Koban 5: A Federation Forged in Fire Read online

  This had been proceeding far better than he’d expected. The Krall had no planned rejoinder for clanships and major weapons being shut down like this. It had been twenty-two thousand years since the Olt’kitapi had tried and failed in this same tactic. Clearly, the failure of that ancient race had been in a lack of aggression by the near-pacifists, unable or afraid to get in close to their enemy, and a reliance on the natural spread of the “virus” by simple proximity between clanships and weapons once “infected.” The Kobani were hardly timid, cautious, or patient, once they had a technology that if applied fast and up close, essentially neutralized the enemy assets, and made them theirs.

  The clanship boarding taking place in orbit was ironic to Mirikami. They were making the craft defenseless and unable to flee, which was a complete reversal of fortune for the Krall. They had used similar tactics for thousands of years, when they first encountered a new species they wanted to conquer. Initially, they disabled the Jump capability of a new race’s ships, and sent in young novices to kill the occupants if they resisted. They then extracted information about the enemy from the captives.

  He was certain every warrior would resist violently, and the Kobani would only capture injured sub leaders for Mind Taps. Payback in kind.

  ****

  Phordot had been bored with sentry duty for days. She wanted to be at New Dublin. Either fighting the newly aggressive PU navy cruisers, infiltrating the planetary defenses to deliver more supplies, or for her greatest desire, to be there to participate in a ground offensive being planned against the human forces. Because of the distraction of recent events at Telda Ka, that invasion force had gone without the supply support they needed, to force the enemy to retreat fast enough that the clans there could overrun a nearby large nesting area before it could be fully evacuated. There would be many kills per warrior when that happened, and good fighting before that to beat back a desperate enemy.

  With the supplies she’d recently helped deliver, that fresh surge was sure to happen soon. Another hand of a hand of clanships had departed for New Dublin just as she had returned here. Expecting to load more supplies and return promptly, she was disappointed when told her status points were less than the level set by her clan leader for warriors to engage in the upcoming ground fighting. As a member of Mordo clan, and Gatlek Pendor of her clan being in charge of that invasion, she’d assumed even a lower level Mordo warrior would be allowed to participate.

  That’s when she made a miscalculation, and complained. “I have served the Gatlek and the clan better than those that have remained on Telda Ka, who merely point to what I should carry to the battle, and then I have to fight my way down to the planet.”

  The sub leader she was addressing was one of those who “merely points,” and he was not going to New Dublin either. He could have sent her back with a load of mini-tanks, where she might have talked her way into a combat situation as the clanship was being unloaded. Instead, he found a duty for her that he said suited her present skills and status.

  “The sentry clanship posted above the northern pole will be departing to join Gatlek Pendor’s forces soon. You will go to relieve him. He has a surplus of status points, so perhaps he will pay you if you allow him to depart early.

  “The duty will give you the opportunity to display piloting and space combat skills. Something that those of us who merely point seldom can practice. If the human navy returns for an attack, you can show them what you learned.” He snorted his amusement.

  It was known throughout the clans (because Telour bragged publicly), that the human leader called Medford had bowed to the Tor Gatrol’s demands to stay away from Telda Ka, on pain of additional worlds to be destroyed. Telour used this bluff well, and the PU leader was afraid to test him. She had even promised to lead them to the base of the humans who had stolen the clanships used against the Krall, at least when she learned where it was.

  Now, after sitting well above the pole for two hands of days, her crew was resentful of her rash words that left them stuck here with her. Phordot was able to observe all of the supplies leaving to support the two invasion forces, secure in the knowledge she would be kept far from the fighting. Her luck, and that of her crew, was about to change.

  Their first hint of their unexpected entry to the field of combat was the White Out alarm each watch standing clanship had set. White Outs were common, random, and daily occurrences, often in multiples at once of clanships returning from Poldark or New Dublin, and arrivals from clan worlds with new war material, which daily arrived on newly completed clanships that had picked up the material enroute to Telda Ka. Even so, none of those White Outs ever appeared directly and closely behind a watch standing clanship.

  The ultrasonic chirp of the White Out alarm signified very close proximity, whereas a deeper note would have reflected a more distant arrival. At a glance, Phordot could see that the visual display showed the location was directly behind them, where her instant-on laser cannons couldn’t fire, and that the mass was identical to that of a clanship. This had the hallmark of a human attack pattern, only there was no indication of energy beam fire, or a radar guided missile launch, which because of proximity was too short a distance for arming the warhead anyway.

  Her plasma cannons would require minutes of pre-heating, and a missile launch needed a radar track for faster targeting. She leaped to the flight control console for the fastest solution, to rotate the ship to bring the lasers to bear. Her weapons master, seeing what she saw, had instantly uncovered the laser ports and initiated the plasma chamber heating, but in a practical sense, he had nothing to do until he could target the clanship behind them. He made a radio call to alert all the ships in orbit and at the domes below that an enemy ship had appeared. He quickly saw that the active light on the communications console was off.

  As he tried, unsuccessfully, to activate the radio, he observed there had been a simultaneous second White Out alert near the wide orbiting sentry clanship, located a quarter of the way around the planet from them. He heard a faint clang sound through the hull, just as he heard a snort of disgust from Phordot.

  He asked himself, why aren’t we accelerating or rotating? His pilot might be impulsive and had insulted their appointed sub leader, but she was an excellent pilot and had reacted even faster than had he to the alert.

  “The Normal Space flight controls will not respond, nor the reaction thrusters.” She snarled.

  The weapons master realized he was unable to activate the radio, and that the pilot’s talon tapping on the flight console was producing no change in the clanship attitude. He told her, “I cannot make a radio call, and the temperature monitors for the four plasma chambers are still offline. We must have had a power failure in a fusion reactor,” was his erroneous conclusion.

  “The consoles light up and internal power gauges show them all as available,” she snapped in contradiction of his statement. When she selected the internal com system on the hardwired ship-wide speakers, her snarled instructions to the crew was heard, loud and angry.

  “We are under attack and have lost propulsion, radio, and plasma cannons.” In the background, she and the crew heard the words of the weapons master, who had tried a test firing of his laser cannons, saying they were also without those beam weapons.

  The fact that they had not been destroyed when they lost weapons and flight controls, and there had been a loud clang heard, she assumed the enemy was burning their way inside, as did warriors boarding a human ship. “Get plasma rifles and put on your armor. Prepare for a boarding attempt.”

  That seemed suicidally stupid for humans to attempt, so it might prove to be some other clan attacking, as improbable as that seemed. The appropriate response either way was the same. Arm and armor yourself for combat, and prepare to repel boarders.

  Her weapons master had retrieved his plasma rifle from a storage slot under the console, and tapped the recessed activation button on the weapon’s power pack with a talon tip, a move so practiced it was insti
nctive. He whirled to retrieve his armor from a storage locker at the side of the command deck when he paused to reach down to tap the power pack again, as he crossed the deck. The pilot was examining her own retrieved rifle as well. The high pitch faint ultrasonic whine of the power pack activating, creating plasma bolts for instant use wasn’t heard. The power indication lights had not lit, as if the pack was totally discharged. That was something no Krall warrior would allow before combat even started. They knew they had fully charged packs when the weapons were placed on standby earlier.

  Both rushed to the storage lockers for their armor and spare power packs, even as calls from crew below reported their plasma rifles wouldn’t activate, and closed doors would not open to simple standard key presses. A quick check revealed that the life support functioned in the suits, but the combat display system would not activate. The visor displays, stealth, or powered assist was offline, and their spare power packs did not activate their rifles.

  They extracted their old weapons harnesses with the ancient design but reliable caseless ammo pistols, and various favorite short swords from past death challenges, or skinning knives used in well-remembered interrogations of prisoners. The latter harkened to the pleasures of the early days of the war, when humans initially, and foolishly, surrendered to warriors. The old ways would have to suffice today.

  Suddenly, there were telltale indicators back at the command console of all ten of the airlocks cycling. The clang they heard had not been from an attached single ship about to burn an entrance. The fools were announcing where they were entering.

  Phordot shouted into the microphone as she passed the command console. “The enemy is cycling through each of the airlocks. Go kill them.”

  The division of forces didn’t need to be spelled out for the Krall by their pilot. They divided efficiently to send multiple warriors to the nearest entry points, with Phordot and her weapons master splitting to intercept the invaders at the two highest maintenance airlocks, knowing they each would be joined by at least two warriors coming from the upper missile bays. How nice the enemy selected nonrandom entry points, so the Krall didn’t have to hunt for them to kill them.

  Having less distance to travel, two missile bay warriors beat Phordot to the maintenance bay she had selected, where an enemy had just cycled through, according to the light panel in the corridor. Aware of the new stealthy human armor, both early arriving warriors entered the compartment with pistols blazing, each warrior firing incendiary rounds with their right hand, and the other pistol loaded with armor piercing slugs blazing away. The advantage of the incendiary rounds was the smoke they produced as they traveled, and within a modestly sized fireproof compartment, with only one hatch into the outer corridor, that smoke would reveal their target.

  An invisible human would make a noticeable hole in the smoke even if it held still, and would stir the air as it moved. There was risk of course to the two warriors, from their own slugs as they ricocheted off the bulkheads, but with their rugged bodies, they could accept the physical damage in exchange for quickly knowing where the human was located. They kept their left arms and hands close in front of their faces as they fired, not for aiming, but as partial defense from beam weapons, which they knew the human suits employed.

  The compartment quickly became smoky, and both warriors received minor wounds as they fired randomly at any pocket within the smoke trails they noticed, with each slug rebounding one or twice as the warriors instinctively dove to each side through the hatch when they snatched it open.

  There was no sign of an enemy, and yet the airlock had cycled. They both stood up from crouches, weapons at the ready as their heads and eyes looked around rapidly in the typical Krall scan mode, seeking the target they expected. Suddenly, they both dropped to the floor, dead before they hit, from two bone-crunching blows that created deeply depressed skull fractures just over their eyes. A hole in the pale smoke dropped to the floor, from where it had held itself by fingertips using small fixtures near the ceiling, legs pulled up tight.

  The hole in the mist turned to exit the compartment with the smoke streaming into the outer corridor, when suddenly it was confronted by a Krall in a blue uniform, rushing to enter the compartment. A swift right hand flashed out to snatch the pistol from the warrior’s left hand, while the vaporous looking left foot kicked up and shattered several fingers and the other gun, which was being held low in the Krall’s right hand. A forward snap of the poltergeist’s helmeted head required a bit of a leap and push-off by the foot still on the deck, but the solid impact broke teeth and stunned the new arrival. The small ghostly apparition pulled a needle gun from a small holster at its waist, and fired a single paralyzing dart into the throat of the warrior as it dropped.

  “I got the pilot or flight commander for Mind Tap.” Carol Slobovic said via Comtap to the other nine boarders. “At least it has a blue uniform. How about you Sergey my lad?”

  She looked down at the two dead warriors at her feet, their fate having been sealed by wearing black uniforms. That color had been their fatal flaw for a live capture, and being Krall, of course.

  Sergey Medlov cursed. “OK. You win, damn it. I caught two black suits and a K’Tal in brown.” By taking the highest located airlocks nearer the command deck, they both expected the flight crew would head towards those airlocks as the nearest points to intercept the boarders. Carol had won their bet. Sergey would have to cook and serve her a dinner back on Koban. If he wasn’t too grumpy about it, she might provide the handsome young spec ops a nice desert.

  She removed a gauntlet, and even before the neurotoxin had acted, started her interrogation in low Krall. “Is the Tor Gatrol on Telda Ka?” She nodded at the thoughts that she sensed, as Phordot snarled and spit a broken tooth, her wrists being crossed and pinned over her chest by this tiny human straddling her waist, with crushing knee pressure on her ribs.

  “Which dome?” Another nod from the small human captor. She selected another Comtap address for a link.

  “Captain Mirikami, Telour isn’t in any of the Graca clan domes. Sending additional small ships there may have caught more of the new leadership, but not Telour. Apparently, the destruction of the previous Joint Council dome keeps him moving around randomly. He was visiting domes belonging to minor clans; probably pretending it was for political reasons rather than for keeping his butt safe from another surprise attack. My prisoner doesn’t know which one, but any call to him would be relayed through the main Graca dome, which has been acting as a temporary council dome. That’s where you might learn where he’s located, from some of his flunkies.”

  “Thanks Carol.” Mirikami answered. “We have that dome well covered. Are your boarding team members all OK?”

  “Yes Sir. I mean, I’ve not heard a report of any problems or complaints from our team. Other than Sergey losing a bet with me. Do you know what the most difficult Russian dishes are to prepare? I want something really elaborate and time consuming for him to make for me.”

  “You’ll have to ask Maggi or someone else. I don't know ethnic Russian foods. Let me know if your prisoner has any more useful information. Join us on the ground as soon as you have the ship secured. Land close to any ships or military equipment that still seem operational to you. Spread the Denial list. Mirikami out.”

  ****

  Ethan flew his four-ship close to the west edge of the tarmac around the largest Graka clan dome. It was the dome apparently used as a temporary Joint Council dome after many of the clan leaders were killed in the old one by the migration ship-turned-into-comet. This dome was where Mirikami had hoped they would find Telour. None of the full size Kobani ships would try to land near any dome until their aerial defenses had been eliminated. Every sizable dome had a number of parked clanships that immediately switched to long wave radar mode, to seek out incoming clanships that didn’t have the proper new landing codes, ready to fire on them. Fortunately, the small ships were as invisible to those ground radar systems as they had been when inbou
nd.

  Any clanship that went active and launched missiles would be targeted by high altitude Kobani ships, using missiles carrying Denial chips instead of warheads. That was only done if there were no ground forces close enough to do that with chips in their rifle ammunition. It was cool that a mere sniper rifle could make the capture of an armored and heavily armed clanship possible. Nevertheless, it took time to put troops in proximity of thousands of scattered ships.

  Ethan settled his little ship quietly next to a row of parked Dragons still awaiting shipment to one of the invaded planets. His keen eye had estimated the separation between the small tanks, and he knew the short range for propagating the Denial list had just been passed through each of the Dragons along the line in each direction. There were two nearby clanships with ramps down for loading. They were close enough to the tanks that were ready to be driven aboard that they too would be in “full denial” mode for the Krall.

  He hit the rear hatch release to slide that open as he rose from his pilot seat. Kit nearly bowled him over in her rush to be the first to exit. Sitting in front as she had been, crowding Ethan, she used her speed and massive bulk to push the other two Kobani in the rear seats aside. She was damn well going to be the first one out!

  “Hey, Kit,” Jorl complained as she knocked him back into his seat. “Wait your turn.” He found he was speaking to a teal colored rump that swiftly and lithely passed through the open hatch. Fred was looking at him with amusement.

  “When Ethan brought her along, did you think for a moment she’d wait for us? She has her own agenda.”