Sortek shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and shook his head. "Eventually you'll get there, Leftenant. But first, you and I will be shipping out to the Lyran Commonwealth. I've got inspections and official functions to attend. Now that you're a hero, we'll give a lot of influential people a chance to have their holographs taken with you."
Redburn frowned with puzzlement. "Isn't there someone else, say, from Redfield or from Galtor, who could go?"
Sortek shrugged and led the other man to the elevator. "Nothing more stale than yesterday's heroes. Besides, some people want to know how this training battalion idea is working out. Lots of resistance in House Steiner to MechWarriors trained in anything other than the Academies. Your men, and their performance against the Liao ambush, are hot right now."
Redburn nodded, but barely heard the words. Good luck, Justin. I know that deep in your heart you’re one of us. Somehow, I'll find a way to prove it.
15
Echo V
Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine
1 January 3027
Jiro Ishiyama bowed deeply out of respect for the wrinkled old monk who had led him through the twisting tunnels of the Zen monastery. Above them, on Echo V's barren, wind-scarred tundra, icy cyclones shrieked as they scourged the planet. Ishiyama fought the shiver provoked by the planet's chill, and respected the old monk even more because of his indifference to the cold.
Indeed, Ishiyama was swathed in the warm folds of a heavy coat, while the monk wore a simple black robe. Though the air was cold enough to show both men's breath, the monk wore only sandals, and had neither gloves to protect his hands nor a hood to protect his shaved pate. In the monk's eyes, however, Ishiyama saw no superiority or disdain for this visitor from far Luthien. Instead, Ishiyama read pity for the man who does not know himself well enough to exist as one with the cold.
The monk looked beyond Jiro Ishiyama and wordlessly directed the two initiates bearing the visitor's lacquered trunks to pass around them. The initiates, bowing only their heads because of the burdens on their backs, passed through the garden to the small hut reserved for the cha-no-yu,the tea ceremony. The two initiates vanished into the hut for a moment, then returned to bow deeply to the monk and his visitor before disappearing into the dark tunnels of the monastery complex.
The monk inclined his head and half-smiled. "Sumimasen,Ishiyama Jiro-sama," he began slowly. "Excuse me if I speak slowly because we use words sparingly here."
Ishiyama bowed. "I am honored by the words you grant me." He looked out over the rock and bonsai garden that filled the underground cavern. The pale white gravel had been raked in long, undulating waves that truly made one feel that he were viewing a frozen ocean. Larger rocks, from the gray of granite to the glassy black-purple of obsidian, thrust up through the stone surf like defiant islands. Nestled in the naturally carven niches, bonsai trees pushed up as though part of the rock, while carefully nurtured mosses clung to the rock, adding the proper verdant touches.
The tea house stood in the center of the garden, and though of obvious human construction, it seemed to be an organic part of the garden. Styled after a pagoda, complete with wood lattice, rice-paper screen walls, and a red-tiled roof, the well-worn granite used to construct the tea house made it look as though the structure were even older than the garden itself. From beneath the tip of the tea house's peaked roof, gray smoke drifted almost imperceptibly.
Ishiyama breathed in and smiled at the familiar, pleasing aroma of burning cedar. Again, he bowed to the monk. "All is perfect. Your faithfulness honors the Dragon." The monk, obviously pleased, bowed his head. Both men knew that, as perfect as the garden might seem, Ishiyama would alter it in some subtle way to make it yet more perfect, and to bind it into the cha-no-yuthat he had travelled more than two hundred light years to perform.
"Do itashimash'te,Ishiyama Jiro-sama," the monk replied softly. "It is we who are honored that the Dragon sends you to grace us with your skill. Be assured that your preparations will not be disturbed. In four hours, I will send Kurita Yorinaga-ji to you."
"Domo arigato."Ishiyama bowed deeply and did not straighten up until the monk had silently departed the chamber. Ishiyama studied the garden. As his eyes followed the path of flat stones leading from the entrance to the tea house, he allowed himself to become absorbed in the beauty the monks had created. The garden, by its artistry and resonance, touched him deeply and peeled away layers of emotion and inner conflicts. The scene restored him to the centered feeling of peace that his trip across seven jump points had stripped away.
Ishiyama forced his mind to the cavern and the garden and his mission. He removed his thick, quilted mittens, stuffed them into his coat pockets, pulled off his boots, and then crossed to where a bamboo rake lay hidden in a shadowed niche. Brandishing it with the care and reverence a warrior might give to his 'Mech, Ishiyama slowly stepped out onto the stone path. Three stones out, he used the rake to gently tease four small pieces of gravel onto that third stone. He did nothing to change or repair how the gravel had fallen, and it might have been only that the last person to rake the gravel had been careless.
Ishiyama allowed himself a brief smile. Deliberately careless.Ishiyama knew that Kurita Yorinaga-ji would immediately spot the small white pebbles on the broad gray steppingstone. He knew, too, that Yorinaga-ji would take them as the first sign that the perfect universe, the universe that had trapped him, was changing.
Ishiyama looked up and concentrated. If the tea house is Luthien, then... He turned to the left and squinted. Reaching out with the butt of the rake, he gently pressed it into the gravel. Mallory's World, the site of Yorinaga-ji's disgrace, would be here.
Ishiyama reversed the rake and used the broad, toothed end to subtly alter the flowing wavelines around the mark he'd made for Mallory's World. Slowly, and with a patience bordering upon the superhuman, he reworked the gravel until one could see, if one knew how to look, minute ripples spreading from that point. Advancing ahead three more path-stones, Ishiyama completed the eleventh concentric ripple-ring—one for each year since Yorinaga-ji had disgraced himself. It was now just over an hour since he had first laid eyes on the garden.
Ishiyama backtracked to the garden's edge, and removed his coat and hat. The chill air sliced through the midnight-blue silken kimono he wore, and Ishiyama unconsciously retied the silver obi a bit tighter. Though difficult to see in the soothing half-light, a dragon figure coiled around the kimono, woven into the garment with slightly darker blue thread.
Ishiyama again studied the tea house and compared it to Luthien's location on the star chart he'd memorized. Further to the left than the mark he'd made for Mallory's World, and just a bit closer to the tea house, he touched one edge of the rake into the sea of pebbles to mark the location of Chara. With benign and skillful care, he flipped the rake over and used its flat edge to smooth away any trace of his original mark on the stones. Only the briefly broken lines of the stone-sea currents suggested that any movement had occurred.
Ishiyama allowed himself another smile. Most would miss it.He shook his head. But not Yorinaga-ji.
Finally, Ishiyama walked the path to the tea house, but he did not enter it. Instead, he carefully walked around the tea house's narrow ledge out onto the ocean of gravel behind it. He sighted a perfect spot to represent the planet Echo, and boldly touched the rake butt into the gravel to mark it. Backtracking, he raked the stones back into their previous pattern. By the time he had returned to the tea house, only the invisible depression representing Echo gave any clue to his passage.