****
Mauss was startled when the Thandol fleet, which still outnumbered them over two to one, with a large reserve yet to call in, abruptly Jumped as a unit, except for the damaged warships that couldn’t do so. The large tachyon trace of their wake endured, proving they were abandoning Wendal to the uncertain mercies of their enemy.
“I didn’t think they’d ever abandon their capitol. We saw no ships leaving the palace complex, but the emperor could have been spirited away on one of the thousands of commercial ships we saw flee the planet in the last few hours.”
There had been a steady stream of large and small cargo and passenger ships lifting from the planet, only to Jump as soon as they cleared the atmosphere. The Federation and PU ships had no intention of firing on them, but the Thandol expected no more mercy than they had shown to their past conquests, when the citizens of defeated and annexed planets tried to flee subservience. Many of them must have carried VIPs, because the Thandol fleet renewed futile and costly attacks on human warships each time, as a distraction.
Mirikami, who had just been in a link with Maggi, had the advantage of her slowly growing expertise of Thandol psychology.
“Golda, Admiral Foxworthy, I’m convinced there’s about to be a second Emperor declared. Maggi’s confident we’ll find Farlol the 84th still inside his palace. Perhaps still crapping his guts out in quarantine, surrounded by his loyal Imperial Palace guards. He may even call out his ceremonial Marching Army with their outsized weapons and flashy uniforms, stomping their feet all together in the review square, to scare us away from the palace. He could already be dead if there was a traditional coup, but he’s been isolated and infectious, so I doubt his usurper would personally get close enough kill him, as tradition would expect. I’d like to know for certain.”
Foxworthy laughed at the mental image of stomping elephant marchers. “We’ll just blast the palace and their marching asses from orbit and go home, right?”
“Admiral, I’d take it as a personal favor if you waited until after me and my people lifted off. And maybe not even then.”
“What? You’re not going down there, are you?”
“Yes. There are a dozen Mark II’s preparing to Jump directly to the Imperial Palace complex rooftops, and two landing areas, with quite a few Kobani in armor that transferred from clanships that arrived with Golda. Using direct Jumps, we don’t risk being fired on from the ground as we descend, and we have several missions I’d like to accomplish.”
“If you’re not going there to take out the Emperor, what would you be doing? Capture him?”
“Our first step is to rescue the palace household spies that have been helping us, and keep the Thandol Palace guards or the Marching Army from killing any aliens that were forced to come here and work for their overlords. We spoke to our insiders via communications devices we gave them, and told them to spread the word to other noble household help, and use their servant’s access to gather in the low security outer sections of the Imperial Palace, and a few levels below that, where the hired help works. We intend to take them safely home.”
“Is that all? You said several missions.”
“There are supposed to be Olt’kitapi survivors that have been kept prisoner by the Thandol for many generations, but we don’t know where they’ve been held. A single subservient species we know of sheltered the other Olt’kitapi survivors, keeping them hidden from the Thandol. These are the same ones that recently moved to the Federation.
“Their former guardians know all the dietary preferences of the adult and larval forms, and they may have learned of a clue to where the Thandol’s prisoners are kept. The subject incidentally came up when I talked with the leaders of the former protector species of the surviving Olt’kitapi, telling them in a humorous fashion, how unhappy the meat eating rippers were when they shared lunch with the free Olt’kitapi. Fruits, nuts, and insects are not good ripper fare.”
He’d promised not to expose the Hothor as the species that had helped the Olt’kitapi, so he didn’t say who provided this next clue.
“They noted that similar food items that might be suitable for an Olt’kitapi diet are commonly sold at a servant’s market, located just outside the palace grounds. Considering the various alien species, which Thandol nobility employed as servants, food of that nature wasn’t considered unusual in that market. What was odd, is that palace security officers routinely ordered items like that, and had them delivered to a palace entrance, where aliens are not allowed to pass. Thandol civilians always paid for, and moved the items inside.
“Per older servants, who have served on previous capitol worlds of other emperors, this has been a repeated pattern at other palaces. Even a well-traveled Thandol wouldn’t likely eat insects or their parts, and not regularly. We believe Emperors have kept some of their former Olt’kitapi rivals as prisoners, keeping them nearby for many generations.
“When Farlol the 84th claimed the former territory that belonged to the Olt’kitapi, after we defeated the Krall, he announced that subservient Olt’kitapi, obedient to him, had approved the annexation. I want to find those prisoners, if he left them alive.”
“I can appreciate that.” Foxworthy acknowledged.
Mirikami next outlined a political and strategic reason to determine if the Emperor was still alive. “I think knowing if Farlol was killed in a coup, or is alive and still in quarantine, is valuable knowledge for us. It might give us an idea of how fractured the Thandol ruling families are right now. How quickly they might unite and form a reduced Imperial territory.
“I hope Farlol number eighty-four is alive. If he is, I want him to stay that way, to divide the loyalty of the Thandol nobility, and oppose whoever ordered the fleet’s retreat today. If there’s a civil war between competing Emperors, and then the Security forces do as I expect, taking possession of regions where they enforced the Emperor’s rule, then the PU and Federation should have a welcome breather before any of the competing factions can threaten us again.
“Long before any one of them grows strong enough to attempt an expansion in our direction, we need to make certain they stay wary of trying anything that dangerous to their own existence.”
“Tet, you do take the long view. I’m just a sailor of the PU, and that’s all I ever wanted to be.”
“Janet, I still consider myself just a Spacer, and if you ask Bledso, I’ll bet she wanted, in her sailor’s heart, to do what you and Golda just did. Nabarone just wanted to be a militia solder on Poldark. We all have gone where we were needed, and did what needed to be done, despite our simpler goals in life. We each rose to the occasion, to make certain that those simpler goals continued to exist for others.”
Foxworthy was still reveling in having become a Kobani. “With nanites and the Prada gene, we’ll get to do that a hell of a lot longer than we expected.”
“True. We still have the long-term impact of our indefinite lives to consider. Those of us that prefer to confront our enemies as we did here, might not have to face that long future, but most of us will. Perhaps we should spend more time talking to the Prada. Wister is over twelve hundred years old, and his sister Nawella is a bit older. But even that age pales compared to the probable ages of members of the elevated species we told you about. We know they stay interested in the Universe at large, observing the future candidates for elevation. There must be more for them to do than follow that hobby.”
“Well, I for one can wait. I still find the mystery of what else there is to discover in this one galaxy more than enough to keep me interested.”
“I do too.”
“OK, Tet. Be careful, and if you see him, tell the Emperor to kiss my ass. We’re picking up survivors now. Even from the other side. No need to behave like the assholes we just defeated.”
****
“Hey Dad, I understand that the size of a Thandol was first compared to Sarge’s height. Is that right?” Ethan had just stepped out of the Mark, where it was poised on the roof of an upp
er level of the Imperial Palace. He expected to meet his first Thandol at any moment.
“Yeah,” Thad answered. “The Dismantler Pholowela showed his image standing next to a typical Thandol for scale.”
“Hmmm. Was that before or after he developed that beer belly? These could be huge suckers.” Winking, he nudged Carson, standing with him on the extended airlock ramp.
Reynolds, usually the originator of snide comments, patted his stomach, or rather the armor covering it. “Flat and hard as ever, boys.”
“Much like his head,” Thad suggested, with a grin.
Mirikami, standing out on the sagging rooftop where the heavy Mark had landed, said, “Your Aunt Maggi slapped our two Thandol prisoners around all by herself, no armor, so size doesn’t matter. By the way, I asked Noreen to leave both the Thandol behind when she lifts off. We aren’t going to hold them any longer.
Carson frowned. “Could they provide clues of where home is?”
“No. Maggi Mind Tapped them to be sure, but they never saw the outside sky while locked up on Haven.
“Anyway, let’s disembark everyone right now, in case Jake needs to relocate the Mark. This roof isn’t made from as strong a composite as we use in our higher gravity structures. With the sagging I see started, it might cave in.”
There were just over a thousand armored Kobani on the Mark, so their weight leaving might ease the strain just enough. The Mark, and eleven other Mark IIs had popped loudly into real space, just above the large palace compound, and settled at strategic locations. Mirikami had selected a wide roof, near where he and Maggi had landed their Scout on the night they infected the Emperor’s personal browsing plots with parasite eggs.
The Kobani activated suit stealth, and spread out to investigate the myriad rooms of the luxurious residential upper levels of the Imperial Palace. In minutes, not only was there no opposition encountered, there were no Thandol civil servants or security forces anywhere to be seen. The upper levels appeared to have been abandoned for several weeks, based on the dust, and ashes of burned plots of what would normally be lush with tender shoots of well cared for sugar spear sprouts. It looked like a scorched earth policy had been applied to the plots, and the royal living quarters, guest housing, security barracks, civil servant quarters, administrative sections, were all empty, left in disarray as if abandoned in a hurry.
This clearly happened well before the assault on Wendal, so likely came immediately after the parasite infestation of the Emperor, his entourage, noble visitors, and harem had been discovered. The quarantine of the infected Thandol nobles was being maintained elsewhere, and wasn’t a detail that the alien household help had been allowed to learn.
This was the upper levels. There were civil servants and security forces in abundance in the middle levels, and around the heavily gilded Imperial throne room. Where its weight wasn’t an issue, there was solid gold décor, such as guide rails, tables for food for visitors or guests to browse, gold trunk-shaped handles to open doors, and solid gold water troughs with cool flowing water. But none of the royal court was present.
At the ground level spacecraft landing area, which the Avenger used, the stealthed Kobani Noreen had brought with her encountered heavy plasma rifle fire from the moment the main airlock hatch opened. It was poorly aimed at chest level, because a few low crawling armored figures swiftly worked their way out below the bolts, proving the shooters couldn’t see them.
The shooters were Palace Guards, firing from the concealment of armored revetments, in a defensive arrangement that appeared to be based on an ancient design that wasn’t intended to be a defense from an invading force. There likely hadn’t been an enemy invasion of an imperial palace since early Thandol history, if then. Their big bodies, cloaked in draped anti-laser and plasma bolt armor, was cinched around their post-like legs, with their feet tucked into armored boots that were part of the draped material.
The front and broad dome of their heads was also shielded, but to keep the freedom of flexibility of their two trunks, and two tentacles, they held up an armored shield to protect their faces, with modest transparent ports to see through, and a slot for the barrel of a weapon. Their weapon barrels were exposed, but a sighting system allowed the shooters to keep clear of the slot as they saw what their weapon was aimed at, and the transparent ports were polarized, to limit a laser’s effect.
Using their automated weapon sights, they didn’t need to expose their face, trunks, or tentacles, to incoming fire through the slot, or laser beams through the eye ports. The fold-out mobile shields normally hung around their necks, and when opened and lifted they were as high as the top of their heads, and nearly as wide as their body. Clumsy, compared to full body armor, but from a concealed position like the revetments, it was effective protection for a bulky body like theirs.
There apparently had never been a need for plasma cannons or heavy lasers to be mounted within an Imperial Palace. Not when an enemy’s ships would presumably be reduced to atomized particles by D-bombs in orbit, long before they could ever land. If some alien ground force somehow infiltrated and reached the palace grounds, they would be incapacitated by Debilitater rays, such as those that were now being played across the tarmac. The Palace Guards had adequate shielding from reflected radiation, and they had no idea that the humans they faced were effectively immune from the nerve shattering effects, even without shielded armor.
Jorl Breaker and Cal Branson teamed together to work their way near one of the revetments off to the side of the ship’s open hatch. They’d noticed the shooter there was forced to lean out slightly to aim at the hatch, then would pull back. Up to now the Kobani had held their fire because Mirikami had asked for live prisoners. Members of the security force would probably have answers to where the Emperor and all the high-ranking imperials from the upper palace levels had gone.
Jorl was waiting for the rifle barrel to poke around the corner again. His plan was to pull the weapon through the shield’s slot, and Cal would grab the side of the shield and pull that free. Then they’d grab the disarmed Thandol, and step through the revetment opening into the protected corridor behind the outer wall.
The shield and protruding rifle barrel came out of the darkened corridor, and Jorl firmly grasped the weapon and yelled, “Gotcha!” and yanked hard.
There was the shrill sound of a bugle, as not only the rifle came free, but the shield came with it. There was a wider conical secondary shield built onto the rifle, to protect the shooter’s trunk and tentacles from beams or bolts that made it through the slot. That cone had jammed in the slot.
The shrill sound was one of pain as the second trunk, inserted through rear mounted loops on the back of the shield, was scraped bloody when its protection was torn away.
Cal grabbed the trunk that had been holding the rifle, and the tentacle that operated the trigger, the other tentacle had been poised to adjust the ammunition selector. The large rifle could fire a projectile, a laser, or a plasma bolt, as the trooper chose. The free right tentacle whipped back over the Thandol’s head to grasp a short sword in a scabbard, strapped to side of its neck. The large size of the grip suggested the double-edged blade was intended to be wielded by one of the much stronger trunks, but it was adjusting. Not that it mattered.
Jorl crushed the rifle barrel with a squeeze of his left gauntlet, and his right hand came up and across the trooper’s face to pluck the short sword away from the tentacle, as Cal pushed the Thandol back into the corridor. The two Kobani followed it swiftly, in case another trooper saw what happened, and took a shot into the revetment opening. The two men filled the opening briefly, nearly shoulder to shoulder, and a plasma bolt would scorch armor and damage the stealth coating, or even penetrate if it struck a flex-joint.
Once in the darkened corridor, the Thandol kicked at Cal, and took a swipe at Jorl with the free trunk. He was rewarded with a loud metallic sounding “thwack” sound, as Jorl used the flat side of the short sword blade to bash him hard on the forehead
, between its red rimed eyes. Delivered by a Kobani, even hitting the head’s armor plate delivered a stunning impact, and the trooper’s left front knee started to sag, and his kicking leg on the right, couldn’t return to the floor in time to stop his awkward collapse to his chest and front belly.
He’d continued his trumpeting, in deeper notes than the initial shrill scream of pain. Their Comtaps translator subroutines had been activated, and it was the Thandol equivalent of “Help me.”
A red laser streaked past Jorl from behind him, and the beam scattered off the draped armor of the Thandol. Turning his head that way, he had no problem seeing the trooper at the next revetment, his shield poised and a motion behind the slot suggested an explosive projectile or plasma bolt would come next.
He mentally triggered the highest power plasma bolt his suit could fire, and directed a green laser at the view port on the left side of the shield, and a red beam through the right port. The plasma bolt passed through the slot, just above the rifle’s conical shield. He blew off the tentacle that was selecting whatever it intended to fire at him next. Jorl’s infrared vision had seen the heat of both eyes peering at him through the shield’s view ports. The green beam passed through the left port relatively unattenuated, but the red beam, like those the Thandol rifles fired was largely blocked, but some portion of the coherent light leaked through.
It was enough. One eye destroyed, another dazzled enough to temporarily blind him, and missing a tentacle, the Thandol turned and ran, scrapping against the corridor wall for guidance. Jorl let him go.
Koban: When Empires Collide Page 41
