Koban 5: A Federation Forged in Fire (62 page)

The exciting part was Jorl’s report from his people. “Captain, some cameras had been directed up at the sky.”

“Contact the other platoon leaders. I want every pile of wreckage searched for those cameras, and have them brought to the Mark. I’ll take the four you have from this building with me.”

Within an hour, they had usable images from over thirty cameras, half of which were directed at the sky directly overhead. They all showed some stars blocked out from the band of the Milky Way, by a dark triangular shaped object, which Jakob said had rounded rather than sharp corners and edges. Then, from two cameras, located on far sides of Elysium from each other, nearly a mile and a half a part, Jakob obtained an estimate of the objects distance, and thus a measure of its size.

The ship, or perhaps a Jump capable orbital station might be a better term for something so large, was nearly a mile and a quarter per equilateral side, or roughly two kilometers on a side. It was damned large, and seen only from below, its thickness was unknowable. If it were a three-sided pyramid, it was even vaster. There were no images recorded as it had arrived, but solid evidence that it had Jumped where it was seen came when it departed. There was a slight Einstein effect at the edges as the event horizon formed, and that horizon was not spherical, as it had to be for clanships as they entered T-cubed Space. For this craft, the event horizon conformed to the shape of the hull, as was the case for the far smaller Dismantler ships, when they Jumped.

Part of the camera images were taken while the attack was underway, but there were no flashes, in visible or infrared light emitted from the triangle. That the attack was underway was born out by the cameras that were not directed skyward. The collapse of buildings, showing lights at windows suddenly vanishing, and spurts of gas that blew out the glass, or sometimes the whole window frame flew away, showed just how rapidly the bursts arrived.

Virtually every building was involved simultaneously, revealing a massive rate of firepower, which lasted only a minute or so. The final hits over the next ten minutes appeared to be follow-on shots, to eliminate pockets of thicker debris where there might have been a possibility that someone had escaped death. There was obviously no desire to permit survivors to crawl out of the wreckage.

Right at the start of the general bombardment, one camera on a building corner had suddenly pivoted out towards the com shack and shuttle, both of which were already expanding gases before the camera was pointed that way. However, an infrared figure in the dark could be seen running along a pathway towards the animal pens, just as the pits and gas sprays started forming among the animals. The figure was lost among the gray clouds drifting on the breeze. It was probably the watch stander, Peshawar Tolvert, and he had been headed directly towards where the storm grate was discovered out of place. He may have escaped, and rescuing him moved to an even higher priority now.

Sarge soon had a report of interest. “Tet, I took the Sneaky Bastard out a light day and a half, and Grumpy, my AI, detected a gravitational ripple spreading away from Paradise. That would be from something massive entering a Jump Hole the night of the attack. I reentered Tachyon space and traced a weakening tachyon wake for long enough to know that a massive object caused it, and had traveled in the spinward direction toward the Sagittarius arm. That places their trail away from here well beyond where the Orion Spur branches off the major arm, which means the attackers were not our close neighbors.”

“Interesting. I want to gather a bit more data here, and make a call to our Disrupter friends. They may have encountered this language before, and could possibly provide a translation of that long repeated message.”

It was late in the day before a low and slow flying shuttle craft spotted a tendril of smoke, rising from the deep woods, nearly eight miles from Elysium, close to the small river. It wasn’t a natural wild fire, because it was so small and localized, and there had been light rain, but no lightening to spark a fire.

Using an external speaker, a voice speaking Standard did what the high pitch sound of the shuttle’s reaction thrusters had not done. It brought Tolvert out of hiding. He’d feared the aliens had come looking for him up close, because they had tried a couple of times to “pop” him, as he described it, while he was in the creek waters. Apparently, the cool water provided some level of protection from detection, if he stayed prone and moving, resting only under places where the bank was undercut, and jutted out overhead with tree roots holding it in place.

When he was picked up he wasn’t thirsty, not with the clear cold stream water he’d had, but he was starting to get hungry. He spoke around a sandwich.

“They hunted me for at least an hour after they killed the last of the penned animals. I don't know why they killed those. Did they hit the mining outposts?”

‘No, and our first contact with them was an hour ago, which is when they learned why Elysium had gone quiet.”

“At first I thought they were after just us colonists, but they also killed our livestock. Why kill the animals?”

“Perhaps they weren’t sure they were animals,” Mirikami said. “Some of our alien allies looked like animals to us initially, so they may have decided to kill anything living in or around the town. You said they tried to pop you. What do you mean by that term?”

“The sound of that weapon, when it first goes off, makes a soft sort of popping sound, like a half inflated weather balloon rupturing. Then there’s a rush of air, or gasses away from the center. That must be from whatever was in range of the effect that vaporized anything it touched. I got to see that happen up close, twice, when water in the stream suddenly seemed to explode out in a spray of mist, and then water would flow back into the big hole just created in the streambed.

“I finally figured out they knew which way I went from the landing pad, but couldn’t find me when I was in the culvert and the cold water. They mistakenly targeted some animals that we started calling a water dog, which lives in and along this stream. They’re sort of like a black otter, but longer and skinnier, about five feet long if you include their vertically flat swimmer tail. I scared some of them out of their den holes as I tried to stay under cover by the banks and under the trees, and I kept mostly submerged in the cold water. I believe their heat signature drew the attention of the aliens. The water dogs swam away from me in fear, moving to the center of the stream where there was less leaf and limb coverage over them. It was after the second time that I decided to stop moving and spooking the water dogs, since that might have helped them track me.”

“How long before you felt safe enough to get out of the stream? Why
did
you feel safe?”

“When I couldn’t see the ship’s silhouette anymore against the stars. It never moved the entire time of the attack. I didn’t know how close it was, or how large.” He held out his hands, using index fingers and thumbs, not touching, to indicate the scale of the triangle he saw overhead.

Mirikami nodded, “It was more than a mile long per side, or just over two kilometers, so it was pretty far up, to appear that small to you. They had good targeting to hit those water dogs from that distance. Did you see anything like a missile or projectile, when they fired at the town or animals?”

“No, the triangle stayed completely dark, and I didn’t see any beams or tracks leading down from it. I didn’t see when it left either because I assumed, if I could see it, they might see the warmth of my face. Even when I checked quickly, after another hour, and saw it was gone or had moved, I stayed in hiding under overhanging tree roots but out of the water, until daylight The cold from that mountain stream runoff had made me hypothermic, despite my cold adaptation mod. I’d not have made it without the clone gene mods. I have to say, Kobani mods appeal to me more than ever.”

Mirikami grunted. “With our high metabolism your body heat could have made you a better target. At least without this stealth armor activated.” He tapped his unstealthed suit. “Although, you’d be a harder target to hit if you moved fast and changed directions, until you reached that cold stream. You made a fire later, which helped us find you. You apparently have some woodsman skills. Not many people could make a fire by hand today.” 

He grinned self-consciously. “I had a fire starter kit, like most of us here carried if we ventured into the forest. With only one shuttle, we couldn’t run much of a search if anyone got lost. I made a small fire, but damp tinder and wood made it smoky. I thought I’d drawn them to me when I heard your shuttle. How many other survivors from Elysium have you found?”

There was an uncomfortable silence. Trevor shook his head. “That’s kind of what I figured. I don't think they intended to leave anyone here alive. Not even our animals. They were only halfway through their fourth broadcast when Gale tried to talk to them. That must have been some sort of trigger for them, because the first thing they hit was the radio antenna at the com shack, where they may have thought she was located. I was on my way to the shuttle, which our AI had remotely started a preflight for me. I guess they saw that and popped it next, and then as the fire alarms started, to get people to wake up and evacuate, hundreds of pops started sounding from every building at the same time. They were frigging slaughtered in their sleep.”

Pesh finally broke down at the relief of having survived, and from thinking of all of his friends and comrades that had died. Alyson comforted the man as he sobbed, while the men felt uncomfortable. Not knowing him well, they weren’t sure if he’d welcome or possibly resent their attempts at sympathy, coming for a loss they hadn’t shared, and couldn’t feel as deeply for people they had not known.

Mirikami stepped away, to talk about what else had been learned from the ruins of the town, and to consider their next steps, and his captains went with him.

“That was a very big ship, and it could easily carry all of the ten ships we brought with us, assuming it had hangers or holds for that. I don’t know if ten ships sent looking in the direction it went is enough to appear intimidating.”

“We, and the Krall, have made good use of these Olt’kitapi designs.” Noreen pointed out. “Appearances can be deceiving.”

“True, but my point is, it was gigantic, and had a very potent weapon, with a high rate of fire, and reasonable accuracy. With a so-called
blast
radius of less than two hundred fifty feet, the warhead isn’t hugely destructive, but it uses a delivery system that doesn’t require direct penetration of the surface of the target. Like the Nova missiles that use a Jump intersect. Therefore, armored hulls would be of little use. We don’t know about their stealth capability, but it didn’t use it here as far as we can tell, other than lights off. Since they attacked, I think if they had stealth it would have been used, at least if they expected return fire. I think they knew the people here were defenseless and didn’t bother to hide. I wonder if they have good stealth detection?”

Sarge spoke for his ship and crew, of the Sneaky Bastard. “I’m all for going looking for them right now. Of course, I’d want to sneak in stealthy, guns and missiles at the ready. We’d have to use some planet or moon to mask our gamma rays on this expedition.”

Thad preferred to wait. “We’ll have the problem of noisy White Out’s solved soon, and we need to go in with enough strength to matter to anyone, or anything we meet. We need more than ten ships, and some more powerful and unstoppable weapons. We can make our own Novae bombs, using Krall single ships. They have remote control capability by the AIs in our own ships, and we can install basic Jump drive capability if there’s no pilot or life support inside. All they have to do is simply Jump and materialize, rotating into Normal Space inside solid matter, blowing a big hole in even a mile wide ship.”

Jorl was puzzled. “I thought there was an interlock that prevented intersects by Krall ships with objects with that much mass?”

Dillon smiled. “And we take the interlocks out of our captured clanships, because we’re not as suicidal or careless as a Krall warrior. I’m not so sure about some of you youngsters, however. Our human made Novae’s don’t have mass interlocks either.”

Jakob intervened to tell them the Vanguard, with Maggi at the helm, had just performed a White Out a hundred fifty miles above what was left of Elysium.

“Tet, I have Coldar and Blue aboard, and some news about who might have conducted this attack.” Using Comtap, she had known the colony had been destroyed before the Vanguard had even Jumped.

“I expect Pholowela to arrive at any moment, because I spoke to her while in transit. She was only six and a half T-cubed travel hours away from Paradise. If you have a recording of the previous messages to the colony, she may be able to identify the species of the speaker, and tell us what was said. The triangular description of the spacecraft’s base is consistent with pyramidal designs once used by a species they said was called the Thandol, who use a base four number system. This ship appears to follow a preferred pattern for this species, except it was considerably larger than ship versions of theirs encountered in the distant past. She thinks they are likely to be a people that the Olt’kitapi considered untrustworthy, and with whom they would not share technology, or trade with them. They are the reason the Olt’kitapi wanted the Krall to become their protectors.”

Chapter 13: The Thandol

Mirikami summarized what they learned from Pholowela and her sister ships so far, but only in an outline form. “So the Thandol were at least as old a star faring species as the Olt’kitapi when they first met, their empire includes multiple subject species, which they forcibly annexed as citizens as they expanded to surround them. Once annexed, they’re expected to behave subservient to the Thandol, and are considered social and intellectual inferiors.”

Maggi added her thoughts. “Sounds rather like they have a gentler form of the Krall superiority complex, and don’t kill off their conquests. They don’t often make outright war, but use their technological advantages and economic power to bully other races into accepting restrictions on their expansion, and limit their participation in the empire. If they object too strenuously, they are isolated, and forcibly blocked from trade with other worlds. In short, strangled.”