Stone and the Ravens (Guardian Stone Book 3)

by Don Koch

  # Four hours later #

  Hank said, "OK everyone, back to the lodge. We need to take a break. Tired minds make mistakes."

  Sass commented after breaking rapport, "By the All One, this lady is a genius at laying traps. I have never seen so many devious layers of security and traps before. No ordinary effort would have been successful. Here we have a team of 20 including some of our brightest, been at this for 4 hours and it is still not done. I am impressed."

  "Bear in mind, this may not have been her work. The Brondins are users and do not necessarily like to get their hands dirty. I would not be surprised if someone else created the grid and she used it for her own purpose."

  "Good point, it would be so like the Brondins."

  Gambel noted, "it appears that we still need another hour maybe two. I, for one, am glad that Henry called a break before we started making mistakes. I think we need to map out everything we have found to see if there are correlations we missed for being so close to the subject."

  "Excellent suggestion," Sam replied. "This has been a real brain twister."

  Barana projected a map of the work done to that point. It was even more complex than she realized,

  "Hank, I am thankful you called a break when you did," commented Trilix. "I was just about to make the very mistake you were concerned with. It seemed logical to connect this node here with that one over there. If I had done so these two down here would have shorted out and the whole network would have collapsed. That would have destroyed the data in these storage units here and here. This map is most helpful. I see how we can isolate the data in all but these three units over on this end of the grid."

  Kaxas, wife of Sass observed, "Those three units can be isolated by linking this unit over here with this one and flipping this null post to active. It looks like the whole thing opens up at that point."

  Sequoia said,

  Hank said, "Ok, Does everyone know what we have to do and the order in which it must be done." Everyone agreed. "Ok lets go finish this. Barana and Sequoia, when the sequence is complete, download everything you can get. Sequoia, move that ship to your core and load it into one of your commercial ships. Deliver that to the shipyards at Antor II and they can go over it with a fine tooth comb. I want that ship out of reach for Rema. Also assure that there are no symbiotes aboard or the gear to manufacture them."

  Two hours later Rema's ship was on its way to Antor II at Tau Ceti.

  # Two hours later #

  Hank again gathered his team. "Our goal this time is to see if we can get anything else out of Brondin. I think that for her, the fact that she is truly a captive and her ship is gone will be tough news to bear. We are about to find out." They entered rapport and projected to Rema's temporary prison cell. Her only warning was a klaxon and an announcement, "Visitors arriving in 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1."

  "Good afternoon Rema, I see you have made yourself comfortable. We have some questions for you and some news as well. But lets start with news. Your two symbiote manufacture locations here on Sitler have been destroyed as has the one you had on Malone. All Symbiotes on planets in the Region have been destroyed. Of course, if you had more it is not likely that you would tell us so we continue to search. We are confident we will find the rest if there are any."

  "Your invasion resulted in minimal damage on Phang, Cestin and Veltor. Phang lost 2 ships with no casualties, Cestin lost 3 ships and had 9 casualties and Veltor had no losses."

  "Your yacht was tough to get at but we managed and all of the data units have been downloaded. Your yacht is now outbound on one of our commercial ships for a complete inspection at our shipyards about 6,000 light years from here. All of your interesting little traps have been removed. We were impressed with the complexity of your security on that ship. Is that your work or that of someone else?"

  "I stole the puzzle grid from some kid that was into creating complex puzzle grids. I then used his work and overlaid a security system on it. That should have been impossible. How did you do this."

  "The impossible merely take a little longer. What kid was that?"

  "The kid of one of my Admirals, I think his name was Ando, no, it was Anto, Anto Grout."

  Hank concealed his surprise and went on, "Why did you start an invasion when the Gorth are so close. You should have been preparing for them."

  "Hah, that old wives tale of doom and gloom. You don't expect me to believe that do you?"

  "At this point, I do not care if you do or do not. Sequoia, would you run Milica's vid of their finding." As the vid was running, Hank said, "you see Rema, the typical Brondin arrogance got in your way again. It turns out that the old wives tale, as you call it, is true. The first Gorth swarm is due to hit Alaok in 2.5 years and Sitler in 19 years. You would have left your adopted planet defenseless or should I say stolen planet. When we have completed our investigation, you will be turned over to Sitler for trial. If you are still alive after that, there is an extradition warrant for you from Yannar. Seems you left a few bodies behind you when you stole the yacht and they are still interested in bringing you to justice. The Rotagillans also want you for leading them into the late unpleasantness with Malone but I happen to think that they are nearly as bad as you are. Do you have anything to say."

  "I have nothing to say to any of you."

  The team then broke rapport on returning to Station One. Hank observed, "That lady still expects to win. I could feel that in her attitude. Her posturing tells me that we do not have all the symbiote manufacturing facilities. We need to particularly concentrate on the Sitler system and on Malone. We need to redouble our efforts there. We are missing something."

  Hank asked Barana to see if the Grout family was available to chat with the team. A few minutes everyone was seated around the big conference table at the lodge. Fasix was clearly the one expecting a question so was surprised when Hank asked Barana to display the map that they had been working on all day. The bigger surprise occurred when his son Anto reacted after studying the image for a few seconds, "Hey that is my missing puzzle. How did it get here."

  Hank chuckled and replied, "Young man, the team you see here at the table has been working on this for a good part of the day. The person who stole your puzzle was Rema Brondin. What she did with it has had this group in a dither for about five hours along with two AI's, Barana and Sequoia. She took your puzzle and overlaid a security system on it that was used to protect her yacht. This was the most complex security system any of us have ever encountered. Do you have other puzzles anything like this?"

  "I'm sorry sir."

  "Please do not be sorry, this is an amazing and creative piece of work and I think that you are going to be a busy young man if you can create more of these. None of us are mad, upset or anything like that. We are all just in awe. We have experienced how difficult it would be to unlock something that you intend to keep locked."

  "I have several hundred of these and this one is not even the most complex. I have been creating these for years. It is kind of a hobby. The trouble is that they have not been very easy to solve so they are not particularly saleable. The only one I know who can routinely solve them is Goulf. Usually, if they try, Mom or Dad can figure them out, so its kind of in the family."

 

  "They may not be particularly saleable as a puzzle, but they will definitely be saleable as a security platform. When it takes 22 fairly bright multispecies individuals including two AI's to solve one of your puzzles while using all of our T-Raptor skills, that is a significant accomplishment."

  "Hank, this discussion just went way over my head. What exactly are we talking about and why is everyone here so excited
about it."

  "Good point Fasix. Lets start from a different viewpoint. The group you see at this table is a special T-Raptor team. That means we are all fairly strong telepaths. We have the ability to project to a location of choice. It is how you and I met. We projected from here at Malone to your flagship at Veltor, and that is 87 light years distant. This particular team has a range of somewhere around 5,000 to 6,000 light years." Hank explained the capabilities of a T-Raptor team and its utility as an intimidation and intelligence gathering unit.

  "Recently we started a more scientific review of those capabilities and found that we could map individual nodes and their functions. Anyone using our teleport function is automatically mapped. From these maps we can identify who has the talent and to some extent the nature of the talent. Each of you has been mapped and each of you has a strong latent talent. My suggestion would be to embrace that talent and train it. You will want to develop shields so you can remove distracting background 'noise' that can be painful to some. Our excitement is in finding a family with this much talent and in a previously unrecognized node that we suspect is the ability with puzzles. I can see applications both from a creation and solving viewpoint. I can also see an analytical application. The choice is up to you but I think you will see that there is much that is positive that can arise from this. Talk it over amongst your selves and let us know how you want to proceed."

  "You did say that you were 87 light years away when we first met on my flagship?"

  "That is correct."

  Fasix looked at each of his family and they all smiled and nodded. "Hank, I am not sure why we have been treated so well but each of us would like to be a part of what your fleet represents. We each are also interested in proceeding with the training you suggested. How many years will this take." Again there was chuckling.

  Sam responded, "It will be more like days and then a few weeks to become really proficient. Barana will get you started tonight. Your beds, as you know are also your training and medical units. You may not have consciously noticed but you are already speaking fluent Antoran. In the days ahead, we will be discussing the variety of options ahead of you. For now, why don't we all enjoy some barbecue chicken."

  Fasix said, "What's a chicken?" Amidst the laughter, Ben Pine finally took him aside and explained the reference including the one made in his and Hank's first meeting.

  Chapter 20: The Plot Thickens

  Station 1 in Malone Orbit –

  March 31 – C Day 579

  "Hank, is it always this interesting around you? Three invasions and a swarm, a mess of alien operatives on our soil stirring up problems and I am worried about where the next shoe will drop."

  "Well Mae, I never plan for these things to happen, they seem to occur when I am near and I hope that is not something with any deliberate intent behind it or that my presence is the cause. That would be a truly scary thought. I take your meaning though, there are way too many things going on. I think that the more likely explanation is that I tend to be drawn to those kind of events when they are pending. I am not so sure that is a less scary thought."

  "I’m not sure how you and your family were able to keep a lid on things for so long so I put some of my best thinkers on this to see if the rest of us might be missing something. You have already met them and they will be here in a few minutes to tell us what they have found. General Sass was Fleet Admiral at Saba when we had our bit of unpleasantness there. Josh Adams was once my commanding officer and later my number 2. He is the one who initially determined that the Glarin were involuntary puppets and identified the symbiotes. He took a step down at his own request and he could well be my eventual replacement. Their wives complement their talents as does mine. The four are a formidable think tank. Ah, here they are now."

  Barana spoke privately to Hank,

 

  "Hi guys, I gather from the long faces, you have found something."

  Sass responded, "More than we would have liked, but we will let Josh lay it out for you."

  "Before I get started, John and Mae, have you said anything to your President Alber Woods that tells him we are here?"

  "Well no, we have not, though that discussion is on our agenda for tomorrow when we meet with him and his Chief of Staff." When they saw Josh's relieved expression to the response, Mae continued, "I have a bad feeling about where this is going."

  "As well you should. We have been looking at the activities of the Sitler operatives here on Malone and noted several points where there should have been some contact with Sitler for revised orders but those never occurred. The more we saw that, the more we realized that someone on Malone had to be pulling the strings and doing so with a level of security that suggested high in the government. Last night we had access to Rema Brondin's private files recovered from the database units on her yacht. She keeps pretty good records. One of the files blew us away. This one here." Josh projected an image of a Marson Fist, a General in the Sitler Army Intelligence Unit. The photo-graph was clearly Martin Fixte, the Malone President's Chief of Staff.

  "This morning, I asked Barana to conduct a DNA review of Mr. Fixte so she engineered a paper cut and teleported some of the blood to Station One, conducted the study and we now know for certain that the man next to the President is Sitleran. Malone scientists would not have noticed the difference in genetic tags. They do not even know of the existence of Sitler. Finally I showed this picture to Admiral Grout and asked if he knew this individual and his response was yes, that is General Fist but that the last time he had seen him was about six years ago. At the time, General Fist was Rema Brondin's birthday party escort."

  Sass picked up for Josh and went on, "We started looking for any communications leaving the Presidential Palace since our arrival in this system that were not normal government communications. That required quite a bit of help from Barana and that was not going well until Kaxas wondered out loud if Anto Grout's puzzle could have been used here to encrypt the communication. Sure enough, that was the case. Here are transcripts of the messages sent and received by Mr. Fist. Note this one, Fist is the one who ordered the death of Lyle Anders, the literary agent, and the attempt on Miss Wells. He also ordered the kidnapping of the four publishing firm employees who worked with Miss Wells. I asked Barana to extract them as soon as we identified where they were being held. They are a bit battered but alive and well. We have them in regular Station quarters so they are not suffering from lack of amenities. Lorena and Charles have visited with them and brought them fully up to date. Considering their experience, they are taking it well. Their absence has to be driving their captors a little crazy. We are watching for any communications resulting from it."

  Josh noted that they were now confidant that they had identified all Sitler operatives and that it was time to round them up. However, he wanted to bring the President into the loop without the Chief of Staff knowing.

  John Raven said, "I have known this President for a long time and he is a good man. My thought would be to invite him here. I think he will be intrigued if I mentally invite him to a meeting. I know that he takes personal time about now and spends a half hour to 45 minutes on an exercise machine. The room he does this in is locked and secure so no one will know he is not there unless he fails to acknowledge any call that might come in. We should be able to make that seamless."

  Hank smiled and said, "Lets do this. Barana would you please facilitate the communication between John and the President."

 

 

  When the President signaled his thumbs up, he was immediately transported to a room inside the lodge. "John, this is a new trick, eve
n for you. What is going on."

  John did the introductions. The convincing of the President that they were an alien force was emphasized by the presence of Sass and Kaxas. "I know that your time on that exerciser is limited so I will try to keep this short. Ten ships from the Exploration units of the Antoran fleet arrived in this region about six months ago. After seeing what was going on, they asked for additional ships. As of 12 days ago, there are now 28 ships in the region. At least one of their ships has been assigned to each of the 8 inhabited systems in this stellar region."

  President Woods interjected. "How can one ship protect an entire system?"

  "Um. Well you see these ships are quite . . um . . large. For example this one that we are on is 260 miles long by 60 miles across and carries over 20,000 warships. Each Station is essentially a mobile base and carrier. Our ships could not begin to touch even one of their warships."

  "Oh . . . oh my!"

  "Exactly. They have just prevented the invasion by the Sitler system of three other systems, none of which we knew about. They have also discovered that Sitler provoked the Rotagillan incursion. Until yesterday there was a Sitler fleet of 30,000 warships poised some 48 light years from here to invade Malone. One of the tools they intended to use was a puppet creating symbiote that, until the Antoran fleet showed up, we had absolutely no defense against. It would have been devastating. There is a lot more but we do not have enough time right now."

  "Easy enough, contact my Chief of Staff Fixte and we will slot the time."

  "Mr. President, therein lies the rub. It appears that Mr. Fixte is actually General Fist of Sitler and he is in charge of the invasion for Sitler."

  They then proceeded to show the President the evidence they had accumulated. Hank said, "Mr. President, we do have a court system here on the Station and we could try him here but we do not have the death penalty. We do have a very secure maximum security prison about 15,000 light years from here where he would be housed and I can assure you that he will never be seen in this region of space again. That still leaves you with the problem of explaining his absence. How would you like to proceed."