Koban: Rise of the Kobani (69 page)

Wister shivered noticeably. “This is the first good thing anyone has ever received from those eaters of Prada and Rulers.”

“Wister, at one time the wild rippers ate humans. Those that live near us no longer do that. We live with members of that species in our homes, and our children play together. We only use caution when we meet wild rippers, far from the domes where we now live. One day I think we will have a treaty with all ripper prides. You must also have had attacks from wolfbats when you built the domes here.”

“Yes,” his head darted forward, “but they were not as terrifying, because we could frighten them away with guns that the Rulers let us have.”

“Humans have a truce with the wolfbats as well. They often work for us, in return for pay in food. We will make peace with any intelligent species when we can, and fight only when we cannot. We cannot make peace with the Krall, and so we must fight them. Not only for ourselves, but also for the Torki, the Raspani, and for the Prada.”

“I have come to believe that your fight with the Rulers is what you must do. I even see that their claim to status as our Rulers is probably in question. That is only my own view, now that I have seen the mind pictures of what they do.”

He explained how he had seen those images. “Maggi brought sixteen of your newest people, who arrived as Krall prisoners from the worlds where most humans live. I saw their memories of what the Krall have done to your worlds and your people. They did not know of my people until you brought them to visit Haven. They were frightened of us, and yet wanted to know about us, and to live on Haven because they cannot return home. They want to learn from us, as if we were the elder race. It was rewarding to feel that way, to have someone to teach. The other villagers are willing to help them make homes on Haven, if they do not live too close to us.”

“Your world is mostly empty of villages and Torki lodges, Wister, so there is room right now for everyone. That will not last forever, as we bring more of your people and mine to live there. Can you learn to work with my people more closely?”

“When you say “you” I believe you mean the other Prada, and not only me. Yes?”

“I do.”

It will be slower for some of my people, but with mind pictures to help, they can all learn to accept you as neighbors. I don’t know how many can turn away from the Krall as our rightful Rulers, as the elder race in the galaxy. That is a difficult thing for us.”

“Wister, you know more of the galaxy than do we humans, but even so the Krall, and the Olt’kitapi before them, occupied a very small part of the galaxy. There must be older races still to be found.”

“If you find them, and we believe they are senior to us all, then we will reconsider. However, the practical problem remains that the Olt’kitapi were once senior, and now they are gone. Even the Raspani were senior to the Krall, but their minds have been lost. The Krall, in their drive to rule the galaxy will attack and defeat any race they find, even if my people accept another species as the rightful and wisest new Rulers. Your people’s problem will not change, even if ours does. The Krall will win with or without the Prada”

“If the people of Koban, and any allies we can find, are able to protect other races from the Krall, then when you find an elder race you will be free to accept their rule. Will you build things we need, in exchange for payment?”

“For now, to help the Raspani, whom we know to be older than ourselves, we will build for them and for you, only if you protect them. That is a payment you can make to us.”

“Good. We were doing that anyway, and your help is appreciated. Can we ask you to make major weapons and clanships for us?”

“No more powerful weapons than we feel are needed to protect the Raspani from Haven predators. That would be small arms, transport vehicles, and shuttle craft.”

“Thank you for that. We need more but those things are helpful, and will ease the strain on our own supplies of similar items.”

Coldar had been listening patiently, curious as to what the Prada would propose to do for the human leader. Now it was his turn to tell him what he had discussed with Maggi in the many days since they had first met. The Torki were not constrained by the notion the Krall deserved to rule anyone.

He began the presentation Maggi had discussed with him previously. “Our designers and engineers have reexamined older storage areas of our Olts, the quantum memory and data devices the Olt’kitapi gave us long ago, to help us become sentient. We saved scientific and technological information learned from species that the Krall defeated. Only those parts of their science that Krall clan leaders saw as useful were ordered into production.

“The Krall prefer weapons that permit individuals to attack alone, or even when part of a mass invasion assault, they normally want to fight and risk death based on a warrior’s own capability. A warrior will often refuse cooperation with other individuals in a battle, or of offering support for warriors of other clans that are struggling with numerically superior forces. They are concerned mainly with their own status and breeding rights.

“Despite the stealth capability of clanships and single ships, most warriors would prefer to openly charge in and fight an enemy. Their stealth ability is actually an outgrowth of the overlaid skin material on their ships to absorb, deflect, or withstand various types of radiant energy in combat. When the outer skin is activated, the ships naturally become stealthy, but that is a side effect. It is not the Krall’s desire to be sneaky because they are facing a superior foe. They will not accept that a superior foe is possible, and for many thousands of years that has proven true.

“Krall personal body armor uses visible
and
infrared background camouflage only because it is based on a design created by the Botolians, a former worthy enemy who preferred to fight at night. The Krall liked the armor because it made their interclan wars more interesting. They had selectively bred for infrared vision, and then found an enemy that could hide from them at night. They wanted to practice fighting an enemy they could not see in those frequencies in darkness.

“That armor could be more effective at other electromagnetic frequencies if they incorporated the stealth technology of the skins of the ships. It could be improved other ways. That quantum level of surface reflectivity control was created by the Olt’kitapi, and adapted and changed slightly by the Raspani. The Raspani version is what is used on single ships we build for the Krall and the original Olt’kitapi design skin is on the clanships. The skin on a clanship is tougher, and on the single ships, the skin has a wider range of radiation response and a faster reaction to multiple frequency energy weapons.

“There are built-in energy weapons available for body armor that the Krall have never requested, and which we did not volunteer to them as possible. Infrared beams, microwaves, multi-frequency lasers, and plasma pulse emitters.”

Mirikami assumed Coldar was being more than merely informative, that he was approaching some sort of point in this discussion. “Are you saying it is possible to make body armor that is significantly better than what the Krall use now?”

This question had all of the men with Mirikami riveted to the conversation. The best hard suits were a better defense against projectiles and heavy plasma and lasers than the Chameleon Skins, but they were much more visible, particularly when moving, as when infiltrating behind enemy lines.

“Yes. I would not waste time explaining the possibility if we could not do this.” It waved both large claws in a wide gesture.

“There are different energy weapons and communications capability for body armor, which the Krall have ignored because they did not need them. They decided to kill the Olt’kitapi because they were on the verge of making fighting too safe for the early Krall warriors to evolve on their ancient Great Path. They have moved far along that path now for many thousands of orbits. Yet, you humans have found a way to move ahead of them in a short time.”

Mirikami looked directly into those jet black eyes on their slender stalks. “Humans will not take their path, because we intend only to stop the Krall from walking over the dead bodies of other species to achieve their selfish goals. I ask you and your people to create body armor like you described, so that we can test it against our common enemy.”

“Your friend, Maggi, was convinced you would ask us to do that. She does understand you well, and I believe her explanation and description of this armor would have taken less time than mine did.”

Mirikami looked around the room again. “I had expected Maggi to be here. She is the closest we have to a diplomat for this occasion, and she’s good at logically laying out facts. She could easily have explained your proposal to me.”

“She already is here.” Coldar insisted. “It was her wish to demonstrate the new armor, for you and for the three other friends that she said will be fighting the Krall. She left the medical facility on this ship only after your ship landed a short time ago. After twelve of your number of days in the medical machine, she said she needed a short time to learn to use the armor we made for her.”

Mirikami looked concerned. No one had told him she’d been sick or hurt. “Maggi was in the infirmary?” This was directed at Deanna, who had remained standing nearby. She reddened slightly, but smiled and said nothing.

Dillon noticed that both Noreen and Marlyn shared the same secretive smile as Deanna, with a gleam in their eyes that painful experience had taught him spoke of feminine mischief. “When is she going to show us this new armor? I’ll bet she’s late because she can’t even stand up in the heavy damned thing.” The wise crack was designed to cover his unease. An unease that was generally justified when Maggi was involved. He suddenly leaped two feet in the air and spun around, looking for whoever had just goosed him. Nobody there.

Then Dillon suddenly realized his crotch was getting uncomfortably warm, and he knew where the heat was localized. Standing in front of a roomful of gawking guests, dignitary’s, and two aliens, he pulled a fastener loose on his Smart Suit’s waistband, plunged his right hand down the front of his pants to the “formerly stylish” package bulge of that old suit’s design, and with a hard tug yanked out a metallic athletic cup. The way he promptly dropped the thing, it either bit him, or was hot to the touch.

The sight and sound of the clinking cup bouncing on the deck drew laughter, but Thad had stepped away from Dillon and was looking around intently. Dillon hadn’t jumped out of mere nervousness, although the height of his funny leap might have indicated some of that was present. However, the metal protector had not heated up all on its own.

Thad knew what he was looking for, and spotted it with difficulty. It was a barely detectable visual distortion between him and Dillon. He took two steps forward and appeared to wrap his arms around an empty place in air. Then the empty place in air suddenly broke his grip, lifted him and had him pin wheeling, about six feet above the deck. A handful of Ladies knew what was happening and were laughing hilariously. Of the men in the room, only Rafe laughed with them.

Thad squawked and yelled, “Put me down, damn it!”

A familiar voice, coming from a point just below him said. “You got it, soldier boy.” He dropped to the floor, putting out his hands to catch himself, grateful now for the lower than normal gravity.

Sarge quit enjoying the other two men’s distress, and spoke up before he became the next target. “Maggi, you got ‘em both. You sure have the muscles to do it now.” He nervously backed towards a side table’s edge to keep her from getting behind him.

Longstreet leaned over to Mirikami. “That’s one impressive suit. It works fast in real time, covering at least the visible light range and infrared. I can only detect a faint distortion from time to time. The heating of the metal cup must be some sort of radiant energy, because I saw the front of his pants start to glow in IR when Dillon turned around. I caught a faint shimmer in the air from him to where Thad made the mistake of trying to grab her.”

Joe startled backwards when her voice, just two feet from him, asked, “Who’s the good looking smart guy? And why’s he hanging out with this bunch of puny male losers?”

Mirikami was grinning. He was relieved to know she was well enough to play jokes, and strong enough to rough house. Yet, twelve days was a long time to spend in a med lab for something minor.

She was getting along in years, and despite the fact that modern people stayed active until very late stages of their lives on Hub worlds, Koban had been harder on their bodies than would be the case on any other human world. He’d noted that Maggi had developed gray strands at the temples, and the outdoor, hot summer sun had added creases at the corners of her eyes in the last few years. She was a hundred and eleven he reminded himself. Hell, he was ninety-one himself. The same age Maggi had been when they were captured.

“Maggi, you’ve had your fun. Let’s see this fabulous suit.”

Suddenly, there was a brief shimmer in the center of the room, and a figure barely over five feet tall stood there, in a small smooth textured black and white suit, with an exotic rounded triangular face mask on a relatively small helmet. The helmet’s front had strange multiple glowing blue lights, with something like earphones on the sides of the head.

Those six blue faceplate lights were centrally distributed around where her face would be, but none appeared to be placed exactly where you’d expect her eyes to be. Tet wondered how she could see the outside world.