Binding Force

by Loren L. Coleman

  Until that time, House Hiritsu would follow the path on which Virginia York had started them: the taking of Kaifeng. Ty Wu Non had been explicit on that point in closing the service. They would continue to obey the will of the House Master, who could be replaced only in accordance with the wisdom of the Chancellor. Ty Wu Non would take on the temporary title of battalion commander, to signify his acceptance of responsibility for the House forces. Aris found that comforting. It meant that Ty Wu Non was endorsing Virginia York’s plan of assault, which was Aris’ creation. Ty would have to be careful of any changes he made, since failure at this point made him answerable directly to Sun-Tzu Liao himself.

  Aris rose from his seat, pulled himself along to the door by the backs of other chairs, and finally swam out into one of the Tao-te’s main passageways. This corridor ran from the war room only a short distance before splitting into a T-shaped junction. From there one could take the lift down to other decks or follow one of the two branches that split off toward either the bridge or the executive staterooms. He took the final launch toward the junction with a push that would leave him ready to catch the handhold next to the lift.

  “Last out the door, Aris Sung? That doesn’t seem like you.”

  Ty Wu Non’s deep voice startled him, and Aris twisted around to see the battalion commander hanging onto the wall just inside the corridor branch that led away to the bridge. The twisting also put him out of position for his landing. Aris caught the wall at an awkward angle, and he was forced to rebound back toward the passage he’d just left. Recovering, he caught the junction corner and was able to rebound a final time to end up in the same passage as Ty but on the opposite wall.

  The battalion commander’s smile was thin, but present. Aris even thought he saw a quick flash of admiration in the other’s face. “Not a bad recovery,” Ty said, though clearly more from a need to cover an otherwise awkward silence. “Sorry if I startled you, Lance Leader Sung.”

  Aris tried to keep the surprise off his face, unable to remember the last time Ty Wu Non had voiced an apology to him, even one that was more form than genuine. “I should have been paying more attention,” he said. “You wished to see me, Battalion Commander?”

  “Yes. I wanted to talk to you about tying up some loose ends.” Ty paused, but Aris did not give him the satisfaction of asking for clarification. “Your report stated that you were on your way to see House Master York about the transmissions. I would like to hear that report now.”

  “Of course. I should have done so earlier. My apologies.” Aris drew in a deep, steadying breath. “Everything is in place. A message must now be routed through two stations, both monitored by our own Capellan technicians and under heavy guard, before it can pass to the communications center. At each stage it is analyzed for direct or indirect indication of the station’s capture. The comm center, of course, is the weakest link. We now have four infantrymen inside and four more stationed directly outside, both teams supported by three two-man roving patrols in the nearby area.”

  Ty frowned. “That seems excessive.”

  “We have a possible espionage agent aboard the Jodo Shinsa. I would rather find out later that I assigned too many men, rather than too few.”

  “Point taken. What about the DropShip Annabelle Lee?”

  “Communications equipment completely removed,” Aris said. “In the last six hours prior to transfer to the Tao-te, I personally screened several innocuous messages and flight-controller spiels that can simulate normal station-to-ship message traffic.” His report given, Aris waited for Ty Wu Non’s judgment.

  “Adequate,” was the senior warrior’s response. High praise for Aris. Then the other man’s eyes grew vague, unreadable. “You know, Virginia York’s last order concerning you was that you continue overseeing the simulated message traffic between the station and Kaifeng.”

  Aris bit down on his tongue hard enough to draw blood. Was Ty going to use that to keep him from combat? Leave him behind on the station while the DropShips burned insystem toward Kaifeng? He swallowed, clearing the salty taste of blood from his mouth. “With all due respect, Battalion Commander, I think—”

  “Don’t worry, Aris Sung,” Ty interrupted. “I don’t plan to leave you behind. In fact, I am promoting you to Company Leader pro tem.”

  Aris blinked rapidly, then shook his head slightly as if that could clear away the confusion. Ty Wu Non, the man who had been poised behind him for eleven years, ready to shoot him the moment he stumbled, was promoting him? Before Aris could react, Ty enlightened him.

  “I don’t like you, Aris. I never have. If you think that’s why I’ve treated you as I did, you’re partly correct. But it was never my responsibility to like you. It was given to me to oversee your training. Which is what I did. I made sure you were pushed as hard as any. And always I worked myself harder, where you could not see, to make sure that when the time came House Master York would recognize me above you.

  “I outlasted four other company leaders who have since been killed or moved into duties as full-time Mentors. Now I will be named House Master. But only after the success of this mission. Virginia York endorsed your plan. Now I must as well. By accepting the post of battalion commander, I forced a vacancy in my old company. However much I think Terry Chan might deserve that position over you, it could later prove self-defeating if your plan does not work. So I promote you. Does this help clarify matters?”

  Aris weathered the soft-spoken barrage of brutal truth with greater ease than he had Ty’s praise. What the other man said made sense. House Master Virginia York would never have needed to have such a talk with a subordinate, but Ty was just as strong-willed and could yet become a decent House Master. And if he thought it necessary to continue the antagonistic control of Aris’ life, then that must be endured. That which does not kill me, makes me stronger, Aris told himself. That thought, of course, could not be voiced. “Yes, Battalion Commander Non,” was all he said.

  Second Interlude

  “To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.”

  —Quote inscribed over the gate to the House Hiritsu stronghold on Randar

  Hsien Park, Yushui

  Gei-fu

  Sian Commonality, Capellan Confederation

  8 March 3051

  The small riverside park in the center of Yushui wasn’t much more than a flat piece of grassy ground that hosted a weekly bazaar or the occasional small carnival. The Nunya River passed nearby, following the ferrocrete bed that had been engineered into the city’s design to help accommodate the heavy annual rainfall for which the world of Gei-fu was infamous. A crowd of perhaps fifty people had gathered, all solemn and devoting their attention to the small, hastily constructed stage. The ground they stood on was soft and damp. The overcast sky and damp chill in the air promised more rain before too long.

  Aris Sung glanced up at the dark, heavy overhang of clouds as if they might pose some potential threat, and then swept his gaze once again over the gathered audience. Only his eyes moved. Feet slightly apart, back straight, Hollyfeld assault rifle held at port arms—he looked ready to bring the weapon up to his shoulder and begin killing at a second’s notice.

  Aris wore the simple green and black uniform of House Hiritsu’s regular infantry, though at sixteen he was already a highly trained scout and competent assassin. He stood up on the plywood stage along with five other infantrymen and two House MechWarriors, all a part of the personal guard for House Master Virginia York, who stood not three meters away. She was present to oversee the public execution of the Gei-fu rebel leadership.

  Aris was present in the honor guard because Lance Leader Ty Wu Non had assigned him there versus one of the combat teams out hunting down the last of the renegade militia.

  The border world of Gei-fu had chosen a bad time to attempt a rebellion. Relying on the planet’s Third Militia, which included a lance of light BattleMechs, the planetary director had thought to engineer a quick
and complete secession from the Capellan Confederation and join the nearby St. Ives Compact. He had gotten as far as taking military control of the planet before learning that the Compact would not be able to extend any support toward the move. The leadership of the entire Inner Sphere was gathered on Outreach for some big talk concerning the Clan invasion, and no general—no matter how highly respected or trusted—was about to launch what amounted to a military invasion without direct consultation with his sovereign.

  But Senior Colonel James Teng and Imarra House Master Ion Rush, in whose hands the Capellan Confederation had been left, felt no qualms about enforcing loyalty within their borders. House Hiritsu had been dispatched to crush the rebellion, which it accomplished in rather short order. Perhaps a single BattleMech and a handful of conventional troops remained to be hunted down. In the meantime Virginia York would preside over the formal and very public execution of the planetary director and his supporters, effectively cleaving the head from the movement.

  The select group of Yushui citizens gathered that morning included the new planetary director and her immediate staff. Virginia York had ordered all BattleMechs to the city’s perimeter. Sealing off Yushui was a routine precaution, but it was also that she didn’t want the gigantic war machines towering over the proceedings to enforce the impression that the Chancellor held power through BattleMechs alone, and not through the loyalty of warriors such as House Hiritsu and citizens such as the new director.

  A single squad of anti-Mech infantry and another of jump troops stood in attendance on either side of the stage, carrying most of their normal weapons but not at-the-ready. Two squads of regular infantry stood guard over the movement’s leadership, one trooper armed with a slug pistol for each rebel. When the time came, one by one, each Hiritsu warrior would lead his charge to the front of the assembly and perform the execution by means of a single shot to the head. Aris’ squad was the only one with weapons held ready, the assault rifles good crowd-controllers. Besides the Hollyfelds, each infantryman on the stage also carried a full medical kit strapped to his or her right hip, ready to leap to the side of House Master York should the unthinkable happen. It didn’t seem very likely, what with the strong infantry presence and the two MechWarriors flanking her and ready to serve as human shields.

  But then no one had counted on going up against a BattleMech.

  There was little warning. Only a large sloshing sound from the waters of the Nunya as the ’Mech stood and then emerged from the depths like some fabled leviathan. A Stinger. Nearly nine meters tall and humanoid in appearance, six of its twenty tons were devoted specifically to armor and weapons. It mounted twin machine guns, carried one on each arm, and an Omnicron medium laser gripped in its right hand like some kind of oversize pistol. Its shoulders and arms were broad and blocky, but its legs were streamlined legs and its head very tiny for the size of its body.

  Aris didn’t have to be told that the ’Mech must have traveled along several kilometers of river bottom to work its way in so close without being discovered. It was the kind of desperate plan he himself might have come up with in the same situation. Kill the Master of House Hiritsu, free the rebel leadership, and you have a born-again rebellion. And Stingers were fast, so there was even some hope of escape.

  The Stinger fired before it ever cleared the river, its machine guns ripping long, broken furrows into the ground as it tracked in on the stage. Aris was already moving, dropping his assault rifle and diving past the two stunned MechWarriors to tackle House Master York and take her off the back of the stage. The long staccato bursts warned him that he would be too late. Should have been too late. He expected at any time to feel the heavy slam of steel-jacketed slugs that would leave him broken and useless. But service to House Hiritsu demanded that he try, and that left no time for useless internal debate.

  But the only impact came when he and Virginia York hit the ground behind the stage, Aris’ face smashing into the soft earth in his efforts to keep from landing heavily on the House Master.

  Spitting out mud and grass, wiping away the blood that poured from his broken nose, Aris quickly rose to his knees and took stock of the situation. From what he could tell, the Stinger pilot was still too interested in living. Those first rounds of machine-gun fire had punched into the anti-Mech troops, and now the Stinger finished off the only apparent threat with another spray from each arm-mounted weapon. One more spray at most, Aris thought. Then it will come for her.

  Virginia York had risen to a half-crouch. Aris grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her back down. “You head for the river. Stay low and move fast.” She started to open her mouth and Aris shook her, hard. “Don’t argue. Just go! The water will carry you away faster than you can run. If it comes for you, try to stay deep as often as you can.” Then with another shove he started her on her way toward the river bank and he raced for the corner of the stage. He never looked back. He trusted her to preserve her own life, for the good of the House.

  By now the Stinger had turned its attention to the milling crowd of Hiritsu warriors, strafing with its machine guns as it searched for the House Master. It was Aris’ one advantage, that BattleMechs were built for engaging other BattleMechs. Even a ’Mech as small as a Stinger had trouble identifying one particular person out of a crowd. But that confusion might not last long. Aris had to make good use of his time.

  The shape of a plan began to form, one that seemed to guarantee that House Master York never got the chance to punish him for his rude treatment of her. Act now, think later. It was a maxim drilled into Hiritsu warriors, the principle that it was usually better to do something constructive immediately rather than wait and think of the perfect response that might then come too late. So before he could talk himself out of it, Aris dashed from his cover behind the stage toward where the shattered bodies of the anti-Mech troops lay.

  Anti-Mech troops generally carried heavy laser rifles that could actually inflict some minor damage to a BattleMech’s thick armor plating. On his own, Aris doubted that would amount to much. No, he had another of their tools in mind. The grapple rod—a meter-long shaft with a foot strap at one end and a ball made of special adhesive at the other. Anti-Mech troops used the device to scale up the side of a BattleMech so they could plant explosive charges at vulnerable places such as knee and hip joints. The dead Hiritsu warriors had turned out with grapple rods on their backs, but no explosive charges. If the Stinger MechWarrior had realized that, House Master Virginia York and Aris would likely be dead by now. Working quickly, Aris picked out two grapple rods that hadn’t been damaged in the attack.

  He planned to get a lot higher than the hip.

  The Stinger had turned back toward the stage, still searching for its target. Almost in afterthought, it reached out to the side and spat out two large red darts from its right-arm medium laser, straight into the middle of a determined clump of Hiritsu warriors who were concentrating a hail of bullets and laser fire against its flank. The acrid taste of ozone burned in Aris’ nose and at the back of his throat, followed by the faint but sickening scent of charred flesh. Then the nine-meter-tall machine was striding straight at him, eating up the ground in huge, four-meter strides. Aris did the best thing he could at that point. He stayed low to the ground and froze.

  BattleMechs tracked best on heat and motion. The anti-Mech troops were too recently dead to be much cooler than Aris, and not even the watchful eye of the Stinger’s MechWarrior was likely to see Aris crouched there, placing a foot in each stirrup and tilting the first grapple rod to take careful aim at the middle torso of the ’Mech.

  The ground shook now with each heavy, ponderous step the giant machine took. Aris waited. A grapple rod was only good for ten meters at most, and he needed to get as high up as possible on the first try. When the Stinger’s left foot hit the ground just three meters away, sinking into the soft earth, Aris thumbed the first control stud that fired the adhesive ball. It flew out, still attached to the shaft by ten meters of thin nylon/myome
r cable, and struck the humanoid machine in the center chest. With the right foot rising and looking as if it would crush Aris where he crouched, he thumbed the second control stud, which activated the winding motor.

  Suddenly Aris rose swiftly off the ground, pulled in between the Stinger’s legs and up, barely missing the right leg as it stepped forward and the right heel came down where Aris had waited. Aris’ shoulder clipped the lower torso as he passed up from between the BattleMech’s legs, almost making him lose his grip on the second grapple rod. He clenched his teeth and fought against the pain, determined to see it through.

  The cable finished winding back into the shaft, leaving Aris dangling against the Stinger’s chest. The machine slowed as its pilot realized what was happening. With images of giant metal hands rising to smear him over the broad chest like some kind of annoying insect, Aris took quick aim with the second grapple rod and thumbed the firing stud. It hit right on target, against the metal overhang that framed the upper edge of the cockpit viewscreen. Aris abandoned the first grapple rod, and rode the second up until it hit its limit and he hung there, bouncing against the high-impact plastic of the viewscreen.

  The Stinger pilot’s eyes widened to see a House Hiritsu infantryman hanging not a meter away from him. Aris wasted no time trading gazes, not yet. The metal lip to which his grapple rod had connected hung down at a slight angle to partially shield the viewscreen and to house the external cleaners that would spray off any film of dust or mud. Hooking his left elbow around the grapple rod to hold himself, he reached down with his right hand and pulled the medkit off his hip. The kit was large and square and dark green, and Aris hoped it looked a lot like an explosives pack. His left hand tore into a side pouch on the kit and pulled out the digital thermometer. Holding onto that, he shoved the medical kit up under the lip and held it there with his right.