-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --
-- File: The Saotome Gambit-1.txt
For centuries the Inner Sphere has been aflame with war.
Struggling from the ashes of the Star League are five Great Houses:
House Kuno of the Furinkan Combine, House Gosunkugi of the League of Five
Nails, House Joketsuzoku of the Jusenkyo Commonwealth, House Shiratori of
the Federated Shiratori, and House Tendo of the Nerima Confederation.
Each House has a claim to the Star League throne, and each has an army
of mighty Battlemechs with which to conquer - but only one House can
rule the Inner Sphere, and none will allow that rule to come without
price.
PROLOGUE:
Planet Lightoller, Epsilon Indi System.
Jusenkyo Commonwealth
12 January 3025
"Step on it, Pop!" Ranma Saotome screamed to her father as crackling
balls of charged particles blazed around them with violent thunderclaps.
The communications antenna on their stolen Swiftwind scout ATV wouldn't
retract, which left a big hole in the top of the ATV's armor, and Ranma
was trying without success to fix it.
The giant panda, growling in abject terror the entire time, already
had his furry foot on the floor.
The six-wheeled ATV swerved past a pile of boulders as another volley
of lightning death lashed into the muddy ground. Clods of dirt and geysers
of steam erupted at the impact point, bathing the open top hatch of the
vehicle's antenna mount in scalding water droplets.
Ranma, suddenly male, turned back to face their pursuer as the now
human Genma Saotome fumbled with the map function display. A Panther
battlemech lumbered behind them, slowly dropping back as the ATV outran
it. The particle projection cannon on its arm smoldered at its glowing
hot muzzle tip from constant use.
"Doesn't she ever give up?" Ranma groaned. The Panther's PPC shivered
with another thunderbolt, and a blindingly bright blue ball of lightning
screamed overhead to explode a dozen meters in front of the ATV.
Genma swerved again to avoid the sudden five meter wide crater in
front of him, nearly rolling over as the ATV tipped up on three wheels.
Ranma was pitched out of the vehicle to land hard in a muddy puddle of
water. She bounced out of the puddle with the force of the impact and
crumpled into a dazed ball. The ATV continued on, with Genma either
ignorant of his son's fate or unwilling to turn around and face the
Panther to retrieve him.
Ranma, covered in mud and dripping wet, tried to pull herself upright
as the Panther's footfalls shook the ground. Doing her best to ignore the
pain and the pounding in her head, she managed to crawl out of the way of
the battlemech as it continued on in pursuit of the ATV.
Shampoo grit her teeth as her 'mech's computer informed her in a
saccharine voice that her PPC was overheating. Whichever of the two
interlopers was driving that infernal ATV was either a panicked fool or
else the galaxy's greatest stunt driver. She had never had such trouble
eliminating a wheeled vehicle before. She was so intent on keeping her
particle cannon online that she did not notice Ranma's accidental ejection
from the ATV.
As the overheat warning became more urgent, she bit down on her lip
and thumbed her weapon selector over to her missile launcher. One good
volley would do the job, even if it wasn't as satisfying as frying them
with a lightning bolt from her particle cannon. The gratifying tone of
target acquisition sounded in her ears, and she sent her missiles flying
with a curse for the damned girl who had destroyed her life.
Ranma watched as four Short Range Missiles streaked from the Panther's
launch tubes and corkscrewed into the air. The stubby ballistically-guided
weapons arced over the fleeing ATV, then dropped suddenly to the ground.
Tremendous explosions threw clods of mud and bits of shrapnel high into the
air. From the midst of the fireballs flew the ragged and burning hulk of
the ATV.
"Pop!" she screamed in horror.
The ATV rolled end over end a dozen times before coming to a stop
upside down a good forty meters from the blast zone. The Panther turned
its sensor head to survey the destruction for a few moments, judged it
good, then turned for home as if nothing had happened.
"Pop!" Ranma cried again hoarsely.
Dragging herself to her feet, she staggered across the muddy plain
to the smoldering ruin of the ATV. Ragged bits of armor plate continued to
rain down from the still air. Sharp pieces of scorched metal lay scattered
about the wreck. Deep within the hulk came the tell-tale hiss of emergency
venting from the scout's fusion reactor.
A tear spilled down her mud streaked face.
"Pop..."
A sob wracked her body as she sunk to her knees and wept.
"That's very touching, boy," a weak voice grunted from within the
wreck.
Ranma's head bobbed up in disbelief.
"Pop?"
Genma Saotome's head appeared from the smoking ruin of the wreck. His
face was smeared with mud, blood, and charcoal. The pungent tang of cyclo-
trimethilene trinitramine, better known as the military high explosive RDX,
filled Ranma's nostrils.
"Pop, how are you even alive?" Ranma asked, tears still in her eyes.
"I saw what happened."
Genma gave him a grave look.
"Thank the gods for seatbelts, airbags, and armor plating," he replied
slowly, and released his straps to fall in the mud at her feet.
Ranma helped her father up. "That Shampoo's gonna pay for this," she
growled.
"We can still make the spaceport," Genma declared wearily. He had no
intention of going back to face any Joketsuzoku. "If they think we're dead,
they won't be watching for us."
"We might as well be dead," Ranma grunted, her elation at finding her
father alive fading fast before the reality of their situation. "Look at
what's happened to us! We've gotta go back and get a cure!"
Genma waved a hand in dismissal. "Are you out of your mind, boy?! We
don't even know exactly how this happened to us! You think we can just
sneak back in there and find a cure? That's assuming there even is one!"
Ranma's face fell. She knew the reality of their situation as well
as her father, but to just run away without a fight...! "Well I'm fresh
outta ideas, Pop."
Genma lowered his bloodied head in thought.
"I have a plan," he said at length.
Ranma gave him a dubious look.
"Where have I heard THAT before?" she groused. Genma offered her a
weak smile, which made her cringe with dread. Finally she could bear the
suspense no longer. "So what is it, Old Man?"
"We're going to the Nerima Confederation," he announced.
"What?" Ranma cried. "You gotta be kidding me. The Confederation is
about to get crushed by both the League and the Combine. They're broke,
their 'mech forces are holding on by their fingernails, and they're halfway
across the Inner Sphere from here. What could possibly be there that could
help us?"
Genma eyed his son, now a buxom scarlet haired girl. "I have an old
friend there. If anyone could help, it's him."
"Whatever," Ranma replied, nonplussed. She gathered up what little
they had that was salvageable from the wreck of their Swiftwind and started
walking. "It's a long march back to the starport, Pop. We better get going
and hope you're right about them not looking for us."
________________________________________________________________________
J. Austin Wilde and Fission Park Press proudly present:
BATTLETECH: THE SAOTOME GAMBIT
by J. Austin Wilde
Safety Control Rod Axe Man,
Fission Park Press
wildeman@psn.net
http://www.psn.net/~wildeman/
The characters and situations of Ranma 1/2 are the
creation and property of Rumiko Takahashi and
Shogakukan/KITTY/Viz Video. Battletech and its
related materials are the property of FASA, inc.
No infringement of copyright is intended nor
should be inferred by this work of fanfiction.
________________________________________________________________________
Chapter One
As Shampoo powered down her Panther and popped the hatch to debark
her 'mech, she noticed the sour and taciturn commander of the planet's
garrison waiting for her on the gantry. His red reptilian eyes fairly
burned under the light of the hangar's mercury vapor arc lamps. She made
a point of ignoring him as she disconnected her cooling vest and neurohelm
from the 'mech, then pulled herself gracefully through the hatch to alight
soundlessly upon the steel non-skid diamond deck of the gantry catwalk.
Still ignoring him, she slipped her helmet off and set it gently in a
shielded and padded caddy near the mech's hatch.
"<Did you finally eliminate them?>" Herb asked archly, his patience
with her at low ebb. The Commonwealth battlemech hangar was a cavernous
and noisy place, and his presence on the Panther's boarding gantry was a
clear sign of his concern in the matter.
Shampoo responded with a toss of her long purple mane of hair, a
gesture that both inflamed and irritated the hybrid mechwarrior general.
Herb had been put out by her insistance on dealing with the two outsiders
herself. Lightoller was his domain, and to have a strumpet from Jusenkyo,
even the great-grandaughter of the Matriarch, personally handling the
internal affairs of the planet's security was intolerable to him.
Shampoo knew this, and with a look she made certain that he knew it
as well.
"<I left their vehicle a smoking wreck three kilometers north by east
of Checkpoint November,>" she told him curtly. "<Cleanup is your problem,
not mine.>"
"<Excellent,>" he managed. "<I was beginning to worry that they had
escaped for good.>"
"<Have you determined their method of infiltrating the labs?>" she
countered, driving home her contempt for him. "<It would be in your best
interest as Governor if the Matriarch knew that the labs' integrity
remained intact despite this breach of security.>"
Herb glared at her.
"<That is being determined this very moment,>" he replied icily.
"<So long as the intruders were eliminated, the secrets of the Jusenkyo
Labs will remain secure.>"
Shampoo doubted that. Rumors of the Commonwealth's Star League era
biotechnics lab had been leaking out to the Inner Sphere for decades now,
almost since her great-grandmother's breeding program began, and while the
location of the labs and the exact nature of the experiments performed
remained secret, she doubted that could last forever. The Combine's spies
were always scuttling about in the shadows, and the Commonwealth's
confederates in the League of Five Nails weren't always the type to keep
their mouths shut. One day the labs' location would be known, and the
truth about what they were doing would be revealed. It didn't take a genius
to realize that shortly thereafter it would become the number one priority
bombing target for every single aerospace fighter outside the Commonwealth.
"<So you say,>" she replied, and stepped gracefully past him to the
mechwarrior locker rooms to shower and change.
Herb watched her go, desire and contempt welling up within him to
wage war on each other. He was a general in the Commonwealth battlemech
forces, and when he was not on campaign in the periphery against the
numerous pirates and bandit kings, he was the planetary governor for the
most important world in the Commonwealth other than the capitol. All that
power and glory should have been enough for any man, even an ambitious one
like Herb.
But it wasn't. He wanted the supreme command of the Commonwealth
military, something Cologne had kept from him despite his obvious
qualifications. The reasons were clear: the Matriarch wanted that honor
to go to her great-grandaughter Shampoo, whom she considered to be the
crowning glory of her century-long Breeding Program, first above all of
her other progeny. The second reason was even more bitter for Herb to
swallow. He was a man, and a man would never command the Commonwealth's
armed forces.
As his lustful eyes followed the graceful sway of Shampoo's hips
he clenched his fists tight with determination. No matter what, he would
have all that he desired, whether it was given to him or had to be taken.
Taking Shampoo and making her his slave would be the sweetest prize of all.
* * *
Shampoo stepped back under the hot pulsating stream of the shower to
rinse herself off. The steam was thick and warm around her, and she was
grateful for it. General Herb made her feel cold inside whenever he was
around, a cold that was hard to dispel even after he was gone, and cold
was a feeling she now had a very good reason to fear.
Since she had joined the battlemech forces upon her first mense,
she had encountered him time and time again, and each encounter left her
with the same icy feeling. It wasn't that he was a man, for despite the
clan's indoctrination promoting homosexuality over promiscuous and
potentially damaging genetic harm to the Breeding Program, Shampoo had
little desire for relations with other women. It was something else about
Herb, perhaps the dragon blood bequeathed him through his parents and
their exposure to the Jusenkyo Effect. Perhaps his cold-bloodedness was
more than just a front for him, but was ingrained into his very being
by the Program.
She had never questioned her great-grandmother's wisdom before, but
the use of the Jusenkyo Effect to augment the superior genetic stock of
the Commonwealth's mechwarriors was beginning to make her uneasy. If it
created cold-blooded monsters like Herb and his two henchmen, Lime and
Mint, what would it do to her? Hers was no longer a pure strain of the
Matriarch's line, and now she wondered with some fear of what would become
of her - and her future children?
Shampoo closed her eyes and let the water wash over her body in a
rush of delicious warmth. She was tainted now, an undocumented, accidental,
and unauthorized experiment in the Jusenkyo Effect, all because of that
meddling red-haired girl! Her only hope lay in Doctor Gaido, and the
slim chance that the Effect could be cured.
With some trepidation she shut off the shower. The steam lingered,
and the air in the open shower bay did not have its usual chill. She had
jimmied open the thermostat for the climate control unit and turned the
heating to maximum, and it appeared to be doing its job. It would be a
disaster for a sudden draft on her wet body to force her transformation -
possibly in front of someone else.
She reached for a towel and dried herself off quickly. Only when she
had donned a thick terry robe and slippers and stepped into the locker
room to change into her uniform did she feel safe. Though not for long, as
the door opened and a man in long flowing robes and equally flowing long
black hair blundered inside.
"<Get out, Mousse!>" she cried indignantly at the young man.
Realizing his error, Mousse adjusted his thick eyeglasses to confirm
that he had in fact walked into the wrong locker room. His weak eyes went
wide at the sight of Shampoo in a state of half-dress, and his face burned
with a fierce blush.
"<Sh-Sha-Shampoo?>" he stammered in shock.
"<I said out!>" she screamed. Still clutching her uniform cheongsam
minidress ineffectually to her body, she searched for something heavy and
hard to throw at him.
"<I'm sorry!>" Mousse managed, and ducked back through the door in
time to avoid a steel laundry hamper.
She waited until she was certain that he was gone before swiftly
changing into her uniform.
"<Stupid Mousse,>" she huffed. He was always following her around like
a puppy, and making foolish and embarrassingly public declarations of love
for her. All this despite the fact that though he was an excellent and
experienced mechwarrior, he was also hopelessly nearsighted, and therefore
disqualified from the Breeding Program. The possibility that he had in fact
not intended to walk in on her slowly crept into her thoughts, but that
didn't mean she couldn't be angry with him anyway.
She knew that she didn't hate him. They had grown up together, after
all, and though he had always been annoyingly infatuated with her, she
tolerated him well enough. He was handsome despite his extremely thick
glasses, and he had a terrific body from extensive training in several
obscure forms of kung fu, but he was so irritating in his obsession with
her that she never took him very seriously as a romantic prospect.
She gathered her things up into her kit bag with a sigh. She needed
to get off this cursed planet and away from Herb, Mousse, and above all,
the House Jusenkyo Labs. After her talk with Gaido, the first JumpShip
headed for the Jusenkyo System would find her on it.
Chapter Two
Furinkan Combine JumpShip _Imperator,_
in orbit above the planet New Hawaii,
Alpha Centauri System, Furinkan Combine
13 January 3025
Prince Tatewaki Kuno of the Furinkan Combine stood in uneasy silence
on the Executive Bridge. His sister was conducting operations against the
Confederation, which always worried him. It wasn't for any concern over
his sister. Though it would sadden him to learn that his own flesh and
blood had fallen in battle, the truth of the matter was that he
considered her a hindrance to his plans of conquest, and a hindrance he
would be well rid of.
What did concern him were the rumors that Akane Tendo had taken
command of the 1st Nerima Guards, the Confederation force that currently
reinforced the threatened planet of Abydos. His lovely battle maiden was
a formidable foe in honorable combat, but at the hands of his cowardly and
blackhearted sister, she could come to harm.
Indeed, his twisted sister had hinted at that very possibility when
she announced her intention to raid the parts depot at Port Said. Though
he had sternly rebuked her for such evil intentions, there was no way he
could guarantee her conduct of the raid short of participating, and that
he was reluctant to do. His reputation would suffer to be associated with
the foul deeds of his sister's Black Rose regiment, whereas by remaining
elsewhere, he could distance himself and make a public condemnation of her.
He could do little else, for Kodachi enjoyed the favor of their father,
and until the fool was dead or he abdicated his throne, he was powerless to
prevent his sister's excesses in any meaningful way.
He stared out the main viewport to the blue bauble of the planet
beneath his mighty starship. His hated father was somewhere down there
inspecting the terraforming efforts and trying out the surf. His gorge
rose at the thought of it. His own father, Shogun of the mightiest of the
five Successor States, wasting his time and his nation's treasury trying
to turn a planet into an imitation of the Hawaiian Islands of Earth. If
he had half a mind towards conquest, he could become First Lord of the
Star League, reestablish the throne on nearby Earth, and then have the
*real* Hawaiian Islands for himself.
Tatewaki frowned in distaste. When he was finally the First Lord of
the Star League, he would order the Hawaiian Islands destroyed - by
continuous nuclear bombardment if necessary - as an act of final contempt
for his father. Until then, he needed to conquer the Nerima Confederation
while keeping an eye on the Jusenkyo Commonwealth and its Comstar puppet.
The League of Five Nails was at best an annoyance, and the Federated
Shiratori and its vapid Goddess-Empress was not even deserving of mention.
Only with the Inner Sphere his, Hawaii a glowing radioactive cinder
slipping beneath the waves, and most importantly his new bride Akane Tendo
by his side, could he find fulfillment. Until then there was only room for
battle and conquest in his heart. How terrible was the burden of the Gods'
divine instrument of destiny!
He raised a fist in anguish to his brow and grimaced in silent despair
and with tears streaming down his face at the thought. His crew went about
their tasks on the Bridge, studiously ignoring their lord until it was clear
that the moment had passed and he was approachable once again.
Chapter Three
The City of Port Said,
Planet Abydos, Algol System
Nerima Confederation
13 January 3025
"Charlie Company of the 2nd Battalion reports contact with enemy
'mechs in company strength moving east along Khafre Boulevard towards the
north/south freeway interchange."
The report came over the crackling command net for the 1st Nerima
Guards Regiment. It was grim news if not unexpected. Alpha of the 2nd
was supposed to have guarded the approaches to Khafre Boulevard and the
freeway from their vantage point in the heavily wooded Osirien Park.
No one at any level of the regiment had heard from Alpha Company of the
2nd Battalion for over an hour, and the regiment's scout assets were too
busy evaluating the enemy's other positions to investigate.
A slender gloved hand thumbed the 'talk' button on her HOTAS (Hands
On Throttle And Stick) controls. Akane Tendo, commander of the 1st Nerima
and Heir to the Nerima Confederation, took a deep breath and addressed her
commanders.
"Order Charlie Company to engage enemy forces in a holding action,"
she said, knowing that Charlie was a rump company of only two lances, one
of which was understrength at that. It was going to be hard on them, but
if the Furinkan Combine raiding parties reached the freeway, they would
have a straight shot into the heart of the city and the parts depot they
had come to loot.
"Yes sir," her adjutant in the mobile command center acknowledged.
Akane took another deep breath. She was only nineteen years old, and
although she was an excellent mechwarrior, she was still not used to having
so many lives on her hands. Not only those of her regiment, but those of
the tens of thousands of civilians living in the heart of Port Said. The
infamous Black Rose Terror Regiment was known for its atrocities, and Akane
had no doubt that they would raze the city to the ground if they could.
These were her people. *Her* people, as the daughter of their liege,
Grand Duke Soun Tendo. She knew that she had to protect them, and she
was too young and naive to realize that her life was more important than
all of theirs.
Her tac-net display opened up to reveal her beleaguered Charlie of the
2nd Commander. His young face was pale with fear, despite the sweltering
heat of a battlemech cockpit. The roar of particle beam fire mingled with
fierce explosions in the background noise.
"Two-Charlie Actual reporting enemy battlemechs in company strength,
all heavy units, approaching our positions from the west. We are taking
them under fire, but do not have the numbers or the ammunition to hold
them for long. Requesting immediate reinforcements!"
The display blurred into an angry buzz of static a moment later.
When the image returned, Akane could see the cloudy blue sky through
the battlemech's cockpit windows heaving crazily above the terrified
mechwarrior, and she knew that he had been hit hard, perhaps had even
lost his main gyroscope.
"Headquarters Company!" she called over the tac-net, so that every
member of her regiment could hear her voice. "Move out! Proceed by lance
to map reference One-Charlie-Three by Six-Oscar-Niner! Reinforce positions
held by Two-Charlie!"
Akane's bright red Warhammer surged with energy as its fusion reactor
came up to battle-power. Her regimental headquarters company, in reality
her personal bodyguards, quickly acknowledged her order and followed suit.
The company of battlemechs thundered down Alzred Parkway towards the freeway
business loop. If they could reach the interchange before the Furinkan
Combine forces, they would have the advantage of the high ground as the
Combine 'mechs tried to scale the on-ramps to engage them.
She thumbed her battlecomp display over to the Civil Defense Order
of Battle. A lance of Civil Defense Urbanmechs and Riflemen was in
position in an elevated parking garage within three hundred meters of the
interchange, ostensibly to act as air defense against the Combine's
aerospace fighter assets. Their long-range autocannons could come in handy
against any battlemechs that tried to jump jet directly up to the
interchange. She called to her adjutant to order them up for fire support,
the civil defense forces being in a separate but inferior chain of command
from her own.
"Lady Akane," her adjutant addressed her with more than a little
concern. He was a former mechwarrior in his mid-forties whose crippling
injuries in battle had shunted him to a staff position, and he had a most
fatherly protective attitude towards her. "This is a dangerous position
you are taking."
Akane grit her teeth. Instead of keeping her reply strictly on the
command channel, she again patched through the tactical net where the
entire regiment could listen in. "Two-Charlie has a dangerous position,
Colonel Mukaida. I'm trying to do something about that."
She was playing dirty pool with a man she deeply respected, but as a
nineteen year old girl who commanded the 1st Nerima Guards by virtue of her
birth as the daughter of the Grand Duke, she had to win the loyalty of her
troops if she was ever going to truly lead them. Now they would know that
their commander wasn't afraid of getting a little muddy and bloody to
protect her own.
She was rewarded with a cheer over the tac-net from those very men
and women she wished to lead. Her heart swelled with pride, and for a
moment wasn't sure if the flush of heat she felt was from herself or the
mighty reactor beneath her. The Warhammer pounded the reinforced roadway,
shaking the buildings that surrounded her, and bringing forth to the
windows curious civilians who began to wave and shout as they saw the
Ducal pennant that flew from her 'mech. Suddenly she felt invincible.
And why shouldn't she? Her crimson red Warhammer was 70 tons of
white hot death shaking the pavement with its cloven hooves. The long
armored tubes of the twin Donal particle projection cannons that made up
the battlemech's arms were capable of annihilating a light 'mech with one
salvo.
The approaches to the business loop were guarded by a company of
mechanized infantry and supported by a pair of Rommel tanks; not nearly
enough to defeat a company of heavy 'mechs, but enough force to hold them
until other units could reinforce their position. The tiny figures in their
urban camouflage battle dress made way for her column of battlemechs as
they stomped past. A tank commander waved from his hatch and signalled
that the way ahead was clear to the interchange.
Colonel Princess Kodachi Kuno of the Furinkan Combine licked her lips
in anticipation of the coming orgy of violence she and her Black Rose Terror
Regiment were about to commence. The pitiful Confederation battlemech forces
had so far put up valiant if futile resistance, and even the vaunted 1st
Nerima Guards so feared by her brother's regular forces were hardly a
significant threat. Her spearhead company was practically in position at
the freeway interchange, having stopped briefly to engage a couple of lances
of Confederation 'mechs. Once the freeway interchange was secured, her
convoys of armored vehicles would move up and stand by to haul off the tons
of battlemech parts and other critical technologies her forces looted from
the depot. And then, once the depot was cleaned out, she could amuse herself
by burning Port Said to the ground.
There were rumors from her Intelligence Section concerning the recent
change of command within the 1st Nerima Guards. It would be amusing to face
Akane Tendo in battle, and having crushed the girl under the heel of her
black painted Marauder, to throw it in her dear brother's face. The only
question in her mind would be whether or not killing the Tendo girl or
holding her for ransom would be more entertaining.
The image of her staff major appeared on her battlemech's head-up
display.
"Spearhead company reports only mop up operations against enemy lances
near the interchange, your Highness. They will have the area secured within
the next fifteen minutes."
Kodachi chuckled with glee. Despite the delays for skirmish actions,
her troops were ahead of schedule! She clicked her mic open to respond.
"Inform them that we shall be joining them shortly. Order the caravans
to move out to their final positions, and alert the DropShip commanders to
prepare to receive captured supplies within the hour."
The major nodded briskly on the display.
"At once, Highness!"
That taken care of, Kodachi opened the throttle on her Marauder and
let the 75 ton battlemech run at full tilt down Khafre Boulevard. Her
plan was coming off without a hitch. She could see lines of smoke from
the recent skirmish between her spearhead company and the hastily
deployed forces of the 1st Nerima Guards.
It was a plan worthy of her reputation as the Black Rose of the
Furinkan Combine. In a daring attack on the outskirts of Port Said's
vital starport, two of her three 'mech battalions were keeping the enemy
distracted and engaged over twelve kilometers from the real objective.
Meanwhile her remaining 'mech battalion plus her Special Forces and her
Transportation Battalions had landed outside the suburbs and near the
two main traffic arteries of the city to carry out the raid.
Thus far the 1st Nerima Guards had shown no sign of getting wise to
her plan, and even if they did, they would have to fight a withdrawal
from the starport and race back across an elevated freeway while being
taken under fire from her aerospace fighters every last kilometer of
the way.
It was enough to make her laugh, and once she got started, there
was little to stop her. She flicked her mic over to the external P.A.
speakers and began cackling with glee. Swinging her 'mech's twin PPCs
to bear on the suburban homes, she began blasting away. The particle
bolts blew the timber and drywall structures to flaming bits, and her
machinegun and light laser equipped lance mates began hosing anti-
personnel fire into the panicked survivors.
Kodachi found another reason to laugh, and began picking targets for
her particle cannons that would likely produce the most potential targets
for her men. It was amusing to watch the pathetic Confederation citizens
scrambling like ants at the feet of her 'mechs as shopping centers and
homes blazed and streams of brilliant light incinerated them in little
strobe-like flashes of flame.
Her revelry was short lived however, as an autocannon shell careened
off her Marauder's precious Lamellar armor with a loud *spang!* Too late,
her threat indicator warned of a hostile Garret D2j radar search and
tracking array in the area. The Garret array could only mean the presense
of air defense 'mechs such as the Rifleman or the Jagermech in the area.
"Combat spread!" she ordered her troops. The massacre stopped
abruptly as her battlemechs fanned out into a dispersion pattern that
would minimize potentially fatal artillery and airstrikes while keeping
the 'mechs close enough to give support to each other. Her eyes flicked
between her viewport and her tactical instruments, searching for the enemy
battlemech.
**Did her spearhead company miss one of the enemy in the confusion,
or was just it a stray shell?**
She had her answer a moment later when one of her spearhead 'mechs
exploded in a shower of silver plasma near the freeway on-ramp a scant
kilometer distant. Streams of autocannon tracer fire rippled through the
ranks of the spearhead company from an elevated parking garage on the other
side of the freeway. Before they realized what was happening, another
spearhead 'mech went down in flames, its legs blasted off at the knees as
it rushed the on-ramp and ran straight into the enemy defilade.
Even as they started taking up defensive positions around the solid
masonry of the interchange, they were hit again from a different quarter;
from the on-ramp itself came pulses of heavy laser fire and bolts of
charged particles. There were more than just air defense 'mechs in position
at the interchange, and they had gone completely unnoticed by her staff!
Kodachi managed a strangled cry of rage as a third spearhead 'mech,
a Catapult making a desperate jump jet leap out of harm's way, was ripped
apart by an internal ammunition explosion as two Riflemen in the parking
garage came to bear with their swiftly trainable anti-aircraft weapons and
opened up with all four barrels. Missiles cooked off and spiralled crazily
out of the ruptured ammo bins of the Catapult, some striking other spearhead
'mechs and adding to the confusion. The view of the interchange became
obscured from visual and thermal imaging as smoke and flames from the
wreckage came streaming down from above.
"Full advance!" she shouted to her men. She ordered a full missile
bombardment on the parking garage as soon as the fire lance came into
range. Next she called in one of her Air Lances covering the freeway for
an airstrike. The Confederation was going to pay in kind for this!
A flight of Slayers answered her call, hosing the parking garage with
laser and autocannon fire and screaming out of the way as her fire lance's
missile barrage struck. The building shuddered with the blasts, becoming
engulfed in flame and thick black smoke. The streams of autocannon shells
and laser fire abruptly ceased, though whether this was because the 'mechs
were destroyed or merely unable to track through the smoke was unknown.
The respite given her spearhead company was good enough for the moment.
Her own Marauder was well ahead of the rest of her company, and she
reached the freeway interchange before her spearhead company could shake
off the shock of the ambush and start to fight its way out of the killing
zone. Kodachi's sudden appearance on the scene made it clear that the only
acceptable direction to move was forward. She pushed aside a Crusader that
wobbled drunkenly from a double blast of particle beam fire and started
up the ramp.
A Phoenix Hawk, hidden from sight by the solid masonry and steel curve
of the ascending on-ramp, jumped out in a clumsy attempt at death from
above. Kodachi swatted it down with the derringer-like forearms of her
'mech, and leaving it behind, swiveled her PPCs back to blast it while it
was down. The Confederation 'mech blazed with blue light from the hits, and
was immolated a moment later as the rest of her company joined her on the
ramp.
Next up was a Griffin that left its protected position to help its
lancemate. Kodachi gave it both barrels of her PPCs, plus her lasers. A
bloom of heat burst from her 'mech's radiators, more than the cooling
system could bear, but Kodachi was a past mistress of pushing her
Marauder's plant to the limit and living to tell of it. With remarkable
grace she shouldered the clumsy Griffin aside, knocking the hand-held PPC
from its grip in a shower of sparks and twin sprays of ruptured liquid
nitrogen coolant lines. The Griffin was finished an instant later by a
volley of short range missiles that blew the bubble like cockpit into a
cloud of flame and transparent durallex canopy shrapnel.
She was at the top of the ramp now, laughing in triumph as the
Confederation 'mechs now felt the sting of the Black Rose's thorns. Her
laughter reached a crescendo as she spied the crimson Warhammer of Akane
Tendo closing in on her 'mech.
"Akane Tendo!" she cried over the enemy tac-net frequency. "I
challenge you to single combat! May we fight in all fairness!"
"I accept!" Akane returned. No sooner had she said this than every
single Combine 'mech in the fight trained their weapons upon her Warhammer
and began firing everything they had.
Only an act of pure desperation saved her as the blistering fusillade
of Combine weapons bore down on her 'mech. Searing bolts of laser and
particle beam fire splashed into the Warhammer as she dove for the relative
cover of one of the elevated freeway's support towers. Alarms wailed in
the cockpit and the *whoosh* of automated fire extinguishing systems told
her of impending disaster.
The brief respite offered by her covered position gave her a moment
to evaluate the condition of her 'mech. One glance at the displays was all
it took to let her know that it wasn't good. She had never been mauled
this badly in combat before.
The left side of her mech's torso was breached and gutted, including
the left side gun cluster and several heat sinks. Only by her desperate
torso twist and leap to cover had she been spared a potentially fatal
ammunition explosion from her short range missile launcher or an equally
fatal crash out from her fusion reactor. Her left PPC was damaged but
functional, and her left leg was reporting an unextinguished fire near
the knee actuator that threatened to immobilize the limb.
"Hey!" she cried indignantly into the tac-net. "What happened to
single combat and fighting fair!?"
Autocannon fire and machine gun rounds slammed into the reinforced
concrete of the pillar in reply, chewing into the masonry to expose the
rebar in showers of green and gold sparks.
"Okay!" Akane shouted over the din. She was practically shaking in
her ejector seat with fear, but she refused to die without a fight. "If
that's your idea of a fair fight, then come and get me!"
She poked her left PPC arm out from behind cover and began firing
point blank into a Combine Warhammer that charged her position with the
intent of gunning her down. The mighty battlemech caught a bolt through
the head as it practically ran down the muzzle of her PPC, and stopped
dead in its tracks before her. She was rewarded with the sight of Kodachi's
black Marauder, carefully positioned behind two Thunderbolts, practically
shivering with rage as another of her mechwarriors was slain. Her fear
melted away upon seeing her nemesis balk, and she charged with a fierce
war cry.
The Combine 'mechs again opened up, but their own dead Warhammer
absorbed most of the shots and flew apart in a cloud of smoke and shrapnel.
Through that cloud came the battered crimson form of Akane's Warhammer.
A few 'mechs triggered their medium and light lasers wildly at her,
which she ignored in favor of clubbing them with the now dysfunctional
left PPC arm. The heavy armored tube of the particle cannon made a lethal
bludgeon, and she smashed through the torso of a Quickdraw in a single
blow. The ferocity of the attack took the Combine mechwarriors by surprise,
and Akane waded into them, now swinging both PPC arms furiously.
Kodachi bit down on her lip as she watched the insane Tendo girl
clobber yet another of her 'mechs. She watched with not a little horror
as the red Warhammer stood over the fallen Archer and beat it savagely
with its PPCs over and over until the dying battlemech's arms were broken
and its torso and cockpit smashed in. A Catapult lashed Tendo with point
blank laser fire, blasting the ruined searchlight to smithereens and
starting a fire within the gutted torso - and received a vicious double
blow across its own torso in return. The Catapult fell over, crashing
into the pavement and leaving a crater.
Kodachi threw her Marauder into reverse and began backing down the
on-ramp, ostensibly to get beyond the minimum range of her primary weapons
so she could finish off Akane's Warhammer with one salvo. It turned into
a full fighting retreat as the remainder of Akane's bodyguards began a
fierce counterattack. Only the strong discipline of her troops kept it
from becoming a total rout on the spot.
"We shall meet again!" Kodachi Kuno vowed angrily as her battered
Black Rose 'mechs withdrew under the cover of a flamer-induced smoke
screen. Her blood boiled with hate and anguish at the terrible defeat
she had suffered. Never before had she known such a disaster!
She consoled herself with burning as much as she could on the way
out of the city, but by now the civilians were in shelters and there was
little sport or amusement in it. The raid was a failure, her crack
battalion was in shambles with heavy casualties, and she now faced the
humiliation of explaining to her brother the losses she had suffered.
She could already see the smug look on his face and hear the angry tone
of reproach in his voice. The only reason he wouldn't strip her of
her command was because Daddy liked her the best and wouldn't permit it.
* * *
Akane stood up through the hatch of her Warhammer and surveyed the
damage. The left torso was truly gutted, and the PPC arm hung battered
and limp at its side. The searchlight was obliterated. Her 'mech now
limped when it walked due to the knee actuator damage. The bright red
paint was burned off in most places from the waist up, leaving only
scorched and dull heat-discolored metal wherever it wasn't slashed open
outright with laser fire. Her Warhammer was going to face an extended
period in the tech shed before it would be ready to go out again.
Grim mechanized carnage lay all about her, most of it by her own
hand. The Combine forces had lost four 'mechs outright on the freeway,
and three more leading up to the on-ramp. The rest had fled with varying
degrees of damage. She had lost four 'mechs, not including the Civil
Defense lance which had lost two precious Riflemen and their pilots when
part of the parking garage roof collapsed on them.
Sketchy reports from her recon lances indicated that the enemy 'mechs
threatening the starport had broken off their attacks and were falling back
in an orderly fashion to their drop zones. If she had sufficient aerospace
fighter assets available, she would have made sure that the Combine forces
received a billion joules per liter send off, but she barely had enough to
cover her own forces, and the Black Rose Regiment would escape with no
further losses.
Civilians in Kodachi's path had fared worst of all. She had begged
her staff not to give her any more reports about it in the field, as she
was close to tears already. The smoke from the fires raged in the distance
with nothing available to combat them.
The only victory today lay in keeping Kodachi out of the heart of the
city, and the only spoils of that victory lay in the salvageable remains she
had left behind. For that victory they had paid a heavy price.
As she watched the Ghouls in the 'mech salvage and recovery squads
pore over the wrecked battlemechs, the voice of her adjutant sounded from
below. Akane looked down to see him strapped to his wheelchair in the back
of a staff jeep waving up at her. His scarred face seemed relieved to see
that she was all right.
"I'll be down in a second," she cried, and clambered out of the hatch
to climb down her 'mech to the scorched pavement. Like most mechwarriors,
she was wearing little more than a tank top and shorts underneath her
cooling vest, and the driver of the jeep hopped out to provide her with
his uniform cloak.
Her adjutant, Colonel Mukaida, saluted as she approached.
"I have the preliminary casualty reports," he said evenly.
Akane tensed for the blow.
"How bad?"
Mukaida handed her the hastily drafted preliminary report.
"Bad enough to pull the regiment back from the line," he replied. "We
weren't full strength when we arrived on planet, and now we're barely at
fifty percent effectiveness."
Akane took the news like a punch to the gut.
"Can the frontier hold on without us? There was a good reason why the
1st Nerima was needed here, and that was because of the buildup of Combine
forces on the border."
"I don't know," Mukaida replied. "What I do know is that another
battle like today - which was apparently nothing more than a large scale
raid - could put the 1st Nerima out for good. We need to fall back to our
second line to repair and replace our 'mechs."
He lowered his face for a moment before regarding her.
"I can't order you to withdraw," he began. "The regiment is yours to
command. You've proved yourself beyond any doubts of that. But I have to
recommend that we withdraw."
Akane looked up to the sky. What would her father do? It had been so
long since he had been a mechwarrior, but Akane could still remember the
solemn look on his face from behind his neurohelmet. What would Dad do?
She took one last look at the devastation and sighed.
"Order the withdrawal to our secondary positions as soon as practical,"
she said tonelessly. The secondary position for the 1st Nerima Guards was
the Nerima System itself. She was going home already, and she had barely
left it.
Chapter Four
Primary Continent,
Planet Capra, Capra System
League of Five Nails
31 January 3025
The deformed monstrosity of a Hunchback battlemech cleared the low
rise of rocky hills at a run. Reaching the high ground, the forty foot tall
war machine came to a halt. Its sensors began to probe the surrounding
territory.
"Where is he?" Mechwarrior Pansuto Tarou demanded of his instruments.
His radar suite showed only the steadily advancing blip of his companion,
Ryouga Hibiki. The yellow and black trimmed BattleMaster seemed to be in
no particular hurry, which was just as well, as Ryouga had a tendency to
get lost when he was in a rush.
"Any luck?" Ryouga called to him over the tac-net.
Tarou grit his teeth and squinted at the display. His radar wasn't
in the best shape after fifty years of service to his family battlemech,
and the mechanical shock it suffered every time he triggered his primary
weapon - a huge Tomodzuru Type 20 autocannon that gave the mech its
distinctive deformity - wasn't helping the unit.
"I don't understand," Tarou replied. "How could that bastard simply
disappear?"
The BattleMaster came to a halt several meters from the Hunchback.
"Beats me," Ryouga shrugged. "If you really did see him, which I doubt,
just remember that Locusts are pretty fast. Maybe he just outran us."
"He can't outrun my radar," Tarou grunted, more than a little perturbed
with Ryouga's skepticism. He keyed the telescopic bifocal unit mounted in
the head of his mech, and zoomed in on a rock formation almost a kilometer
distant. "That's the only place he could be hiding."
The Hunchback's right arm extended in the direction of the red-brown
pile of sandstone in the distance.
"Could be," Ryouga agreed, concealing his distaste for their hunt.
The poor excuse for a sun on Capra was going to be setting soon, and the
early evening sandstorms that rose with the sunset winds were murder on
sensitive battlemech parts. He wanted to return to Capra City and park his
mech in a covered hangar before that happened. "But we're already way out
of our patrol sector."
"What's another klick at this point?" Tarou scowled.
"Another klick could cost us our jobs," Ryouga returned, baring a fang
for Tarou's benefit. "I don't know about you, but I want to make enough
money to get off this stupid planet. Forfeiting our contract because you
*think* you saw him is no way to do that."
Tarou cast another look at his noisy radar display.
"All right," he conceded, scorn dripping from his voice. "But I know
that he's out there somewhere, and my vow to atomize the little freak will
finally be fulfilled. After that, Cologne and House Joketsuzoku."
Ryouga had his doubts about Tarou's sanity some times, and this was
one of them. What was worse, this planet was getting to him. Ryouga hated
Capra, and he hated the Joketsuzoku for what they had done to both of them,
but how could they realize their vengeance if they lost their jobs? Worst
of all, their deal with the mercenary company they now served included
stiff penalties for breach of contract.
If they weren't careful, they could both lose their battlemechs. Until
they passed their probationary period with the company, they would have to
suffer liens on their 'mechs for spare parts and adaptation to the harsh
sandy climate. There wouldn't be much sympathy for them from the Governor
of Capra, either, as the mercs represented the only significant protection
he had from the predations of bandits or the Combine. No, it would all be
nice and legal, and in the end they would join the hated ranks of the
Dispossessed. Suicide would be the only honorable way out after that.
He cast his eyes out across the desolate expanse of waste and sighed.
Home was many parsecs away.
**How did we end up on this forsaken dustball?**
He knew well the chain of events which led to their practical exile
on the frontier League world, but the reasons why Fate had decreed that
this should happen to Ryouga Hibiki and Pansuto Tarou escaped him. What
had they done to deserve this?
Their last assignment as part of the mercenary garrison on the
Commonwealth world of Lightoller had been dull - as the planet was heavily
fortified against attack - but extremely lucrative. Perhaps too lucrative,
Tarou now asserted. Ryouga still reserved judgement on that score, but
was beginning to see his point.
Happousai, posing as an agent for independent mechwarriors, had steered
them into the job as they looked for work within the Federated Shiratori.
They agreed to a sweet deal, booked a trip to Lightoller - travel expenses
paid for by the Commonwealth, Tarou liked to point out - and began months
of tedious but well paid patrols around the primary starport. It wasn't bad,
but for reasons that became clear one fateful night in the not-so-distant
past, their Commonwealth employers were extremely interested in their
physical and mental condition. They both received extensive physicals and
psychological exams, gave blood regularly (ostensibly for their own
protection should they become badly wounded in battle and need a reliable
source for transfusions), and periodic follow ups.
Then came the night of the 11th of January, 3025, and their lives as
they knew them ended.
Ryouga remembered almost all of it painful detail. They had been on
patrol in a light hovercraft, battlemechs being reserved for higher stages
of alert, when they were directed towards a position outside the landing
fields by the starport security chief to investigate a possible smuggling
operation. They turned out instead to be scouts or spies, probably for the
Combine, as he later reasoned, but Tarou had mocked his conclusion ever
since. At that point their otherwise reliable commo system had failed, and
they were unable to report their findings.
Unwilling to let the spies get away in order to report back to base,
Tarou suggested they follow the spies and wait for a chance to take care
of them. Ryouga reluctantly agreed, and they followed them to an off-limits
area almost a hundred kilometers from the starport. The area was restricted
to Household forces only, but with no way to sound the alarm, the two of
them decided to take matters into their own hands.
What followed was an utter nightmare that still made his skin crawl.
The Joketsuzoku had some kind of Star League era biological science lab
running in secret for a purpose he and his companion could not even guess
until it was too late. His memory was still vague on what happened inside,
though whether this was from the effects of the weird machinery that he
and Tarou fell victim to, or his own subconscious trying to protect him,
he did not know. The last thing he remembered before the change was the
sight of a red-haired girl flying at him from above, being chased by a
large and furry black and white beast.
When consciousness returned, he was no longer human. What was worse
was the sight of the thing that had become Tarou towering before him and
wailing in terror and anguish. He fled the facility in panic, with the
thing that Tarou had become chasing after him.
It was only much later that they came to their senses enough to stop
running and take stock of their situation, and dumb luck in the form of
Tarou's clumsy fumblings with a hot flask of coffee left behind in their
hovercraft to reverse their hideous mutations. They had left their uniforms
and ID cards back at the demonic laboratory, making it clear that the
Commonwealth forces would consider them among the spies that had broken in.
Fear and utter loathing of the Commonwealth for the black arts they had
chosen to dabble in had made them decide to make a run for it, and so just
before daybreak they marched their battlemechs to the starport and hired a
tramp freight hauler bound for the League to take them out of the system.
Their money was only good enough to get them as far as Capra. Since
then they had been on the run from the Commonwealth, who were now rumored
to have put a price on their heads. As for their transformations whenever
they were splashed with cold liquids, neither he nor Tarou would speak of
it to the other, much less to anyone else. The closest either came to the
subject was talk of revenge on the Commonwealth, which had forged a bond
between them that no amount of previous combat had been able to create.
But Tarou had another axe to grind; the reason they were now out in
the middle of the wastes looking for a Locust battlemech. He considered it
to be no accident that they had ended up at the lab that night, and that
they fell victim to such a horrendous fate. Ryouga had listened to him
night after night since their arrival on Capra about how the Commonwealth
doctors had done such extensive testing on them before that night. He was
convinced that they had been used as unwitting guinea pigs for some kind
of freakish Commonwealth experiment, and he was convinced that Happousai
was ultimately responsible for their present miserable conditions.
Now Tarou was convinced that he had seen Happousai, of all places, on
the very shithole planet they had been exiled to by blind chance. Ryouga
wasn't sure what to make of Tarou, whom he knew wasn't entirely all there
upstairs *before* their trip to Lightoller. He decided not to press the
issue. The two battlemechs turned with the grace of rhinos and began
marching back the way they came.
A kilometer away, a cunningly painted Locust stood against the rock
face with its reactor down. A battlemech could have marched right past the
well camouflaged war machine and never noticed it - which was just the way
the Locust's pilot preferred things.
Happousai watched as the two battlemechs receded over the line of
ruddy hills, and puffed on his pipe. It was a very near thing as far as
he was concerned. He hadn't lived as long as he had by taking foolish
risks, but to be fair to himself he reflected that there was no mention
of Pansuto Tarou and Ryouga Hibiki in the rosters of the mercenary
battlemech company he was observing.
Those two were going to be trouble, he decided. The rest of the
mercs were a bunch of third rate cupcakes who had deserted from the
Federated Shiratori - easy pickings. Hereditary mechwarriors like Hibiki
and Tarou could eat them for lunch, and they'd certainly be a handful for
the company of Combine mechs scheduled for a surprise raid on this
dustball.
He took another thoughtful puff on his pipe.
The direct approach wasn't going to work. He may have been one of
the best mechwarriors in the Inner Sphere, but his Locust wasn't going
to make it toe-to-toe with a BattleMaster and a Hunchback. Neutralizing
the two was going to require personal action on his part.
Happousai nodded to himself as a plan formed.
Chapter Five
Kawaii City, the Capitol of the
Federated Shiratori
Planet Genevieve, Martina System
2 February 3025
Brigadier Ukyo Kuonji of the Federated Shiratori battlemech forces
waited outside the throne room of her Goddess-Empress, Azusa the First,
with her adjutant. She wore her dress blue uniform with all her medals and
braid for the audience with the Empress, and strapped to her back in place
of a sword was her family weapon, an implement that looked suspiciously
like a humongous spatula. Despite her rank and her dedication to her career
as a mechwarrior, Ukyo looked distinctly uncomfortable in her dress blues.
She disliked having to speak to the Empress and dealing with her fawning
sycophants, but for what she wanted it would be necessary.
Major Konatsu, Ukyo's devoted adjutant, looked prim and military
proper at first glance, but upon closer inspection the skillfully applied
makeup, fastidious grooming, and hand tailored uniform brought out a
distinctly feminine side that drew second looks from male passers-by. It
was only upon learning who the attractive young officer was that the men
shied quickly away, for Konatsu was in fact male.
Konatsu checked his watch, a little golden heart-shaped pendant with
brilliantly executed scrollwork and decorative enameling.
"Pardon me, sir," he said gently to Ukyo. "But it's past three-thirty."
Ukyo blew her chestnut bangs out of her eyes.
"Tell me about it, sugar," she groused. "We've only been standing here
waiting for the last hour."
She brushed at a piece of lint on her jacket. Wool attracted lint like
a magnet.
"I suppose we only have another hour or so to go."
Konatsu nodded absently. One of the things that endeared him to Ukyo
was his unflappable patience, something she herself did not possess in
any great abundance.
"Yes sir," he demurred, then smiled coyly at a young General Staff
lieutenant who dared a second glance. The lieutenant blushed furiously
and continued on.
Ukyo had noted the brief exchange and sighed. Here she was in the
flower of her youth, fairly pretty if she was any judge of appearances,
and quite desperately single. Meanwhile, her adjutant, who was in fact
a man even if he was a little confused on the whole gender issue, was
getting all of the attention from the guys.
Konatsu stiffened beside her, bringing her attention to the swaggering
figure of General Mikado Sanzenin, the Chief of Staff for the Federated
Shiratori Armed Forces. Mikado was making a beeline straight for her, and
he was not alone. She bit down briefly on her lip when she noticed the
attractive red-haired captain by his side.
As he neared within three paces she reluctantly snapped to.
"Brigadier Kuonji," he said absently, returning her less than
enthusiastic salute with one equally sloppy. He then took Konatsu's white
gloved hand and with a warmly said "Major Konatsu," kissed it gently,
causing the adjutant to blush. Ukyo for her part thought she was going
to be sick. Mikado knew full well about Konatsu, and while there was
absolutely no evidence to support the notion that he swung both ways, he
was most assuredly sincere in his efforts to flatter Konatsu.
"General Sanzenin," she and Konatsu returned. There was a considerable
difference in the level of enthusiasm present between the two of them, and
Ukyo felt like stomping on her adjutant's foot.
"Have you met Captain Curtiss before?" Mikado asked Ukyo with one of
his patented teeth-gleaming smiles. The captain, who couldn't have been in
the service more than six months judging by her overwhelmed look, tried
to smile and yet still maintain respect for Ukyo and Konatsu's ranks.
She had beautiful red hair, deep and dark - not orange like most redheads -
piercing blue eyes, heart shaped face, a slim figure and curves in all
the right places. She also didn't look terribly bright, although that could
well have been chalked up to her present state of bedazzlement in the halls
of power. She was a real prize, Ukyo decided. No wonder Mikado had snatched
her up.
"No, sir, I don't believe I have," she returned, hoping that he was
simply here to show off and then leave. Mikado had always taken somewhat
personally her rebuff of him in the past, and every now and then would
attempt to demonstrate to her just what she was missing. So far it hadn't
had much more of an effect than annoying her.
"Captain Curtiss has just joined my personal staff," Mikado declared.
**Imagine that...** Ukyo thought dryly.
"She'll be taking over the strategic logistical planning system," he
went on, and alarm bells began ringing in Ukyo's head.
"That's quite a task," Konatsu said, stepping blindly into the trap.
Ukyo very nearly stomped on his foot in desperation.
"It is indeed," Mikado replied smugly. He was looking straight into
Ukyo's eyes as he did so, and she now confirmed by the twinkle in his eyes
that he meant to screw her over yet again. "So much so that I'm going to
have to personally see to the turnover process with Jane, I mean, Captain
Curtiss. We're going to my Winter Headquarters on Calliope to begin the
process..."
"But the Spring Manuevers!" Ukyo protested weakly. She was screwed,
and she knew it, but still the desperate plea escaped her lips. She wanted
to stomp on her own foot now. At least then she might have a dignified
excuse to slip away.
Mikado shook his head sadly. "You'll have to take over for me,
Brigadier Kuonji. This turnover process is too important to jeopardize.
One mistake could throw the entire army out of kilter for a year or more.
Besides, you've handled it exceptionally well before, something that can't
be said for other officers of the General Staff."
**That's because between you and the Empress you've managed to fill
the entire staff up with beautiful looking incompetants!** Ukyo screamed
to herself.
"I'm here to petition the Empress for diplomatic duty," she said
instead. "To the Nerima Confederation as a military attache."
Mikado shook his head.
"Sorry, my sweet, I need you here in the Federated Shiratori. You're
one of my only effective generals. You'll have to beg off to the Empress
in light of the new situation."
The urge to split Mikado's skull with her spatula began rising within
her, and Konatsu turned to offer a concerned look that was resolutely
ignored in favor of hellfire eyes directed at Mikado. The Commanding
General either ignored her or was oblivious, thinking that even now she
was under his spell.
"Yes sir," she sizzled.
"Excellent!" Mikado replied, sickeningly happy to have shirked his
responsibility once again in favor of seducing one of his junior officers.
"Carry on then, Brigadier. I expect detailed reports from the exercises
as they develop, and a copy of your orders has already been sent by guard
mail courier to your headquarters." He tossed them both jaunty salutes and
then took Curtiss gallantly by the arm. "Later!"
Ukyo Kuonji turned to her adjutant, her green eyes burning and her
heart pounding in her ears.
"I hate that man," she growled. "With a passion beyond words..."
Chapter Six
Tetsuyama Fortress
Capitol of the League of Five Nails
Planet Angbad, Melkor System
The League of Five Nails
3 February 3025
The private apartments of Hikaru Gosunkugi lay deep within the roots
of Tetsuyama Fortress, sheltered from the sanguine glow of the red giant
star Melkor and the prying eyes of his meddling parents. Bookcases carved
whole from single trunks of ironwood and Aldeberan black oak dominated most
of the available wallspace, while the remainder was taken up with portraits
of Akane Tendo. The collection of books were mostly of the bound paper
variety, though Hikaru was no technophobe, and maintained an equally
formidable library of electronic media. The photos and stereographs were
a combination of Nerima press shots and ones surreptitiously acquired
through his personal network of spies and informants within the Nerima
Confederation. Hikaru paid not in C-bills but in gold for the most candid
of these second variety.
The air hung heavy in these rooms, both from the many votive candles
that burned upon occasion during Hikaru's rituals, and from the lack of
adequate ventilation such a remote and withdrawn location within the
mountain dictated. Hikaru didn't mind, as he had been living this way for
most of his life. Visitors on the other hand frequently succumbed to the
oppressive weight of so much black basalt hovering over their heads, the
lack of fresh air, and the foreboding stacks of ancient and half-forgotten
books that dominated the place. These people often felt the sudden urge to
flee to the exposed battlements of the fortress and never return, which
suited Hikaru just fine.
He preferred his privacy, and despite his very public status as the
heir to the League of Five Nails, he made every attempt to maintain it.
His parents, no great lights themselves, wanted him to be some shining
example to his people. Hikaru could have cared less about the billions
of souls that called the League home and the Gosunkugis their liege lords.
Only one thing motivated him: his pursuit of Akane Tendo.
Akane was his love, his driving passion. She was the blessed light
of creation, the angelic goddess that inspired the poets of old and drove
men mad with desire. She was also, Hikaru was absolutely certain, destined
by the very Cosmos itself to be his.
The fact that he had never even met her face to face meant nothing to
him. Nor the reality that though the opportunity had arisen several times
during diplomatic functions between the two countries, he lacked the nerve
to approach her, much less even speak to her. None of it mattered, because
as he had read in the various and numerous auguries he had cast, Akane
would be ultimately be his.
Despite such cosmic assurances, he did have to admit that he had a
deadly rival for Akane's affections. Prince Tatewaki Kuno of the Furinkan
Combine also desired her, and had waged continuous war against the Nerima
Confederation since the day he took command of the Combine's army in order
to get her. The beleaguered troops of the Confederation had fought many
hard battles since then to keep her safe, and prevailed each time, which
in Hikaru's mind was proof enough of Fate's intention to deliver her to
Angbad as his bride.
Grudgingly, he admitted that while the cosmos smiled on his future
union with Akane, he couldn't sit completely idle and wait for her to
come to him. The Combine's military might was slowly pushing back the
Confederation while the League fought indecisive skirmishes that brought
him no closer to his goal.
Clearly the path to Akane did not lie with military action. He was
intelligent enough to see this, but his entire family was sotted with the
old triumphs, the old conquests. They could not see that the glory days
of the Army of the League of Five Nails were long past, that they had
become weak and impotent on the battlefield.
His parents were the most blind of all to this truth, pushing him
into a career as a mechwarrior when it was obvious that he lacked the
skills and the temperment to prevail in combat. He was the Heir to the
League, they reminded him, and the Heir's first duty was to the Army.
They did not want to understand that he answered a different calling.
The alternative to military action was intrigue. It was plain to
unclouded eyes such as his. Armed with such wisdom, he considered the
facts.
The Furinkan Combine was too great a power to successfully oppose on
an extended campaign. That was obvious. The war the Combine waged against
the Confederation was driven by one man, Tatewaki Kuno, for the purpose
of taking Akane Tendo for his bride. If Tatewaki were removed from the
equation, the war against the Confederation might lose momentum and the
Inner Sphere would return to its usual state of hostile equilibrium. Even
if peace did not immediately result, it solved Hikaru's problem with a
rival for Akane's love.
Removing Tatewaki Kuno would prove exceedingly difficult, and thus
prohibitively expensive. He had once made discreet inquiries among those
darker elements of the Inner Sphere who specialized in such matters. It
was at a point not long ago when it seemed that the Combine was about to
flatten the Commonwealth like a nuclear powered steamroller, and the
situation had seemed desperate. Fortunately the Confederation rallied
soon afterwards, though Hikaru had spent many a sleepless night in prayer.
What he learned from his inquiries was that Tatewaki Kuno was often
considered for assassination by elements both within the Combine and
without, and due to a little healthy paranoia on his part and an elite
staff of fanatics who served as his personal guard, was a tough nut to
crack. At one point the use of nuclear weapons was bandied about before
being quashed as doing more harm than good. In any event no hit man would
even consider the job without a ridiculous fee, at least half of it up
front, and the rest waiting in escrow, with clauses for the killer's next
of kin, to receive on completion.
There were other problems with assassination, and reprisal was one
of them. State-sanctioned murder of another state's heirs lowered the bar
of acceptable conduct far too much for Hikaru's taste. The Inner Sphere
had barely lurched back from the brink after the First Succession War,
and he had no desire to be next on the chopping block.
What he really needed was a plan to spirit Akane out of the Nerima
Confederation. Once she was with him she would fall madly in love with
him, and together they would demand of her father the entire Confederation
as a dowry. Grand Duke Soun Tendo was a nervous wreck and a doting fool;
there was no chance that he would refuse to capitulate, Hikaru was certain
of it.
He also needed to craft and execute this plan from some point away
from Tetsuyama and the interferance of his parents. They would not approve
of such methods unless it was presented to them as a _fait accompli,_ and
so he had no use for them. Where to go, and how to keep his parents out
of his hair?
As he paced down a short hall from his study to his bedroom an answer
to his dilemma came to him.
He would go on campaign. With a large portion of the League's army at
his disposal he would have troops, battlemechs, DropShips, JumpShips, bases
near the frontier, supplies, wide access to funds, special forces and
intelligence personnel; everything he would need to carry out his plan.
His commands to his personal spy network would be concealed within the huge
volume of message traffic flowing through the headquarters of an army corps.
He would also be far away from Tetsuyama, and his parents would be fooled
into thinking that he had finally come around to their desires.
It was perfect!
Suddenly inspired, he rushed to his private shrine. Once there he
hurriedly donned the headdress and lit the candles. Two carefully crafted
straw effigies were withdrawn from the shrine, one resembling Grand Duke
Tendo with a long moustache and the other like Tatewaki Kuno with blue
rice paper hakama and a katana etched from a toothpick. Each was stuffed
with hairs taken secretly and at great expense from their respective
victims.
Hikaru then took a namesake iron spike and drove it with a curse
through each effigy. The spike used on the Kuno effigy was driven through
with a single blow, an omen Hikaru found to be especially auspicious. The
other was driven through with a similar ease. The gods had spoken. Fate
had chosen Hikaru Gosunkugi for the richest prize the Inner Sphere had
ever known.
Akane Tendo.
END OF PROLOGUE
A SUMMARY OF THE SUCCESSOR STATES
OF THE STAR LEAGUE, ca. 3025 CE
HOUSE TENDO
(The Nerima Confederation)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Nerima Confederation is headed by the widower Grand Duke Soun Tendo and
his three daughters, Kasumi, Nabiki, and Akane. The Confederation holds on
to its territory by mere fingernails. It is pressed on two fronts by the
Furinkan Combine and the League of Five Nails. It maintains a relaxed
neutrality and trade pact with the Federated Shiratori, and has little
formal contact with the isolationist Jusenkyo Commonwealth. In reality it
is a state living on borrowed time, where only the most desperate of
gambles can hope to save it from total subjugation.
HOUSE KUNO
(The Furinkan Combine)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Furinkan Combine is the most powerful of the five Successor States.
It is led by a deranged lunatic and his two equally unbalanced children.
The battlemech forces are led by Tatewaki Kuno, and have made significant
attacks on Nerima Confederation territory. Tatewaki is obsessed with Akane
Tendo, and hopes to gain her as a prize of his conquest of the Nerima
Confederation. Kodachi Kuno has her own axe to grind with Akane Tendo,
though she usually prefers to act as foil for her brother's plots.
The Furinkan Combine is at war with the Nerima Confederation and with the
League of Five Nails, who are also trying to conquer the Confederation and
wed Akane Tendo to one of their own. The Combine maintains a watchful guard
against the Jusenkyo Commonwealth and the Federated Shiratori.
HOUSE GOSUNKUGI
(The League of Five Nails)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The League of Five Nails is actually second to the last in wealth and power,
but by picking on the weakest nation, the Nerima Confederation, its status
has improved greatly over the last few decades. The League is run by the
Gosunkugi family, once wise and powerful and now decadent and failing. The
family's last hope rests with the heir, Hikaru. The League is at war with
the Confederation and with the Furinkan Combine. It maintains a good
relationship with the Jusenkyo Commonwealth, serving as an access point to
the rest of the Inner Sphere for Cologne's covert agents. The League has a
tepid relationship with the Federated Shiratori.
HOUSE JOKETSUZOKU
(The Jusenkyo Commonwealth)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Commonwealth is an isolationist state second in wealth and power in the
Inner Sphere, and first in the possession of technology. House Joketsuzoku
has in its possession a Star League biotechnic research facility and
cloning ward, and from this facility has come up with a terrible new
weapon: the Jusenkyo Effect. This mutagenic agent forces the victim to
assume a new physical matrix (usually an animal) almost instantaneously
after suffering a sudden change in external body temperature.
The Commonwealth has ties only to the League of Five Nails, using it to
infiltrate their agents into the Inner Sphere. The Commonwealth has also
heavily infiltrated Comstar, giving them almost unrestricted access to the
message traffic of the Inner Sphere - an Intelligence coup of the highest
order. Because of this, it is practically impossible to keep information
secret from House Joketsuzoku for long...
HOUSE SHIRATORI
(The Federated Shiratori)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Federated Shiratori is a state devoted to worship of its Goddess-Empress
Azusa. All other considerations of statecraft are secondary, although Azusa
has declared a jihad against the Furinkan Combine for the loss of one of
her pet commanders in a Combine raid. Free enterprise blossoms in the
Federated Shiratori under Azusa's benign anarchy, and the country is quite
prosperous. This prosperity has not translated into any military success,
however, as many of Azusa's generals are appointees chosen by her for their
looks rather than their ability.
The Federated Shiratori has declared a jihad against the Furinkan Combine,
though the Combine doesn't deign to reciprocate with its own declaration of
war. It has poor formal relations with the other states, as Azusa can't be
bothered by such trivialities as diplomacy.
____________________________________________________________________________
Author's Notes:
This fanfic cannot by its very nature as a fusion with Ranma 1/2 be as close
to canonical Battletech as some might prefer. Where I had to make a choice
between using the flavors of Battletech or Ranma 1/2, Ranma won out almost
every time. This is especially true where the curses are involved, but I
tried to make them the result of forbidden and dangerous technology rather
than magic. (Which isn't to say that things like ki-blasts and other special
attacks aren't possible. They most certainly are...)
I have also not been as strict with the allocation of specific 'mechs and
other war machines to their respective Houses. I realize that certain bits
of hardware like the Jagermech and the Rommel tank would not be found with
the 'Confederation,' but thought a certain amount of liberty was warranted
given the nature of the story. Also, I wanted everyone's choice of battlemech
to reflect in some way on the character piloting it.
Let me know what you think of all this.
Free The Nukes!