Koban 4: Shattered Worlds (37 page)

The octet ahead of him safely reached the first gun position, and swarmed inside the obviously improvised and crudely made firing port. The leader reported there was a scent of a single recently departed human, with others having been around the gun perhaps several hours ago.

The gun was found powered on, pointed listlessly down at the back of the empty driver’s compartment. The gunner had left the rear clamshell standing fully open, as if the operator had fled in a panic. That sense of hurried evacuation was reinforced when the octet leader noted that there were three nearly depleted plasma feed rods inserted, ready for firing additional bolts, with many more reload rods in the racks. The gunner had run away before taking those final few shots at his advancing enemy. This was the first break in the discipline Gofdar had noted in this otherwise effective small force of fighters.

Down below, in the nest, the enemy had retreated only in the face of relentless pressure of his warriors. This individual had abandoned his post up here before there was any direct pressure. It was out of character it seemed, compared to the actions of the other fighters.

Gofdar was the first to peer into the cavity where the higher gun was placed, and saw again the familiar shape of a ladybug. Somehow, they had brought it up here, and physically carried it close to the cliff face from that small space in front of the lift’s door. A hole had been battered through the rock to provide an opening for a firing position. He looked out over the valley, to where he saw the exact spot where he and his octet leaders had first come under fire from this very gun.

He manually opened a ventilator port on his helmet to scent the air. He’d noted that this gun cart too had its clamshell open, that there were three nearly depleted ammunition rods inserted, ready for one or two more bolts to fire per barrel. He looked down at the roof below and realized how easy it would have been for that gunner to kill him as he followed the three warriors just ahead of him. It was almost insulting, as if fate had twice deemed Gofdar an unworthy target for this gunner.

He had noted that with the clamshell open as it was, this gun too was pointed down at a sharp angle, directly towards a hump at the back of the driver’s compartment. He saw a series of lights flicker on the gun’s command console, and sensed a pulse of heat from the lasers at the base of the gun mount as they vaporized the tips of the ammunition feeder rods, followed by a hissing sound as plasma was magnetically routed to feed the tri barrel’s plasma chambers. Recalling what his octet leader below had just relayed to him, he realized each gun was positioned exactly the same way, aimed down in the same manner.

That sound he heard was fate, and it wasn’t passing up its third chance to eliminate him. This gun was preparing to fire, but not at him. He briefly wondered, as he moved far too slowly to make a difference, what he would have received for his second name.

****

Greeves was exasperated. “Sarge, if you won’t shoot them off the wall from where you’re concealed, why don’t you want us to pick any of them off from here? They’re hard to see, but we can kill a few of them. What the hell do you mean wait another fifteen seconds?”

“Stop bugging me, Thad. I’m watching them, or at least I see some of the lose rocks fall and a few plants pushed aside. When they reach the second tri-barrel, I’ll take care of them all for you. Now stop distracting me. I said I’d bail your ass out from that harebrained scheme of jumping out of the building as it blows up. The jumping part is all that worked, you dummy. However, I’ll fix it for you.”

“Who’re you calling a dummy? I’m out here in the creek with fire support, while you’re alone in that pile of rocks, which the Krall are going to swarm all over in another ten minutes or so.”

“You’re safe? There will be perhaps eight hundred to a thousand Krall pouring out of that building after us when they figure out where we went. You won’t be safe until I make you safe…,” He paused as he watched something on his visor.

“Ah. Here we go. Lights out sub leader.”

“What do you…,” Thad didn’t finish his question. His mouth was simply left hanging open as his visor system automatically adjusted to protect his eyes.

A brilliant pair of flashes lanced straight out from the cliff side before two fireballs erupted, and matching huge dust plumes expanded and merged right behind them. It took only a few seconds for the double blast waves to reach them. An expanding spray of dust and rocks obscured that entire section of the ridge above the lodge. The thunder lasted longer than expected for the blast. However, it finally ended before the reflection of the sound returned from the far wall of the valley, three miles away. The cause of the extended thunder became obvious as the dust thinned.

A large section of the cliff above the lodge had fractured and slid free, falling onto the lodge below. The entire structure, already weakened, had totally collapsed as the tens of thousands of tons of rock slammed the upper levels onto the lower ones, and buried most of the building. The collective weight of the rock face was far more than the ferrocrete and steel structure alone, and both had combined to crush the Krall assault.

There would be isolated Krall survivors, of course, but not in numbers that they couldn’t be easily eliminated now.

Spartan was first to speak. “How the hell did you get the rest of our explosives up to the ladybugs? There was no time, and no one to move that many tons so quickly.”

“Hell lieutenant, why would I go to all that bother when all I had to do was read the ladybug safety manual? Hey, Thad. Let me tax your underused brain for moment. I’m sorry if that will cause you undue pain.” He laughed cheerfully.

With a sigh, Greeves knew he was going to hear about this forever. “Go on.”

“I asked for the limit pins to be removed from the gun mounts, as you recall. What was the purpose of those pins? You received the same downloaded user’s manual that I did.”

“To prevent some knuckleheaded gunner like you from accidentally putting a bolt down through the back of the driver’s head.”

“True enough, which would be bad for him. However, what sits directly behind the driver’s compartment, and even lower that his head?”

“Son of a bitch! That was brilliant!” Greeves would regret his shouted jubilation and compliment, but only later. His brief lapse in guarding his words of praise for the
never
humble Sarge would return to haunt him.

“What was?” Spartan asked. He’d seen ladybugs of course, but had never operated one. That was regular army grunt work.

Reynolds explained, as his “humble nature” would have him doing repeatedly, to anyone that couldn’t escape his company. “The fusion bottle for the ladybug is placed between the drivers cab and the clamshell that covers the gun. Open the clamshell, remove the limit pins, and you can fire down on your own fusion bottle. They sure make a hell of a bang when they rupture don't they?”

Two days later, back at their quarters outside Nabarone’s Headquarters bunker, Greeves had some news to share with Reynolds. “I just heard from PU central command that the First will not be pulling back any farther. The Shadow fighters performed beautifully against the Krall single ships. In or out of atmosphere, the Kobani Shadow pilots kicked their asses, five to one for air-to-air kills, and still managed three to one on space kills, where Krall advanced ship technology has an edge over our space plane designs.

“Shadow Wing knocked down enough single ships they were able to strafe some of the loaded Krall convoys preparing to make their withdrawal. Even the Navy sent in some of their space planes to help.

“Their pilots aren’t as good, and they lost thirteen of them, but with the Shadows to take the pressure away from single ship engagements, the navy hit the spread out supply lines of the forward Krall clans hard. Their warriors are now low on power packs and replacement weapons. Because Gatlek Pendor withheld much of the air and artillery defenses for his use in the next invasion, that’s forcing the minor clans to slow their pushes.

“We think they went past the points where they were told to halt their advance coming out of Novi Sad and on a couple of other fronts as well. They thought they were going to pin and destroy the First Army in the mountains, so they kept pushing. They need to pull back out of the mountains now because they can’t get the resupply they need. The Gatlek doesn’t appear willing to share any of what he’s taking with him.”

Reynolds nodded. “I think Pendor is in such a hurry to lift with his invasion fleet that he didn’t want to launch the large reserve of single ships already stowed in the clanships. He’s willing to leave the minor clans here with less material. They still have enough warriors, weapons, and supplies to fight Nabarone’s forces and win, provided they don’t fight as stupidly as they have this time. I hope it was Pendor that was responsible for their screwing up the assaults, letting them get overextended. They never fought that sloppy before, when following their more traditional style of steady warfare. If he’s in charge of wherever they plan to invade next, it may not go well for him.”

“We’ll know where they’re going soon.” Greeves revealed. “SatCom surveillance reports the lines of trucks that have been parked for days on the roads have started racing towards the gathered clanships. Apparently they’re about to pull out their invasion forces before they become bogged down in supporting the continent wide assaults they initiated. Pendor let the small clans get out of hand. Restraint isn’t their style when they see the enemy retreat, and Nabarone really took advantage of that.”

“Aren’t the minor clans still pressing their attacks on our forces?” Reynolds asked.

“Yep. I think that streak of independence in every Krall is exaggerated in a small clan’s ego, pushing them to ignore the preset limits of how far they were supposed to chase Nabarone’s troops. Now, when they discover that their massed clanships are pulling out, taking much of the equipment, they’ll soon get to taste what it’s like to retreat.”

“Assuming they know how,” Reynolds snorted, indicating doubt.

“Oh, I think Nabarone is ready to teach them how. I was just speaking to Henry. He has some excited new supporters in the Navy. They see clear preparations for the predicted partial Krall pull out, and are ready to make it as costly as they can. For today, Henry practically walks on water, so far as prognostication is concerned.”

“Buoyed up there by Tet’s analysis, you mean.”

“Sure, but his superiors don’t know that. Besides, Henry is damned shrewd in his own way. It was his plans that turned Tet’s prediction of a partial pullout into a way to bleed the most out of the bastards. I hope they like how fun the liftoff will be.”

****

“My Gatlek, the leaders of the minor clans refuse to believe the massive amount of supplies they know exist will not be moved forward to them.”

Pendor reared back his head and snorted with amusement. “They were told not to advance so far and so fast. Nearly all have moved beyond the geographical points where they were instructed to halt.”

“Sir, Kothar, the Toldak clan leader, has been heard openly discussing offering a challenge to you, if you proceed with withdrawing so many forces. He says they only pursued the human First Army so deep into the mountains because you sent a blocking force to try to trap them.”

“Tor Gatrol Kanpardi has orchestrated the partial withdrawal to conduct another invasion. I cannot be challenged for obeying an order from our highest war leader. Let him challenge the Tor. It is true I sent a blocking force into the mountains east of Novi Sad, which then failed to contain the largest enemy army as I ordered. The leader of that raid is dead, so let Kothar also challenge
him
for failing.” Another snort.

He added, “If the small council of minor clan leaders had obeyed the restrictions I placed on their advances, they would not be so far ahead of their supplies. Tell the various command bunkers that their warriors must return to the positions where they were ordered to stand and hold.”

His aide risked condemnation, but had a duty to remind his leader of something. “If the humans counterattack strongly, they may not be able to move enough supplies forward fast enough to keep all of the territory they now hold, even at the positions where you ordered them to wait.”

“That will be after I have relinquished my command here, and have departed on the new invasion as Gatlek on a new war front. Kanpardi will assign a new Gatlek over Poldark, promoted from a leader among the minor clans that will remain here. Remind them of that coming honor. One that only the strongest supporter of the Tor Gatrol’s strategy can receive.”

He suppressed a snort, aware that Kanpardi might not be the one to confer that promotion. Not even his own loyal aides knew of the arrangement he had made with Telour.

“Prepare my clanship for departure. I intend to launch in the vanguard of our brave charge to force a landing on a new human world.” The use of the term
charge
was in keeping with Kanpardi’s assertion that this action was vigorously expanding the war on humanity, not a redistribution of temporarily limited forces and material, a result of human actions.

****

Crager was standing next to lieutenant Honley, as the young spec ops officer absorbed the intelligence arriving by the second. The rate of loading the clanships had peaked, and was progressing at a steadier level now. It was evident that some of them would need to launch soon, because it would lead to recklessly excessive risk to launch all of them simultaneously, even by Krall standards. Because the war leaders had clearly been conserving resources in the last six months, since the Kobani raids, a reckless surge of launches so close together would risk collisions and waste.

When Crager had reported to Honley that a group of armor wearing Krall had left the main hillside entrance to the Gatlek’s underground bunker, he merely nodded. They had boarded a nearby clanship, of many parked close to that thousand six hundred foot high small mountain of rock that protected the complex. What made this clanship more noticeable was that when unstealthed, it was revealed that it had no hull sections of slightly different shades.

Clanships, or their parts, were often used for a thousand years of lifetime, and repairs from battles, accidents, and ordinary wear resulted in a less than uniform exterior appearance on very old ships, at least when they switched off stealth. The clanship that sub leaders from the bunker had boarded appeared to be genuinely new.

Crager knew the young spec ops officer personally, and assigned as the XO of the company now, he recalled that he had been a good trooper. He’d help train him five years ago. That fact appeared to have intimidated the young officer, and he looked too much to Crager for the NCO’s advice and approval. Listening to his more experienced NCO’s was a smart thing to do, but he didn’t appear ready to act quickly enough now.  

“Sir, I think some of high ranking staff of the Gatlek is preparing to depart. Pendor may or may not be with them because we don't know if he’ll continue to command here, or has been promoted to lead the next invasion. We do know those warriors that came out are part of the staff of whoever will command the invasion, and several were aides to Pendor. They’ll lead from the front, as usual.” The implication he wanted Honley to catch was that Krall leaders didn’t stand around and wait. That ship would be leaving soon, and not alone. It would be bad if he had to tell the Captain that his XO was indecisive.

It turned out he didn’t need to. On the common command link, which all of his senior NCO’s were also monitoring, they heard him call the commander of the cruise missile base. “Colonel Dolby, the Krall leadership has just entered their clanship. I believe they’ll start liftoffs within the next five minutes. I request you launch the first wave now, and the next wave two minutes after that. We’ll blow the plasma batteries when your birds exit the passes from the foothills. There’ll be less time for the clanships to adjust and to target your missiles.”

“Lieutenant, I sent the order as you were talking. The first hundred are lighting up now.” Obviously, the colonel, with intelligence of his own, had also been waiting for the young officer to act.

Honley verified that the three signal transmitters, which provided triple redundancy for the detonators, were all online via his suit’s AI. “Sergeant, I think business will be booming around here shortly.”

“Yes, Sir. I think it will.”

The first indication the Krall would receive that their enemy knew that they were pulling out some of their forces, would be when those low-level cruise missiles left the cover of the nearby foothills, three miles from their defensive perimeter. The moment the first missile appeared, a dozen of the heavy plasma cannons in the ring that defended the Krall clanships would erupt in flames and fragments, leaving a gap almost seventeen miles wide for the missiles to pass through.

The missile base was over a thousand miles away, so the time of travel intentionally allowed room for the first successful clanship launches to start. As much as hitting the lead ships, which the high status invasion leaders would occupy, had appealed to Nabarone, he’d ordered that the first strike not arrive until there were numerous clanships lifting, conventional thrusters blazing. The volume inside the sixty-mile diameter circle was expected to fill with a thousand or more simultaneous rising clanships, with another thousand prepared to lift, and another third still closing portals. The maximum opportunities for confusion and success in knocking many of them down would present itself then, when they were fully committed. Mirikami and Nabarone hadn’t deluded themselves into thinking they could get even a quarter of them. The Krall reacted too fast, and their ships and weapons were too sturdy for that.

Besides, killing clan leaders and sub leaders had relatively little impact on how well the Krall fought. Other, slightly lower status leaders were eager to leap in and fill voids, and each clan knew intimately the extensive hierarchy of their own rising high status warriors and sub leaders. Lower status sub leaders and warriors would instantly defer to the orders of those of higher status that survived. If there
were
two Krall of equal status that both desired the same leadership position and they refused to share, a sudden death match challenge might select the fittest to lead. It was like cutting the individual snakeheads off a medusa-like foe, where an unending number of new heads of similar skill and experience was waiting eagerly for their turn to lead.

Following Mirikami’s strategy, they were striving to reduce the amount of
material
available for the Krall to make war right now, before the remote Krall worlds could ramp up the production ability of their hundreds of underutilized factories and slaves. After thousands of years of meeting easy and unimaginative, intrinsically unwarlike foes, the Krall had permitted war production to become centralized, controlled by a handful of the most powerful clans. That would not continue, but if humanity could act fast enough, they could force the Krall to regroup and slow their advances, buying time for other worlds.

****

Pendor was of course on the control deck of his newly built clanship, the equivalent of a flagship in human terms. Unlike a human admiral, he was personally staffing one of the four command positions, with a single plasma cannon and one heavy laser linked directly to his station. Not that he anticipated having the pleasure of firing his weapons at the enemy, of course, because this massive fleet launch would completely catch the humans by surprise.

The second and third group of launches, slated to follow on each other’s heels, would see more action, as Poldark’s full set of potent Planetary Defenses discovered this wasn’t just a handful of clanships departing, as was usually the case. They would engage the next launches with more than the usual number of ground missiles, plasma cannons, heavy lasers, and orbital rail guns.

There were two space plane carriers in the system, and their craft had been involved in ground support actions for two days. The complement of thirty heavy cruisers based here would probably engage the ships at the edge of the columns of rising clanships. There had been reports of White Outs of more massive human ships arriving a week ago, however they had not been seen in the inner system, and may have departed. The entry into a Jump Hole wasn’t always observable if you weren’t close by.