"No guns!" Ninyu called. "He must die by steel. First squad."

The agents who had entered with Ninyu slung their automatic weapons and drew swords from the scabbards lashed to their backs. Steel whispered against lacquered wood, the only sound in the chamber. The Coordinator raised the sword high over his head and slowly lowered it into chudan-no-kamaeguard.

"A blade is too good for dogs such as you, but the curs are many and I but one. Come and die."

A burly agent, deceptively fast for his bulk, rushed the Coordinator. Their blades rang in belling parries until Takashi slid his sword along the agent's and turned the edge, slicing the man's neck as he withdrew. The dead man fell, a soughing moan coming from his slit windpipe.

The first encounter displayed the Coordinator's weakness to his opponents; Takashi's wrenched knee limited his movement. A second agent stepped up to fence at long range, trying to draw him out. Takashi stood firm, refusing to fall for the ploy. Instead, he sucked the agent into a trap of his own. Letting the agent's sword pass through his guard, he took a blow on his do.He had seen the lack of strength in what the agent had obviously intended to be a feint. The unexpected success of her unparried blow opened the agent to a counterstroke. Takashi's sword took her in the belly, gutting her. A second stroke cut upward across her torso and flung her back into her companions.

The others became more cautious and began to circle Takashi. He held his ground, keeping his back to the fallen Michi. The agents could not come at him that way without tripping over the body.

Two closed together, striking high and low. Takashi pivoted on his weak leg, dropping low as he did. The first agent's sword met his steel and the second's whistled over his head. Blade to blade, Takashi heaved himself up and threw his opponent back by sheer strength. The other agent's sword sliced through his kimono, scoring the flesh of his right arm. Takashi's single-handed return stroke caught the overextended agent on his own arm, but it bit deeper. The agent's sword clattered to the floor and he staggered back, spouting blood.

The first closed again and Takashi barely managed a parry. They exchanged a rapid series of blows, their blades a chiming gamelan of sound. To maintain the initiative, Takashi was forced to advance. With a sudden, sharp ping, the agent's sword snapped. Takashi ran him through with a quick thrust. Shoving the open-mouthed agent off his sword, Takashi retreated to his original position.

"Second squad," Ninyu said.

Five more swords were drawn as agents moved to reinforce the single survivor of the first squad. Ninyu stood at the edge of the room and watched. Takashi was tired, his swordsmanship beginning to falter. Even if the second squad was inferior to the first, they would likely kill the Coordinator.

Shouts echoed in the garden.

Ninyu cursed, and Takashi smiled. The agents stopped their advance. The closest backed away a step, retreating to a safer range while they looked questioningly to their leader.

"I will hunt you down," Takashi said.

Ninyu shrugged in exaggerated nonchalance. "You have no evidence, Coordinator. This was undoubtedly an attempt by a dissatisfied faction of renegades. Perhaps it was the work of Davion infiltrators. There will be evidence to that effect." His eyes kept darting to the garden entrance. "Let the matter go. Even you must know that the Combine could not survive if you decapitated the ISF at this point in history."

Takashi's voice was cold and unforgiving. "We have survived traitors before."

"The ISF serves the Combine, not the Kuritas. Who are the real traitors, you glory-bound samurai?"

Takashi took a step forward and his voice trembled with rage. "I will kill you myself."

Ninyu laughed at him. "If I thought that you would live to see another day, I might be concerned, Coordinator. But you will reap what you have sown, for you will die at Jaime Wolf's hand. A fool's death."

Hard footfalls slapped thunderously on the veranda. The Otomo would arrive in seconds.

"I must go. Enjoy your duel, Coordinator," Ninyu said.

The ISF agents slipped through the opening from which they had emerged. Ninyu slid the panel closed, apparently assured that he and his agents would be long gone before the Otomo could force their way through the wall.

Dead men dressed in black lay strewn about the chamber. One, only wounded, drew a knife from his belt and joined his colleagues. Takashi was left standing alone within a ring of bodies.

A handful of men rushed into the dojo,a dozen Otomo and half again that number of Izanagi Warriors. Some were wearing the ceremonial armor of the palace guard, others wore duty uniforms or off-duty clothing, a few were half-dressed. All were armed. They halted just inside the doorway, stunned by the carnage surrounding the Coordinator.

Theodore pushed his way through them. He surveyed the room before holstering his pistol.

"Father?"

"I am barely wounded."

"No thanks to your bodyguard." His tone promised retribution for the breach in palace security. "Where is Shin Yodama?" There was no answer from the assembled guards. No one cared to speculate where the head of the guard could be. "He was on duty. Find him."

A woman in the uniform of Yodama's Izanagi Warriors dashed off. Still unsure, the other guards remained clustered at the door. Takashi knelt and laid his bloody sword on the floor. He looked exhausted.

"It will do no good."

"You killed them all?"

Takashi shrugged. "There might have been more. Perhaps it is a good idea to search the garden."

Theodore glanced at the guardsmen and nodded once. All but two rushed away. The pair who remained took up stations at the door. Theodore knelt at his father's side.

"You must see a physician."

"First you must hear what happened here."

A flash of puzzlement crossed Theodore's face. He leaned closer to listen to Takashi's whispered account of the confrontation with Indrahar. Takashi concluded, "For all that I do not care to have the decision made for me, Indrahar's evaluation of the situation has merit.

I was too blinded by my own concerns to see what a duel with Wolf would bring."

"Perhaps a reconciliation with Wolf ..."

"Iie.The Coordinator did no wrong. Wolf's public insult cannot be ignored." Takashi closed his eyes. "But I see what Michi Noketsuna saw before he spent his life for the Combine."

"Surely we can find another course."

"You never were comfortable with the code." Takashi almost smiled. "I am a samurai and I believe in the old ways. That may not be what is necessary to guide our realm into this new age. Certainly, you have shown me that new ways are necessary to deal with new problems. Perhaps in this I can show you that the old ways are not to be despised. In some circumstances, bushidois the answer to problems that no amount of flexibility can surmount."

"Father, this is not the answer."

"This is an old and tired samurai's answer." Takashi indicated Michi with a slant of his head. "Such strange karma.He put aside his personal honor for the greater good of the realm, defending my life against those who would take it unlawfully. He wanted my seppukutoday, and today I will go onward. But I— we—cannot allow the truth to be known. My honorable passing must be cloaked in a dishonorable lie. For the good of the realm. Indrahar wanted the people to believe that I had died in my sleep. Let his lie serve us as well as him, let that be the tale. You must tell no one the truth, not even Jasmine."