Koban (59 page)

“Do they fight us with anything other than projectile weapons
like the pistols or rifles? No lasers? How are those against the armor you have?
I understand
they
don’t wear armor.”

“I know they have lasers, but I haven’t seen them in hand weapons
for them. Just the lasers I’ve seen on shuttles and Clanships. They are usually
content to put bullet holes in you as they close with you, and they rely on speed
and dodging rather than armor. Remember, a serious wound to us might only be an
inconvenience to them.

“They do have a love for up close and personal fighting. Naturally,
they can pull an arm off you by springing the armor joints, or bend you in ways
a human and armor can’t go. I studied a lot of the armor brought back, before me
or any of my people ever went out.

“The lower rank Krall warriors sometimes carry armor back like
a trophy, or send us out to find it in trucks, as I told you. We then repair what
we can, and they give us new stuff when we run low on parts.”

He described the types of damage. “Some have holes from armor
penetrating projectiles, wide rips from explosive rounds, or deep dents from straight
on soft nose impacts.

“I found indications that they slipped blades into joint crevices
or where they can force an opening between overlapping plates. Some armor appears
to have been removed reasonably carefully, and they finished the job slowly by hand
or with knives. Some of them are sadistic that way. Speed and efficiency be damned!”

“You ever see indications of larger explosives, rockets, mines,
grenades, booby traps, artillery, mortars, and so on. You know the kind of stuff
we are working on or thinking about.”

“No nothing like that, Tet. I’ve told most of this to your people
over there, and in particular to Dillon, who drinks this stuff up at every opportunity.
I don’t think explosives are available here because it isn’t given to us, but no
doubt they have that and higher tech weapons.”

Leaning back against the post and listening to them, Dillon looked
rather placid now that the tingling had subsided. Leg movement made it return so
he stayed very still.

Greeves, the professional soldier part of him, continued. “Dillon
has even been getting hand to hand combat instruction from me, and asked for knife
fighting lessons of all things. It started out as a request from Maggi, to suggest
the training to him. She almost begged me the first day I met her.

“I suspect from a comment Dillon made when I offered to teach
him, at her request, that it might have been a joke on him. Nevertheless, he agreed,
and he has taken to it with a will. For a brainy scientist he has shown a surprising
ability to pick up physical skills, and he keeps his head in a scuffle. He has a
built-in athletic ability and calm assurance in tight situations that I wasn’t born
with myself. It took a lot of years of experience for me to get as good as he might
become naturally.” He paused in reflection.

“For instance, he’s sitting there calm cool and collected while
surrounded by a near rabid pack of gun toting people out searching for two criminals
that can’t possibly escape anyway.”

Mirikami glanced over at Dillon, and the diversion briefly brought
a smile to his lips. “Maggi zapped him with a Jazzer in the…uh, legs,” he amended
his word, “thirty minutes ago. He’s still recovering.”

Lifting an eyebrow Greeves asked, “Why’d she do that?”

“Another exchange of wisecracks and retaliatory pranks between
him and Maggi. It happens often with those two mismatched book ends. Dillon is a
smoother walker than he is a smooth talker when it comes to getting the upper hand
with his petite mentor.” He smiled again, briefly.

“Humph,” grunted Greeves. “Anyway, as I was about to say, he
reminds me of another brash young man from my detachment that moved that well, even
better.” With a shrug, he added, “Randy died trying to cover me, after he blew off
that damned Krall’s arm.” It was obvious the image still haunted his memories.

Mirikami shifted the conversation from Thad’s old pain back to
his own worries. “In combat, have the Krall done anything surprising that you know
of, so far as field tactics or weapons go?”

“No. I’ve watched dozens of hunter-killer teams from as high
up in the dome as I could go. Our people decide where they will hide or fight. Sometimes
they split up to use different terrain, or just to divide the hunters. They go out
a day or two before, sometimes even earlier to scout, pick their spots, dig in,
hide, whatever they decide.

“The Krall novice warriors always land by shuttle here, then
either take trucks or go out on foot, and start looking for us. The higher-ranking
warriors fly the shuttle out to get a head start on the novices.

“I’ve never seen a hint that the Krall in the dome help them
in any way, and they do not use that tattoo tracker to find where we hide. That’s
against their nature anyway to use gadgets to track us that way. The first warrior
contact or any shooting usually draws all the rest if they are close, wanting a
share of points for kills. If it was only a part of our team they found, they spread
out again and search some more. They have excellent noses, and they can track a
sweaty human really well.”

“Are there favorite places for our teams to go, to try to stage
an ambush or hold them off?

“The low mountain ridges and cliff caves are favored the most
for their high ground, hard cover, and defensive opportunities. That’s why the Krall
usually look there first.

“Ambushes, when you do manage to spring one on them will not
contain them or drive them to ground. They briefly duck towards the closest cover
but keep right on coming at you in a fast series of jinks from rock to tree to bush,
always closing with you and shooting back with great accuracy while on the move.

“Next is the forest slash jungle, appealing because of its cover
and opportunity to change location. But don’t climb a tree, once spotted you can’t
retreat. That damned squirrel analog, like the one I shot, will give you away with
its chatter, and birds and insects are a greater nuisance to us in there. It’s hard
to avoid drawing attention to yourself if you move around.

“The marsh has been used, but there is no hard cover such as
rocks, and very few trees. A crab like thing will try to bite pieces off if you
lay down, and there are bunches of itchy biting things your armor can’t keep out.
Dig a hole and it fills with water in short order. You won’t like their leach equivalent,
because they are a foot long and remove a plug to get at your blood. There are big
fierce looking eels, but the armor keeps them out.

“The section of plains to the south and west have high grass,
but the Krall can follow your trail through that at a dead run, and apparently spot
your heat signature at some distance, even when you are lying down in the tall grass
in a swale. Southeast are dunes and less vegetation. Not very good cover.

“On the river you have no cover except for a few small mostly
flat rocky islands with shrubs and spindly trees. The riverbanks are steep sided
in places near the hills and in a canyon near the end of the ridge. But they are
open to view from the opposite sides, and they will patrol that in pairs, one on
each side.

“The Krall sink like rocks in water, so a couple of teams dug
pits on the islands after rafting over. The damned warriors can hold their breath
and walk over on the bottom. The river isn’t more than twenty feet deep most of
the year and the current isn’t very fast. When the water is higher and swifter,
the islands are almost covered.

“We also don’t know much about what lives in the river. There
are normal looking fish in it, but all of them seem to have teeth. Some two or three
footers have been caught and they fight hard, taste like crap with a lot of bones,
and will chomp at you even out of the water. A couple of times someone has insisted
their line was taken so hard they couldn’t even turn the fish and the line or pole
snapped. The water is often muddy and red tinted from the silt so you have poor
visibility. The water flows fast after rains, and it can freeze almost to the bottom
in winter.

“There are heavy mesh screens at both ends of the stream where
it passes through the walls, but small things might swim through and grow up. I’d
assume those unknown things are as dangerous as most life here. It hasn’t been nice
to anyone that chose the river area for his or her terrain. But nothing out there
is very nice for us.”

“Thad, what keeps someone from going over the compound wall and
waiting them out?”

“The reason is that the top of the wall and the gates are heavily
electrified to keep carnivores out of the compound. There are a lot more animals
outside than I have seen up close. Rhinolo are simply the largest grazers and a
preferred Krall prey because of the danger if they see you. You
don’t
want
a rhinolo to spot you.

“I think most of the other herd animals are probably even faster
than rhinolo, which is hard to believe after you see one of those in action. It
seems like all of them have horns, and they might attack you if you look threatening
to them. Of course, there are rippers and their smaller cousins out there. There
is actually a range of large and small predators and scavengers out there, and I
don’t think we are a match for any of them. Not even armed and in armor are we
safe.

“People that go out one of the gates, which the Krall permit
us to use, are seldom heard from again unless they return within an hour or less.
You might think that they just drove into the sunset and escaped to live happily
ever after. Except the empty and sometimes-gory trucks are brought back by the
Krall. They’re retrieved provided a rhinolo herd hasn’t torn them apart for play.”

“They would need extra fuel for an escapee to go very far in
any case.”

“Oh, you haven’t been in a Krall truck yet, have you? They have
the smallest fusion bottle I’ve ever heard of, or perhaps some equivalent technology.
They seem to run forever unless they have a mechanical breakdown or a rhinolo gets
to them.”

After that, both men were quiet for a time. Thad shook his head
as if dispelling memories of what he’d seen of hunts from the dome over the years.
Then he suddenly felt curious, and for some reason, apprehensive about Mirikami’s
series of questions.

“Tet, I see you probably as do your people from the ship, as
a ‘Big Picture Guy’ that is trying to direct a gang of geeks, Spacers, and demoralized
mentally defeated misfits into a semblance of a guerilla ground force against an
overwhelming enemy.

“You motivate and inspire people, and maneuver for advantage
where nobody saw room to move or any advantage to take. Normally you focus on the
direction to go, not on the small steps needed to get there.

“You seem different to me right now. Why are you asking me about
these small details of weapons, armor, and terrain?”

Coming to a decision, Mirikami gave his answer calmly.

“Because Thad, in three days I’ll be out there with weapons,
wearing armor, and using that terrain.”

Greeves had somehow sensed that was coming. He looked at the
smaller man, assessing him professionally, seeing him as he would a man he would
have to share a foxhole with and count on in a physical gunfight. It wasn’t comforting.

“Tet, I don’t have to tell you that you aren’t prepared. You
obviously know this. You getting killed will not restore the life of any of the
names on that list. They are going out anyway because you can’t
replace
a
single one of them, the Krall don’t permit that. So why?

Mirikami shrugged. “I had told Telour when he offered me ‘advantages’
as he called them, and I told my core people that I would not accept immunity without
earning it as anyone else did. I need to
earn
that if I expect the Koban
Primes to join with us.”

“What if you waited until next month, when you place your name
in the lottery…, Oh. You don’t think there will
be
a lottery system do you?”
He realized that was a highly probable outcome.

If the system in place had been corrupt from the beginning, things
could revert to every man or woman for themselves. The Krall grabbing whomever they
find first, pulling victims from hiding.

Thinking of how it could change now, Thad said, “Without any
organized structure there will be anarchy, and you would lose the cooperation you
needed to give us a chance, not just a chance for those of us trapped here, all
of humanity. Are you
that
much of a Big Picture Guy?”

“Crap Thad. You make being scared shitless sound noble,” he complained.

“Scared shitless but going anyway is bravery. But, if you are
dead is there anyone in your group that can pull this off without you? Keeping you
around seems smarter than losing you.”

“I have to earn the Prime’s respect, and preserve the trust the
volunteers have placed in our goal. In three days if I do nothing, both of those
are gone.”

 Mirikami elaborated. “I believe that if we can’t convince the
Krall clan leaders that humans are worth their time fighting, they will take the
expedient
efficient
step of quick eradication of an animal pest. We don’t
even taste good to them, unlike the poor Raspani that they only keep alive for food.”

Greeves suddenly looked horrified.

“Thad, you heard this Krall strategy story before.” He didn’t
understand his reaction.

“Raspani meat is from a race the Krall defeated? Oh my God!”
He seemed revolted.

The explanation quickly followed. “I’ve eaten that spicy
meat, so have a number of us. It’s what the Krall take for rations on hunts! You’re
gone all day so they feed us what they eat. It was like beef jerky in their field
ration version. Dorkda said he liked it raw or lightly roasted. Those are intelligent
creatures they eat?”

Tet repeated what the translators had told them. “Thousands of
years ago they were a star traveling race. I think now they may only be semi-intelligent.
There’s supposed to be a herd here on Koban, and I thought it might be located here,
but it must be at another compound.”