Part 734: Let's Read Close Quarters - Part 2
Chapter 4New Horizons
Somewhere in the Periphery
30 June 3056
Cassie is 25. New Horizons is not on any map of the Inner Sphere, so when they say ‘Periphery’ they mean ‘Deep Periphery.’ This chapter isn’t that great, it smacks of editorial interference. It’s both the first time we see Cassie as she is rather than as the scared little girl she was and it’s a ‘hook’ to get teenage boys and adult nerds to read the novel.
The 17th Recon Regiment, Cassie included, is hunting pirates who have a base under a lake. The whole area is swampy which the pirates have used to defeat other attackers, but Cassie has scouted out the safe places and moved the pirates’ beacons so they won’t know where the safe paths are anymore. She finds a footprint which she immediately identifies as a Marauder’s. She wants to kill it. Cassie in 3056 is just a hair shy of completely insane.
The 17th calls her Abtakha, after the Clan word for a captive taken in battle. She’s part of the 17th’s battalion of scout infantry, nearly all of whom were cowboys back on Sierra, Cerillos, and Galisteo the so-called “Southwest Trinity Worlds” of the Free Worlds League. New Horizons was once known as Crotch, which is fairly appropriate since the area they’re in is a bayou. We’re introduced to Captain Father Doctor Roberto “Call me Bob” Garcia, a Jesuit priest who is, among other things, the unit’s historian. He will be important, much later. For now it’s enough to know that he exists. Cassie calls the artillery units to be ready, they’ve pre-plotted some attacks based on Cassie’s scouting and her work with the local population of Filipino-Cajuns.
The artillery commander, Diana Vasquez, actually thanks Cassie for doing her job. It’s implied that Diana is both very conscious of others and that Cassie doesn’t get along with most of the unit’s Mechwarriors. Both are true. She nearly stumbles into a lazy pirate patrol, nearly giving away the entire attack, but they’re preoccupied and Cassie murders them both with her dagger without a second thought. It’s implied that she’s killed with her blade often enough that she can’t enjoy the 1990s action movie clichés that are apparently still common in 3056.
Cassie is a remorseless killer and an abhorrent human being.
She’s prepared the swamp with a bunch of fake fireworks launchers that look and sound a lot like LRM barrages. The pirates deploy in confusion and the Marauder she was hoping to kill eats one of Diana’s Arrow IV missiles to the face as its deploying from the pirates’ underwater base.
Colonel Carlos “Tiburón” Comacho orders Cassie out of the Battle Area, which she ignores. She gets yelled at by “Buffalo Soldier,” whom Cassie refers to as a “Rastaman.” Which is pretty fantastic imagery: dreadlocks and a cowboy hat. Many of the best background characters in this trilogy are black.
Cassie lures a pirate Locust off the safe paths and bogs in down in the swamp when it tries bunny hop from one patch of safe ground to a beacon Cassie has moved into a dangerous spot. Cassie hides from the Locust in the den of a burrowing creature she’d scouted previously, and it bogs itself down in the mud. Cassie doesn’t kill the pirate Mechwarrior, she lets him run because she’s already got the trophy she wanted.
Yes, I’m conflating Cassie with the Predator.
This is true, IIRC she won’t kill another `Mech in this novel. The “Mary Sue” vaunted for taking out BattleMechs “barehanded” (by preparing the battlefield and luring overconfident Mechwarriors into traps by shooting at them and literally flipping them the bird) scores two BattleMech kills in four chapters to establish she can do so and then moves on to what actually matters: a few people’s efforts to save our psychopathic main character from herself.
Chapter 5
Imperial City, Luthien
Pesht District, Draconis Combine
27 August 3056
The Kokuryu-kai Black Dragon Society is plotting secret attacks on the Federated Commonwealth to take advantage of Victor Davion’s weakness. Subhash Indrahar has them all killed on the spot, and releases the recording of the murder publically to discourage others from joining Kokuryu-kai. He’s joined by Takura Migaki (who is the head of the ISF’s Propaganda Branch). Migaki will be important in the third novel, but presently he’s barely a bit character. We learn that Ninyu Kerai Indrahar has been sent to Hachiman. Dun-dun-dun. This was a short chapter.
Chapter 6
Masamori, Hachiman
Galedon District, Draconis Combine
27 August 3056
Our viewpoint character this chapter is “a young man with a pencil-thin moustache” and a “beautifully chiseled profile.” He’s playing news reporter, and just like our friend Bethany Cochraine, he is a Almost Definitely Not A Spy. He chatters about Masamori and reveals that only the railroad bridges will support the weight of a BattleMech, none of the other bridges in or out of the river city will support the weight of a BattleMech. They must be awfully short bridges if they can’t handle 20 tons of regular traffic.
The 17th Recon Regiment is taking a parade route into town, because their employer Chandrasekhar Kurita is a showoff and the people of Hachiman love to party. Carlos Comacho is introduced fully here, piloting his captured Mad Cat D—for those not in the know, that’s arguably the Timber Wolf’s most dangerous variant. We’re also introduced to Gavilan Camacho, Carlos’s son, who drives a Shadow Hawk. Gavlian’s nickname should’ve been “Poor bastard,” because he’s going to turn out to be a rather sorry SOB.
Cassie is leading the procession on a bicycle, and we learn that our spy is Archie Weston,
Bob talks about the history of the Eastern Roman Empire for a bit (it’s the 90s, so he uses Byzantium), and Archie is surprised to learn that Bob Garcia pilots a Crusader. Nearly everyone in the 17th old enough to fight is a combatant, the regiment has little patience for conscientious objectors.
Chapter 7
Masamori, Hachiman
Galedon District, Draconis Combine
27 August 3056
Best characters of the novel are here. Lainie Shimazu, leader of the 9th Ghost Regiment, and her entourage Buntaro Mayne, Usagi and Unagi, and others are enjoying the festivities (and sizing up the possible opposition). The 9th Ghost Regiment is tasked with defending Hachiman, and being a Ghost Regiment, most of them are in the Yakuza. A fair bit of made-up slang is thrown around, the 9th refers to any traditionalist Kurita who can’t stomach Theodore’s military reforms as “Moustache Petes” among other things.
A disgraced Samurai kid with a purple-dyed top-knot (further proof that this is a ShadowRun novel) calls the 17th out as “not looking like much.” Buntaro Mayne reminds him that the Smoke Jaguars don’t just give Timber Wolves away, which pisses off the disgraced samurai kid. The 17th’s Mechs distract them a little more, especially a Locust (the same one Cassie captured a few chapters ago) which is covered in cheap plastic toys.
Disgraced samurai kid continues to piss off the ghosts until Lainie calls him “No-Name,” which is his nickname from now on. I don’t think we ever learn No-Name’s actual name until the moment he dies, which is a nice touch. He can’t challenge Lainie to an honor duel over the insult, she’s his commanding officer and doing so is a death sentence for his entire family. One of Lainie’s actually capable henchmen comments on the coincidence that “Uncle Chandy” has called up a bunch of offworld mercenaries within a few weeks of the 9th Ghost Regiment reaching full strength.
Chapter 8
Masamori, Hachiman
Galedon District, Draconis Combine
27 August 3056
We rejoin Cassie on a bicycle. She considers racing down the hill to Uncle Chandy’s factory but knows most of the 17th Recon’s Mechwarriors would take that as a challenge and that a lot of partying Draconis Combine citizens would get squashed in the stampede. So she doesn’t. She focuses on the terrain so we get a lot of descriptions of the city and the Uncle Chandy’s complex, Hachiman Taro Enterprises. Cassie is very detail oriented, which means she’s ignoring most of the sararimen. Masamori is done in the Yamato style, which means “monstrously attenuated shark fins” and “a terraced face slanting back toward a sheer vertical wall,” details I’d forgotten but can use for future maps.
Her paranoia is in full force, she’s worried about snipers and already watching for possible threats. The HTE complex is massive and walled for defense, with a firing step for BattleMechs and a sheer enough front to prevent BattleMechs from climbing it easily or shooting the buildings inside. We’re then introduced to Cowboy (and Cassie’s personal nemesis Captain Kali MacDougall) in the best possible way:
Cowboy’s at best 19, Kali isn’t much older. Cowboy is also the only character who I will guarantee does not change at all throughout the entire trilogy, and he’s fantastic because of it. One of the 17th’s Russian members immediately (and this is intentional on the author’s part) fucks up some historical details and likens the HTE complex to Stalingrad.
Cowboy
Please donate to help the poor flood victims down in Texas if you haven't already.
The smallest building in the complex is built like an ancient Japanese castle, because among other things Chandrasekhar Kurita is still a Kurita. He’s also Marvel Comics’ The Kingpin. He’s fat, but nearly every piece of art in the book (there was art in this book, which sadly did not make it into the Kindle version) depicts him as utterly gigantic in a more-muscle-than-fat sort of way.
This is Uncle Chandy:
Why no, he’s not a supervillain, why do you ask? (He’s totally a supervillain).
He’s backed by Mirza Peter Abdulsattah, who Cassie immediately spots as a killer. The Mirza is a strong contender for most dangerous man on the planet, and he’s backing the actual most dangerous man on the planet. Carlos climbs out of his Timber Wolf, and Cassie laments that the Smoke Jaguars cut out his heart on the planet Jeronimo. She doesn’t elaborate on what this means, but the Smoke Jaguars killed Patsy Comacho and Don Carlos has been utterly consumed with depression and regret. Uncle Chandy welcomes the regiment to Hachiman and the chapter ends. We are roughly 1/6th of the way through the novel.