Twisted away from facing the direction of the attack, Victor still saw the Thorthat had blown Renny's 'Mech to scrap. Facing the wrong way!As the Thorstalked forward, Victor tried to crank his 'Mech's right arm around to target it. Out of my arc! I'm dead!
The Thorpointed its left-arm autocannon at Victor. The pilot swung it into line with the back of Prometheus'head, as if to dispatch a wounded animal. It took one step closer, guaranteeing a kill, then jerked as if that last step had landed it on a live wire. As Victor watched, its center-torso armor went from black to red and then white. It melted over a round hole at the Thor'sheart, then the last vestiges of four large laser beams flashed through the opening.
"What in hell?" Victor brought his 'Mech to its feet as the Thorfroze, then slowly toppled to the side. "Whoever got that Thor,thank you very much."
A distant radio call filled with static answered him. "It was my pleasure, Victor Davion."
"Hohiro, is that you?"
"It is, Revenant Leader. The 311th Pesht Regulars are joining up now." In the distance, Victor saw the Kurita 'Mechs sprinting into view. "We would hate for you to think, on your first visit to the Combine, that we would let anything untoward happen to our guests."
36
Sian
Sian Commonality, Capellan Confederation
8 May 3052 (Day 8 of Operation Scorpion)
Though hardened by years of viewing the results of his mother's depravity, Sun-Tzu was shocked to see her and his father, Tsen Shang, in this way. It was not their nudity—he had seen his parents naked on various occasions—nor was it the apparent reconciliation that had placed both of them in the same bed. Tsen Shang, who had never been able to explain his attraction to Romano, had told Sun-Tzu that she would never kill him, and he would always return to her whenever she asked.
What surprised Sun-Tzu was the violence and obvious surprise that twisted their bodies. Tsen Shang had slipped out of bed, his legs apparently tangling in the sheet as he had made a dive for the bedside table. His attempt had toppled the table and spilled the laser pistol he sought onto the floor, just centimeters from his outstretched fingers. The carpeting beside his right hand had been slashed clear down to the floor by the razored fingernails on his three fingers as he clawed his way toward the pistol.
The laser wound in Tsen's back looked surprisingly bloodless. If not for the one thin ribbon running from the wound across his spine, the blackened circle could have been mistaken for an infected insect bite. It hardly looked sufficient to have stopped a man of Tsen Shang's size, but from its location, Sun-Tzu knew it had burst his father's heart.
He stood up from his examination of the body and wiped his hands on the legs of his trousers. "Given that you died trying to protect my mother, I suppose you died happily. Here, on Sian, that is unique indeed."
Looking at his mother, Sun knew the opposite had been true of her. Slumped back against the headboard, she looked as though she must have drawn herself up like a cat to hiss at her assailant. Fury still locked her face in a hideous death mask, but the position of her body made her look more piteous than frightful. Even so, Sun-Tzu could not help feeling more relief than sadness at her passing.
Sun-Tzu folded his arms across his chest to suppress a shudder. Romano's assassin had been most careful, the laser having struck his mother squarely between the eyes. Part of him recognized the wound's stigmata as being that of the Biblical mark of Cain, but he rejected that as an explanation for the shot. He knew his mother would have railed against her assassin and would have bragged that she could destroy
him using the powers centered in her third eye. What better proof that she was mad?
Even as he became confident of his reconstruction of what had transpired in his parents' bedchamber, the allusion to the mark of Cain haunted him. Cain was a fratricide, if I recall my mythology correctly.He knew his mother had ordered the death of her sister and he strongly suspected her of having had her own father killed. A symbolic gesture, then?
Immediately he knew who had slain his mother and father. "How fitting, how appropriate." He knelt once again and scooped up his father's laser pistol. He savored the cool smoothness of its grip and reveled in its weight. He knew where he would find the murderer and he resolved to thank him before he completed the job his mother's assassin should have done on New Avalon.
As he stalked through the corridors of the palace, he felt his heart begin to pound louder and faster, though he recognized it as anticipation, not fear. Avenging his parents would be his first action as the new Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation. According to his plans, his accession to the throne was decidedly premature. Nor had he anticipated the death of his father, though he had acknowledged the possibility that he might have to destroy Tsen Shang after he had eliminated Romano.
The realization of his full responsibilities might have crippled another, but Sun-Tzu was energized by them. He knew he would have to move swiftly to consolidate power, but not with the brutal public purges his mother favored. Such measures would not inspire the people's loyalty or confidence, but bred the opposite instead. No, he would quietly repudiate his mother's actions and pay some reparations to those who had lost kin to his mother's predations.
He would show his people the velvet glove, knowing he could always wield the steel fist it sheathed. To further unite them, he would launch a preemptive strike at one of the bases his Uncle Tormana maintained within the Federated Commonwealth. With enough evidence to prove they hoped to hit us, I will create an external threat that will bind us together.
He shifted the gun to his left hand, wiped the sweat from his right onto his trousers, then gripped the gun firmly again. With his left hand, he twisted the knob and smiled to find the door unlocked. He opened it slowly and slipped noiselessly into the room that had become his sanctuary. Pressing the door shut behind him, he studied the second pair of tracks in the dust and traced them around to the hooded, cloaked figure sitting in the chair behind the desk.
"Reports of your death have been greatly exaggerated, I see, Justin Allard." Sun-Tzu brought the pistol up and held it unwaveringly on the seated person. "I compliment you on the accuracy of your shooting. I had heard, on Outreach, that you were good with that wrist laser of yours, but I had not imagined such exacting skill."
"There are many things you cannot imagine, Sun-Tzu Liao," Candace Liao hissed as she sat forward and let the hood slip from her head. "Justin was good, very good, and he got the assassin who would have slain the two of us, but he was not good enough to avoid dying from a mortal wound."
Sun-Tzu, his mind reeling, blinked and felt his chest tighten. "How? You are supposed to be dead!"
Candace threw her cloak back from her left shoulder with a stiff motion. "You know, of course, that I was treated for breast cancer on New Avalon six years ago. I underwent a radical mastectomy and had the muscles rebuilt with myomer fibers. Your assassin's laser had enough power to burn through flesh, but myomer is a bit tougher than that. When I fell, I hit my head and was knocked out, creating the illusion that the smoking hole in my chest had killed me.