That hardly seemed gallant, but Mirikami also knew it was the most survivable plan. He was about to climb in when he realized the shuttle thrusters were easing in pitch. Krall thrusters generated lower frequencies than on human shuttles, by design. The Krall, with ultrasonic range hearing, didn’t like the interfering high pitch of human shuttlecraft. The sound was definitely easing, as if throttling back and settling to the tarmac.
“I think they are landing outside.”
Alyson nodded her agreement, “I see the nose of the shuttle reflected on a window of the dome.”
Before he could tell her not to do so, she rushed forward towards the open hatch, and light as a feather in 1.52 g’s, stretched out prone as she neared the lip of the deck. She had tied her hair back in the last few seconds, because it had been loose around her shoulders when she offered him the empty locker a moment ago. Now her hair was in a ponytail, and she had done it on the move to the opening, to keep it out of the way. These TGs thought and acted fast, for even small decision.
Trusting that she would tell him what they were doing, Mirikami decided to see if he could get the left side hatch to open for him by trying other simple codes. He reasoned that the Krall wouldn’t expect an enemy to survive to infiltrate their ship, so might not have a complex code.
He tried several simple different combinations that all failed. In frustration he mashed the two top left keys as he turned away, intending to join Alyson. That was the standard “open/close” key combination that he’d seen Alyson press seconds ago. This time a hiss of air marked the opening of the hatch, as it slid sideways to open a way into the ship.
Alyson also heard, and she pulled back and came over to him, speaking softly. “You found the combination. What was it?”
“It opened when I hit the standard two keys.” He sounded puzzled.
“I tried that first.” She told him.
“I saw you. I tried it on the right side as well. But forget that, what’s happening outside?”
“The shuttle landed out on the tarmac, with the Clanship between them and the dome entrance. I can only see the shuttle by reflection from dome windows, and it landed aligned parallel to the dome wall. The hatch on the far side hatch opened, but not the one on the side towards the Clanship. That shuttle and the Clanship landing jacks give them cover, and some of them could be outside already. They are clearly suspicious of something, Sir.”
“OK. You keep watch at the bay doorway. I need to go inside and find the Jump Drive. Watch your back. We don’t know how many came on this tub.”
“Shouldn’t I go with you, to watch your back instead of mine?”
“Possibly, but the Krall won’t expect you to be up here, so you may be able to help out if more of them come out of the sally ports at the base of the ship. They might rush the dome entrance. You have a great sniper position. I wish you had a rifle instead of two pistols.”
“Sir, at this range I’d have to be half blind and upside-down to miss a head shot with either hand.”
He grinned. “I forgot who I was talking to. Carry on TG Alyson.” He gave her a casual salute, and ducked through the open inner hatch.
****
Heading for the anticipated hunt, Toltak watched the once familiar teal colored terrain pass below the shuttle. She pointed Gapod in the direction the sensors indicated was the nearest rhinolo herd. As they passed over the compound’s outer wall, she noted with satisfaction that the electrical fence was still in place after all this time. It would be unpowered of course, but the last repair job had held up well.
As a no-rank raw novice here, before she gained a few status kills in a hunt at the former human compound, she had made routine circuits around this compound. Looking for damaged fencing, corrosion, cracks in the wall, or places where some animal had tried to dig under. A rhinolo could tear through an electrified gate before falling dead. It happened sometimes, if a belligerent bull saw movement inside. The carcass might ground or short-circuit the power to the gate or fence.
Rippers and desert panthers could scale the walls and enter, if not for the electrified fence on the top, and they seemed adept at figuring out if the power was off. She didn’t know how they knew, but at times small dead animals with claw or teeth marks were found that seemed to have been thrown against the fence and fried, to test if it was live or not. A ripper inside the walls was a real concern. They had no fear of armed warriors, and would stalk and kill several hands worth each year at this compound. She had heard that some broken down gates were from rhinolo chased by rippers. The big animals were normally smart enough to stay clear of the deadly gates, so it might be plausible they were trying to escape a pride attack. The evidence was ripper scent, and multiple paw prints outside, and sometimes inside a broken gate entrance.
It was odd that the unpowered gates were not yet breached. That had happened several times in a Koban year to energized gates when she was here. The uncropped grass inside was proof they had not been. This close to the sea, the salt laden breeze deposited its corroding influence on the wires, insulators, and support posts. Without electrical power, the animals soon learned they could push against the gates and break them down, or scale the walls.
The tall grass and shrubs visible inside the walls should be a constant temptation for some grazing animal or other. Removing a dead animal from the wires was a frequent task for a new novice here, until the duty rotated to an even newer and lower status arrival.
A herd of several thousand rhinolo was within a short distance of the compound wall, so she ordered Gapod to circle the area well above them, to avoid spooking them. She was seeking IR sensor signs of rippers. The various smaller predators were also fast and dangerous, but they didn’t work together in a pack to hunt like rippers, and were less intelligent. A ripper pride appeared to cooperate far more than mere animals should be able to do, and certainly targeted Krall hunting parties.
To insure an uninterrupted hunt for the short time they had to spend here, Toltak wanted the terrain well scouted for a pride. They could go to the next herd if one was in this area. As their path took them back close to the wall, she snorted when she saw a large winged, blue and yellow bird that had died on the electrical fence along the top. It had touched two wire strands at the same time, rather than safely touching only the top wire. It was well decayed, and the first good wind would blow it clear. Her initial thought, provoking the snort of amusement, was at least she didn’t have to power down the fence and climb up to pull it down this time.
“What is it you saw that is amusing?” Gapod was sometimes suspicious of his sub-leader’s confidence in his piloting skills.
She explained about the dead bird, and how as a novice serving here, she had to cut the power, remove the dead animals, and then rearm and test the fence’s power.
Gapod was a decent pilot, and as a K’Tal had some expertise with repairs, equipment, and electrical systems, but normally showed no interest in anyone else’s duties if it didn’t affect him personally. This time, his dull questions provoked a response he hadn’t expected.
“What killed that bird anyway?”
“It’s an electrical fence,” Toltak answered, as if to an idiot, suppressing a snort that could spoil the pleasure of the hunting yet to come, if Gapod took offense.
“Why did they leave it turned on when we left Koban?”
Toltak suddenly felt very much focused, as she felt when a raid was about to start. She responded sharply, slipping into command mode. “Fly to the nearest gate and land close, inside the wall.” She wanted to check something, but didn’t want to be outside the wall when she did that, because they had not finished their scouting. Several things had just coalesced in her mind.
When the shuttle landed by a gate, she made her exit and walked, pistol drawn, over to a box on the wall next to the gate. She was studying the ground as she walked, and after opening the latched cover to the box, slammed it shut suddenly, and looked around alertly. Gapod wasn’t the only one to notice the
change in her manner through the cockpit windows. The warriors in back, lacking side windows, had watched her actions from the open hatch. Matching her demeanor, they drew weapons and rushed out to form a defensive perimeter. Against what threat they didn’t know, but their leader clearly was now watchful for some perceived danger.
Reaching them, she quietly hand signaled to recover into the shuttle. Closing the hatch, she told Gapod to get airborne and to climb higher over where they were. She ordered him to level off when the entire compound was visible. Then told all of them what she had discovered.
“The power to the fences is still on, after nearly two birthing cycles, and it was to be shut off when the clans departed. The power for them comes from generators in the dome. I just saw recent transport tracks in the soil passing through the gate. This dome has one or more inhabitants and they have restored the security of the compound.”
Pindor, the next highest status warrior below Toltak asked, “Can it be another clan that has returned, also against the wishes of the joint council?”
Toltak made a shoulder shake that displayed indecision. “It is possible, but the risk of staying here so long that they restored the power and repaired the fences means they must be prepared for a chance discovery by another clan. We risked status by coming to hunt for a single day. By staying here for so long, they risk banishment, sent to die fighting humans with only pistols if lucky, or dishonorable execution if not that lucky.”
Pindor spoke the obvious words. “We cannot reveal that we found them here to our clan leaders, not without admitting we came here, and they cannot allow us to depart if we will speak of them being here. We need to negotiate with the clan represented here, for mutual silence.”
Toltak spoke the obvious alternative. “We can also fight and kill them. However, we do not know how many we face or how well they are armed. With us in the shuttle, we have only projectile weapons and no armor. Our Clanship was open to them while we were scouting, and they may hold that now.
“It is possible they wait for us inside our ship. Our first objective is to get close to our Clanship, but we will not fly into the shuttle hanger. I have seen too many such traps when fighting humans to let another clan do that to us.” The silence of the other warriors was confirmation of her strategy.
“We should be prepared to fight our way into our ship if necessary. However, by their inaction when we landed, I think we may be able to negotiate with those in the dome. They saw us arrive and yet stayed hidden, revealing a possible weakness, which we might use in negotiation. They may suspect we have another Clanship coming, and we must not reveal that we are only six warriors and this one Clanship.”
She laid out her plan to land near the Clanship, using it and the shuttle as cover, where five of them would exit to observe the dome and Clanship. Gapod would remain in the shuttle to use its sensors, and the one laser port on the side towards the dome if there was a fight. Toltak would try to make contact by radio, and initiate a negotiation.
****
When Mirikami entered the hatch, he discovered he was in an airlock, which made sense for a shuttle hanger that opened to space. Except the outer airlock door probably needed to close before the inner door would open. Unless the Krall had a bypass code, allowing both to be open when in atmosphere. He didn’t know the bypass code, so he stuck his head out and softly told Alyson not to be alarmed if the outer airlock door closed.
Mirikami drew his pistol, and pressed the same top two keys on the inner door’s pad. As he had expected, the outer door slid shut before the inner door opened. He was standing to the side, realizing that if a Krall were waiting he would not likely get a shot off anyway. They were too fast for an SG. He had reasoned before going in, however, that no Krall would have waited this long to go after intruders if they knew they were human, so there would be none waiting. A quick look through the second hatch confirmed his reasoning, and he remembered to breathe again.
Fingering the two grenades on his belt, he hurried quietly through a wide corridor that led towards the center of the Clanship. The passage ended fifty feet farther in, feeding into an open deck area that was wide and empty, except for a continuation of the large heat insulated central thruster shaft. There was no lift present as there would be on a human ship, but the Krall generally preferred stairs, which couldn’t break down in a battle if power were lost. There were, predictably, eight broad upward spiraling stairways spaced around the circular bulkhead, and eight wide door hatches leading to side corridors and compartments placed closer to the hull.
A clanship was significantly larger than his old command, The Flight of Fancy, and was at least six hundred feet high, compared to the Fancy’s four hundred feet. He’d have to climb the stairs, the steps set too high and wide for a human’s comfort, and this deck was only about thirty feet above the tarmac, with probably two decks below. To find the Jump Drive, he hoped he wouldn’t need to climb most of the six hundred feet. This deck appeared to be about eleven or twelve feet high, suggesting the Krall ship might have fifty such decks, and he was on the third deck from the bottom. It was a long climb, even with clone mods in Koban’s gravity, with a potential ambush at every new deck.
Pistol in right hand, he used his left hand on the bulkhead to guide him as he kept his eyes fixed on where the steps penetrated the next upper deck. He nearly stumbled due to the high step spacing, so he periodically checked his next step. As his head reached the base of the next deck he could see it was lit, and as high as the deck below, and he heard nothing other than air moving through ventilators.
Peeking over the edge, it looked essentially like the deck he’d just left. These decks were probably where warriors clustered, waiting to descend to the four sally ports at the base, to join those that had already charged into battle, and where spare supplies could be placed for fast access. He noted the recessed cargo attachments in the deck and along the bulkheads, confirming this level was sometimes used for stowage. There looked to be floor plates that opened, and matching ones in the ceiling above, so there were probably hoists somewhere above that could do heavy lifting between decks.
Feeling time was against him, he increased his pace, hoping that any remaining crew would be closer to the command deck at the top. He recalled that Telour, a translator that had accompanied the Flight of Fancy on her abduction to Koban, remarked that human ships needed far too many crew to be efficient. He said Clanships were simpler, and more Spartan (not that he had used that word), and needed little maintenance and no special accommodations for the warriors. They never slept, so they needed no beds or cabins, and had common sanitation and waste disposal sites on each deck, food distribution was on two central decks, and there were several exercise and combat training decks. Thirty-two single ships could be stowed in outer compartments with external hatches, or attached to the outer hull. To double the number of single ships carried, they sometimes used both methods.
He quickly reached a deck where the ceiling was at least two decks tall, observing the center shaft was behind a much larger circular inner wall that went from floor to ceiling. He explored cautiously, but growing more confident that there was no Krall located on the lower decks. He found two doors into the large center area, and was confident, based on the soundproofing and thermal insulation present, that this was where the main thruster engine was located. It was clearly a far more compact engine than the three engines the Flight of Fancy had contained. Nevertheless, the Krall’s advanced thruster technology generated considerably more “push” that the Fancy had been able to produce.
Pistol again at the ready, he pressed the top left two buttons on the keypad. Nothing happened. After a second try that failed, he circled to the other door and tried there. Surprisingly, the hatch slid open instantly. He’d thought the vital room might be locked when the first door failed to open.
The area was quiet and empty of life. The geometry and engine design was alien, of course, but he found multiple large feed lines for fuel that led to what was
probably a combination mixer and combustion chamber. If necessary, he could place a grenade here and do significant damage that the warriors were likely not equipped or trained to repair.
However, with an operable Jump Drive, they could obliterate the dome here and leave a very deep and miles wide crater if they tried to create an event horizon in this gravity well. That was his preferred target to disable, since they would never reach another star without Jump capability. However, a Clanship airborne on thrusters was also a weapon they couldn’t counter. Its plasma cannon and lasers were unmatchable. There was nothing but poor choices to select from in here.
His cable and fuel line tracing had brought him closer to the door that would not open for him earlier. It seemed odd to lock that one with a different code, and leave the other door ready to open with the standard code. He noticed a single Krall character over the door. His spoken Krall had progressed with Jake’s teaching, but written Krall much less. However, this door’s symbol was different from the one over the other door, and both matched the symbols he’d seen on the airlock doors on the left and right. With a flash of insight, he wondered if this was equivalent to #1 or #2, or Left and Right.
He tried the standard two top left keys and the door stayed closed. Then he pressed the two top right keys, and the door slid open.
Duh! He thought to himself, applying a mental slap to the forehead. He recalled the Krall generally followed the ancient KISS rule for many things. Keep It Simple Stupid.
The airlock door that had not opened for him had the same symbol as this door, and it would have opened if he’d tried shifting to the two right side keys. It was strange that the other door had not opened for Alyson, since she had used the correct key press. The same key press had worked for him. It was a minor puzzle for later consideration. He needed to climb higher.
Koban: The Mark of Koban Page 49
