Koban: The Mark of Koban Page 11

  After several minutes of listening, and holding her, Mirikami thought she had released enough grief that she might be ready to listen to him. Her sobs had dwindled to just crying now. Not knowing exactly what happened, he thought he’d reassure her that their friend’s death wasn’t her fault.

  “Noreen,” he stroked her long black hair, in a fatherly way for a grieving daughter. “You didn’t cause her death. It was all of us underestimating the raptors. It could have been any one of us.” The vehemence of her denial startled him.

  “No! I killed her,” she told him, another sob rising. “The damned monster had her in its jaws and it was going to eat her alive. She looked at me for help…,” she told him, sobbing harder, “and I shot her in the head. I couldn’t let her die like that, but she wanted me to help her.” The sobbing went on longer this time. Only now he knew why, and what he would say when she was able to listen.

  He could hear the sound of an approaching shuttle. Over the cockpit radio, he heard Dillon’s anxious voice calling to them. Noreen also heard and her crying suspended for a moment. Now he could talk to her, and explain that what she had done was show a friend the greatest love possible, at considerable self-sacrifice. He knew it would be some time before she believed the truth of that herself.

  7. Poldark and Bollovstic

  “Stanford is just trying to get tighter control over Poldark,” Colonel Henry Nabarone protested. “This training base will bring tens of thousands of off-world recruits for us to turn into Planetary Union soldiers, and they will feel no loyalty to you, Mike. I think it’s a mistake to allow this.”

  He was speaking to Michael Boldovic, Poldark’s Governor. He formerly was the planet’s President before the referendum to join the Planetary Union. That had passed by well more than the required two-thirds majority of the planet’s citizens. Nabarone had opposed the change in status.

  “Hank, you see Hub conspiracies everywhere,” Boldovic told him. “You previously suspected Mavray Doushan’s disappearance was some political move by Stanford, to block a trade agreement between us and Bollovstic's Republican Independency.”

  Nabarone wasn’t giving up yet. “Yes, well if Doushan had succeeded with the trade negotiation I don’t think the Planetary Union’s economic proposals would have sounded so good to our people. The referendum might not have passed. It was a plausible idea that the Hub could have acted to block his mission.”

  “I question your use of the word plausible, Hank,” rebutted Boldovic, “but we now know that it was the Krall, not the Hub that kidnapped Mavray and his diplomatic mission, including your mentor, Thad Greeves. We have had the recording analyzed that the Krall used when they captured several passenger ships right after they made their White Outs. The man that identified himself as Mavray Doushan had a Poldark accent; he matched Doushan’s voice imprint, and the date of captivity he mentioned matched closely the date his ship went missing.

  “I listened to that recording, Hank, it sounded just like the man I knew. There isn’t any possibility the aliens could have faked that.”

  Nabarone’s nod conceded that point but not his other. “It still doesn’t mean Stanford isn’t using the alien scare to try to gain more control over the Rim worlds and New Colonies.”

  Boldovic sighed. “Again, Hank, the Planetary Union will relocate the troops after training, placing them on the worlds considered at highest risk. Poldark is one of those high-risk worlds. The Planetary Union is only planning to keep ten thousand permanent postings here. Having the continuing availability of partially trained recruits at TB-85 increases our level of protection. That security in turn will encourage the investments that we want the Hub corporations to make.”

  A New Colony, Poldark was located on the boundary of what most “Hubbers” considered the Rim. A region noted more for its comparison to North America’s old Wild West, than a stable place to do business. By joining the Union, there had been a promise of corporate investments to follow, based on the assumption of future stability. Union spending for government construction and hiring civil servants would also increase employment.

  “Stanford is only keeping ten thousand here, eh? That’s nearly nine thousand more than the militia Thad trained before he disappeared, and that I command now. I’m sure they will be better armed than our troops. We can get better weapons you know. There are ways to get them if you’re willing to pay.”

  Boldovic was tired of the word game, and played his trump card with pleasure and anticipation. “Actually the permanent Planetary Defense commander will actually have eleven thousand troops, who will have the best weapons and body armor the Planetary Union can provide. This will include our militia, who are already trained.” Now he waited with an amused expression for the explosive outburst he knew was coming. He wasn’t disappointed.

  “You gave away my own command to the stinking PU?” blasted Nabarone, in red-faced outrage, oblivious to the pun he’d made. “When does this happen?” he shouted in full betrayal mode.

  “As soon as the local commander I nominated is prepared to accept his commission in the Planetary Union Army,” answered Boldovic, with a smirk.

  “Local? Local?” repeated Nabarone, sputtering. “Who?”

  “I believe I told them it was General…, uh, Nabarone.” The Governor finished. He enjoyed Hank’s strangled expression. The former Colonel had to swallow his next verbal explosion undetonated.

  “I, uh.., I mean…,” he stammered.

  “I believe you mean, ‘Thank you Governor Boldovic, I’m honored to accept, Governor Boldovic,’” supplied Boldovic, enjoying his strongly opinionated friend’s discomfort.

  There was nothing else to say. “Yes, I accept,” agreed Nabarone. “But only for you and Poldark.”

  Then the reality of the moment struck him, and his predicament. “Fuck it Mike, I’ll be in Stanford’s chain of command! She’ll be my ultimate boss.”

  “Oh, I’d not worry so much about her. Think of the layers of Hub Generals she’s creating above you, mostly a bunch of Ladies that have no ground pounder experience what so ever. Not that there are many men with experience either.” He smirked.

  “Oh, damn you Mike,” Nabarone warned with a wry smile, “I’ll find some way to get even for this.”

  “What? Nominate me for the Senate and send me to Earth?” he countered with his own grin. “I decline.”

  Nabarone did some quick thinking. “Some of my militia cadre will still be needed to help run TB-85. I want you to apply leverage to allow me to select the best recruits they recommend for the permanent Poldark force. As you mentioned, out here we are a high-risk Krall target.”

  He nodded agreement. “Hank, I know you have seen the media interviews with some of the commanders appointed on other worlds. They all seem to want tanks, heavy weapons, aircraft, fortifications, automated drones, and orbital defense platforms. I’m sure I didn’t catch all of their recommendations, but I know you were paying attention. What do you think we should do?”

  “Mike, we know they have single ships that we can’t match, which have Trap drives in a small package that can out accelerate anything we thought possible with a living being aboard. Those ships have displayed evasiveness and reflective shields our lasers and plasma beams couldn’t penetrate, and I’m positive we haven’t seen all of their technology. They can Jump directly to orbital levels at will. We can’t keep them off our planets, and I don’t think the defensive strategies being considered will work very well.”

  “I assumed you might have some ideas of your own. Thad Greeves was a good teacher, and you were a good student. What would you suggest?” Boldovic asked.

  “I studied the Nook recordings in great detail,” Nabarone told him. “I noted that even when the Krall operated as teams of eight that their warriors; I use that term deliberately, fought usually as individuals. We will train soldiers to face warriors, which in large force engagements can work to our advantage to offset their hugely superior physical capability. However, I don’t
know if we will see armies against armies.”

  “You confused me Hank. Warrior or soldier, same thing aren’t they?”

  Shaking his head, he told him, “Common mistake Mike. A warrior fights to protect a family or clan, for personal wealth, notoriety, or glory. Warriors stay in a battle so long as they are achieving what they wanted. They may quit the fight for a time, if they win the bounty they wanted. The Krall left the Nook after two days. I think they got what they wanted, and left. We sure didn’t drive them away.”

  Nabarone continued, “A soldier isn’t concerned with self-enrichment or personal glory. I don’t mean a soldier can’t win glory, but he or she submits to the orders of the State, or to those that represent the State to defend an idea, to fight for their fellows. Guided by honor and loyalty, the soldier serves not themselves, family or clan, but their nation, planet, or society. They act in concert to achieve the larger goal, which does not lead to personal gain, and in fact requires sacrifice.”

  Shrugging, Boldovic accepted the difference, but asked, “Why might that suggest to you they won’t fight us like the other new generals think they will?”

  “Thad prepared us for possible guerrilla warfare,” answered Nabarone. “Where our small militia would become the guerrilla’s. He knew we couldn’t prevent a large-scale invasion from the Hub, if they ever turned aggressive. Nevertheless, we could fight them effectively using asymmetric warfare. I think that type of warfare will appeal more to the Krall’s style of fighting, their personal preference if you will, to conduct raids where a smaller number of warriors wreak havoc for personal glory or to prove themselves.”

  “How would that affect your strategy?” Queried Boldovic.

  “I think we need to create mobile fast reaction small units to intercept raiders. We can structure them so that we can send as many as the raid size dictates we need. We can reach any place on Poldark quickly if we preposition our units close to probable targets, which on Nook were population centers. The Krall like killing humans, they don’t want the real estate or our property. We know when confronted that they are relentless in their attacks. We should sucker them into ambushes and traps. In the field, they haven’t seemed very bright so far, despite spectacular capability as a warrior slash fighter. Those miners on Nook, with no training at all, pulled one group into two different traps.”

  Boldovic wasn’t entirely comfortable, “I’m certainly no expert, Hank, but if the Krall doesn’t attack us like you expect, and comes at us in force, we can lose a lot of people before you pull in your fast reaction units. Those units won’t have training in large force operations. We won’t have logistics in place to supply them. I’m worried about spreading out all of our forces.”

  Nabarone shrugged, “Mike, we will have a hundred thousand recruits at TB-85, being processed in four staggered training cycles. About three quarters of them at any time will have received basic weapons training at a minimum. As training cycles pass midpoint, half will have received the latest in fitted, powered, active camouflage armor.

  “The most advanced one quarter of the trainees will have started heavy weapons training and will have war games practice. This isn’t an ideal force, obviously, but they will be better equipped than any of our civilians will be. If we maintain transports at the Training Base, we can move them if we have a larger force to face. We can’t post large units all over the planet anyway, we won’t have that many.”

  “Hank, you just gave me an idea. Our civilians are unarmed because there never have been any legal arms they could buy, none even produced. I know, you told me earlier we could get them if we paid enough. I think Civil Defense is something we should look into. Our citizens are a bit rougher around the edges than the ‘fluffs’ of the Hub worlds. They’ll like owning guns. Hell, I want one myself.” He grinned.

  Nabarone clapped him on the shoulder. “Expert or not, you just came up with an obvious idea that our ultra-safe Hub driven culture kept me from even considering. Arms manufacturing is going to explode, pardon the pun. I think you should offer guns to people that have clean records, and will accept firearms training and gun registration. I think most will pay for their own weapons.”

  “Hank, I’ll pass the word to the new Central Command on Earth that you are Poldark’s choice for commander of our Planetary Defense Force. I assume they will be sending a commander for the training base, but if you want to sponsor anyone on your staff for that position, I’ll forward your recommendation. I’ll also broach the subject of arming civilians. However, I can initiate that on Poldark even if they won’t furnish the guns free. The Emergency Powers act just passed gives me latitude in that respect, although I doubt their civilized minds even gave that application a thought.”

  ****

  Ortega’s Airland subcommittee had gained four new members, but by rule, the junior Senator retained his position of Chairman for this session of Parliament. He’d been the committee’s only member when he acquired that “lofty” position.

  The subcommittee had gained considerably more influence as the government moved to place humanity on a wartime footing after three hundred years of peace. However, the full Armed Forces Committee wielded the real power and final say on major decisions, which mostly concerned expanding the Navy.

  The ten million-man army was a concession to public demand and to Ortega’s “Remember the Nook” rally cry. Every world wanted a ground force for defense against a Krall invasion. However, effectively defending the entire surface of a world with just ten thousand troops on each was nearly impossible. That’s why the full committee shunted the Governor of Poldark’s request to Ortega’s subcommittee for consideration.

  “What is Poldark’s population?” asked Lady Haruko Takahashi, a junior Senator from cold Yuki Matsuri, a Japanese Old Colony commonly called just “Snow” by Standard speakers, rather than Festival of Snow.

  Ortega checked the AI’s terminal. “Three hundred twenty four million at the last census, taken just before the referendum to join the Union,” he supplied.

  “Do we even have that many weapons to ship to them?” she asked incredulously. “The automated factories have just converted to produce those weapons.”

  “Governor Boldovic did not ask for one per person,” Ortega pointed out. “He wanted a weapon for each household, which would be roughly one fifth of the population. That’s perhaps sixty five million guns. Which, to answer your next question, we also do not have available as of yet, nor the ammunition for that many automatic rifles.”

  “Then how do we respond to the full committee?” asked Lady Chaudance Kessington, another junior Senator, from the Old Colony of New Glasgow. Ortega was out “femmed” by the four female Junior Senators that had joined his subcommittee, and they were unaccustomed to deferring to a male, in government or otherwise.

  She added, “They expect a recommendation for furnishing New Colony worlds with means for their own defense until we have a trained Army. I’d hate my first committee assignment to end with an apology, telling them in a publically televised session that we have no ideas.”

  “Gracious Ladies, I didn’t say we have no options,” Ortega was pleased to announce. “We simply don’t have any weapons to send, as of yet. However, we can send them something else sooner, and shift the burden of production and shipping from the Hub worlds, to their own systems.”

  “How can we build them factories there faster than we can build and ship them weapons from here?” Takahashi wanted to know.

  He told them confidently of his solution, “I did a search, and learned there are several hundred mothballed orbital factories that were no longer modern enough to produce contemporary consumer products, and which have outdated automation control systems. They have been sitting airless and preserved in orbits around moons of dozens of Hub and Old Colony worlds, hardly worth the value to cut up for scrap. We can return them to operational status in weeks per factory. They were built Jump capable, to reach their production worlds from where they were built. All of
them will need new fusion bottles and newer AI software, and their computer directed machine shops can be reprogramed to make human portable weapon systems.”

  In a scornful tone, Lady Kessington asked, “If they can’t make modern consumer products how are they going to make modern weapons?”

  Ortega smiled patiently in reply to her skepticism. “We don’t need them to make modern weapons, Dear Lady, such as laser rifles, smart guns and self-directed ammunition, pulse or microwave cannons, or super Jazzers. The projectile weapons in use three hundred years ago for the Clone Wars are at least a match for the weapons the Krall used on the Nook, and some of the old weapons are even superior. Instead of making bicycles, gyro cars, exercise equipment, and so forth, they can produce rifles, pistols, machine guns, mortars, and ammunition.” He glanced around the table in triumph.

  The Ladies were not done. “If the Krall start using better weapons than that, then what do we do? Their technology base is more advanced than ours,” supplied a smug Lady Eldridge, Senator from the Canadian Republic, a (barely) New Colony that dated from just before the Collapse.

  “They don’t want to overwhelm us immediately Gracious Lady. They say they plan to fight us for generations,” he reminded her.

  “Tell that to Greater West Africa,” she sneered at the upstart male.

  Even the other Ladies saw she had made a boneheaded argument. Takahashi was the first to break ranks. “The Krall needed a base of operations within our sphere of influence, and that colony was apparently convenient and suitably isolated. It wasn’t a slow conquest because they needed to wipe them all out to take possession. The early broadcasts, while they lasted, proved that the alien warriors used the same weapons as they did on the Nook. However, there were at least a million of them, and they never left and never quit killing. I’m sure those poor people wished they had weapons.”

  A unanimous subcommittee sent Ortega’s recommendation up to be presented to the Armed Services Committee, where it was not only approved (by a slender margin), but it was expanded to send many operational orbital factories to as many outer worlds as possible for arms production. It occurred to enough of the Ladies on the committee that luxury consumer products were going to be a bit less important than survival to their voters.