Date: December 12, 2850
Location: Luthien
Title: Karma
Author: Chris Hartford
Type: Short Story
Synopsis: Coordinator Yoguchi Kurita returns to Luthien aboard his Leopard DropShip, accompanied by his command lancemates Karl Pettersen, Hachiko Osaki, and Jackson O'Connell. The close comrades banter during the rough landing, mentioning Roweena Kurita and her People's Reconstruction Effort power base, and other aspects of court intrigue and power politics. When one of his aides cautions him against unbuckling before the ship has landed, he laughs it off, saying that the kami that kept him from dying on Tishomingo would not kill him just as he returns to safety in Imperial City.
Roweena Kurita greets her older brother as his lance's battered 'Mechs arrive at the Imperial Palace, making a stark contrast behind her elaborate dress and rigid adherence to protocol, while Yoguchi and his lancemates are scruffy, bruised, and stained. The Coordinator thanks Roweena for the timely arrival of her troops on Tishomingo.
Yoguchi sees ISF Director Malcom Katsuyori watching, and thinks back to his lancemates' gossip that Roweena is sleeping with him. He berates her for having usurped the power of the Coordinator instead of supporting the proper chain of succession, and questions her loyalty, and that of the ISF. He instructs her to summon the High Command to plan a retaliatory strike against House Davion.
In Unity Palace, Yoguchi is greeted by his favorite courtesan, Snow Fire, whom he obtained at a Rasalhague ukiyo in 2848. Over drinks, they discuss Roweena's activities during the months he was trapped on Tishomingo.
Once Yoguchi falls asleep, Snow Fire, aka "Denise" fetches a polymer knife and a unit insignia from the Fourth Royal Guards, and raises her knife to murder the sleeping Coordinator in retaliation for his son's annihilation of the 4th, per orders from "mother."
Notes: On the ship, Yoguchi refers to Tsingtao, but this is probably a typo, since he was trapped on Tishomingo. (Tsingtao is a Capellan world.)
The Snow Fire legend has had numerous versions, but this (being prose fiction, rather than a sourcebook) appears to be the definitive account.
The Combine, embarrassed, put out the story that Yoguchi was killed while heroically fighting a team of assassins. House Davion tried to take credit, with the story that she was assisted by a Davion agent codenamed "The Footman," but he/she doesn't make an appearance here, unless he was the head of the ISF.
Laurent Infomedia, a Free Worlds League publisher of popular conspiracy-theory books, put out a new edition in 3067 alleging that Snow Fire was a SAFE agent who put the 4th Guards patch on Yoguchi as a means of misdirection. (So...motive is long-delayed retaliation for Helm, maybe?) Since Denise thinks of her dead true love who was a soldier in the 4th Guards, the alleged SAFE ties (also mentioned in Handbook: House Marik) are clearly hokum.
The timeline for Snow Fire's mission in "Karma" doesn't exactly match the various accounts. Here, she appears to have caught the Coordinator's eye immediately and become his lover in 2848, whereas official accounts suggest she was brought to Imperial Palace by a member of Yoguchi's staff and gradually worked her way up to increased prominence and the Coordinator's personal attentions.
What's nice about this story is that it takes the time, in seven short pages, to build Yoguchi's character. He has friends and foes, has to deal with palace intrigue, matters of state, family politics, and personal feelings.
He's definitely not set up as a villain whose death we should celebrate. He recognizes that his son Hugai (the one who wiped out the 4th Guards and forced its captured commander to beat his own younger brother to death, unaware who it was he was fighting) is a monster, and feels for the millions of Combine civilians on Tishomingo who died to keep him from being captured by the Federated Suns.
Even Snow Fire acknowledges that he's not a bad guy, but carries out her orders as instructed. In fact, all things considered, Yoguchi is a much better ruler than Denise's own Archon (who gave her the "kill" order), the recently deceased Claudius Steiner, who is rumored to have been poisoned by his own family members when they couldn't stand his fondness for torturing people with LosTech medical devices any more. (Today, we're going to try out this device we call...Mister Thingy!)