Koban 4: Shattered Worlds (50 page)

“I don’t believe you about the suits.” Foxworthy rudely told him. “There is no way suits that form fitting can give you that much of a physical advantage, or have the energy to provide the type of stealth our ships generate with tachyon derived power. Your people also moved and reacted just as fast as that Krall did.”

He shrugged. “Despite seeing them for yourself in those recordings, I knew you wouldn’t believe it without a personal demonstration.”

He walked over to the plazsteel and tapped hard with a knuckle. He gestured towards the glaring Krall and said, with a Reynolds-like flourish, “Watch this neat trick.”

The Krall suddenly lifted six inches from the floor and quickly lurched the eight feet directly towards the plazsteel window, causing both admirals to flinch back, and look towards the armed men stationed to the sides of the room. The men stood there, stone faced, as instructed.

Mirikami stepped to the door that led into the interrogation room and insanely, from the viewpoint of the two naval officers, pulled it open. The two officers looked concerned, but realized that no one else in the room seemed worried or had pulled back. What the hell was he up to?

Mirikami said into the room, clearly empty except for the Krall, “Set her down there please, and step back to the far wall. Use low power settings on your lasers to hit the top corners and fire one low power plasma bolt to hit the top center of the frame holding the prisoner.”

To whom is he speaking? Certainly not the Krall,
Bledso thought.

The Krall and the entire heavy steel framework settled to the floor without a loud thump. The women realized the Krall hadn’t walked or jumped towards them, it was still strapped to the framework, body sagging against the restraints under gravity. Suddenly, two lasers, one red and one green beam, lanced out from a point in space near the far wall, about five feet from the floor, briefly touching the top corners of the steel frame, and a single actinic but obviously low energy plasma bolt struck the center top of the frame. It also originated from that point in space by the back wall.

“Admiral Bledso and Foxworthy, this was done by one of my people, wearing the stealthed armor you don’t believe can exist. You just saw some of its weaponry, and I think the stealth capability speaks for itself. I doubt you saw more than a ripple of movement from that suit, if even that. The armor was powerful enough to lift not only the Krall, but also that heavy steel frame. Let me introduce you to my trooper.”

He leaned through the door. “Stealth off please.”

The black and white armor that instantly rippled into view was of the same type the three men had used to capture the prisoner. Except the two navy officers realized the images recorded outside the Claw and in its cargo hold had apparently misrepresented the true size scale. This figure seemed very much smaller than they expected.

Still skeptical, Foxworthy asked, “Is there even a man inside that? It’s very small. And those men at the Claw moved as fast as the Krall did.” She considered the possibility that this object, and those men, were a new type of AI controlled device.

“Is that a robot?”

Mirikami offered an odd assurance. “It’s true that there’s no man inside.” He grinned.

Both women looked sharply at him at that admission, thinking the robot guess had been right.

“Helmet off please.” He said, through the open door again.

The headpiece suddenly spread wide at the neck, as hands reached up and lifted it higher. A shock of short dark hair fell free, in slight disarray, and distributed itself more evenly as the person tilted their head down and shook the unruly hair into a semblance of order. Then the person raised their head, revealing facial features of a rather normal looking, small sized young woman. When she smiled, she suddenly seemed transformed into an attractive, petite young Lady.

“Gracious Ladies, I’d like to introduce you to Lady Carol Slobovic.”

Carol merely nodded at the window, unable to see who was on the other side, now that her helmet sensors were unavailable to her.

“Carol, could you remove the rest of the suit please, and join us? I want our two navy visitors to be certain you are not some sort of attractive young cyborg.”

He turned away from the door as he spoke, to observe the two admirals. They in turn divided their attention between him and the young woman through the window, quickly removing armor that opened wide to let her step clear and remove.

Mirikami told them, “Carol is over eighteen years old, I think, and clearly she isn’t…” he was interrupted by her voice through the still open door.

“I’m nineteen…, and a half, Sir.”

That brought some involuntary chuckles, since only the young consider a half year worthy of mention.

“I stand corrected,” Mirikami acknowledged with a grin, and continued.

“She clearly isn’t a man, and I don’t think any similar sized male you know could have lifted that Krall anyway, along with the heavy steel frame it’s strapped to. Could a petite young woman like Carol do that?” He didn’t answer his own question, letting them make the wrong assumptions on their own.

As he spoke, said petite young woman bounced up the low step into the observation room. She was at least an inch shorter than the below average height of Mirikami, and her bare arms below her short sleeved utility shirt had nicely defined muscles. However, they were somewhat slender muscular limbs. Koban carbon fiber tissue did not produce bulky muscles, not if your natural genetics would not produce bulk in the human tissue they supplemented. She was still stronger than an ox, but didn’t look like she was.

When Mirikami made the official introductions to the admirals, he was pleased to see that Carol remembered the acting lessons he’d quickly coached to her. She offered only a half hand insertion on the handshakes, making her grip feel limp, and as she pretended to be introduced to Nabarone for the first time, he deliberately engulfed her small hand in his, so that she pulled it back quickly when released, as if he’d gripped her too tight. This was all part of the sales pitch that the alien suits had power assist because it was supposed to be obvious that Carol was no super woman.

Nice acting
, thought Mirikami.
I wonder if she considered crunching down on the hands of the admirals anyway.

Foxworthy again proved she was the harder sell here. “I didn’t hear your answer as to how your men moved as fast as that Krall in freefall. Being stronger is different from being fast. It’s why we use AIs on our ships, for fire control against the Krall.”

Mirikami had an answer. Not perfect, but “seeing” might also be “believing” for the two officers, if he provided a reasonable sounding answer.

“PU body armor has an AI, why wouldn’t alien designed armor have some equivalent? A similar system is installed in the fully enclosed helmet, which I assume you noted has no front faceplate. That suit can adapt to the human nervous system, and actually detects your thoughts as they are formed in your brain, to start the suit moving even before you actually can make a muscle start to move. The person inside goes along for the ride, as quickly as they think of what they want to do.”

This was another partial truth, because the suits did interface with the Kobani superconducting nervous system, and responded instantly to mental commands such as weapons selections, power level, and firing commands. However, it didn’t have any powered joints to respond to movements. That was all done by Kobani muscle power, and the speed of reaction was from their own nervous system.

When Foxworthy simply nodded, Mirikami knew he’d scored all the points he’d wanted to make today.

When the admirals tried to pry into Carol’s personal life and home world, Mirikami stepped in. “I’m sorry Admiral Bledso, Admiral Foxworthy, but I understood that General Nabarone had described to you the ground rules that we insisted on for our own security. We will not risk offering details that could be used to trace us back to our various home worlds on the Rim. The Krall, if they find out where we have our small bases, would put an end to our service to you, and destroy our worlds.” There was more than a touch of truth to that statement, but some of his security concerns were due to the Hub government’s own genetic laws.

Bledso apologized. “I’m sorry Captain. That was indeed explained to us. We simply found your young Lady here so engaging that we forgot.”

Possible, but not probable
, Mirikami thought.
You were snooping.

He moved the discussion back on track, since they appeared to see Carol as what she closely resembled. An ordinary teenager.

“As you saw just now, the suits do have excellent stealth, even built in energy weapons, and a compact alien designed power source to run them. Wearing that suit, Carol was easily able to lift the Krall, and that heavy steel support frame.” Of course, she probably could do that one handed, without the suit’s minor weight to add to the total being lifted.

“I think I have demonstrated that my people have the capability to successfully infiltrate down to the surface of K1, discover where you could do the most damage to their stockpiles with a surprise heavy attack, and slow or stop the Krall advances on our worlds for years, while your own forces get stronger. We are never going to win this war as we’ve been fighting it against them.”

He knew the half-truths and misdirection of today, about his leading the so-called “Rimmers,” wouldn’t stand indefinitely, and eventually they would learn the people giving them a fighting chance had been genetically enhanced. That they came from a world outside of Human Space, well beyond what was currently called the Rim.

Right now, the navy could hit effectively at the Krall on K1, while they were still limited in their war making ability, because of a temporary clanship and migration ship shortage. He could also assure them there was no threat from Eight Balls, because they had all been destroyed, and the Krall couldn’t make more. The Hub government needed to be bolder, to fight harder despite loses, or human civilization was doomed.

Bledso, unwilling to make even a tentative positive comment openly, was concerned with political repercussions for her own career. Anything she said today might be leaked to the president, or worse, to the press. Her ambition to press the war against the Krall might end as badly as it had for Admiral Mauss, who stepped away from fleet command duties rather than be fired after the Rhama disaster, despite a combat victory while she led the fleet action at K1. A hint of Bledso’s true feeling was revealed however.

“Captain Mirikami, we will be eagerly waiting for what you have to show us from K1. The word of a single warrior could be the bragging typical of their nature, although there has been a truthful basis for much of what they have openly broadcast to us in the past. If they are accelerating planetary invasions, billions of lives are at risk. We can’t take preemptive action without strong evidence. I hope you can find proof on K1 that I can take to the Joint Chiefs, and if they agree, can be presented to the president. Good luck to you Captain.”

It was as close as Mirikami was going to get to a commitment from the navy, and he had intended to scout K1 regardless. “Thank you Admiral. We’ll Jump in a day or two, and I expect to return with Tri-Vid evidence confirming what we were told by this prisoner within two weeks. Our information for which clans have responsibility for storing and safeguarding this war material was extremely detailed. We won’t have to scour the entire planet.”

Telling the PU navy he was going to scout K1 in advance, and then bringing back the proof the Krall were prepared for a second invasion was better than suddenly showing up and making that same claim. It lent credence that his people had the capability that he claimed, and then demonstrate they had completed a mission the PU military could not perform.

They shook hands and said their goodbyes. Mirikami told Crager he could accompany him back to Koban when he returned from K1, and he had regretfully turned down Carol’s imploring to go with the Mark to K1.

“Carol you perform a valuable and needed job for General Nabarone’s forces here. Remember, scouting the enemy in complete secrecy will mean that if we’re successful, we shouldn’t encounter any fighting on K1 for this trip. Which is something you apparently have discovered is strangely included in your definition of liaison work.” He raised an eyebrow, not in disapproval but amusement.

“Oh, that’s true,” she reflected. “On second thought, spying doesn’t seem quite as exciting as actually meeting and beating the enemy in combat.”

He smiled at the slightly bloodthirsty look the pleasant looking young Lady flashed him as she said that.

****

The Mark performed a White Out at two hundred miles above K1, practically above a hand of Tanga clan domes, where Hothdat said some of the larger weapons were said to be stored. There were thousands of the white ceramic-coated Dragons parked at two domes, along with lesser numbers of much larger armored gray transports. They were gathered in columns, facing the open rim area of the large circular tarmacs, ready to stream onto clanships when they landed to load them. At two other domes were thousands of laser and counter battery rocket carts for defense, and thousands of plasma cannon carts and mobile barrage rocket platforms, for use in mass assaults when forcing and securing an invasion landing area.