Lethal heritage Page 21

  "Bid?" Phelan didn't understand at all. "Your 'Mechs might be good, but this isn't a game ..."

  Ranna look at him with steel in her blue eyes. "No, Phelan, this is not a game." Tension filled her voice and body. When a large data monitor mounted on the wall flashed to life, her head whipped around and she watched the scene below intently.

  In the holotank, the Star Colonels shook hands, then left the display. Ulric nodded to Lara and she said something, but the sound did not make it through the window. Behind her, fifteen eight-pointed, red dagger-stars lined themselves up on the wall-mounted data display beneath an icon that Phelan decided represented the Dire Wolf. At the same time, a small device clipped to Ranna's belt beeped and a red LED lit up.

  Ranna smiled wolfishly and rubbed her hands together. "Yes, open with everything and see how he cuts it."

  Marcos thrust a fist in the air and shouted something, but again the sound was lost to those in the observing room. Beneath the line of stars that materialized when Lara spoke, another line appeared, but this one had only fourteen stars. Lara immediately replied to Marcos, and two of the stars vanished from her line. Marcos countered and Lara matched him, leaving each row equal in length at a dozen stars.

  Phelan looked over at his companion. "What just happened?"

  The Clanswoman held her right hand up to forestall another question. "Preliminaries, that is all. They are both at twelve stars and it is Marcos's bid."

  Marcos turned and huddled with a couple of other Clan officers, including Vlad. Phelan saw the Precentor Martial say something to Ulric, which brought a nod from the Khan and a sour look to the ilKhan's face. Lara watched her adversary through the holotank and waved off advice from her supporters.

  Marcos turned and grinned confidently. He offered a bid that removed three of the dagger stars, replacing them with three small, five-pointed, blue-white stars and three green, four-pointed dagger-stars trimmed in silver. The ilKhan saluted that bid, and Marcos stared at his opposition.

  Lara's return bid swept away three of the dagger-stars, but put nothing up in their place. Marcos looked stricken, and the blood drained from the ilKhan's face. Ulric nodded a silent salute to Lara, and the Precentor Martial matched the gesture.

  "No!" Ranna looked down at the device on her belt as the red light died. Anger and frustration warring for control of her face, she slumped down on the couch beneath the window. "Why bid my star away?"

  Phelan folded a leg beneath himself and sat beside her. "What's the matter? Can't you explain any of this to me?"

  She turned to him, staring angrily as though she didn't recognize him. Then her mood softened to take him in again. "Lara and Marcos were bidding to see who could take the world with the least amount of equipment and personnel. Each of the red dagger-stars represents a Star of 'Mechs. The small blue-white stars represent a Star of Aero-Space Fighters, and the green dagger-stars are Elementals. Marcos's bid substituting three Aerostars and three Elemental stars for three 'Mech stars surrendered him no power. Lara realized Marcos had hit the low end of his confidence, so she dropped herself down to nine 'Mech stars. It gives her room to maneuver if she runs into trouble on the planet, and will be a great victory if she does not."

  Phelan frowned. "What do you mean by 'room to maneuver'?"

  Ranna looked at her hands. "Lara can call down forces equal to Marcos's last bid without surrendering any booty to him. With his agreement—something she is not likely to get—she could call down forces equivalent to her opening bid, but she would have to concede all sorts of things, making the victory worthless to her."

  "Oh." The mercenary peered at Ranna, trying to pierce the veil of dejection. "Why are you upset? I thought you wanted Lara to win the bidding war."

  "I did." She showed him the device that had been clipped to her belt as though in answer to his question. "It is just that the last 'Mech Star she bid away was mine. While she is down there fighting on New Bergen, I will still be up here."

  "Sorry. I didn't realize I was such poor company. I can see how you would prefer combat to ..."

  Irritation knotting her brows, she cuffed him playfully. "It is not that. But I want to be part of the invasion. This is the first assault since I tested into Star Commander and I want a chance to prove myself."

  Phelan covered her hands with his. "I understand."

  The door to the observation room slid open to admit Khan Ulric. Ranna and Phelan both stood immediately. If the Khan noticed their physical contact when he entered, he gave no sign. The Precentor Martial, a step behind him, did notice, but controlled his reaction perfectly.

  The Khan pointed toward the battle bridge. "Did you see what happened, Phelan? Did you understand it?"

  Phelan took a deep breath before answering. "I watched. I believe I understand. Your commanders bid against each other to see who can accomplish an objective with the least amount of personnel and equipment. I can see how it forces each to be as sharp as possible because, I assume, success in a mission breeds opportunity for more missions. What I don't understand is why you wanted me to watch this"— Phelan searched for the appropriate word—"ritual."

  The Khan spitted Phelan with a steady stare. "I wanted you to watch because I want you to understand. I want you to understand because I want you to see how we think and operate."

  The mercenary frowned. "I am honored, but how does that make me more valuable to you?"

  "You underestimate yourself, Phelan. The ilKhan has decided that because our next target lies near the border of our attack zone and that of the Ghost Bears, I will have to bid against Khan Bjorn for the right to take it. You are acquainted with how your people make war, and from what the Precentor Martial tells me of your background, you possess a most unorthodox military mind. I want you to help me prepare my bids. Our next target is a ripe plum, indeed, and I mean to have it."

  Ulric reached out and clapped the younger man on both shoulders. "With your help, Phelan Kell, Rasalhague will be mine."

  23

  Edo, Turtle Bay

  Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine

  7 May 3050

  Crouched in the darkness of the storm drainage tunnels beneath Kurushiiyama, Shin Yodama adjusted the light sensitivity of his mirrored faceplate. The device, which had been given only to the yakuza's "wet" team, concentrated the available light streaming in through the small, round drainage hole above them. With the amplification, the meager light pouring down through the drains dotting the tunnel's spine looked like harsh spotlights.

  Shin glanced at the luminous time display on the upper left corner of the faceplate. Above, the time slowly increased toward midnight. Below, seconds and minutes clicked down as the deadline for their attack approached. Shin smiled, trying to fool himself out of the nervousness that had his stomach churning. We're here a full minute ahead of schedule. Three minutes and counting.

  The wet team had approached the prison by swimming beneath the Sawagashii River, then located the ferrocrete tunnel where the Old Man had found temporary refuge after his escape years ago. It led deeper into the prison, and was designed to carry water from the monsoons and other storms to the river. The two-meter-diameter tunnel had long been dreamed of as an escape route, but all the drains leading down into it were too small to admit any prisoner, and no one had the equipment to break through the ferrocrete that lay between him and the path to freedom.

  Shin watched as two of the dozen-man team placed the explosive charges in a circle around one of the drains. Those shaped charges should blow up and out with enough force to open a hole for us to climb through into the cell blocks. The MechWarrior glanced up at the drain. I hope the yakuza who volunteered to get themselves incarcerated so they could get word to the Legion's people will be able to get out again. Motochika had been first in line for that duty.

  To reassure himself, Shin dropped a hand to the curious weapon he had been given for the assault. Mated to the body of a laser rifle, the barrel and action of a pump-fed shotgun clung
to the underside of the laser's barrel. For the sixth time since entering the tunnel, Shin looked at the pulse duration selector for the laser and held himself back from increasing it to a full half-second. If a .25 second bolt can't melt its way through something, the shotgun will just have to knock it down.

  Mindful of his encounter with an armored infantryman half in and out of his armor, Shin had filled the bandolier hanging across his chest with heavy slugs. That the shotgun would eject to the right and cross his line-of-sight bothered the left-handed yakuza a little, but he dismissed the concern as trivial. If that's the worst thing that happens to me in this operation, I will be doing fine. More practically, Shin drew confidence from the bandolier's heavy weight and the fact that the thigh pockets of his black fatigues bulged with power packs for the laser rifle.

  As the last minute counted down on the clock, Shin and the rest of the team moved back down the tunnel. Thirty seconds to the blast. The yakuza outside the prison should start their rocket barrage soon now. The Inferno missiles should shake up these invaders a bit and even provide us some illumination. If they miss their deadline, we just switch the explosives over to remote ... No, there they go.

  The thunderous rumble of SRM and Infernos exploding against the prison walls and gates reached the tunnels below Kurushiiyama. As flames soared high into the sky, enough light flickered down through the storm drains to nearly blind the team waiting below. As the last second vanished from his faceplate clock, Shin ducked his head, screwed his eyes shut and clapped his hands over his ears.

  The force of the explosion bounced him a meter back down the tunnel, but he recovered his balance almost instantly. Uncoiling like a snake, he darted forward. In the shower of dust filtering down from the hole, Shin saw the twisted ends of the metal bars that had formed the tunnel's skeleton. Letting the rifle swing back on its shoulderstrap, he grabbed a bar and pulled himself up into the dark confines of the prison laundry.

  Others also clambered up and out of the hole, then spread out to form a perimeter. Firelight streamed in through the barred windows, dispelling all but the most dense shadows. Shin pointed one man to check a line of washers that had been tumbled over like dominoes in the blast, then sent others forward toward the doors. When his scouts reported all clear, Shin moved the team out.

  We 're in the lowest level of Katana Block. Up the corridor, around the corner to the stairwell, through the checkpoint, and we reach the Gallery. Blow the bar-locks and everyone is free. Shin moved to the front of the group. He stopped at the end of the corridor, glanced quickly around the corner, then waved the others onward. Another man dropped to one knee at the base of the stairs while Shin swept past him, taking them two at a time.

  A flash of motion caught by the faceplate's enhancement of his peripheral vision gave him enough warning. Shin launched himself into a rolling dive that took him to the stairs' first landing. He ignored the grinding pain in his back as he somersaulted on the bandolier. Reaching a sitting position, he slewed himself around so that his back slammed into the landing's far corner, pounding pain through him again.

  Needles of laser light burned yellow-green flames in the bricks just above bis line of travel. In the laser rifle's backlight, Shin saw the hulking shadow of a man silhouetted between the stair railing and the building wall. Shin swung his own weapon into line with the apparition, then jerked the shotgun's trigger and hit the laser's firing stud.

  His laser bolt caught the Smoke Jaguar just above the waist of his dark green jumpsuit. The shotgun slug slammed nto the laser rifle, destroying its energy coils in a brilliant electric-blue flash, then ricocheted into the invader. It enered his chest just above the laser wound and spun the warior away into the wall. The Smoke Jaguar hit the bricks hard, then rebounded and cascaded limply down the stairs to Shin's feet.

  Two more yakuza ran up the stairs. One knelt beside the Smoke Jaguar and checked his throat for a pulse, while the other dropped to Shin's side. "Are you hurt?"

  Shin shook his head, then rubbed his right hand against the left side of his chest. "The gun was just seated wrong. It recoiled into my ribs." He rolled forward and scrambled to his feet without assistance. He straightened up slowly, then pumped another shell into the shotgun's action. "Wait! What are you doing?"

  The man who had knelt next to the invader had drawn a knife from his boot. "He still lives!"

  Shin felt a hollowness in the pit of his stomach. He nodded to the man, who then cut the Smoke Jaguar's throat. Shin motioned to another member of the team to move up the stairs and pointed toward the steel door set back from the top of the stairs. As the man unlimbered a portable rocket launcher, Shin carefully deployed those yakuza who had not already taken up their assigned positions. "Go!"

  The armor-piercing rocket's depleted-uranium tip punched through the door like a bullet through an apple. Two meters beyond the thick steel slab, the rocket's warhead exploded within a narrow rectangular chamber. A jet of fire stabbed back out of the entry hole to scorch the stairwell wall, then subsidiary flames created a reddish-yellow corona around the door seconds before it tottered from its tracks and smashed flat against the ferrocrete floor.

  Smoke billowed from the chamber beyond the door. The upper half of each wall had been blown out by the blast, sowing glass shrapnel through the guard chambers on either side of the security checkpoint. Through the smoke and beyond, Shin saw into the Gallery.

  Two yakuza moved in low, then lofted anti-personnel grenades into the guard stations. Twin explosions sounded one after the other, and some of the barbed, plastic flechettes from the grenades bounced out to the stairs. One of the two men rose up and took a step forward, then hesitated for a fatal second.

  Three scarlet laser bolts shot through the smoke and punctured his chest. Energy only partially spent, they burst through the back of his black tunic, igniting cloth as they did so. The yakuza spun around, collided with the railing at the top of the stairs and pitched head over heels. His body landed with a wet thud at the bottom of the stairs and lay very still.

  The blood-streaked Smoke Jaguar in the guard's chamber disintegrated in the withering hail of return fire. Dozens of little fires burned like votive candles in the wall beyond his position. The furthest-forward yakuza stayed low and moved through the checkpoint. His appearance on the other side of the doorway brought a cheer from the inmates while more detonations shook the building from outside.

  "Yamato, prepare to blow the bar-locks." Shin waited until Yamato had climbed through the empty windows to the guard station before he charged into the Gallery. Even though he'd studied plans of the building to where he found himself wandering through it in his dreams, the reality of it shocked him. This is a wastebin for humanity!

  Rising up to a height of ten tiers, the Gallery formed a gray, cold ferrocrete canyon separating dark walls dotted with even darker holes. Arms and legs jutted between prison bars like insect appendages hanging from the mouth of a lizard. Thousands of voices echoed through the room, filling it with a murmuring chaos that drowned out all but the sharpest explosion from outside.

  Shin darted toward the staircase leading to the upper levels of the cell block. A shotgun blast blew the lock from the wire-mesh door. Shin ripped it aside and sprinted up the stairs. Hohiro is in Cell Seventeen, Tier Three. Another shotgun slug mangled the lock on Level Three and gave Shin access to the tier's balcony.

  People jammed the doorways, stretching their arms out to claw at him and draw him closer, desperation on their faces. They all want to be free, but they're terrified they'll never make it. We've got to get them out.

  He found the mouth of Cell Seventeen and leveled his gun at the inmates choking it. They melted back, leaving Shin a clear view of Hohiro seated on a cot. He'd raised himself up on his elbows and had an expectant look on his face, but the circles under his eyes and the bloody rag wrapped around his right leg gave the yakuza the true story of Hohiro's condition.

  Shin stepped to the balcony and raised his right hand. Someone
down below relayed the signal to Yamato. A sharp flash of light preceded the report of an explosion and the resulting alarm signal. A series of metallic clicks sounded up and down the cell blocks, and inmates quickly pulled their limbs back through the doors. The steel-bar portals slid back throughout Katana Block, and the denizens of the cells poured out.

  Shin fought his way through the press of prisoners into Cell Seventeen. He pulled his faceplate back onto the top of his head and seated himself on Hohiro's bunk. Pulling free the medical pack from its straps at the small of his back, he smiled at his Sho-sa. "Sorry we could not come for you sooner."

  Hohiro laughed with relief as tears rolled down his ashen face. "I am glad you came for me at all. Even when word got through that something was going to happen, I couldn't believe it. I should have known you would come up with something."

  Shin shook his head. "I am merely the servant of a master craftsman, doing what I have been told." He ripped open the leg of Hohiro's prison togs up to mid-thigh, then pulled a white adhesive patch from the medical pouch. He pressed it to Hohiro's leg, just above and behind the knee. "That's for the pain. Can you walk?"

  Hohiro nodded, the tension lines around his eyes beginning to ease. "I can walk, maybe run for a short distance."

  "Good. Bare your right forearm." As Hohiro complied with the command, Shin slapped a blue patch to the crook of his elbow. "You'll sleep for a week after we get out of here, but this stuff should keep you going until then."

  Screams and the sounds of gunfire echoed up to the cell. Hohiro grabbed Shin's arms, the second drug having already sharpened his reflexes and increased his strength. "What's going on?"

  Shin freed himself from Hohiro's grip. "I don't know. Crawl along the balcony to Cell Fifteen and wait for me there." The yakuza pulled his faceplate on again, fed three more shells into the shotgun, and ran to the cell's entrance. What he saw below brought him up short and took his breath away.