Koban 4: Shattered Worlds (106 page)

Hours later, over snifters of brandy from the Hub colony nouvelle Gaul, courtesy of Chief Haveram’s travels, the Kobani movers and shakers proposed they discuss the future, now that the birth of a child reminded them they should continue to plan for one.

With personal difficulty, Noreen shifted the conversation away from her new grandson, “Tet, you said Huwayla spoke to her sister ships about the Krall’tapi not being trusted anymore. Maggi said that was the same status the Krall had, and that all of you were trusted. Do you think that means all humans are trusted, or just us Kobani?”

He shrugged. “It may only be Kobani. We were the ones that were aboard her, we all had the quantum key in our tattoo, and our DNA isn’t identical to a Normal’s pattern. However, it sounded to Maggi and me that all species were considered trustworthy by the Olt’kitapi until proven otherwise. You do need the quantum key embedded, to relay your DNA identity pattern, but I’ll bet it doesn’t require visible tattoo marks, such as the Krall were using even before the Olt’kitapi found them.

“We Kobani have expropriated use of the Worthy Enemy mark, which Telour gave me as a sort of going away gift. However, I don't see why it has to be a visible mark, any more than an empty ring or a solid black oval. If anyone that has a Katusha can embed the quantum key on themselves or others, it isn’t a very exclusive key. We tested it on pigs before we did it to our kids, and a pig’s nose couldn’t activate anything made for the Krall such as door keypads, to see if their tattoos worked. For pigs they didn’t work, for kids yes. I think the Katusha, or possibly the DNA pattern the quantum circuit detects in us, restricts an active key to an intelligent creature.”

“Sure,” chimed in Reynolds. “Otherwise they’d have an infinite number of monkeys poking at an infinite number of keypads, causing an infinite amount of trouble.”

“Dillon disagreed. “Requiring intelligence from a trained monkey can’t be the restriction for the key being activated. We’ve seen proof that isn’t needed.”

“When?” Sarge immediately challenged.

“I saw you open a clanship door. I rest my case.”

“Zing,” Maggi cried out, laughing. “I taught my protégé well.”

Miffed at the joke at his expense, Reynolds had an observation. “He went from the moron you wasted your years trying to teach, to your protégé. Did he bribe you with honorary great grandma status?”

Dillon grinned. “You want a certificate Maggi, or something to pin to your tunic?”

“A gold pin will do nicely.”

Carson avoiding being drawn in asked, “Uncle Tet, have you tried calling the other Dismantler sister ships, to speak to them like you did Huwayla? You said they can communicate with all the devices the Olt’kitapi invented, and apparently ours are a mix of Torki and Raspani design, which also works.”

Mirikami used an example. “Carson, there are some spec ops that recently graduated from Heavyside and came here for their Mind Tap mods. They also just got their Comtaps. You haven’t met them, but link to one of them for me, please.” 

“Uh…, I see what you mean. We don't have a device address. Until we meet and know them, it’s hard to make contact. Isn’t a general location enough, like when the rescued Torki were on the Avenger, and Cal reached them on their Olts with his new Comtap?”

“Cal was calling someone specifically on the Avenger with them, but who was outside of a Jump Hole at the time, which was sort of like a call to the exact area, but with the specific receiver not able to answer. The Comtap chip, using tachyon quantum entanglement, found new ultra-sensitive Olt chips on the ship where you and Alyson were, and linked to them instead. Tell me, what exact area in the Orion Spur of the Milky Way is close enough to reach the Olt’kitapi ships? It’s too broad a region for such a random possibility.

“By the way, that’s not a bad question. Maggi and I already tried exactly that, and spent some hours with Blue Flower Eater and Max Born, who described in detail why we had trillions times trillions of links we’d have to sample first, to hope to find even a random device number, which would most likely be a wrong number if it connected.”

“Well, it would have been glitzy if you could have come back home with a way to block the Krall from operating plasma rifles, Dragons, or clanships.”

Maggi smirked at the use of the old Koban kid slang word, and tossed in some that were much older. “That really would be
neat, cool, and gnarly
.” She enjoyed the usual odd looks from him and Ethan.

“However, I guess we wouldn’t be wishing for that if we hadn’t all been in such a damned rush to get off Huwayla. Thoughtless of us, hurrying just so she could go save a billion people at Bootstrap. What were a few million more lives if we took our time?”

“No! Aunt Maggi, that’s not what I meant.”

“I know Carson. I’m explaining why we were motivated to move so quickly. All of us have kicked ourselves since, because we could have thought to take a plasma rifle power pack with us, to see if it would still spread the DNA exclusion code. But we had our built-in weapons, and carrying a visible Krall rifle canceled out our suit’s stealth, so no one carried anything that would make us a visible target when we evacuated past Krall that still had usable plasma rifles.

“According to the ship, the Olt’kitapi did try to deny the rebelling Krall their new weapons on the Krall home world, but it wasn’t very effective when the clans quarantined and destroyed infected equipment. The short transmission range of the effect slowed the spread. Max Born has a theory, and the Raspani scientists seem to agree with his proposal, that there is a fifth force involved with use of the key, and with Katushas and Q-ruptors. The Raspani made the latter tool, but those that knew the theory of that technology didn’t make it past the Krall dinner tables.

“Max says his proposed fifth force is certainly a quantum mechanical one, as are the other four forces. Gravity and electromagnetism are effectively infinite in range, and the strong nuclear force and weak nuclear force are extremely short range, acting only within the nucleus of an atom. We gained Jump travel when we discovered and solved the equations of quantum gravity, and its
interdimensional
connection to Tachyon Space. This fifth force may not have as dramatic a result as that, but Max says it will have some surprises. One is that it has an intermediate characteristic range.

“According to Max, at an effective force range of hundred twenty two feet, or 37.3 meters, it seems short to us. Until you compare it to say, the weak force range of about 10 to the minus 18 meters. Eighteen zeroes in front, before you get to the decimal point on the left. This fifth force has a greater range, by at least
19 or 20 decimal places to the right, than the weak force. That takes it outside the nucleus to a scale we intermediate sized humans can comprehend, but not out to the tens of billions of light years and more for gravity and electromagnetism, which exceed our direct comprehension.”

Sarge tried to describe what he thought he understood. “OK. The Olt’kitapi gave away the quantum key for the devices they made, and the keys can sense the DNA pattern of intelligent holders of the key. If they encountered a species they couldn’t trust, they simply blocked their DNA pattern from activating the devices. They expected to trust everyone, so the list of blocked species would be small, and added to the list as they met them. Otherwise, the Olt’kitapi let everyone do their own thing, without their interference. The Prada didn’t need help to become sentient so they stayed hands off, but the Raspani and Torki did. The Krall were sentient but headed for self-extinction, and the Olt’kitapi offered them a way out, with strings attached. The Krall cut the strings.”

Maggi nodded, happy that Born had kept his lecture simple enough that she could pass on the basics. “For the number one monkey of an infinite line of monkeys, not too bad.”

“Thanks for the complement. I’ll pick fleas’ outa your hair later.”

“Max says the short range of the fifth force was the problem with stopping the Krall. The blocked DNA pattern needed to be passed to each device, and it is passed between devices but only within that short range. And, if you don’t use Olt’kitapi keyed devices, you go on your merry way.

“Huwayla said the Krall had a planet stockpiled with their older traditional weapons to use, because apparently back then they actually made things themselves. When the planet was blown up, the Olt’kitapi apparently couldn’t live with the deaths, which they sense through some effect in Tachyon Space when billions are killed at once, and most of them ended their own lives. The infected devices on Olt’kitapi designed weapons were slagged along with the planet. The Krall tell the history as if they had fought and won an extended great battle. No doubt, they did kill and eat many Olt’kitapi as they claim, but I’ll bet they kept their clanships well away from them firing missiles, and went after them on the ground using conventional weapons, like the pistols they still have the Prada produce. In time, with The Olt’kitapi gone, and they had Prada slaves and automated factories, they shifted to using the better Olt’kitapi designed equipment, because it lasts longer and works better.”

“Aunt Maggi, Huwayla wouldn’t obey a Krall because they weren’t trusted. How did they even get inside her?”

“I don't know. Using a Krall’tapi perhaps. We didn’t have a dinner conversation to ask such polite questions. The doors in the ship opened for everyone, Krall included, when you walked up to them. Perhaps the builders saw no need to have locking door devices on a ship they would only permit trusted operators to control. Your Uncle Tet, based on that trust, was able to convince the ship to open all the doors of the corridors, and keep them open. That was to our benefit, to move faster and less observed, and it accidentally helped empty the ship of air faster when we left. I think Huwayla could easily have repaired the hill openings we burned to get out fast, avoiding the airlock cycles. She allowed the air to vent. I suppose she could claim she wasn’t interfering with a trusted species decision. We’ll never know.”

“Why did the Krall weapons work inside the ship at first?” That was Carson.

“Same lack of dinner conversation, son. We have an idea, though. The ship said its mind was patterned after the Olt’kitapi, and they avoided interfering with other intelligent species. It certainly would not interfere with our fighting and killing each other within her, one of us trusted, one of us not. So apparently disabling the devices the Krall brought with them was considered interfering, until they changed from fighting us, to actively trying to damage her.”

She used an analogy. “You have the freedom to swing your arms as you wish. However, your freedom to swing ends where my nose begins. Huwayla was permitted minimal interference to protect herself, and to preserve her ability to operate the internal life support safely.

“She had asked the Krall’tapi to stop them, but it had a Q-rupter hole in it by then. At some point, she deactivated one rifle that had damaged a vital circuit, and it spread the effect to other keyed devices that got too close. Armor, rifles, and power packs.”

Mirikami stepped in to get the discussion back onto what they would do in the future. He often felt like he was herding unruly ripper kittens when his circle of friends engaged in one of these free exchanges of ideas.

“Mind Tap with me or Maggi later, and we’ll share what Huwayla told us. We need to decide what we will do if the PU government seriously turns on us. Maggi expects exactly that from Medford, ‘cause that politician is facing an angry and frightened Hub population, and her party is facing midterm elections they need to win. As Commander in Chief, the military has to follow her orders, and every citizen in Human Space has probably heard the Krall ask for our asses, or else they’ll suffer more destroyed worlds. The President might try to deliver.”

Sarge had been off hunting, so he asked. “Does the PU have any of our people Medford can grab? We have liaison and Comtap people there.”

“Not for long. We are about to gain about 700 patrol boats when those Comtaps come home.” Maggi told him. “Two key people we were most worried about were Carol Slobovic, who was posted at the Presidential Mansion, and retired spec ops major Ankit Patel, who was assigned to Bledso and the navy. Ankit was ready to retire and wanted to age regress, so he did, and was sent to Earth under a seemingly shaky alias of
Andy
Patel, who looked to be in his twenties instead of sixty-nine. They both were recalled two and a half weeks ago, and each said they had secured a ride. They’ll be here any day. The kidnapped stand-in clanship for the Mark will get to Earth at about the same time. If we didn’t want to get Carol and Andy out, those would have made for interesting conversations.”

****

“It’s full of dead what?” Medford couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“Yes Mam. The clanship has thirty-two smelly dead Krall aboard.” He repeated. It was the captain of the three-ship heavy cruiser detachment, which she’d sent to capture Mirikami, and anyone with him.

She apparently hadn’t grasped precisely what he was telling her. “Was Mirikami dead too? He should have been asleep when you took his ship in tow. You’re saying the Krall were already aboard then?” She wondered if the Kobani were in league with the Krall after all, and had a falling out after they were caught in the Jump Hole. That made no sense, but neither did the report she’d just heard.