Koban (66 page)

Selecting Thad’s channel, Mirikami asked, “Thad, you mentioned
that the birds and squirrels in the forest can give you away. What about the wolfbats?”

Greeves answered, “In the woods a bat isn’t always obvious to
us if they sit hidden in a tree. But you can bet the birds, squirrels and small
animals know they are there. It will probably keep those creatures quieter, since
the bats hunt them. It’s probably best if they see them to just leave them alone.”

“Are you willing to tell them that Thad? Or would you rather
it came from me? I know you aren’t happy with them.”

“Ah crap. I’ll talk to them Tet,” he relented. “I have a few
other tips I can pass along. They could bait their back trail with seeds or berries
that’s hard to get into, say in tightly wrapped packages or boxes with small holes.
The birds and squirrels that sort of food would attract will make a loud ruckus
they could hear if a Krall passes close by.”

“Thanks Thad. Divide and conquer may benefit us too if the Krall
split their forces. I wish them luck if they get a kill. What about the wolfbats
over us? Will that give us away?”

“I don’t really think so. I noticed they circle even higher when
Krall are around because they take well aimed pot shots at them. The bats generally
orbit over the entire combat area, not knowing where the next meal will be. A Krall
always leaves a body for the scavengers, and the bats know this. You might actually
use them yourself as they follow warriors.”

Thanking him, Mirikami resumed work on his two “special” traps.

Up on the ridge they made certain Jake notified them when they
were in clear sight as they set their devices, raising an arm as a signal. They
signaled with the number of fingers when they set a remote activated trigger, and
set that as the activation code.

Then they made additional preparations in an area where they
sincerely hoped the Krall would not think to look first. They had made careful plans
to ensure Krall attention would be focused elsewhere.

Later in the day, using their helmet radios, the shuttle made
a circuit of the woods, marsh, and river canyon, calling out and retrieving the
three other teams.

Thad was quietly disdainful of the three smaller groups as they
returned to the Flight of Fancy for debriefing; quiet only because Mirikami had
asked that he be so.

He was angry because the other dozen selectees not only hadn’t
chosen to cooperate with Dillon and Mirikami, but also had farther fragmented into
teams of three, four, and five people. He thought this weakened their overall chances
of a quick sure kill by not combining greater firepower. You won that day’s war
if you killed a single enemy.

Five people, the remaining four Flight of Fancy volunteers and
the companion of one of them, had elected to fight in the woods. They were planning
to set mines along their back trail if the Krall tracked them by scent. They also
had taken as many grenades as they could attach to their armor, along with two pistols
each, rifles, and extra ammunition stores placed at several fall back locations.

Three people had chosen to enter the marshlands, to take advantage
of the protection of the Smart Fabric body suits, and the fact that this hard to
defend territory was normally ignored by the Krall in initial searching.

They intended to dig in, submerged in water up to their necks,
protected from the irritations of swamp insects, and bites from leeches and crabs.
There were fifteen-foot eel-like creatures that passed for snakes there, but they
rarely were a threat to humans armed with guns. They had taken machetes for those,
to maintain a quiet defense.

They had asked for gloves and hoods to be made, which left only
their faces uncovered, and the helmets would protect those. They too had grenades
and three claymores they could trigger remotely. They had made small flotation platforms
to hold spare ammunition and their remotes, which they would conceal beneath pulled-up
marsh grass.

The other four had elected to use removable ropes to rappel down
the canyon walls from the ridge tops, two people on each side, to reach a matching
pair of hard to reach caves. The caves had formed when a softer layer of rock had
eroded away over thousands of years, as the river had cut its way down through the
harder rock of the uplifting future ridge.

 The slit-like entrances now were about two hundred feet higher
than the swifter flowing river below, and several hundred feet from the top. The
two sixty foot wide crevices, four feet high and forty to fifty feet deep, could
each provide cover of the opposite side cave for mutual support. The claymore mine
each person carried down would help defend the entrance if a Krall tried to enter.
Their plan was frankly to let the two better equipped and more aggressive ridge
and woods teams score a kill, or at least draw the Krall’s attention while they
waited out the day and night in a secure hard to search location.

The shuttle would make at least four or five trips the next morning,
starting at first light. It would drop off the four groups with additional supplies,
and take whatever else they decided was needed at the last minute.

The general attitude in the dome was that this was the best-prepared
set of fighters to go out in years. There was a guarded sense of optimism that some
of these selectees might make it back with immunity, entirely because of the more
aggressive attitude fostered by Mirikami and Dillon, and due to the defensive surprises
that the Krall had yet to experience.

It was ironic that a few people were heard to say that once the
Krall shared briefings of the combat techniques the human’s used this time, that
later teams would have less of a surprise advantage. It might have been better to
take their chances this time.

However, that was based on a completely unproven ability to lure
the Krall into fatal mistakes.  No one knew how practical and effective homemade
explosives and weapons would be against a seemingly invulnerable enemy. No one actually
offered to swap places.

The Koban Committee gathered for a private dinner that evening.
They were served their food in a small conference room where they could ensure privacy.
Chief Steward Nory Walters was the last server to leave, closing the double doors
as he left. Every Steward had been granted the honor of carrying a dish or drinks
to a meal for only five people. They each had offered well wishes and good luck
to the Captain and Doctor Martin.

Noreen stood to offer a toast to her friend and Captain, and
to her lover and friend Dillon.

“Gentle Men,” she looked fondly at them both. “May you be not
so gentle on the morrow? Give the Krall Hell.” Her eyes glistened and her throat
felt constricted. She found it too difficult to speak, so she simply raised her
Champaign glass as Maggi and Aldry rose and raised theirs as well.

Afterwards, their glasses drained, Dillon was ready to ask for
a refill but looked at Aldry as if for approval. “Uh, I certainly don’t plan to
have a hangover tomorrow, but is alcohol really safe in our present mid transition
status?”

Aldry poured his glass full, saying, “Dillon, you might never
really feel intoxicated again, with your new metabolism. Not without large amounts
of alcohol poured down your throat. You will metabolize liquor too fast to get very
drunk. Even at the seventy percent level your mods have probably reached so far.”

“Huh,” he grunted. “You didn’t explain that little detail. I
don’t know if I want to face the rest of my life here permanently sober.” He grinned
to show he wasn’t serious.

Aldry elaborated. “There will be some consolation effects that
you, in particular, might appreciate.” She smiled wickedly. “Sexual endurance will
increase, and the tissue changes that accompany the genetically enhanced heat tolerance
tend to make certain, shall we say ‘delicate’ surface areas more sensitive and responsive
to their environment. There’s more than one way to become intoxicated.”

Noreen gave him a look, a clear indication of scientific testing
to be conducted later that night.

Mirikami, however, was a little uncomfortable at the turn of
the discussion, so he diverted it back on topic. “Will our mods be offered to others
of our people, now that they appear to work just as the records indicated they would?”

“Tet, the tissue samples I took from each of you when you flew
back an hour ago were sequenced and scanned. You, probably due to a lower body mass,
showed almost seventy five percent of your cells expressing the metabolism mod,
and seventy four percent the heat adaptation mod. That percentage will increase
at a steady rate for the next week until you could even pass the traits along to
future offspring.

“Dillon, you are only a percentage point or two behind Tet, mainly
due to your greater body mass. We had to infiltrate and convert a lot more cells
and tissue with our viruses. However, you are younger and more athletic and you
get more exercise, so I think your genetic conversion will be complete in perhaps
less than a week.

“How soon can we apply the next two mods?” Dillon asked.

“You mean strength and endurance,” supplied Aldry. “I’d recommend
a few weeks to allow what you have started to fully propagate through your bodies.”

Then the fact that they had shifted to future planning sank into
their minds. There needed to be a future for Mirikami and Dillon beyond tomorrow
for them to participate.

Taking the bull by the horns, Mirikami forced them to face the
immediate prospects. “Ladies, no matter what the outcome is tomorrow, there is more
at stake than the lives of Dillon or myself, or the entire combat team we have joined.”

He knew it wasn’t necessary, but he reminded then anyway. “The
human race needs time, hundreds of years or more, and those of us on Koban are the
only ones that have a chance of giving that to them, even if they never learn what
we did.

“Tomorrow is but a single step, successful or not. There will
have to be other steps after that, and you at this table will be part of those steps.
However, those steps must be taken. You have to make it happen
at any cost.
I repeat,
at any cost
! Do you understand, do you promise to do this?”

He pointedly looked at each of them, and waited until he saw
agreement in each of their faces as they nodded, and stated their acceptance.

“Now, this has turned far too somber, so why don’t we eat, drink,
and be merry.” He declared.

Only Maggi, with her interest in twentieth century flat screen
films recalled the rest of that ancient biblical derived expression.
For tomorrow
we die
, which she kept to herself.

An hour before sunrise, Mirikami was dressed and had finished
a surprisingly sizeable breakfast for him. His metabolism boost was demanding more
calories.

Thad had Linked to say he was on his way to the valley truck
park, dragging smelly clothes behind him in the dirt, claiming he needed a longer
rope because even he could smell them. He’d taken a truck from the south garage,
to make sure several trucks and halftracks were ready at the east, and north sides,
to encourage Krall novices to take those.

He had left two scent trails from the north and east garages,
towards the dirt track leading towards the valley.

Dillon met him outside by the shuttle, just before sunrise, talking
with Roni Jorl’sn. Deanna Turner, Frank Constansi, Clarice Femfreid, and Juan Wittgenstein
were there as well, all carrying their armor, but dressed in their body suits. They
were the members of what everyone was now calling Mirikami’s Team.

Maggi, Noreen, and Aldry came down the hold ramp together and
walked up to the group, shaking hands and wishing each of them good luck. Back at
the hatch, Mirikami saw that it was crowded with his crewmembers and a lot of early
rising passengers. They waved when they saw him look their way.

He was already in his armor, carrying his helmet, with two pistols
at his hip but no rifle. He had three remotes securely fastened to his chest, and
ammo was secured to a waist belt and a cross-chest belt. There was also a Katusha
on his belt. If a Krall got close enough for that to work and knew where he was,
things would have gone very wrong.

Noreen gave Dillon a lingering kiss, but a hug would have been
awkward with his hanging pistols, grenades, remotes, ammo belts, Katusha, and a
rifle. Besides, they had conducted a final “scientific experiment” an hour ago to
“test” Dillon’s readiness for the day’s activities. He passed with flying colors,
though Noreen was ready for a second shower to cool back down. She wanted her own
mods now, just to keep up.

Maggi and Aldry both shook hands again with Tet, and Maggi made
Dillon bend down to where she could give him a kiss on the cheek, placing her small
hands on each side of his face. She was misty eyed as she turned away.

For once, even as protected as he was in armor, Dillon resisted
the impulse to wisecrack to his mentor. Besides, she might have explosive shells
loaded today. He’d noted she was wearing a standard Krall pistol plus her Jazzer.

The morning was already warm, but the sky was heavily clouded,
suggesting it might be cooler than usual and the day might produce a shower or two.
It wasn’t the rainy season, but that time wasn’t too far in the future.

Thad Linked to Mirikami. “Tet, I just parked the truck in some
trees slightly past the Krall’s usual sheltered parking area. I’m dragging the tattered
clothes up the slope to the first cave, where I’ll throw them in the back. I’ll
leave a trip wire rigged halfway in, with enough plastic near the roof to bring
the hillside down. Kindly pick me up so I don’t have to walk to the top.”

“We’ll be loading up and starting out in a few minutes Thad.
We should be there probably before you finish your booby trap. Mirikami Out.”

He faced “his” team, though he didn’t like it being referred
to that way. “Gracious Ladies, and Gentle Men, I think we are ready to make some
history. We’ll pick up Thad on the way then check out the ridge top and terraces
before setting down below the ridge. After that Ms. Jorl’sn will be ferrying out
the other three teams to their selected spots.”