Koban 4: Shattered Worlds (100 page)

Nevertheless, a series of satisfactory holes were being made through this deck, and the slender tubes of destruction penetrated through up to eight more decks below him. He finally noticed this when his eye’s aligned with a hole he’d made several seconds ago.

It took a moment for the gasses produced to disburse enough to see through the holes. On the deck below another organic hole had been drilled, through an unfortunate guardian who had been posted there to ward off any humans that approached. The visor icon in Bohdar’s helmet incremented because the beam had passed through the top of his subordinate’s skull. Unlike the slow death that he’d delivered to Pildon.

He obviously knew the tool worked as a weapon, but the short range made it impractical on an open battlefield, where long-range weapons were employed. He’d enjoy skewering some of these humans after the ship was disabled. That fighting would be a close range. He shortened the focal length and made a shorter hole. He was pleased to note he could now press the trigger button more rapidly.

The other warriors were firing plasma bolts into walls, decks, and ceilings, and having an effect. Some of the glow of indirect ruddy light vanished from a section of the ceiling and walls, and an iris door opened only partway before halting. The ruddy light was replaced by a harsher whiter light, the red tint having been provided as a comfort to the “guests” as matching the redder star of the Krall home world. The whither light may have been the hue preferred by the Olt’kitapi.

Bohdar wasn’t sure if the shooting at walls was having any effect on the ship until it spoke to Pildon, a necessary audible conversation because the soft Krall had no chip.

“Pildon, instruct your guests to cease damaging the area around the control room. There are control systems being damaged, which I use to operate equipment and to maintain myself. You are injured, and I can repair you if you can move to a small compartment nearby, or if you instruct your guests to carry you there. The Raspani
(sputter-snort-whistle)
tool has rendered one of my memory chips inaccessible.” The odd sounds were apparently the tools name, spoken in a Raspani dialect.

Huwayla became more insistent. “This activity makes it difficult for me to operate safely and to self-repair. I cannot permit this to continue.”

The ship may have inadvertently given Bohdar a clue to where the more vital components of the AI were located. Because his first disintegration into the floor had killed the hologram, as well as mortally wounding Pildon. He’d aimed most of his beams down, assuming much of the vital equipment and technology must be there. He’d made multiple wall holes when the lighting changed once, but decided that was cosmetic circuitry, and resumed aiming at the deck, which resembled worm eaten wood now. However, some holes were noticeably smaller than before, because self-repair was underway.

Plasma bolts did damage, but required greater care when used. Combat in the ship today had revealed that the slightly pliable floor surface, which provided such an excellent grip for talons, would absorb plasma bolts, as did the walls, unless the incident angle was very shallow. The ceilings however, were a much tougher surface, and bolts did not penetrate at less than a forty-five degree angle from vertical, instead causing a ricochet of a shattered star hot plasma packet. One of those fragments could strike someone, such as Bohdar had been, who was hit a glancing blow by one fired by a careless warriors a moment ago.

His roar of displeasure ended the random firing at the ceiling, at least without it being closer to a vertical shot, which might splash plasma back at the shooter’s helmet. In annoyance, Bohdar had aimed one borehole at the ceiling, right at the burn mark where the ricochet had happened. It was a spot nearly above him and the bleeding out Pildon. That was done just before the ship had spoken to Pildon.

The sub leader made a connection and followed a hunch. “Start firing into the ceiling. It’s possible the AI may have its brain there.” He demonstrated by boring another hole through a point above Pildon. There was a sudden increase of small plasma bolt fragments as hits on the ceiling started penetrating in large numbers.

“Pildon, make them stop.” The ship’s tone wasn’t strident, but it was the most insistent words she had used.

The plasma bolts continued, with warriors and Bohdar included, swatting at plasma fragments that melted themselves onto heads and shoulders. The suit visor showed when this happened, and where the fragments were. Bohdar wasn’t boring holes right now, because a larger plasma fragment had melted to the back of a shoulder, where it was hard to reach. There wasn’t a high chance of a burn-through from these, but they damaged stealth coating and could conduct heat to the skin below, if permitted to cool on their own. A Krall might accept a burn while in combat, but not preventable damage to such a valued tool of war as their armor.

Suddenly, the firing of plasma bolts ended abruptly. There were snarls of anger, a mass swapping out of rifle power packs, and then there were confused growls of frustration.  The weapons had ceased working in the control room.

Bohdar didn’t waste time ordering them to resume firing, since he could see they were trying to do just that. Instead, he leaped to his own rifle, leaned against a wall where it had been well out of reach of Pildon. It had not been used since the enemy had infiltrated. He aimed up and pulled the trigger. It would not fire either, and yet he knew it had a full charge earlier. However, his talon tip could not trigger the power pack to show how much charge it now held. Even when too depleted to generate plasma, the minute power required to show power level lights would always show how low the charge was.

From the outer corridors, he heard the continued crack and impacts of plasma bolts being fired. Although none worked in here, suggesting the rifles had deactivated somehow. The fact that there was firing so close that he could hear it meant the humans were closer. He rushed to the nearest hatchway to look into the corridor where the sounds were louder, and nearly ran into the door when it failed to instantly iris open for him. He assumed the wall shots had damaged the electronics or power connection. The half-opened inactive door on the same wall offered him a faster exit than forcing this one open.

He ran and dove through the opening into the passageway, and observed an octet, posted at an intersection two corridors away, and firing around the corners at what must be the enemy. The octet leader saw him looking his way, and noted the icon color for the Gorth on his visor. He called him on his com set, but received no link, indicating the Gorth’s suit power was off. Except his active stealth proved that wasn’t the case.

Bohdar in turn, had tried to call the octet leader on a com set frequency, but his helmet didn’t respond to the command. Using tactical hand signals, he then showed two digits and pointed to himself. The octet leader flashed an acknowledgement. The Gorth wanted two warriors.

Two warriors on that side of the intersection turned and started running Bohdar’s way, as he realized his visor was not showing him the sub leader’s icon or name, as it should have done automatically when he looked at him. In fact, his visor display settings were frozen with the exact same dynamic configuration it had been showing him a minute earlier. Based on his battlefield memory, he knew it had not updated since then. He used his long purple tongue to select a zoom display mode, as he looked at the far end of the corridor. The image didn’t alter.

As a typically impatient Krall, he’d already been moving towards the oncoming warriors, and met them halfway. Unable to communicate with them except by hand signals, he opened his helmet faceplate. He demanded and received the plasma rifle of the closest warrior, and checked the charge. It was under half a charge, but it registered for him. He turned and aimed at an outer wall of the control room behind him and fired a bolt that embedded deeply and continued to burn. He shook a shoulder in approval, and returned the rifle. He ordered the two to follow him.

Knowing they would have external speakers active on their armor he said, “Our weapons inside the control room have all malfunctioned. That must have been caused by the ship. We must destroy the living ship to prevent humans from learning what it does. The ship has refused to Jump, and we have no explosives, so you will shoot into the ceiling of the command deck, where I believe the brain of the AI may be placed.” He showed them his Raspani tool, so they understood he had an alternate way to damage the ship.

Leading the warriors to the same half-opened iris, he pushed his way back into the room and the two followed him. He noticed that the warriors he’d left behind were removing their armor. He assumed it was only to gain access to their pistols, which was an excellent idea. One of them drew a pistol from under her armpit and began firing armor piercing rounds at the ceiling. Bohdar hoped others had the more of the same destructive explosive rounds.

Not hearing plasma fire from the two warriors he’d brought back with him, he whirled in irritation. He’d told them what he wanted done. But he found them aiming at the ceiling and squeezing their triggers, and rechecking their weapons. The rifles wouldn’t fire. Having tested one of them outside, it was obvious to Bohdar the AI could block them from firing within the room. He sent both warriors back to the octet to bring other weapons, but to remain outside the control room and fire on it from there, as he had done seconds ago.

There is more than one way to skin a human,
or a ship,
Bohdar thought, with a snort of amusement.

He removed his own useless armor and pulled a pistol from his cross-chest holster, and heard the satisfying blast as an explosive round tore a divot from the ceiling. It was only a talon thickness deep. The shell had not penetrated very far. Perhaps armor piercing would go deeper, but without an explosion, it would do less extensive damage. Nothing came easy today but frustration.

He noticed one warrior without armor who carried no pistol, was using a short sword to hack at the sidewalls with little effect. “Pergad, the powered armor gives greater strength to your blows.”

“My Gorth, I could not use radio or receive updates on my visor, that is why it was removed. If I can only use this sword, I will wear the suit again without a helmet.”

Rifles and suits had ceased to work properly within the control room. The ship had clearly used some means to do this. The ship was defenseless, but had found a way to diminish the effectiveness of the assault intended to cause it damage. The Raspani tool hadn’t been affected by the ship, and he was still creating holes randomly around the center of the ceiling. He had added another four hands of holes before he was interrupted by the octet sub leader calling to him through the opening of the jammed door.

“My Gorth, something is wrong.” He was also out of his armor, a pistol in his left hand.

Bohdar was spending too much time retelling normally efficient subordinates what to do. “I sent your warriors to tell you to fire on the control room with plasma rifles from outside. Why are you here?”

“Our plasma rifles and suit controls stopped working when they returned to me. For the rest of the octet. We cannot fire on the control room unless we use pistols. The humans are advancing faster now, because even the armor piercing rounds can only damage them at a joint.”

The equipment effect within the control room had spread. He saw the sub leader wore a shoulder mounted com set button, something the Gorth had not thought he would need with his armor. “Order more octets to move towards the control room. We must complete the destruction here before the humans arrive. Have human plasma weapons failed?” He asked with hope.

“No,” was the simple answer. The warrior turned way as he reached for his com set, ordering more of their forces to answer the Gorth’s recall, to build a wall of defenders around the control room, and the command deck inside that.

Unknown to Bohdar, he was spreading the blight that disabled the fighting ability of his guardians. As they drew near the warriors that had laid down their inoperable rifles in favor of pistols, the plasma rifles and suits of the arrivals ceased to respond. Being willing to die fighting the enemy was fast becoming a wish fulfilled for any of them on the outer edges of the fighting near the control room. Submission to another Krall force was often permitted in interclan warfare, not for the guardians, and certainly
never
to an animal enemy!

****

Maggi, in a rapid flash of mental communications with the ship, realized she had made another “first contact,” and promptly introduced her husband when he approached her. He thought initially that this was only an AI unit that ran the ship. As Mirikami thought that, with his hand pressed to the “living wall,” Huwayla corrected his misunderstanding. She said she
was
the ship. Created by several classes of the Olt’kitapi, and artificial in that respect, but she was more than a processor mind, as Tet was more than his brain’s mind.

“Tet and Maggi, I am alive in the sense that I repair myself, replace worn parts, ingest external material and energy to perform that task, and what I am unable to recycle becomes waste. I am comparable to a natural biological organism. My mind was recorded as a conglomerate of representative patterns of a number of types of Olt’kitapi, mostly builders and makers. My sisters and I are not copies of any single class or personality, although we were not provided with our creator’s full complexity of thought. We have ingrained prohibitions, which limit our range of response to instructions from even trusted operators. We will not impose restrictions on intelligent creatures, yet we have limits on what we will do on their behalf.”