Koban 4: Shattered Worlds

by Stephen W Bennett

  It was a plausible plan, and an excellent way to trap pests in boxes. It presupposed the pests would be in the boxes when the trappers arrived to surround them. They weren’t.

  Bohdar’s first clue came when the octets rushing to follow the Gorth’s orders suddenly slowed to literally a crawl on the display. They appeared to pause to check each room they had to pass. The sub leader was slow to note their laggardly ways because the white dots closest to him had begun to spread like flies, moving away from their previous three concentrations. They were brazenly moving in the corridors.

  The reason Bohdar had needed so many octets to return to the command deck area, was because he’d incorrectly thought there was no way the enemy could penetrate to the inner area, not with every corridor under observation, from the edges of the heavy combat locations with these mysteriously efficient human fighters. Warriors were assigned to watch each corridor for doors that opened on their own. They would fire on them, and alert nearby octets to rush to intercept whoever had triggered them.

  Somehow, twenty-five of the enemy was now loose in the nearby corridors, going in and out of compartments randomly. With their superior invisibility, they were difficult to locate, but his observers should have kept most of them from risking exposure in the unsheltered corridors. The doors were not depicted for the compartments (that had not been requested) so it was a moment before Bohdar saw that the white dots moved in and out, or passed through compartments and back into corridors freely. Every time a door irised open that should draw plasma bolt storms.

  He saw one of the octets he’d summoned, entering and leaving every compartment along a corridor that led to the center. He called the leader.

  “I ordered you to move to the center on those corridors, the humans there have broken out and you should have fired on them when you saw the door open. Why do you search each room?”

  “My Gorth, all of the doors opened at one time. We fired through those that were close, and are seeking hidden enemies in each one. The doors remained open and no longer close when we leave a compartment. Direct us to the enemy.”

  Bohdar saw several yellow dots of assigned watchers at an intersection near the center change blue, and a white dot turn green near them. He could hear sounds of fighting. He roared on the com set to order the warriors he’d summoned to move now to the center of the ship. With the doors always open, the humans were passing by his defenders like sand through a net. Detected only by chance or random shots, which connected before they could duck into one of the hundreds of compartments, many of which had two or more doors.

  He saw a risk of humans reaching the command deck before his reinforcements arrived. He had thirty-two warriors with him, which no longer seemed enough. “Pildon, tell me how long before the ship can Jump.”

  “Huwayla, when can you Jump to Telda Ka?”

  “I am able to do so now,” was the glorious answer Pildon needed. With no explanation as to why she had not complied with his previous request to be notified when that was possible.

  Bohdar screamed in roaring triumph, “Jump now!” Of course, the ship waited for a trusted operator to speak.

  Pildon spoke in relief, “Huwayla, Jump immediately for Telda Ka.” Relief can be an ephemeral feeling.

  “You are countermanding my previous instruction to remain here and open all of the corridor doors?”

  Pildon looked like a prey animal caught in a dead end canyon, with deadly killers approaching. An appropriate look for him at this moment.

  “I didn’t say that.” He looked at the blade Bohdar had produced, and felt the plasma rifle pressed to the back of his head by the shackle holder. His mind raced to find ways to save himself.

  He tried reason, “You have been with me and heard every word I spoke.” They were unaffected.

  He didn’t think appealing to Krall law or tradition would help. Mentioning that both Krall were breaking with protocol seemed too weak. Carrying weapons so close to a soft Krall was forbidden, although desperate or not, he couldn’t take advantage.

  He selected logic. “She didn’t say no! She asked if I was countermanding a previous instruction. I will!” A flicker of Bohdar’s wrist and the plasma rifle was pulled away, the knife slipped into a sheath.

  “Countermand your previous instruction.” Bohdar’s strained words proved he had barely kept his impulses under control

  Uh oh. Pildon had never given that instruction, so being told to countermand it was tacit admission that this sub leader thought he had. He was as good as dead if he didn’t get clarification before the new instructions were issued.

  “Huwayla, I countermand the instruction of whoever told you to remain here. Who was that?” He needed a sliver of hope to stay Bohdar’s hand after the Jump.

  “Trusted operators, that are the new visitors, have asked that I remain here. There is a conflict of purpose if I do as you ask. I require a consensus, and two trusted operators agree with one another to remain here. Do you have trusted others to join with you Pildon? Within me, there are a hundred and two other trusted operators, and they have not spoken to me on this proposal. Only a builder may override a trusted operator consensus.”

  Apparently if you weren’t untrusted, you were trusted if you had a quantum key. Good until proven evil. The Olt’kitapi truly had been a trusting species, if not great judges of character. In time with the Krall’tapi, their starting characters could have been molded and developed.

  The untrusted individual actually in charge made the expected ill-tempered decision of someone of poor character. He used his suit’s com set for a general push to all of his warriors. “Kill the ship, we cannot Jump.”

  He pulled his Raspani boring tool, and aimed the first one hundred twenty-two foot length, four-inch wide disintegration beam into the deck below the holographic projection, which showed white dots working their way closer.

  As quantum decoherence broke the bonds holding atoms and molecules together, a spray of gaseous elemental material was ejected away from the path of the invisible narrow beam. Some of that vaporous jetting material had formerly been inorganic compounds, or metallic alloys, but some of it had been very organic, as part of Pildon’s lower torso.

  Pildon gasped and clutched at his abdomen as he sank to the floor. Strangely, it didn’t hurt like a plasma bolt or blade would have. The holographic projection vanished, as demonstration that the downward aimed beam had also found technology to disrupt.

  “Fire into the walls and deck,” he ordered his thirty-two warriors here with him. He chose another point on the floor to aim his next beam. He was frustrated that it didn’t work like a sword, where he could carve a path as he swept the tool sideways. It appeared to activate for only an instant, and then he had to press the activation button again, producing a new bore tube of disintegration. There was also a limit to how quickly he could activate the button, since for almost a half second the tool would not respond after a press.

  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 i
nto 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 octe
t 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.”