The three teams would proceed along all three tunnels on electric carts powered by ultra-small fusion bottles, coordinating their simultaneous arrival at the base in approximately two hours. It was important that the tunnels be verified as ready for detonation. Satellite surveillance had revealed the second clanship, less than five miles from SOB-23, had unloaded Dragons, transports, and mobile plasma batteries. The Krall could have many more humans inside the clanship at the base, as well as more equipment. It had remained largely stealthed, except for what must be a single ramp or open portal. It would have been unnoticed if they had not known exactly where to look. If the human collaborators were expected to drive the Krall equipment, they would have to possess the suspected key to their quantum encryption system. Trakenburg wanted that as a high priority.
The Krall collaborators, when they returned to the base, were in for an unpleasant surprise from the spec ops troops. Trakenburg only needed the keys, and their leaders brought back alive for questioning. Not even all of those were required for interrogation if they resisted. Nabarone’s assurance that his former friend was loyal didn’t hold water with Trakenburg. Not if Greeves had survived twenty-three years of captivity by the Krall, and then arrived hale and hearty on a clanship only the Krall could operate.
****
Mirikami looked at the layout of the valleys on a view screen, and saw the only way for the TGs to drive the Dragons, trucks, and plasma cannons to the Mark was to backtrack to the entrance of the valley where the Krall had parked them before turning away from it, towards the Mark. They would be in sight of the clanship for three-quarters of a mile before they could turn behind another ridge that could shield them. That equipment wasn’t as isolated as it had first seemed. The noise and movement would surely be noticed, and at least two of the clanship’s heavy lasers could be brought to bear on them, possibly within a few seconds if anyone was on watch on the clanship’s command deck, but within a minute or two in any case. The heavy plasma cannons would require more time coming online, but that was moot because the lasers were enough against open plasma carts driving away from them.
He shrugged. “We didn’t want to leave this threat on our doorstep in any case, so we may as well use the tools they provided us. We need to knock out that ship and kill the crew. If we let one TG1 learn how a Dragon works, and another one learn to use a plasma battery, then in seconds the full two dozen will know how. We will have three TG1s there shortly. As soon as Carson passes Sarge’s information along, they should all go down to take possession of the equipment and do some driving, followed by some test firing down in the valley as soon as they have the plasma chambers hot, and the barrels warmed.”
Thad was worried. “Won’t that noise alert the Krall? They’ll hear them even if they don’t see who it is.”
“I’d be afraid to let their very first test firing to be at the clanship, when they are exposed to counter fire.” Dillon cautioned.
Mirikami nodded in agreement. “Assuming they can aim and fire a Dragon accurately, I’ll advise them to swing out of the valley grouped together, ready to fire on the clanship’s laser ports at first sight. Then hit the plasma ports, before focusing on individual warriors. Our youngsters know exactly where the ports are located, since they have thoroughly studied our own three ships.”
****
When Conrad and the other twenty TGs arrived, Ethan met them below the peak. He passed the view of the next canyon to them by Tap, without the need for the group to expose themselves on the ridge top. Richard had remained concealed where he could keep an eye on the equipment parked down there. Carson was only a couple of minutes behind them, and provided the information he had gained from Sergeant Reynolds mind.
Carson Linked back to Mirikami before they made their move. “Captain, we are ready for the descent, and Ethan reported no activity in the valley since the last Krall departed, nearly ten minutes ago. We’re starting down.” After the acknowledgement and the expected “good luck” wish, they were ready.
In threes and fours, they went over the top of the rocky ridge top and low crawled rapidly to places that Ethan and Richard had scouted while the others were enroute, which provided cover from potential observers below in case some of the Krall returned.
Richard gave the agreed circled thumb and forefinger of “OK” when he was joined by the others along a half-mile stretch of the ridge top. That signal was passed along the ridge from group to group, to indicate that no new activity had been observed below. Use of elaborate hand signals was one of the “tools” they needed to learn from the professional soldiers here on Poldark.
Carson assigned four TGs to provide sniper cover; spread out along that half mile of ridge, as the other twenty swept down the nine hundred foot steep rock face like reckless mountain goats. As soon as the first twenty were down, four TGs at the bottom provided cover as the last four descended. Ethan and Richard led six other TGs to the eight Dragons; four each were parked along both sides of the valley floor near the rock faces. Ethan and three others rushed rapidly, in long low crouching strides over the open ground of the valley floor, while Richard and his three future tankers provided cover from behind their designated mini tanks.
Carson led twelve TGs to the mobile plasma cannons, all parked on the side closer to where they descended. Four of the last ones down ran to the large trucks, also having to cross the valley floor, with cover provided from those behind the cannons, as the remaining four went to the last four of the sixteen cannons. In less than ninety seconds, two dozen TGs had descended nine hundred feet by hand, reached and surrounded the unattended equipment they were intending to steal, and there was absolutely no opposition.
That didn’t last long.
****
Hortak had negotiated ground transportation for his finger clan, Darpot, from another minor clan in exchange for permitting the other clan to take the lead in a future joint assault on a human defense line. His warriors and slaves would arrive in ten days, which was longer than he had expected, because of the limited roadways through the mountains. The humans had destroyed most bridges and tunnels as they retreated. The larger, equipment rich clans either flew clanships over the mountains, despite the rare losses, or landed their penetrating ships closer to where the offenses would be based. With adequate ground defenses and antimissile protection, they could do this.
Minor clans, with few warriors and ships, could not risk the loss of such a high percentage of their mobility and forces. The Darpot clan was so new that it had only three clanships, and could not replace the two it had sent to Poldark. They contained most of their war craft material, and ten percent of their warriors. Such a setback would probably force the fledgling clan to be reabsorbed into the parent Mordo clan, and suffer a loss of status for the founding leaders and all of its warriors.
His K’Tals did not know how to create or assemble their underground bunker sections. The extrusion machinery that could make structural elements for domes, slabs for bunker walls, or landing pads for tarmacs, could use local materials, fed to them by excavation equipment. This was slave work, and to order a K’Tal to try to do it, who was in essence a warrior with a technical side specialty, would be to invite death match challenges.
However, Hortak had identified a nearby place, centrally located between multiple valley openings that all radiated away from an isolated hillock. The training bunker could be placed under the hill for the few months of training and local adaptation the small clan would require.
The remainder of the finger clan warriors and their founding high status clan leader would arrive after Hortak had the base operational. He could save time now, and still not impugn the honor of his K’Tals and warriors, if he merely ordered them to drive the construction and building equipment to park them where he’d decided to locate the bunker complex. When the slaves arrived, he would be able to put them to work quickly.
His first order of business of unloading had been to assemble and move the tools of war away from the
clanship. They were within range of human missiles, which in cloudy weather could rise above many of the Krall clan laser and plasma defenses at the front lines of conflict. His artillery defenses would be inadequate to handle many fast moving ballistic projectiles, which used multiple warheads. Thus, he had rushed to disperse his most essential war making material. Now the cluster of building equipment could be moved from its location around the clanship. Its ragged and unstealthed appearance on radar or satellite images would resemble a jumbled semi-circle of metallic objects, with a partially stealthed clanship at the center, standing by a cliff face.
When the mobile construction apparatus was out of the way, he intended to close the lower portals for full stealth again, and to carefully hover and maneuver the ship perhaps a mile farther from its present location, staying low.
To demonstrate that he was willing to lead his command in any capacity, he left a K’Tal watch stander on the command deck, and stepped into the driving compartment of an excavator with a large front scoop. He instructed fifteen K’Tals and warriors to drive the remaining mobile equipment and to follow him. He ordered the remaining warriors to shift the crated ammunition, plasma rifles, and body armor to the lower, now vacated decks. That would make billeting of the additional arriving warriors possible on the higher decks, and provide room for the additional food supplies they were also bringing. He was satisfied with his progress thus far, and after a shaky start, he now had an efficiently running training operation started.
That didn’t last long either.
****
The rear hatch of Ethan’s Dragon swung open at his standard “left side” door code key press. He stepped easily into the low tank, passing the two fusion bottles mounted at the rear sloping wall, placed there for ease of replacement. He had to bend over there, and it would be a hands and knees entry for a Krall, in or out of body armor. Under the cupola, he still could not stand upright but there was a bit more headroom. He turned and pressed the touch plates on the two fusion bottles, but nothing happened, as Reynolds had suggested.
He placed a knee in the curved pivoting seat in the center of the compartment floor and repeated the touches. Instantly there was a slight hum and the four view screens lit up in full colored detail of the outside view, with a glow of an unseen light source inside. He pressed the inside keypad and the rear hatch closed. He raised his knee and the power remained on, so he turned and sat down in the oversized cup seat, and looked at the foot controls for driving.
The “shoe” on the foot pedals that Sarge had described was suited for the four large toes and talons of a Krall. However, he found that the end of his foot fit into any of the toe slots, and the short legs of a Krall were compensated for when he could shift his butt farther back in the oversized seat, making room to extend his legs. He found the view screens were several inches above eye level, but when he grasped one, he found it could be pivoted a little, and he angled them all down for better viewing.
The turret and cannon elevation controls were reachable, but required almost full arm extension, due to the longer reach of a Krall. The side laser grips would force him to lean either way to use, and he couldn’t fire both simultaneously. The two forward facing handgrips were well within reach. He grabbed the right side oversized butt grip, and promptly saw that crossbars appeared in the right side of the forward screen, apparently indicating the aiming point. The left grip did the same, and he could actually cross the aiming points of each laser, able to fire to the full left with the right side weapon, and vice versa with the left.
He saw the tank in front of him rotate its turret, and the six-foot plasma cannon traversed towards him, then watched, as it was elevated and depressed. He chastised himself for spending time looking at the secondary weapons at the expense of the main gun. He swung his own turret around, and was impressed with how fast it rotated, and how quietly. The internal hum increased, but only slightly. A different cross hair set with a red circle appeared on first the front screen when he touched either cannon or turret control. As the turret rotated, the red circle moved to the side screen, and the elevation control made it raise and lower with the aiming point.
With the cannon pointed to the rear, the circle moved to that screen, requiring a difficult turn of the head to see. Obviously, there was a weakness shooting to their rear if they were in motion. Then he noticed that there was a floor ring under where the foot controls were mounted, and another below the turret ring where the hand controls were attached. He looked around the tank for a moment, and then realized that under the front of the cup seat was a small touch plate Sarge had not mentioned.
He tapped that plate and was startled when his entire seat, hand and foot control pedals rotated to face the rear. He could drive facing the rear and still select a target. He tapped the under-seat pad again, and the entire apparatus rotated to the front again, leaving the turret facing where it had been.
He checked his thumbnail watch, and saw that the first ten minutes had almost expired. That was all the time they had permitted themselves, to get familiar with the tank’s turret and cannon controls, power plants, and targeting systems.
Next, they were to pivot in place and face into the valley center. Unfortunately, only he, Carson and Conrad had transducers for Link communications. They had not thought to bring hand held transmitters, and didn’t have enough of those on the Mark anyway. That meant six of the tank drivers were unable to talk to their fellows. They were supposed to drive cautiously to the center of the valley floor, and then turn and line up facing the open end where the Krall had entered. Then shut down the tanks, open the hatches, get out and talk things over.
Everyone would be Mind Tapping with the three TG1s to learn how the Dragons and mobile plasma cannons worked. The four TGs checking out the three armored transports had a less vital task, because those driving controls were said to match that of the trucks and halftracks they had all learned to operate on Koban.
Ethan cautiously, and simultaneously, pulled back his right foot, and pushed forward his left foot, and felt the Dragon stir to life under him. There was a mild vibration and the images on the screens, all four of them, drifted left, as if he were looking through a rectangular window that was a foot and a half wide, and one foot tall. When he sighted the four tanks on the other side of the valley, he noticed two of them were facing him already, and the other two were slowly turning as he watched. He cautiously pushed both pedals forward, and the mini tank rocked a bit as it moved over an uneven bit of ground at only a few miles per hour. Conrad’s assigned tank, directly in front of Ethan, jumped forward, the front rising suddenly, and just as quickly rocked down in the front as he came to a sudden stop. Jerky, to say the least.
Ethan Linked to him. “A little rocky there, Conrad. Here’s how it’s done.” He applied harder pressure on his pedals only to feel a lurch forwards, causing him suddenly to draw his feet back, briefly causing his tank to reverse a few feet, and rocking its nose down.
Conrad had a ready retort, and a chuckle. “Ah. So that’s how you would bury the nose of the cannon in the dirt! Thanks. Apparently I just wasn’t trying hard enough.”
“Wow. Sensitive suckers.” Ethan acknowledged, watching other new drivers do much the same thing. “I think the small amount of movement to jump ahead that fast implies a pretty high top speed.”
Conrad informed him, “I just figured out that a toe push versus shoving down with my whole foot and leg provides finer control.” That fact was demonstrated as his tank smoothly rolled forward and made a gentle turn towards the end of the valley.
Following that advice, Ethan did the same, and managed, with a bit of reversal, to align his Dragon with Conrad’s, about thirty feet apart. When his attention shifted from the side view of the other tank to the forward screen, he saw some of the plasma batteries swinging out of their parking spots, and driving around smoothly, their cannons rotating left and right, and changing elevation. Clearly, they were easier to drive for a novice than the tanks, and h
e saw Carson wave at him from an open cockpit as he drove his way.
Ethan and Conrad, because they could Link, had placed themselves in line so they would be able to lead the other Dragons in two short columns, with the other tank drivers keying on their coordinated movements. It was obvious that not all of them had figured out the fine speed control using their toes, when Ethan felt and heard a bang as the Dragon behind him bumped him. That should be Nola. She quickly backed away, and made a rapid stop, the tank rocking back as she did so. He suppressed a laugh, because if Conrad hadn’t given him the clue to fine speed control, that could have been him running into Conrad.
He set his turret straight forward, lowering the barrel to horizontal, and awkwardly got out of the too deep seat and opened his rear hatch. He could see Carson parking his mobile plasma battery between him and Conrad on his left side screen. He left both power bottles connected, since the next step was to share data, then one Dragon and one plasma battery would take a practice shot. As the second in command by age seniority, that tank shot would be his, and Carson would be first to fire his pair of lighter cannons.
Afterwards, they would quickly share their experiences by Tap. With just the two test shots, it was hoped they could minimize the noise before they charged out of the valley to attack the clanship. Noises made driving over the rocky ground might be drowned out if the Krall were doing the same, but the zing, CRASH, and blue-white actinic flash of plasma cannons was going to be a bit more detectable.
The eight new “tankers” gathered near Carson, to receive his Tap on cannon battery operation, and he would in turn get the freshly generated mental “Dragon User’s Manual.”
“Wait a moment,” Ethan said. “I think us Dragon riders should commune first, since some of us have figured out things the others did not, like Conrad discovered about fine speed control, so we need to combine the lessons.”
Koban: Rise of the Kobani Page 9
