by Victor Milán
"I'd like that too, Captain," Cassie said before she could stop herself. Inside her a voice yammered, I can't have friends! Friends always leave! Patsy was my friend, and she—
"Kali," MacDougall said. She was looking past Cassie now, to spare the other woman the direct pressure of her gaze without actually looking away.
Cassie drew in a deep breath, from the diaphragm, the way Guru had taught her. Control your breath, and you can control the fear, he always said. She could not make it go away, but she could prevent it from mastering her.
She tried to pass discomfort off with levity. "I guess I made some assumptions about you, Kali," she said. "I thought you were more, like, well—Lieutenant Hurd."
Kali laughed. "I know what you mean. Annie Sue seems kind of naive at times, but she's a good enough kid." She sipped her juice. "Hmm, I call her kid and she's older than I am. Guess that's the way she is. But she handles that old Rifleman pretty fair, and Lord knows that isn't easy."
At sixty tons, the Rifleman was considered a heavy BattleMech. Most modern 'Mech pilots also considered it a deathtrap. It had a decent punch to it, particularly at intermediate ranges, and its two big Imperator autocannons provided highly desirable long-range, low-heat firepower. But it had the worst vices of both heavy and medium 'Mechs: a medium's armor mated to a heavy's speed. That made it a support weapon, like an old-style self-propelled gun; it couldn't survive in a furball. Caballero that she was, Avengin' Annie had gotten the most out of her Little Sure Shot in more than a score of battles.
"Yeah," Cassie said. "She's steady enough on the firing line. But, I mean, she carries that teddy bear in the cockpit with her."
"Bunny Bear," Lady K said, and shrugged. "I have a teddy bear too. Name's Albert. 'Course, I don't carry him around in Dark Lady with me, but, you know, whatever gets you through the night."
Cassie made a face, but nodded. Whatever gets you through the night was something of an unofficial credo of the free-swinging, high-living Seventeenth. To the 'lleros, how a person lived was her own damn business, as long as she was there when it hit the pot—as the damnably clever Captain MacDougall had just reminded Cassie. There was something else in the way Kali was looking at her, not threatening, but unnerving in a way Cassie couldn't pin down.
She didn't get much chance to try, because just then the door to the street opened in a puff of smells of wet asphalt and exhaust fumes. The Repose was on a side street, off the approved hover-route, and though it was at basement-level, the short steps led straight down from the street without a dogleg or baffles to keep the customers from being blown into the jukebox whenever a blower cruised by. Outside it was raining.
A figure slipped inside, stepped quickly left to clear the doorway. He was a startling apparition, a young man with a wolf's face and a black eye patch, a shock of black hair, a leather jacket fallen artlessly open to reveal elaborate tattoos twining the right shoulder visible beneath his tank-top. He looked around the bar, tipped the toothpick he was chewing up to his upper lip and smiled.
"Uh-oh," said Cassie. Under her own jacket she made sure Blood-drinker was loose in her sheath.
"What do we have here?" Kali murmured, sliding down and around in her chair just enough for her peripheral vision to pick up the door without being obvious about it. "A man who's proud of his tats, looks like."
"Those are irezumi," Cassie said. "He's yakuza."
Lady K pursed his lips. "Trouble?"
Wearing a worried look, Mr. Krishnamurti started to bustle out from behind the bar. Unfolding himself from his habitual barstool, Cowboy sent the proprietor trotting back on his heels against the bottles on their shelves with a friendly backhand push to the sternum.
"Lemme handle this, Hawkeye." The boys had started calling the bar owner "Hawkeye" for no very obvious reason.
"Could be," Cassie said in answer to Kali's question.
Thumbs tucked into his belt, Cowboy rolled toward the newcomer with an exaggerated bowleg stance, despite the fact that he hadn't been on an actual horse in years.
"Howdy," he said. "Reckon you know by now you wandered into the wrong place. This here's an exclusive kinda establishment—"
The newcomer looked up at the lanky Cowboy, who was a head taller than he was, and smiled wider. Then he jammed a stiffened forefinger into Cowboy's solar plexus.
"Not any longer," he said in crisp, Drac-accented English as Cowboy doubled oven The newcomer glanced at Cowboy's two companions, who had jumped to their feet at the bar.
About that time Cowboy nailed the yak with a loopy right that originated down around his pointy-toe lizard-skin boots. The one-eyed man flew back against a poster of Purple Tailfeathers and kind of slouched there, sorting it all out.
"Whoo," Lady K said, getting to her feet. Cassie noticed that she was suddenly wearing gloves—ladylike buckskin gloves. Until a few minutes ago, Cassie would've chalked it up as an affectation worthy of Avengin' Annie. With her new perspective, it occurred to her that even light gloves enabled a body to hit somebody full-out in the head with a much reduced risk of breaking something. For the puncher, that is.
A few more yakuza came darting in, jackets slick with rain. One looked over at the still-dazed, one-eyed man. The other cracked his knuckles and began to advance purposefully on Cowboy, who, having delivered himself of a righteous payback shot, had returned to the important business of bending over and groaning.
Cassie made a face but did not rise. She wasn't much for recreational combat. Her go-arounds with Macho and Cowboy that first night in the bar had not been sport, but rather communication. She wouldn't back her buddies in a casual dustup, a fact that they all knew and accepted—but if things turned deadly, she'd be right in the midst of them, striking like a cobra.
"Stop." The word wasn't loud but it cracked, as if it carried the supersonic harmonics of a gunshot. The yaks froze. So did Reb and Buck, who were just making their way over from the bar.
Another figure now stood in the doorway, silhouetted black against a drizzle illuminated by the streetlight at the corner, so that it seemed to be a haze of drifting light-motes.
A moment, and then the figure stepped inside. It was a woman in tight leather pants and a bulky leather jacket, a woman standing taller even than Lady K's 170 centimeters. She had golden skin, freckles scattered across a snubbed nose, red-brown eyes with pronounced epicanthic folds, and a wild profusion of startling red hair, the kind of mop that can't be tamed, and shouldn't be.
The three male yaks snarled but fell back, convincing Cassie that this whole little scene was a put-up job of some sort. The yakuza—the Combine's well-organized underworld—had a strong sense of hierarchy, and the tall redhead was obviously in command.
Maybe literally, Cassie decided, because all four of the intruders wore patches showing a skull sporting wings. Obvious unit insignia. And she, of course, knew exactly which unit.
"Cowboy," said Kali MacDougall, who had stepped forward to face the newcomers. "Payback's a mother. Now let it ride."
"Aw, Kali," Cowboy said, straightening as if nothing had happened. The right leg of his cammie pants dropped back down to the instep of his boot. He hadn't quite got it hiked up enough while doubled over in apparent agony to get his hide-out dirk into play. At least he hadn't gone for the left boot, where the ten-millimeter double-derringer rode.
Cassie stood up and came forward. "Captain MacDougall," she said, "let me introduce Tai-sa Eleanor Shimazu, commander of the Ninth Ghost Regiment. Colonel Shimazu, this is Captain Kali MacDougall, commander of B Company, First Battalion of the Seventeenth."
"I'm honored," Shimazu said, and extended her hand for Lady K to shake. Then she turned to Cassie with one flaming eyebrow raised.
"And who are you, that you know who I am?"
Cassie grinned. "This is Lieutenant Junior Grade Cassie Suthorn," Lady K said dryly. "She's our best scout, and darned near as good as she thinks she is."
The Ghost colonel nodded. "A unit needs a good scout, she s
aid, and then broke into a sudden grin. It was a good grin, but it passed quickly, like a leaf blowing down the street in the autumn Hachiman wind.
The one-eyed Ghost was standing without the help of either of his friends or the wall now. He rubbed his jaw and looked appraisingly at Cowboy.
"Good right," he said.
Cowboy snorted a laugh. "You sport a pretty mean finger, hoss." He stuck out his hand. "I'm Cowboy."
After only momentary hesitation the one-eyed man shook it. "Buntaro Mayne," he said, his voice giving no sign of the fact that Cowboy was trying to mash his hand to paste.
After a moment Cowboy's eyes got wide. Sweat started at the line of his dark hair. Another moment and the yakuza relented, letting the other man have his hand back.
"Buy you a drink?" Cowboy said, trying not to shake his mangled fingers.
"Sure thing," Mayne accepted with a grin.
Tai-sa Shimazu accepted a seat at the corner table with Cassie and Lady K. "Pardon my ignorance," MacDougall said, "but isn't tai-sa a few grades light to command the Ninth? I thought the Drac ... onians put only generals in charge of regiments."
Shimazu showed her half a smile. "Such is the common practice," she said. "But the regulars of the DCMS would be scandalized beyond measure were a yakuza to be granted general's rank. Much less a woman."
The on-duty Krishnamurti daughter came trundling up to take the newcomer's order. The colonel ordered Old Stick and Sack—Hotei Black Label—neat. Kali signaled to put it on her tab. Shimazu's eyes narrowed briefly, but the smooth skin of her face remained unwrinkled, and she said nothing. She was calculating the extent of the obligation the mercenary officer was laying upon her, and finding it acceptable, Cassie knew. She'd learned the same assessment reflex herself among the expatriate Dracs on Larsha.
Shimazu leaned forward. Closer in, her eyes glowed strangely in the muted yellow gleam of the lights. The strength of her personality seemed to glow from her like heat from overworked 'Mech's sinks; she was like a force of nature.
Cassie slid a little to the side in her chair, hooked one arm over the back. At the same time she saw Lady K lean slightly forward, place her forearm on the table. It was Cassie's way to bend to the forces of nature, Kali's to stand up to them—and neither woman's way to give in.
From the colonel's slight pause Cassie guessed she hadn't missed the unspoken dynamics of posture either. No surprise. In the Combine the unspoken—haragei, "belly talk"—could be as important as what was said aloud.
"I observe that there are an unusual number of women in your unit," Shimazu said, "with a fair percentage in positions of command. Is that often the way in the Free Worlds League, then?"
She was showing two could play Cassie's game of knowing. Just about every detail of any DCMS unit's composition and deployment was considered a military secret, but as a courtesy, the mercenaries had been provided the names of the commanders of the Combine unit on-planet, the Ghosts. Given the flamboyance of the Ninth's commander, it was inevitable that she became a recognizable presence. Uncle Chandy's security people, whom Cassie had invited to drinks in on-site commissaries, had plenty to say about her, most of it gossip.
Of course, all the Colonel had to do for information on the Seventeenth was ask. Chandrasekhar Kurita had been compelled to provide the planetary government a complete TO&E on his merc unit before they could get permission to drop out of orbit. What Shimazu was mainly demonstrating was that she too had done her homework.
Kali laughed softly. "Not hardly." Having made her point about personal space, she leaned back and relaxed again. "Fact is, our little corner of the League, what most people call the Southwestern worlds, is about as male-chauvinist as anyplace you can find, Colonel. So what's a lady with a taste for adventure—or at least, no taste for being an obedient little baby-factory and homemaker—what's she gonna do? Join the army and take it from there, basically."
Shimazu nodded. "I understand you fought the Clans on Jeronimo." Which proved she'd gotten intelligence digests from the ISF, too; Uncle Chandy hadn't been required to put that on any forms.
A faraway look came into Kali MacDougall's eyes, and she sighed. "Yeah, we did at that. Left near half our people there, too—rotting, 'cause we never leave the living behind. Fought alongside the Combine troops."
Shimazu nodded. "I know. I lost friends there, too. And against the Ghost Bears, when we fought them on Alshain."
The drinks came. Shimazu tossed hers back without showing a reaction, then leaned forward. "What do you think about how to fight them?" she asked. "Everybody knows we're going to be up against them again, too soon. Our Coordinator remembers that, even if the other Great House leaders have become distracted by their petty dynastic squabbles. Just as if the Clans had never come—the fools."
"Hon, you got that right," Lady K said. "What we learned when we went up against the Clans was that we had to remember two main things: how the Clans fight and how they think we fight...."
* * *
Buntaro Mayne leaned his back to the bar with a whiskey bottle clutched in one hand. His two yak brothers sat at a table near the door, watching. They weren't expecting trouble, least of all from the Friendly Persuaders. But you didn't last long under Tai-sa Shimazu if you started taking things for granted. Since for most members of Heruzu Enjeruzu the alternative to service was slam, it paid to be attentive.
"How do you like being under the command of women?" he asked, taking a long pull.
"Well, it ain't what Daddy raised me for," Cowboy said. He sat facing the bar, propped on his elbows. "But honesty compels me to point out, Buntaro old pal, that Cap'n Mac ain't rightly my commander. She's Bronco's CO. I'm with Adelante."
He took a hit from his own bottle. "You?"
Mayne shrugged. "It took some getting used to," he admitted. "But the Colonel ... is clearly most fit to command."
Cowboy nodded. "Well, I got to say that el patron—that's Don Carlos, our Colonel—ain't one to just raffle off company commands. Pure and simple, Lady K's got what it takes."
"In more ways than one," Reb said through a haze of cigarette smoke.
"Don't underestimate the skinny little one, either," said Buck Evans, who was standing between Cowboy and Reb. "She busted old Cowboy's beak for him last week, just for runnin' a friendly little scam on a newbie."
Mayne looked at Cassie, who was sitting listening intently to the conversation passing between MacDougall and the Ghost commander. "What do you think they find to talk about with such interest?" he asked.
Cowboy shrugged. "Oh, the usual," he said. "Clothes, hair, all like that." He hefted his bottle. "Say, this thing's running low. Hawkeye, hustle your butt on over here and top off my tank before I die of thirst."
14
Masamori, Hachiman
Galedon District, Draconis Combine
3 September 3056
"Ah, Eleanor-san," the man behind the big black desk said through a lipless reptile smile, "so good to see you."
Lainie Shimazu was glad of all her extensive practice at remaining expressionless as she approached the great man. "Oyabun," she said. "The pleasure and honor it gives me to see you are without measure."
Which, as far as it goes, she thought, is the absolute truth.
The yakuza leader was a small man with an almost earless head perched on a skinny neck emerging from his black, Western-style suit coat. He looked quite like a turtle.
Behind him a clear wall—transpex, the projectile-proof synthetic used in BattleMech viewscreens—gave a breathtaking panoramic view of Hachiman's capital in all its chaotic glory. The orange morning sunlight filled the room almost tangibly, like a smell, softening the intentionally spartan decor and creating an illusion, not of cleanliness—the janitorial staff kept the offices spotless, of course—but of purity.
Kazuo Sumiyama's office occupied the 100th-floor penthouse of the Sumiyama Building, headquarters of Sumiyama-kai, the Sumiyama Society: the largest yakuza organization on Hachiman. It was all q
uite open; the Society's name and logo were displayed on the front doors of the building, in three-story letters on each face of the structure, and as mon, crests, on the right-breast pockets of the midnight blue blazers worn by the two goons who stood flanking the oyabun and slightly behind him.
Gaijin were always astounded by the overtness of the yakuza presence in the Combine. The yakuza conducted their above-ground operations with the full knowledge and tacit consent of the police, and by extension, the ISF. One major reason for that was simply tradition; it had always been thus, in the Combine and in pre-spaceflight Japan before. And in the Draconis Combine, tradition had nearly the force of law.
There were other reasons for police forbearance, too, of course. Lainie knew them well. And the new Coordinator's long-standing alliance with the yakuza clans was only one among them.
"Please sit down." Sumiyama gestured to a chair waiting before his desk. The desk itself was carved from a single piece of native Hachiman ebony, and gleamed like obsidian. With its high metallic content, the wood was dense and difficult to work. It was also supposed to be very effective at stopping small-arms rounds, and to take a while for a man-portable laser to burn through.
The chair of curved chromed-steel tubing and black synthetic leather was not comfortable, nor was it meant to be. Lainie dropped into it in as much of a sprawl as respect for the oyabun—"father figure"—would permit.
At that, she was crowding the envelope, no new experience for her. The bulkier of Sumiyama's bodyguards growled low in his throat. A gigantic man, much of him was fat and just as much was not. His face was the color of tanned boot leather, with a bit of purplish tinge. His cheeks bulged outward around an oft-mashed nose and thrusting jaw almost as if swollen by some disease. Above them, his eyes were sinister slits.
A sumitori forced to retire from competition by certain allegations of impropriety, the man went by the name of Emma. It was not the female given name, but rather the name of the Buddhist King of Hell and judge of the dead. It was also ingo—yakuza street slang—for pliers, for King Emma often used such instruments to pull the teeth of the unrighteous, to help put their minds straight. They were also used by this Emma for the very same purpose; that and a fancied resemblance to the literally bull-headed deity gave the former sumo wrestler his name.
