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drily.
For the next hour Aidan abandoned command duty for the sheer pleasure of
watching from his window as Joanna conducted the drill session. She and
MechWarrior Diana weaved among the warriors, prodding them to speed up or to
better execution or to simply remain standing when they looked ready to drop
from exhaustion. Several instances of defiance occurred during the first
few minutes of the exercise, but the pair of drill instructors had
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countered each incident with a physical response. Several old warriors were
easily decked; others had to be fought more craftily. But in each case Joanna
or Diana prevailed. They had the advantage of determination as well as of
having maintained their own regimens; they were simply in much better shape
than any of these aging or scruffy warrior-misfits. By the end of the hour,
this particular Trinary of Falcon Guards was actually beginning to
show some precision in its group movements. Joanna immediately ordered
another Trinary to assemble in the drill zone.
Satisfied that Joanna was carrying out her mission efficiently, Aidan
began to study MechWarrior Diana more intently. Something about this
young woman, who reminded him more and more of Marine, intrigued him. It made
no sense, of course. He must certainly be turning a slight resemblance into
something more. But it was not only that the young warrior looked like Marthe;
she moved a bit like her, too. What's more, she showed exactly the kind of
skills that had been Marine's specialty. Only her recklessness was a contrast.
Marthe had been methodical, meticulous. Diana's hotheadedness was more like
Aidan than Marthe.
Well, he thought, Clanspeople of all castes could resemble one another. Was
there not a saying that everyone had his or her twin on some Clan world?
Sometimes it seemed quite possible.
Joanna felt exhilarated for the first time in years.
"You know what it is?" she said to Diana. "It is power. I have always craved
power. I was meant to be at the highest levels of command. Only circumstance
has kept me from it. Your father has given me a chance to "
"Please. Never refer to him as my father. If anyone heard "
"If anyone heard, they would not care, nor would they believe it. Why be so
obsessed by the fact? No one else would. Your father himself would
probably treat the information as no more than a curiosity. It is not as a
daughter that you must strive to impress him. Impress him as a warrior. And
now be silent. I have much work to do."
As ordered, Diana spoke no more.
Over the next days, Joanna began to post so many rules about
nearly everything that the grumbling from the barracks seemed to became
pan of the night sounds of Mudd Station.
But her rules brought results. Formerly filthy Mech Warriors suddenly
began to appear at musters clean and in immaculate outfits. Personal
weapons drills led to high scores. In marches, left feet tended uniformly to
contact ground followed by die simultaneous movement of right feet. Aidan
knew from watching the marching drills that Joanna's success was
phenomenal. None of the warriors had been in a close-order march since
cadet training. How she had terrorized them into it he did not know, nor
did he care.
Her real triumph, however, was the 'Mech drills.
At the beginning of them, she had delivered a long, scathing oration on how
most of the warriors had lost sight of their place in the Clan and what the
Clan should mean to them.
"Individuality, that is your curse/' she screamed at them. By this time, they
were surprisingly docile whenever she raised her voice. "You know who believes
in the promotion of the individual at all costs? The warriors of the
Inner
Sphere, that is who. They have weakened themselves with just that sort of
degeneracy. They scheme. They employ
vicious trickery. They believe in personal glory. Heroes are valued. And do
you know what happens? They become reluctant to take the necessary risks, the
ones that might endanger their lives, because they have begun to think their
personal existence matters more than the goal for which they are fighting.
"Their kind of hero separates himself from the others and attempts
to prevent any tarnish to his reputation.
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Suddenly it is better to hold back and let someone else fight the battle.
Suddenly there are more heroes in the rear than at the front. Is that the kind
of hero you all want to be?
"No? Yet each of you seems to have developed personal styles,
quirks, and idiocies. But it is not differences, individuals, that are
the way of the Clan. Do you forget the cause that has governed our lives since
any of us emerged from die iron womb? It is the cause that must be our beacon.
In this war with the Inner Sphere, it is the Clan that must prevail, not the
individual in battle. Each time you destroy an enemy 'Mech, it is for the
Clan, not for your personal glory. Anyone who is not willing to die for
the Clan is not truly a warrior.
"You have transformed yourselves into individuals. I intend to make you Clan
warriors again. Do you wish to be
Clan warriors?"
 Seyla!"
"Ah, I thought so. Then get off your spreading be-hinds and do as I tell you.
Exactly as I tell you."
If a few recalcitrant warriors still resented Joanna, the others
brought them back into the fold. Soon the Falcon
Guards were operating with more precision. But Joanna insisted on more, and
she got it. And what Joanna could not get, Diana did. The two warriors
savaged the new Falcon Guards and then revived them. Which was
exactly what
Aidan had ordered them to do.
Joanna came into Aidan's office one day. "Go to your window, Star Colonel,"
she said.
Looking out, he saw the entire Falcon Guards on the field, all the pilots in
their 'Mechs, all the Elementals in their battle armor. MechWanior Diana
stood on a recently constructed platform. At a signal from Joanna,
she gestured toward the assembled troops.
In almost a single precise movement, all the BattleMechs, all the Elementals,
raised their left arms to a chest-high position. This was followed
by the right arms, which went past the chest position and raised
up, stopping at an oblique angle, all of them in approximately the same
position. Then each arm was lowered separately.
At the next signal from Diana, each of the BattleMech torsos inclined first to
the right, stopped simultaneously, then in synchronization, inclined to
the left. After holding the pose for a moment, all the BattleMechs
returned to the upright position.
These were just the beginning of nearly an hour of precise drills, sometimes
just the BattleMechs, sometimes just the Elementals. At the end, they formed
into marching units and left the field in a precision drill.
Aidan, who had been spellbound by the demonstration, finally turned to Joanna
and said, "I am impressed. But just what in the name of Kerensky was happening
there?"
"Well, in one sense, you have just witnessed the universe's first BattleMech
calisthenic drill. In another, you have seen I have done my job. You can go
into battle with some confidence in the Falcon Guards. They are still a bunch
of aging or eccentric warriors, but they are now a unit. Sir."
"I have seen your work over the last two weeks, Star Commander. I have known
for some time that your mission was a success. And in good time, it seems. Our
orders are to proceed to Tukayyid in two days. I appreciate what you have
done, Joanna."
Joanna did not acknowledge either the credit or the familiar use of her name.
As usual, Aidan could not be sure what she was thinking. She probably hated
him as much as ever.
"At the beginning of this," he said, "you did not think much of my plan. What
do you say now?"
"The plan was chancy, but it worked."
"Thanks to you, Star Commander,"
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