master, or course," he said, hiding his disappointment. House Master Non would never add to his duties while Aris was assigned to a mission as important as safeguarding Chancellor Liao, so that meant he was completely off the assignment. He consoled himself with the honor he had known as the squad leader on six worlds already. "Would you like my recommendation for security replacement?" he asked in a carefully neutral voice.

  The House Master shook his head, his dark hair whipping back and forth with no gravity to weight it down. "You have not been removed from security. Only your assignment has changed. You will now be directly responsible for the safety of Isis Marik. Chancellor Liao is no longer your concern."

  "May I ask why my assignment has changed?" Aris chose his words carefully. Questioning the House Master was a tricky process, only to be done under the strictest of protocol. "If there was a failure in my previous work, I should know so as to correct the situation."

  Ty Wu Non held Aris under his intense gaze for a few moments, no doubt a caution. But when he spoke, his tone gave away his concern for how Aris might be taking the news. "There was no failure, Aris Sung. Chancellor Liao no longer requires your services, and so has instead entrusted to you the care of his fiancee."

  Aris felt a mixture of relief and pride in Ty Wu Non's indirect praise. The possibility of having failed Sun-Tzu Liao had worried him greatly. Another three warning tones from the klaxon, this time alerting everyone that jump procedures had been initiated, cut off his next comment. Though muted through the steel door and bulkhead, the tones still commanded attention.

  Tensing, Aris tried to prepare, even knowing there was no real way to do so. One instant everything was normal, and in the next it seemed as if the entire room was being stretched in some fourth-dimensional way. It hurt the brain to look at it, and Aris tried to squeeze his eyes shut. In that frozen instant he could almost sense the firing of his synapses, the emission of the bioelectric command that traveled through his central nervous system like a tiny piece of fire slowly crawling along a fuse, and the final jump to muscular response. Then the instant finally passed, and everything returned to normal.

  Aris blinked.

  Shaking off the effect of the jump, Aris shivered as if cold. "I will revamp security procedures at once, House Master," he said.

  "No, you will not," Ty Wu Non said, voice suddenly hard. "No changes. You will keep the same codes and procedures as when guarding the Chancellor. And you are to tell no one that your assignment has been altered."

  That makes no sense. Obviously, there was more going on here than the House Master was telling. Aris read in Ty Wu Non's tone that no further questions would be tolerated. But to do my job, there are things I must know. "We will coordinate with McCarron's Armored Cavalry as usual?"

  The House Master visibly relaxed, as if he'd been concerned that Aris would press beyond the normal House courtesies.

  When he spoke it was still with a forced calm. "You will coordinate with the Hustaing militia. The Nightriders have been relocated."

  Aris felt himself groping in the dark for anything familiar. House Master Non had to be aware that radical alteration of preset plans constituted a possible security breach. His team would be operating on incorrect information, and now their main backup force was missing. He sensed hidden plans at work, but did not possess enough information to reason it out for himself. The honor squad suddenly seemed much less glorious. What else can they throw at me?

  As if in response to his private question, the comm set on Ty Wu Non's desk chimed once and then began to emit the Dainwu captain's voice. "House Master Non, the Celestial Walker jumped in after us and immediately released its DropShip."

  Ty Wu Non pressed down a button to talk. "And why is that a problem, Captain Wan?"

  "Sir, it immediately jumped out again. The Celestial Walker has left the Pearl of True Wisdom behind."

  Ty nodded to the disembodied voice. "Thank you, Captain. You will please institute an immediate communication's blackout with Hustaing. No messages without my express permission and then only under my supervision."

  Questions burned on Aris' lips. The Celestial Walker was the Chancellor's JumpShip and the Pearl of True Wisdom the DropShip on which he traveled. Things were happening too fast, impinging on his ability to provide protection. He looked to his House Master, hoping for some explanation, but found only a mask of careful neutrality looking back.

  "You are dismissed, Aris Sung."

  Aris left, still groping in the dark.

  Pinedale, Denbar

  St. Ives Compact

  Activities buzzed throughout the Whiteriver Base's huge 'Mech hangar as Major Trisha Smithson walked the floor with her executive officer Warner Doles. Black night showed outside the huge, open doors, but inside, banks of glaring floodlights kept the darkness at bay. She smelled the mixed scents of grease, sweat, and hot metalwork. Her hearing protection kept the blaring cacophony of sounds to tolerable levels.

  Technicians worked everywhere, some pulled from Denbar Home Guard bases located in other cities around Pinedale. They ran diagnostics and performed last-minute maintenance on BattleMechs and the Blackwind Lancers' armor company vehicles. Flashes of white-blue light occasionally strobed out from behind protective screens as they welded armor into place. Civilian laborers pushed handcarts or drove forklifts as they hauled supplies out of storage bays; mostly foodstuffs and munitions. MechWarriors supervised the
work on their own 'Mechs or clustered in tight knots, passing along the latest rumors or predicting the battle to come.

  It is a chaotic, savage stage play, and I am the writer, thought Trisha Smithson. She leaned in toward her XO. "They certainly believe we're going somewhere."

  Warner Doles shook his head in frustration. "I haven't been able to figure out who exactly is behind the rumors. It has to be one of the company commanders, though none will take credit. Near as I can tell it started with a few MechWarriors dragging techs out of the club to get their machines combat-ready. That, plus the intel from Hustaing."

  "What about that intelligence? Is it reliable?" Trisha stepped aside to make more room for a forklift carrying missile reloads. "Sun-Tzu is unprotected?" She watched her exec closely.

  "He has been traveling with a Warrior House," Warner reminded her. "I would not call him unprotected. But yes, the Hustaing garrison regiment from McCarron's Armored Cavalry appears to have been relocated from Hustaing to Kaifeng. That gives Sun-Tzu only the Warrior House and the Hustaing Home Guard, which does not include BattleMech forces."

  Trisha brushed fingers through her auburn hair, lips pursed in thought as she recalled the speech Chancellor Liao had given on Gei-Fu. Hustaing—he mentioned ending his tour on Hustaing. She had no doubt that it was a sign. But is Captain Doles ready to head off in the direction I want to go? "The Home Guard will be spread around the world in company-strength lots," she said, yelling a bit louder as technicians used a nearby cherry-picker to lift themselves up to an Orion's shoulder. "But a Warrior House is nothing to laugh at."

  They stopped in front of the berth that held Trisha's Victor. Two astechs serviced the assault machine, loading large, nickel-ferrous slugs into the Gauss rifle ammo feeder. Both paid a moment of silent respect to the impressive war machine, before Warner finally spoke. "When you asked me to draw up some assault plans, I talked to a few of the small mercenary units on-planet. We could call up two more BattleMech companies. That would give us the edge."

  Good. Good. "They have to be inbound by now. Could we make it?" Having spoken several days ago with a JumpShip navigator, Trisha knew that they could. But again, she had to keep Warner involved. He's borderline. What I'm setting up will run counter to his devotion to the Compact, but then he's also of the old Capellan school where you follow where your commander leads regardless of cost.

  "They have seven days to planetfall," Doles told her. "If we boost hard to the JumpShip, I calculate we can be docked up in three. Two navigators have separately plotted jump calculations for a pirate point that would bring us in on the back side of Hustaing's moon." He hesitated for the briefest second, but then nodded confidently. "Yes, we could make it."

  Just as she had figured too. JumpShips usually left and entered a system at the zenith or nadir points well outside a system's elliptic plane, avoiding the gravity well that interfered with the ship's interstellar drive. Pirate points were places inside a system where gravitational effects canceled each other out and allowed for a closer approach. If it were going to be done, that was the way.

  Trisha walked along silently for several long minutes, passing her Victor and coming now to Warner's Grasshopper. It was a gamble, she knew, and at stake would be her career in the St. Ives military forces and the years of preparation to get her this far. But so long as Colonel Perrin kept her bottled up in the Blackwind Lancers' second battalion, her career path was dead-ended anyway. So one last roll of the dice to break free.

  Trisha turned to fully face her exec, who met it with equal determination. Not that it was ever your decision to make, she thought, or mine. "Load them up," she ordered.

  9

  Qingliu, Hustaing

  Sian Commonality, Capellan Confederation

  26 September 3060

  Aris Sung fought his control sticks, trying to keep his Wraith balanced as a hail of twelve-centimeter autocannon slugs chewed into the armor on his left leg, effectively laying it bare to the endo-steel skeleton beneath. The Wraith's tactical computer painted the new threat on his head's up display, a Hunchback, which had been hidden behind an overpass to Qingliu's main highway and now stepped down from a grass bank to join Aris' Wraith on the pavement. Almost by reflex Aris triggered off one burst from the large pulse laser mounted to his 'Mech's right arm, the scarlet pulses stitching into the Hunchback's torso but failing to penetrate, and then raced outside the reach of the other 'Mech's main weapon.

  Can't afford the time to fight it. Not now.

  Caught at Qingliu's spaceport, well outside the city proper, Aris had stood in shocked amazement to learn that a battalion of Blackwind Lancers supported by mercenaries had dared to assault a Capellan world. The shock lasted all of ten seconds, giving way quickly to a chill of concern for the welfare of Isis Marik. Having seen her safely ensconced in the city's convention center, with Death Commando guards and a healthy complement of Hiritsu infantry, he had returned to the landing fields to coordinate 'Mech patrols with the Hustaing Home Guard armor forces present. But except for a company's worth of Warrior House 'Mechs already patrolling the outskirts of the city, security wasn't set to handle a full-scale assault by Compact forces.

  Separated from his charge by several kilometers and who knew how many hostiles, Aris had ignored his ground car in favor of his Wraith. The fifty-five-ton 'Mech, powered by a large extralight fusion engine, was faster than most ground transportation and could stand up to hostile fire. An impressive design, its smooth segmented parts lent it a streamlined appearance, while the turret-style waist allowed it a good range of pivoting motion. Hiritsu techs had given its armor the blued-steel look of a rifle barrel, heightening its deadly appearance. As the Wraith ran along the freeway at better than one hundred fifteen kilometers per hour, the few cars remaining on the road had hit the shoulder quickly on seeing the 'Mech moving up from behind.

  Aris opened a channel to the rest of his lance, hastily formed at the spaceport and now trailing him by a kilometer in slightly slower BattleMechs. "Enemy Hunchback one klick up from you," he informed them. They could take care of a single Hunchback, and he had to get into the city.

  Gaining the highway's paved surface the Hunchback throttled up into a run, trying to keep the Wraith in range of its deadly weapon for another few seconds. Aris slammed his feet down on the Wraith's pedals, engaging jump jets and hurling the 'Mech skyward before he had even consciously considered the action. Tactical instincts bred into Aris over years of 'Mech piloting had spotted the opposing Mech Warrior's error in committing himself to forward momentum that would place his Hunchback within jump range of the Wraith. Angling backward and spinning through a slow barrel-roll, Aris brought the Wraith right back at the Hunchback. As he passed overhead he noticed the Blackwind Lancers' insignia on the Hunchback's shoulder, a blue ax-head set against a yellow circular field. Then he was over, and coming down for a landing not ten meters behind the enemy machine.

  His large laser flared with a burst of staccato pulses, melting armor across the opposing machine's wide back and laying it open for the medium lasers on the Wraith's left arm. These stabbed scarlet fire into the Hunchback's internals. The damage missed the autocannon ammunition, which would've turned the fifty-ton war machine into instant scrap, but as the gyro was completely cut away, the enemy 'Mech sprawled forward and continued in an ungainly skid along the pavement until it piled up along the shoulder and remained still. No way to tell if the pilot is injured or not. Aris was surprised at the thought. These people are the enemy!

  The cockpit temperature spiked sharply as the fusion reactor bled waste heat, but Aris hardly noticed except for the salt taste of sweat burning his lips. He reopened the channel to his lance.

  "Correction," he said in a flat tone, throttling back up into a full run. "One Hunchback down. Proceeding on track toward Capella One." He paused for a moment, then gave in to a slight twinge of conscience. "One 'Mech drop out and check on the downed pilot."

  "Don't wait for us," Raven Clearwater trans
mitted back, her voice robbed of any emotion by the air waves. "And quit wasting time with the visitors. We'll clean up behind you."

  Aris raced onward.

  At the outskirts of Qingliu he traded hasty shots with a Cataphract bearing the blue and yellow of the Lancers. He sacrificed some armor along his right arm before evading, but claimed in exchange a solid head shot against the heavy 'Mech that no doubt left the enemy Mech Warrior evaluating his own mortality. A moment later Aris found himself sandwiched between two UrbanMechs. Insufferably slow but decently armed and armored for a light 'Mech, the walking trashcans pinned him in a crossfire of autocannon cluster munitions that sanded off armor all over his Wraith. A lucky combination of laser hits damaged the autocannon of one, and with their firepower halved, the Urbies withdrew.

  And bothering Aris more with each passing encounter was a hollow sense of futility. Part of it was his fighting against machines that were unmistakably Capellan in their original design, bearing colors that had once been familiar to the Confederation. Part may even have been the idea that the face inside the other pilot's neurohelmet might show Asian features speaking of a Capellan heritage. Mostly it was a sense that he had failed Isis Marik, and so failed his Chancellor. He shouldered the doubts aside. He was a warrior in a Capellan Warrior House, and his vows demanded that he always strive for success. No matter the odds or the situation.

  Two more blocks. A chill that had nothing to do with the coolant flow to his vest shook Aris as he saw the column of smoke rising above buildings ahead. Only the lack of enemy units in the area bolstered his confidence that he could still find and extract Isis Marik. Then the commline crackled to life with the static-filled background that told of a jamming attempt or long-distance transmission.