Kris Longknife: Tenacious (Kris Longknife novellas Book 12) (19 page)

The
next day, Kris made a trip down to see the pyramid one last time. The pit had been filled in. A 12mm laser antiaircraft rifle had been applied to the door mechanism.

“That puppy will never work again,” Gunny assured Kris. However, the work had been done very judiciously. There were only three 12mm holes drilled into the rock.

What Kris most wanted to see was the stone that now stood filling half the doorway. Tall and well polished on the side that faced out, it had lettering derived from the walls inside behind each of the glass-enclosed figures.

Jacques translated for Kris. “The top phrase says, ‘We came. We looked upon your work. What we see of your false enlightenment disgusts us.’ We used the plural because they seemed to almost always use the singular.”

“The enlightened
one
kind of thing.”

“Yes, the ‘your false enlightenment’ is singular. That will fit the bill perfectly.”

“I think you’re right. We function as people. He is just one man. If that doesn’t scare them, it sure ought to confuse them.”

“Unless they have no respect for people acting as a group,” Penny said.

“The word must be getting around that you underestimate us at your risk,” Jack said, dryly.

Both Penny and Jacques shrugged.

“They look pretty sunk in their own ways,” Jacques said.

“But you did it this way,” Kris said. “And the lower phrase?”

“We used the simple syllogism you suggested. ‘No hunt us, you will have peace and harmony.’ We liked that line from the creation song last night, and they’d used something like that for the condition they left the dead worlds in. We’ll see how they like that offered to them. The second part goes, ‘Hunt us and we will flood this place with your blood and bury it under your heads.’”

“I don’t think you could make the point any stronger,” Kris said.

“Win, lose, or draw, I think this is the best way to confront them,” Jacques said.

“I agree,” Her Highness, Vice Admiral Kris Longknife said, with finality. “Now, if you’ll give me a moment, I’d like to walk through this chamber of horrors one last time. Jacques, you said the top line behind each victim’s coffin was numbers. I think you said they might be positions on a star chart. Have you had any luck matching them to our map?”

“We have one match, the one you found on your long scout. Unfortunately, one point is kind of hard to use to fix a chart that is undefined to us.”

“I hate to think that finding more murdered worlds might help us.”

They came to the huge chamber and fell silent. Kris again faced the family. Now, knowing what she knew of what they’d likely done to this planet, she felt less sympathy. They might have earned their place here. The ones who deserved her sympathy were the others, murdered with no warning and no idea why this was happening to them.

Despite the pall that swirled around Kris, seeming to demand silence, Kris had to ask one more question of Jacques.

“Of the races entombed here, how many looked sentient?”

“That’s impossible to say, Kris,” Jacques said. “For example, was that big dinosaur thing over there self-aware? Some of the trophies look like they’ve hardly crawled out of the water, but just because we can’t conceive of such animals as sentient doesn’t mean they aren’t.”

“I didn’t ask how many
were
sentient,” Kris snapped. “Only how many
looked
it. Don’t you have a guess? Something, say, someone with a high-school level of education might conclude.”

“None of the boffins has a high-school education, Kris.”

Jack coughed softly. “I had a Marine medic, the one who first opened the entrance, go through. Actually, she did it on her own. Took her own pictures. Her best guess, from her tally, is twenty-five to thirty-five percent look aware of what was happening to them.”

“By that estimate,” Kris asked, “how many sentient species did they murder in the last hundred thousand years?”

“Her guess is between one hundred and a hundred and fifty,” Jack said.

“Damn,” was all Kris could say.

“God forgive them,” was Penny’s prayer.

The others stayed mute.

“No more. Not one more, you hear?” Kris said to the dead chamber.

“I think they will hear you very well,” Jacques said.

The next day, the ships’ fuel tanks were all topped off. The last of the scientists were back aboard and happily reviewing their data. None had discovered a word for god or goddess, other than the Sky Gods, but they were all looking now.

With everyone ready, Kris gave the order to the squadron to undock and head out.

That was when the natives flipped out.

“Kris, the natives don’t want to go into the eggs,” Nelly reported as Kris ordered the fleet to two gees.

Kris headed her own egg for the drop bay and found it a madhouse when she rolled in. There were Marines not too subtly trying to get the natives into eggs, and natives scampering around everywhere. A few had even resorted to waving their knives threateningly at the Marines.

“It’s like chasing a bunch of greased pigs,” Gunny reported. “A guy pissed on a corporal who almost caught him.”

That wouldn’t lead to any place good.
“Tell your Marines to relax,” Kris said.

“Stand down, Marines,” Gunny ordered in that quiet voice that can resonate around the walls of drop bays, hearts, and souls.

“Captain Drago, hold at one gee for a few minutes,” Kris ordered.

“As you will, Admiral, but we’ve laid in a fast trip back home. If we make it just like Nelly thinks we can, we’ll be home in three jumps. It will take some slowing down in Alwa System, but it will be fast and no one in between any the wiser.”

“I understand, Captain. I just need some honey to make things go a bit easier here in the drop bay for our local hires.”

“Waiting on your word.”

Kris motored her egg to the center of the drop bay. “Gunny, have your Marines stand clear of the walls. Nelly, stand by to shrink the bay to Condition Baker, if you will.”

Gunny got a big grin on his face and ordered his Marines into the center of the room. His grin proved contagious as the troopers jogged in from the bulkheads.

The natives eyed what was going on. Some of them edged in closer. Others looked no more willing to get close to the Marines.

“Nelly, execute Condition Baker for the docking bay.”

The drop bay was quite spacious. It had to be with four longboats, the admiral’s barge, and the captain’s gig strung out along its walls.

Suddenly, the bay was a whole lot smaller. The boats were much closer, the distance across the bay a lot less.

Several natives found themselves pushed rather unceremoniously along by the closing walls. Though they looked surprised and not at all happy, none appeared injured.

~We are going for a walk among the stars,~ Kris said in a firm voice. ~It will taste better if you sit in one of these.~

Kris waved at the forty eggs. They’d been parked in a triple line along the center of the deck. On Gunny’s orders, the Marines got in theirs.

“Captain, you may go to 1.5 gees when you want,” Kris said.

“Going to 1.5 gees now. I’m taking the ship to Condition Baker.”

“We’re already at Baker down here.”

“Oh, I bet that was fun.”

“No one was hurt,” Kris said.

The natives’ eyes got wide as their weight went up fifty percent.

~It is better to put these on,~ Kris repeated, waving casually at the unoccupied eggs.

The graybeard got in one. His eyes did go wide as it eased the acceleration on him. ~Good. Son, get in one. Get the boy in one.~

The lad who’d caused all this was looking much better. He scampered into a high-gee cart and relaxed into its cushioned embrace. ~Good. Good good,~ he said.

“Captain Drago, would you care to go to two gees.”

“With pleasure.”

The acceleration went up, as did the apparent weight of the natives still on their feet in the drop bay.

That was enough for most of them. They were into the eggs in a wink. The one holdout was the old bald woman. She clung to her staff.

I
BET SHE CAN’T TAK
E THE STAFF INTO THE
ACCELERATION CART,
Nelly said.

I
WON’T TAKE THAT BET.

Kris motored over to the practice equipment lockers and pulled a puggle stick out of its space. N
E
LLY, RIG A PLACE ON M
Y CART FOR THE STICK
.

It was done.

Kris motored over to the last unused egg. “Nelly, rig her egg to have a place for her stick. Open a hole so she can place it standing up.”

Nelly did it.

Kris pointed to the hole, then to the stick, and waved the woman to the egg.

For a stubborn moment, the woman stood firm in her place. N
ELLY, TELL
C
APTAIN
D
RAGO TO ADD A QUAR
TER GEE.

The woman sighed and began to make her way to the egg.

“Captain Drago, you may drop the extra quarter gee.”

“It is done.”

Kris turned her egg to face Gunny. “See to it that the natives all learn how to drink from the water line. Can you make sure that Cookie knows they are down here and gets them something to eat that isn’t too unfamiliar to them?”

“Will do, Admiral.”

Kris surveyed the situation and found it good.

A few minutes later, she motored onto the bridge. “I hope I didn’t cause you any trouble,” she told Captain Drago.

“Nope, no bother at all. How are our passengers?”

“In their eggs, surrounded by Marines, and trying to adjust to star walking.”

“I like the idea of their being surrounded by Marines. I’d hate to have to chase them down at high gees.”

“It shouldn’t happen. What’s our course?”

“Nelly has drawn us a very fast course back to Alwa. We will come flying into the system at a high speed, but it shouldn’t be a problem. No one uses the Alpha Jump, and we’ll have one of the gas giants capture us. It may involve some 3.5-gee deceleration, but what’s a little gee among friends?”

“Let’s get home. I have a lot to report.”

“Report to Alwa or report to the king?” Captain Drago asked.

“That is something I will use this short trip to meditate on,” Kris said, and guided her egg into her day quarters.

The
Wasp
led the rest of the squadron through the Alpha Jump and into the Alwa System. As soon as all the ships were through, they flipped ship and began applying a full 3.5-gee deceleration burn.

From her day quarters, Kris began making her report to Alwa. “We are back, and our investigation was very fruitful. We found the alien home world and have even recruited twenty of them. Since the home world has returned to the Stone Age, I’m not sure what we’ve recruited them for, but for better or worse, we have some aliens aboard and talking, such as they can.”

Kris paused to collect her thoughts. She knew it would take quite a while for this message to reach Alwa, and just as long for any response to get by.

“Kris, I think we have a problem,” Nelly said.

“What kind of problem?”

“There is no message traffic directed at us, but there is a lot of traffic going out from Canopus Station. I think someone has hijacked a freighter.”

“What?” didn’t say much, but it was all Kris could get out.

“A freighter is making for the Beta Jump. It was supposed to stop at an asteroid mine, but instead of flipping ship and decelerating, it took off at 1.25 gee for the jump.”

“Nelly, get my team up here,” Kris said as she guided her egg onto the bridge.

“Captain Drago, we may need to keep all our velocity. Please send to squadron, ‘On my mark we will kill the deceleration burn, please acknowledge.’”

“We have acknowledgments from all the squadron,” the comm immediately reported.

“Mark,” Kris said. And the
Wasp
went zero gee.

“The squadron is still in formation,” the navigator reported. “No problems reported.”

“Very good,” Captain Drago said as he rolled his egg off his bridge and into the admiral’s bridge.

Once in, he paused. “Now, Your Highness, would you mind telling this poor working stiff what the hell is going on here?”

“It appears that someone hijacked a freighter and is making for the Beta Jump,” Kris said.

“Christ on a crutch,” Drago said. “Who would do that?”

“Apparently,” Nelly provided, “Commander Sampson managed to pull it off.”

“You should have hung that bad apple when you had the chance,” Drago said.

“I may have definitely failed that leadership challenge,” Kris admitted. “Nelly, get my battle staff in here, if you please.”

“Yes, Admiral.”

Moments later, Kris had her key fighters assembled. Jack arrived with Amanda and Jacques. Penny rolled in right behind them with Masao.

Kris quickly filled them all in.

“Nelly, are you sure?” Captain Drago asked.

“None of this traffic is aimed at us,” Nelly said, “and we did arrive in the middle of it. However, I am now 99.9 percent sure that I understand it correctly. Commander Sampson managed to get aboard a freighter headed for an asteroid mine.”

“She’s risking long space jumps with a single reactor,” Captain Drago growled. “She’s a bigger fool than I thought. The greater fools are those who went with her.”

“That turns out not to be the case,” Nelly said. “The mine had a very productive two weeks and had an extralarge load of ore for Smart Metal production. Someone assigned one of the empty supply ships, still with its two reactors, so it could get the entire load in one lift and do it fast.”

“When luck goes bad, it just doesn’t quit,” Jack muttered.

“Sampson took off with the freighter for the asteroid belt at 1.25 gees and it wasn’t until the
Sisu
failed to flip and begin a deceleration burn that anyone was the wiser. She’s now headed for the jump and will hit there going at close to four hundred thousand kilometers an hour.”

“That will be a long jump,” Kris said.

“At least seven hundred light-years, maybe more, if she puts revolutions on the ship and gooses its acceleration up just before the jump,” Nelly said. “Kris, Sampson didn’t make any jumps like that on her way out here on the
Constellation
, what with Canopus Station and the factories tagging along.”

“No, but if she’s done any reading about the way we jumped around on the way back to human space after the first battle, she’ll know something about it,” Kris said.

“Will the people with her be prepared for high gees?” Penny asked.

“How hard is it to make an egg?” Kris asked.

“It’s easy,” Nelly said. “If you have the software.”

“What’s the rest of the fleet doing about this renegade?” Jack asked.

“No warships are out in that sector of the system. No ships are expected through the jump point, so there is not much chance of an easy intercept.”

“Trying to intercept a ship coming at you at four hundred thousand klicks is not something I’d want to do,” Drago admitted.

“The fleet is basically tied up at the pier on Canopus Station, doing fix and mend from a practice exercise they finished yesterday,” Nelly reported. “They are refueling as fast as they can, but it will be a long and slow stern chase for them.”

Kris stared at the overhead for a moment, then made her call. “Captain Drago, what is the squadron’s fuel state?”

“We’re around eighty percent, plus or minus a few points, Admiral.”

“It appears to me that we are in the best position for a stern chase. Do you foresee a problem?”

“None at the moment, Admiral.”

“Then send to squadron. ‘Set course for Jump Point Beta. On my mark, you will begin a 3.5-gee acceleration.’”

“The message is sent,” Drago reported. “We have acknowledgments.”

“Mark,” Kris said.

In her day quarters, dust motes that had been floating in zero gee began a dive for the deck.

“Captain, set a course and speed that will get us to Jump Point Beta with a velocity of four hundred thousand klicks on the squadron. Be prepared to adjust that speed based upon our observations of the renegade’s speed as it enters the jump.”

“Aye, aye, Admiral. Nelly, if you will work with my navigator, I would appreciate the effort.”

“Most certainly, Captain,” Nelly said most primly, then added, “Captain, Admiral, I foresee a small but not insignificant probability of a collision at extremely high speed with an asteroid or ship if we follow a course direct from here to Jump Point Beta. May I recommend that we adjust our course to take us outside the plane of the Alwa System. It will add time, but be safer.”

Kris raised an eyebrow to Captain Drago. He nodded. “Nelly, send to the squadron, ‘Conform to flag’s movement,’ then adjust our course up or down.”

“I believe down would be the safest course.”

“Tell my navigator to do that,” Captain Drago said.

“Is there anything else I’m missing?” Kris asked her crew.

“Someone will have to inform the aliens,” Jacques said. “I visited with them for a bit yesterday, checking on some language issues. They find the eggs confining and want to know when they can get out of them. I told them soon.”

“Then I will have to tell them later,” Kris said, “but not now.”

She paused to compose her thoughts. “Nelly, send to Admiral Kitano. ‘We are in the system in a high-energy state. We will take over pursuit of the hijacked freighter. Please clear the area around Jump Point Beta for our use. Be advised that more reports on the investigation of the alien home world are to follow. Please pass along to me any report on your present situation. Longknife sends.’”

“That ought to cause quite a stir,” Jack said.

“We’ll see,” Kris said. “Nelly, have you and your kids sifted through all the reports we have? Select out the most complete and informative. Send all their executive summaries first, with the rest to follow. See how much we can get out before we go through Beta Jump.”

“Working on it, Kris. I assume this is a second priority to navigation?”

“Correct, Nelly. Catching Sampson is our number one priority.”

“We can handle it all, Kris,” Nelly said, and if she’d had them, she would have been busting her buttons.

There was a long wait before the first message came in from Canopus Station, and it was a visual of Admiral Kitano.

“Oh my God, you folks are coming in fast! We have a problem,” and she proceeded to fill Kris in on the problem she already knew about. Kitano was about halfway through the explanation when a lieutenant brought her a message flimsy. She glanced at it and laughed.

“So, you’ve already picked up on what I’m telling you and, as I should have known, are reacting to it. Okay, you have the right of way. We will keep the space around Jump Point Beta clear for you. Good luck and Godspeed or more.”

The admiral paused to take a deep breath. “Viceroy, I’m glad you had good luck at the alien home world, but we’ve had the worst luck here. Some of the old Rooster elders have taken to civil disobedience. They wander into roads, purely by accident, they insist, but our trucks don’t dare do more than fifteen or twenty klicks for fear of running someone down. The rains didn’t come again, so even though we’ve got plenty of farm gear to plant with, we can only use land we can irrigate.”

The admiral paused to catch a tired breath. “Someone put sand and gravel, even some large stones, in the intake for the viaduct. We got most of the big junk out, but we couldn’t get it all. We’re a good ten percent down on our water flow.”

Kitano glanced offscreen as if looking for words. “We’ve tried talking to them, but all we get is a stubborn insistence that we go back to the way things were. We tell them that there are aliens coming to really mess with their world, but they say they’ve heard enough of that, I think the word they use is something like ‘fairy tale.’ There are a whole lot of us down here about ready to pull our hair out. If that could be done, I think your friend Armstrong would be bald.”

“There have been some ugly incidents between the Alwans that follow the Associations and those that live in the deep woods. So far it’s just pecking at each other, but Granny Rita says she expects bodies to be found any morning now. Sorry to dump this on you just as you’re chasing off after my screwup. If you want my head, I’ll hand in my resignation. I hope you’ll let me keep the
P Royal
, she’s a sweet ship. Kitano, out.”

And the screen went dead.

“And I thought we had problems,” Kris muttered.