The waning inner moon of Lyons casts deep shadows in the courtyard of the 411, Skye Rangers' headquarters. A sentry pauses as he walks his rounds, taking a moment to stamp his feet and flail his arms across his chest in a futile aftemptto restore the circulation which the bitter cold has all but ' stopped completely. Muttering under his breath about being posted at a Godforsaken garrison on a God-forsaken world on the God-forsaken Kurita border, he retrieves his TK-70 assault rifle from where he rested it against the wall, and resumes his sentry-go. As the sentry turns a corner, a shadow detaches itself from the deep gloom not a meter away from where the guard had rested his weapon.
The shadow slips across the courtyard, moving silently as a ghost, hardly slowing its pace as it encounters one of the outer walls of the fortress. Swiftly and surely as a cat, it climbs up and over the wall, drops to the ground on the other side, and vanishes into the night.
There is no alarm that night. It is not until late the following afternoon, in fact, that the Officer of the Watch makes an alarming discovery. In one of the fortress headquarters' Secure Rooms -- vault-like chambers carved from solid rock and triple-guarded by check points and sentry stations -- he finds, resting next to the lock controls for the headquarters vault, the only trace which will be found of the fortress's midnight visitor: a small piece of black paper intricately folded into the shape of a crouching cat.
That cat -- an example of the ancient Japanese art form known as origami -- is proof that the Lyons garrison outpost has been penetrated tracelessly. At first, the cat is only a puzzle. Later, when a top Steiner intelligence operative learns of the find, the situation takes on a more ominous and sinister aspect. The origami cat is a calling card, of sorts; the fortress' visitor was Nekekami.
The garrison defense is thrown into an uproar by the revelation. The lists and catalogs of secret information stored within the Lyons fortress vault is checked and doublechecked. Nothing is missing. Was the vault penetrated? The origami cat was found outside the vault; perhaps the person who left it behind was unable to break in?
But if the shadowy visitor was Nekekami, almost anything is possible. Anything! How to be sure?
The Lyons garrison command intelligence department is still going over their lists of the vault's contents when the Kurita raiders materialize at the Lyons nadir JumpPoint. Union-class DropShips make high-G runs, avoiding AeroSpace defenses by timing their attack so that the Lyons orbital defense station and its squadron of Steiner Stingrays are on the far side of the planet. Ground forces move to their defensive positions, to find Kurita DropShips descending on a dry lake bed less than ten kilometers from an important machine tool plant at Cantaba, on Lyons'southern continent.
Crack Kurita companies fan out in formations obviously drilled in the importance of decisive moves and precise timing. The industrial facility is taken after the briefest of firefights with civilian security forces on duty around the plant-the nearest Steiner 'Mechs and armored forces are guarding a supply depot fifty kilometers distant-and Kurita 'Mechs and DropShip crews begin loading their booty. By the time the local garrison has mustered for a counterstrike, the raiders have boarded ship and boosted for deep space. Steiner Stingrays move to intercept; they are intercepted in turn by swift Kurita Shilones and Slayers.
The raiders escape. The final tally is grim: one Shilone and two Stingrays destroyed, 22 civilian security personnel and Techs dead, wounded, or missing, and some hundreds of millions of Cbs worth of carballoy steel, precision tools and machine dies, military spare parts, and microelectronics looted from the Steiner industrial plant.
The incident described above may sound unlikely, but it actually happened. Although the Steiner high command moved quickly to squash rumors that the Nekekami had struck -- that origami cat didn't necessarily prove that whoever had left it was Nekekami, after all -- the success of the Kurita raid on Lyons early in 3026 can only be explained by the assumption that someone penetrated the fortress vault undetected, examined the secret files stored there, and photographed or memorized enough to allow the Draconis Combine raiders to pinpoint the vulnerability of the Cantaba Plant, and the weaknesses in the Steiner garrison defenses.
The Lyons raid has all the earmarks of a successful Nekekami operation.
House Kurita has acquired something of a bad reputation when it comes to House relations with mercenaries, but there are always exceptions. The Nekekami are one such, a caste consisting of several family clans of professional spies and assassins which has been occasionally employed by House Kurita and by numerous individuals within the Combine's High Command, often with startling success.
They are rarely hired directly by the Luthien government, of course, for political reasons which should be obvious, but they have been employed by numerous high-ranking nobles, officers, and agencies within the Combine. It is rumored that they have been used at times by the ISF, though this is impossible to confirm. It is their history of success which makes them less mercenaries employed by House Kurita and more yet another of the weapons at the Combine's disposal in its never-ending struggle against the barbarian hordes pressing in upon its borders.
Nekekami: the Spirit Cats
The stories told of Nekekami agents and assassins are legion--so much so that it has become virtually impossible to separate fact from fiction. They are, in fact, a small clan, and difficult to locate, but the stories spread about their exploits can create the impression that they are everywhere. Stories are told of Spirit Cats who made themselves invisible, who walked through walls, who lowered their heartbeat and respiration to feign death or reduce their bodies'need foroxygen in tight, sealed spaces. Information about the Nekekami themselves is plentiful-but most is suspect, the product of exaggeration and fear, of guesswork and sensationalism, and at least partly a result of the disinformation activities of the Nekekami themselves.
Indeed, little is known for certain about this secret warrior clan, whose name is Old Japanese, meaning Spirit Cats. Certainly, the Nekekami don't speak of their activities to outsiders at all, and most of what is known about them has been garnered from interviews with various House and planetary security personnel, intelligence operatives, and some of the very few living eye-witnesses of Nekekami operations. It is known that at least one member of a Nekekami clan did talk, providing a rare glimpse into the clan's training, codes, and background.
Unfortunately, that lone informant died apparently of natural causes--in his prison cell within hours of his final interview.
For the most part, individual Nekekami are born into one of several closely related clans, families whose names and identities are secret, though it is rumored that all are influential, with numerous family members holding places of influence and power both in Kurita space and within the territory of other of the Successor State Houses. There are, in fact, two groups or "castes" within the Nekekami-the warriors themselves, and the non-warrior families who produce them. Only a few of the children of these families are chosen for training as Nekekami warriors. For those who are chosen-boys and girls -- training begins around the age of 10.
Training
Training methods follow the pattern of another secret warrior society with which the Nekekami is often compared-the Ninja of feudal Japan, on ancient Terra. A strenuous regimen of calisthenics and flexibility exercises is employed to strengthen the novice's body, while a series of puzzles and riddles serve to train the young warrior's mind to operate in logical patterns. Early in his training, the Nekekami apprentice receives his first instruction in weapons and weaponscraft, learning to shoot air-guns, and fight with light-weight wooden swords and knives. In these first few years, he also receives the rudiments of unarmed combat-karate, ju-jitsu, quick-kill, and other ancient martial arts chosen for their value in both physical and mental conditioning.
As the Nekekami trainee gets a little older, he begins learning techniques of stealthy movement, climbing, and concealment. He is also taught the basics of human anatomy and psychology. Around age 15, he begins training with projectile and energy weapons, as well as the melee weapons which he will use throughout his career. Instruction in the use of poisons and explosives comes later, as does training in sophisticated electronic espionage equipment. Some Nekekami are cross-trained in the skills of regular MechWarriors and Techs.
Throughout their years of training, the Nekekami are taught not only the skills of sabotage, espionage, and assassination, but an entire philosophy, a way of life and thought unique throughout the Inner Sphere, even among other secret warrior societies. Where some clans teach only the quick completion of the task at hand, by whatever means necessary, and others teach little beyond the techniques of assassination, the Nekekami teach their trainees to perform their missions with a minimum of bloodshed. "If a Nekekami draws steel, his mission has failed," teaches one proverb attributed to the Nekekami.
Indeed, the Nekekami stress that the secret warrior's mission, whatever it is, should be thought of as a work of art, carried out with skill, precision, subtlety, and elegance.
The origami cat left at the scene of a recent penetration of a security area within a garrison fortified compound is a case in point. It was first thought that the paper cat--an obvious reference to the warrior Spirit Cats and similar to items found at the sites of several Nekekami operations--could not possibly be the work of true Nekekami since they would not have advertised the fact that the garrison's security vault had been penetrated. A careful check of the secret documents stored in the vault indicated that none had been taken, and metal sensors built into the frame of the vault door would have registered anything--weapons, recorders, or camerascarried in or out.
As security checks within the garrison command proceeded, however, rumors that the garrison's security had been breached circulated among the troops. They became nervous. There were several incidents of men firing at shadows or their own comrades, and one 'Mech company commander ordered his Techs to begin careful maintenance checks of the unit's 'Mechs, looking for signs of sabotage.
In other words, the mere presence of the origami cat sowed doubt and confusion which actually served to further confound the planetary defenses, weakening them at a critical moment. In retrospect, it is obvious that the spy managed to learn the dispositions and make-up of most of the garrison's defense forces as well--he must have memorized them since a camera would have triggered an alarm--and that information told the Kurita raiders where to strike. What is not known is which element of the operation helped the raiders more--the intelligence on the garrison defenses, or the confusion caused by a folded paper cat.
A Nekekami master would regard the Lyons operation as a masterpiece of art.
The story is told of one Nekekami, hired to assassinate the leader of a terrorist cell on Marlowe's Rift, who used a longbow to eliminate his target. This is not all that remarkable, until one examines the path of the arrow. To hit the terrorist leader, the Nekekami was required to shoot through a narrow gap in a crumbling stone wall which surrounded the terrorist camp, through the tangled branches of a bluethorn briar bush, and through a small closed window. The arrow struck the terrorist leader through his left eye and penetrated his brain, killing him instantly.
The House Kurita general who hired the Nekekami -- the officer's identity is being withheld at his request -- was surprised to have half of the agreed-upon fee for the kill returned to him after the mission. The assassin claimed that his accomplishment had been flawed: he had been aiming for the bridge of the target's nose.
Weapons
Though trained in the use of modern weapons, Nekekami almost never use them, preferring instead bare hands or a selection from a huge arsenal of traditional, ancient martial arts weapons. The longbow is a favorite, it seems, and all warriors receive training in the use of sword, knife, crossbow, and various throwing blades.
The sword used by the Nekekami is a straight-bladed, single-edged weapon with a chisel-shaped point, a slightly curved handguard, and a two-handed grip. The fittings are usually made of some darkcolored metal, most often blued steel. At times, the blade is also darkened. Overall, the sword is about 85 cm long and weighs about 2.5 kilograms. The sword is very seldom used in the field, having its primary use in each warrior's training and conditioning, but a few Spirit Cats seem to take pride in accomplishing their missions without resorting to any modern weapons-and the sword is often a part of the arsenal they carry with them into battle.
Favored weapons are longbow and crossbow, a wide variety of particularly nasty throwing knives, ordinary knives ranging from easily-concealed stilettos to heavy blades which are in effect short swords, and martial arts weapons such as nunchaku, shuriken, and the kama. Special missions may call for special weapons such as blowguns, throwing darts, or weapons hand-crafted from innocuous and easilyobtainable materials such as string, writing pens, needles, and ID cards.
Less frequently used, but used with skill when the mission demands it, are more modern weapons such as tranq guns, stunners, and specially designed and balanced snipers rifles. Only rarely, if ever, will a Nekekami use such-to him-inelegant and inappropriate weapons as a laser, missile launcher, or flamer.
Poisons are used when the situation calls for them, and the pharmacopia of substances in this part of the Nekekami's arsenal is extensive. Chemical poisons like ferro-cyanide, mineral poisons such as strychnine, and animal poisons such as the venom of the Eniffian Gremlin Viper have all found their way into the food, drink, or bloodstreams of various enemies of the Combine targeted by the Nekekami. In one case, a House Davion emissary suspected of being a spy died at a banquet, apparently by choking on a piece of food. Only pure chance -- the ship's doctor aboard the Davion DropShip who performed the autopsy had had xenobotanological training -- revealed that the "diplomat's" salad had contained chalal leaves, which have high concentrations of naturally-occurring belladonna.
One poison used occasionally is called "the Dragon's Tears" by the Nekekami. The exact composition is unknown to outsiders. All that is known is that a few drops, administered over the course of a few days, will slowly, inexorably, and irreversibly drive the victim insane.
Lysergic acid diethylamide and sodium meta-choline mayalso be usedfrorntimeto time, in place of poisons. Lysergic acid is a powerful hallucinogen which can temporarily mentally unbalance its victim, while sodium meta-choline is a psycho-active drug which induces a state of severe paranoia followed by profound depression. This psychotic state lasts for several days before passing, leaving the victim with no ill effects, and no recollection of the time he spent while under the influence of the drug.
Such drugs are employed with great selectivity and for specific purposes. The star witness in the trial of a free merchant accused of running arms and money from a Kurita-governed world to an anti-Davion terrorist group on Errai demonstrated in rather sensationalist fashion his sudden and unexpected paranoia while in the witness stand... and days later took his own life in a fit of suicidal depression. The case was thrown out and the merchant cleared, thanks, itis now believed, to the intervention of a Nekekamiagent. How the assassin was able to reach the closely-guarded state witness with psycho-active pharmaceuticals is still a complete mystery.
House Kurita, incidentally, was never implicated in the incident in any way. It is believed that the Nekekami assassin was employed by an unknown factor in the merchant's trading company seeking to clear his employer's name.
Besides being administered through food or drink, poisons and drugs-particularly fast-acting agents such as ferro-cyanide and sodium meta-choline-can be coated on tranq gun pellets, needler slivers, the tips of blowgun darts, and the points of throwing stars. Countless toxins exist which can be concentrated enough to make certain that any hit from the blade they coat will be fatal. Throwing stars--the shuriken made famous by the ancient Ninja of Earth--are made deadly by coating them with fast-acting blood or nerve poisons and are used for silently neutralizing sentries, guards, and pursuers.
More The Nekekami Spirit Cats Draconis Combine
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