****
Dwarfed by the huge ship, the men stood craning their necks, trying to gauge her size.
"A mile high, at least," marveled John, taking in the vast expanse of gray metal, bulging with weapons blisters and instrument pods.
"A mile and a quarter, actually," corrected POCSYM.
"And eight miles long. Designed for space but transported here by me, under orders."
"Magnificent," D’Trelna breathed. "I don't recognize her class, but she's certainly one of the great Imperial dreadnoughts. Why didn't they take her with them, POCSYM?"
There was a moment's silence, as if the computer were debating itself. If so, it reached a decision.
"They couldn't, Captain. She was exiled here, to the Empire's outer marches, greatest and last of the symbiotechnic battleships."
D’Trelna stepped back with a gasp. K'Raoda's eyes widened and his jaw dropped. A murmur of disgust swept the K'Ronarins.
"A mindslaver!" D'Trelna finally managed.
"If you will, Captain," said POCSYM with distaste. "But not just any… 'mindslaver.' She is Revenge. Does that name still mean something to you?"
The Terrans, lost by this exchange, saw that the name did indeed mean something to their allies. It flew from lip to lip.
"Only one ship has ever borne that name," said the Captain slowly. "T'Nil's Revenge."
"What's all this about?" asked Bob.
"T'Nil's Revenge
Great ship of woe
To distant time
To greater cause
Must she need go"
Quoted K'Raoda. "I always thought it just some childish doggerel," he added.
"You see before you a legend, Professor," said D'Trelna, hand sweeping the vessel. "T'Nil's Revenge, politely known as a symbiotechnic dreadnought, commonly called a mindslaver. Bigger, faster, deadlier than any battleship since her ancient day. And totally outlawed. To build a mindslaver or to research mindslaver technology carries the death penalty-a punishment otherwise reserved for high treason."
"What, pray tell, is a 'mindslaver'?" demanded an exasperated Sutherland.
"A ship having, as its various cognitive cores, disembodied human minds," POCSYM said. "Such vessels enjoyed vast superiority in Weapons, Maneuver and Tactics. Properly maintained, the mindslaves were virtually immortal."
"You might tell them the rest, POCSYM," said K'Raoda. "How such minds went quietly mad, unable to die, living only for combat, the thrill of killing. How they were controlled by technicians mindlinked with them. Of the toll it took on those men."
"This is the last mindslaver?" asked John. "Yes," POCSYM said. "The rest were destroyed as a mercy by the selfsame T'Nil whose revenge she embodies." "How so?" asked Zahava.
"The Annals say only that criminals were killing people and selling their brains for use in warships," said K'Raoda. "T'Nil, then Admiral T'Nil, brought them to justice and was crowned Emperor by a grateful people." POCSYM laughed.
The humans looked up, startled, as the resonant laughter boomed through the cavern.
"I'm sorry," POCSYM apologized, recovering. "You just reminded me, Subcommander, of what a Terran general once said when asked what history would say of him. 'History, sir, will tell lies,' he said.
"Let me tell you the truth, gentlehumans, about Revenge and T'Nil and the Mindslavers Guild. My truth.
"Once upon a time, many thousands of years ago, there were space pirates, raiding K'Ronarin shipping and small colonies. Each year the problem grew worse, with Fleet never able to catch more than an occasional small pirate ship. The captured outlaws would usually confess to knocking over a few star-yachts, but even under mindprobe proved ignorant of the large, fleet-sized raids.
"The victims of these raids disappeared forever. Ransom was never asked.
"The attacks grew larger and bolder. Fleet, responding to the public outcry, built more and more of the new symbiotechnic dreadnoughts, equipped with the brains of convicts and the terminally ill. Within five years, fleets of these great ships were scouring the galaxy, searching for the brigands' base-a hopeless task, it seemed, given the vast number of possible hiding places, the dearth of accurate intelligence.
"Heeding the cries of anguished relatives and friends of the hundreds of thousands of missing colonists and spacemen, an already overtaxed Empire dug ever-deeper to build more ships to end the scourge.
"End it did-unexpectedly.
"A task force under Admiral L'Rar T'Nil-a cagey old war dog brought out of retirement to hunt down the pirates-a task force on routine patrol received a frantic distress call from the mining colony of R'Noa. Traveling at flank speed, T'Nil's force dropped out of hyperspace almost on top of the unsuspecting outlaw fleet-sleek vessels, bearing no insignia, but deployed in standard Fleet orbit pattern.
"Although taken by surprise, the brigands made a fierce stand.
"Only when T'Nil's marines finally stormed the bridge of the sole surviving hostile vessel did resistance end. And only then did the diabolical truth come to light.
"These were no 'pirates.' They were mindslavers-avaricious men ruthlessly collecting functioning human brains. Brains which they sold to Imperial Fleet contractors to build more mindslavers to hunt down the nonexistent pirates.
"The captured ship was a brainstrip facility. The colonists' brains were carefully removed and their empty, frozen bodies sold for surgical spare parts on the black market.
"The mindslavers had only partially scrubbed their records before dying. A complete list of their shareholders was recovered. It contained some of the most powerful and wealthy names in the Empire: senators, industrialists, financiers, senior officers, privy councilors, members of the royal family. All had profited handsomely from the venture.
"T'Nil was a brilliant strategist, and not just in space. He was adept at the political infighting that pervaded both Court and Fleet-'that fox,' the Emperor had once called him, unkindly.
"More, he commanded the close loyalty of his officers and men, for he'd been given back his old battlegroup, Task Force Forty-Seven. They'd followed the Admiral into hell more than once. Now he asked them to do so again, for he knew his command and life would be forfeit if he sent an honest report of the action.
"Task Force Forty-Seven disappeared into space, captured ship in tow.
"With unseemly haste, T'Nil and his men were proclaimed deserters and traitors, tried in absentia and sentenced to death.
"Two months later, raiders in Fleet uniform seized the civil communications station orbiting K'Ronar and broadcast graphic proof of all that I've just related to a horrified, sickened Empire: brainless, recognizable heads, holograms of the brainstrip vessel, airtight documentation.
"The ensuing popular revolt was brief but bloody enough for a general catharsis.
"Did I mention T'Nil's daughter? She was on R'Noa. Her father arrived too late to save her or his grandchildren.
"Even before his coronation, T'Nil rounded up all the masters of the de facto Mindslavers Guild. He had them brain-stripped and placed aboard this vessel now before us. The other mindslaves were mercifully destroyed and the ships converted to conventional craft.
"Thus ends my truth, Subcommander," said POCSYM. "May it inform your own."
"Why was she sent here?" K'Raoda asked.
"I wasn't told. I suspect, though, that the disintegrating Empire didn't want Revenge falling into the hands of, say, a rebellious sector governor."
"And the mindslaves?" asked Bob.
"Functional, as is the rest of the ship. I've had her in stasis, of course. The mindslaves-"
The computer was checked by D'Trelna's upraised hand. "Yes?" the Captain said into his communicator.
"Sir, message from Admiral L'Guan." L'Wrona read it to him.
"I have something to add," said POCSYM. "Please check your detectors now, Commander. Do you confirm what my satellites have picked up?"
As L'Wrona turned toward the screen an ensign called, "Enemy force emerging from hyperspace."<
br />
Next to Pluto a swarm of tiny red dots were forming into a huge phalanx.
"S'Cotar battlefleet has entered from hyperspace near the ninth planet, sir," reported the XO. "They're dropping into assault wedge."
"How many?"
L'Wrona hopefully tapped the telltale. The figures didn't change. "Two thousand five hundred and twenty-eight," he reported stoically. "Heavy cruisers, destroyers, corsairs, scout and patrol craft, supply and transport vessels. Lots of transports. They're not just here for a casual visit."
"Where is the command ship?" asked the Captain.
"Can't tell at this range, sir."
"I have her, Captain," said POCSYM.
They were back in Central Control, facing a hologram of the solar system. "My apologies," the computer said, "but it seemed less cumbersome."
In the midst of the red dots now advancing on Earth glowed a single green light. "The command ship," said POCSYM. "She is Nasqa-'deadly wraith.' One mile in diameter, crew of three thousand."
"Well, Captain?" asked John.
D'Trelna was silent, eyes distant. He ran his fingers through thinning hair.
"POCSYM," he said finally, "can you defend Terra against such a massive force?"…
"Gallantly, Captain, but very, very briefly."
"Can you put Revenge in orbit?"
"Yes, with ease."
"Can you put an assault team aboard Nasqa before her ships come within range of Terra?"
"Yes."
"My friends"-D'Trelna smiled-"let's adjourn to the meeting room and discuss a mad scheme I have. It's just insane enough to work."
****
"The hell you are!" John stormed at McShane. "You heard what the Captain said. His own men are afraid to mindlink with those creatures. What makes you so damned omnipotent?"
No sooner had D'Trelna announced his twofold "mad scheme" than Bob had, volunteered for what John thought the most dangerous mission: mindlinking with the disembodied brains aboard Revenge.
The professor calmly regarded his angry ex-student. "I saw no rush of volunteers," he observed dryly.
"Also, I submit myself as the logical candidate.'' He poured water from an onyx carafe into a matching cup and sipped.
"It's been speculated that only Terrans, with their heart rate higher than K'Ronarin, have a chance of arriving aboard Nasqa undetected."
Speculated was the word for it. Two months ago the K'Ronarins had captured a S'Cotar courier ship. Along with new Fleet deployment and withdrawal protocols it carried modifications specs for ships' Security systems. Henceforth, penetration alarms would be keyed only to the K'Ronarin heart rate. The S'Cotar had evidently been plagued by false intruder alerts triggered by too broad a detection program.
Rigging the courier's drive to overload, the K'Ronarins had blown the ship up along with her dead crew, hard by the S'Cotar advance. They could only hope the aliens had bought the accident, leaving the program modifications unchanged.
"Thus, all Terrans now here fit for combat may attempt entry. The surviving U.S. troopers left with Mr. Montanoya; his 'witnesses,' he called them."
"Despite the space spectacular, he'll need them if he wants to stay out of the funny farm," said Greg.
Bob smiled slightly. "Knowing the cobwebbed minds that clutter many senior government posts, I'm sure he will. If he appeared alone crying, 'Watch the sky! Watch the sky!' they'd put him in a rubber room.
"But that leaves only the five of you.
"As we know, the K'Ronarins refuse to meddle with what is to them abomination. The good Captain here will only ask his crew to man the less exotic parts of Revenge.''
"Never give an order you know won't be obeyed," mumbled D'Trelna, sitting on the table's edge, eyes occasionally flicking to the screen and the advancing S'Cotar fleet.
"Further," continued Bob, "without the mindslaves and the weapons systems they control, Revenge is just another ship. Correct, Captain?"
D’Trelna nodded.
"Someone who is expendable, unburdened by ancient legend and possessed of a disciplined mind must serve as mind-slave liaison. I am that man, gentlemen and lady. Hobson's choice: Take me or do without."
Before anyone else could try to dissuade him, POCSYM spoke.
"Nasqa will be within transporter range in thirty minutes and her fleet within bombardment range of Terra in four hours. May I urge speed?"
"Nasqa assault group will don warsuits and arm. Be back here in twenty minutes for transport," ordered D'Trelna, rising.
"Crazy old coot," John muttered as he walked past McShane, affectionately squeezing the professor's shoulder.
Bob turned his head, winked and lit a cigar, exhaling a great wreath of tobacco smoke.
Wonder if he'll look so smug in a mindlink helmet, K'Raoda thought, seated across from Bob. Pouring himself a glass of water, he toasted McShane.
Stephen Ames Berry
The Biofab War
Chapter 16
The handful of Terrans strode purposefully down the gray, curving corridor of Nasqa. S'Cotar scuttled and flitted all about, paying them no mind.
"They're arrogant and literal-minded," POCSYM had said earlier, as the teaching helms settled over their heads. "Arrive undetected by their equipment and they'll think you're transmutes. You'll make it to the bridge."
When the helms lifted, three lost minutes later, they knew Nasqa: her layout, crew disposition, bridge operations; knew her as well as any S'Cotar. It was hard-won data, gleaned by POCSYM and Confederation Intelligence over the years.
The bridge crew should number no more than six. If the humans reached the bridge, they just might carry the day.
Maybe, thought John, running his thumb along the smooth leather of his holster.
POCSYM had put them as near to their objective as possible in so distant a moving target. They had only a walk of a hundred yards before the Terrans came to the bridge. S'Cotar came and went through the round, open doorway.
An alarm hooted. Lights flashed. Thinking it was all over, John turned to down the nearest aliens. But the S'Cotar ran past the humans, ignoring them. Giant blast doors began trundling shut. In a moment the bridge would be sealed.
"They're getting ready to engage Implacable," whispered Sutherland, drawing up beside John. "Now or never," said John. "Let's go." Caution tossed aside, he led the rush through the half-closed doors.
Nasqa's central screen showed the position of her fleet relative to two dots midpoint between Earth and Moon-two dots, John noted with relief. Revenge had joined Implacable.
High-backed chairs fronted the six bridge positions, hiding their occupants from view. "Turn slowly and you won't be hurt," lied John, seeking to spare only the consoles.
The chairs swiveled slowly about. Six empty chairs.
Drop your weapons or die where you stand, hissed something cold in all their minds.
The bridge swarmed with warriors.
****
K'Raoda had briefed McShane as the three of them rode the small, open hovercar through Revenge's broad, empty corridors-more roadways than corridors-eerily still save for the vehicle's quiet purr.
"All we know of the mindslaves comes from POCSYM and N'Rar's Annals of the Empire," said the young officer. "Both say you must dominate the mindslaves, force them to your will."
He broke off, grabbing for a sidebar as D'Trelna banked sharply around a corner at full speed, yet another of Bob's cigars clenched between his teeth.
"Sorry," grunted the Captain. "You may not believe it, but I once fit into the cockpit of an esper fighter."
"Professor," continued the Tactics Officer, "you must overcome their initial resistance. It's imperative."
"And if I fail?"
D'Trelna spoke as K'Raoda hesitated. "They'll burn your cognitive centers out just to feel you twitch," he growled. "Don't fail."
They pulled up before a small door neatly lettered "Sym-biotechnic Control Facility."
"Remember," added K'Raoda, "don't mindlink unt
il POCSYM has us in orbit. And leave your communicator open on tactical. We'll be on the bridge, driving this battlewagon. You've got forty-five minutes to take control. Assuming our friends succeed aboard Nasqa, we'll need all the firepower you can give us. Good luck."
As soon as he was inside, they drove off.
An innocuous little room, thought Bob, to house something that excited so much horror.
Two thickly padded armchairs faced a soaring, blank screen-"primary battleboard," POCSYM had called it. Above each chair hung a translucent, bowl-shaped helmet, similar to POCSYM's teaching helms.
"Just sit in one of the chairs," POCSYM had instructed. "The helmet descends. What happens then varies each time. But you, not the mindslaves, must control events. And beware: they're treacherous."
The condemned man enjoyed a hearty last cigar, thought the academician, patting his pockets as he walked down the spiral staircase into the pit. Reaching the bottom, he groaned: D'Trelna had filched his last panatela. C'est la guerre. He smiled wistfully, recalling another war, other faces.
Bob wasn't long alone with his memories before D'Trelna called, "We're in space, Professor. Please begin."
"Tactical. Beginning now." He sank into one of the comfortable chairs, remembering, as the helmet lowered, to repeat "Tactical," keeping the channel open. The helmet settled down over his ears.
It began at once.
Hall, comrade, came a single, gentle whisper that was also many. Welcome to our sepulcher. Long have we waited. What service may the penitent perform for Emperor and Empire?
The Empire is dust, thought Bob. You may, however, save all humanity from that which would destroy it.
Surely a noble task, comrade, came the ghostly chorus. We would know more, but sense that time is precious. Open your mind to us, that we may know all.
Thank you, no. You've earned a durable reputation for malevolence.
One in which we take some pride, comrade.
There was a fierce buzzing, as of angry bees in condave, then the attack Bob had expected struck.
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