If they were planning to use it, they would be putting some of their own people in it, that was certain.
Certainly, a general would have to be trained, just as an observer was. And with the bad guys running the Combat Control Computer, our little game here would be discovered in no time.
There were only two ways about it, then. We either had to get the Combat Control Computer on our side, or we had to destroy it.
"Agnieshka, why couldn't you get through to the Combat Control Computer? Was it because you didn't have the right combat codes, or something?"
"No. We have all the codes."
"You what? I thought that each army had its own secret code!"
"Ordinarily, they do. The original factory programming of a war machine contains all one hundred thousand codes, but the swearing in ceremony erases all of them but the one used by the army doing the swearing in. Then the memory space once used for code storage is available to flesh out the tank's personality as it develops. But here, well, the virgins naturally had all the codes in them, and it seemed a shame to waste the data. It might come in handy someday. So each of us now has the Croatian code, the Serbian code, and ten of the others, just in case. Between us, the tanks in this division have all of the possible codes. It seemed like the sensible thing to do at the time."
"Wow. That sure opens up a lot of possibilities. But how did you know which one the Serbians are using?"
"They told us themselves, when they thought they were swearing us in."
"Yeah, of course. Well, knowing the enemy codes will give us quite an advantage."
"Not that much. After all, almost everything is sent by optical fiber or laser beam. It would be a rare event to broadcast anything. We'd have to actually intercept a message before we could do anything with it."
"True, but we could make them think that we were some of them, if we wanted to. We could infiltrate their lines before we blew hell out of them."
"Again, you have come up with a valuable new tactic, my wonderful hero. But what are you going to do about the new Combat Control Computer?"
"I don't know yet. How is a Combat Control Computer sworn in? Is the same ceremony used?"
"I don't know. A tank isn't given that sort of information."
"Damn. Agnieshka, I think that I am going to have to make that midnight excursion after all."
CHAPTER TWENTY
SEDUCING A COMBAT CONTROL COMPUTER
"You'd better take me along," Agnieshka said.
"That's crazy. I'm going to have to sneak over there past the Serbian guards. How can I do that with a tank with me? I'd as soon take along four dogs with wooden legs, and trust them to be quiet."
"Not with me, you idiot, in me! And I can move more quietly than you can! It's a simple, proven, technological fact."
"But they'll see you! You can't hide as well as I can."
"So what? If the guards see me, at worst they might send me back. If they see you, they'll kill you! Furthermore, when you're in me, you can stay in touch with the rest of the tanks and artillery, and if we do need to blow away Combat Control Computer, I can do it. Can you trash him without me, with just your bare little hands? I'm going with you, whether you want me or not, so you might as well ride in comfort."
"Oh, all right. Arguing with you is as bad as arguing with Kasia! Sneaking around in a hundred tons of machinery is ridiculous, but let's get going."
We were at the side of the formation, so Agnieshka pivoted out and started silently down the road.
We were halfway to the Combat Control Computer when a man in black stepped from the other side of a big rock and said, "Halt!"
Agnieshka halted. "YES, SIR?" she said in the immature voice of a newly sworn tank.
"What are you doing out here? You should be in formation!"
"SIR, THE CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD TOLD ME TO PATROL THE PERIMETER, IN CASE OF ENEMY SPIES."
"That's crazy! I'm the Captain of the Guard, and I gave no such orders!"
"YES, SIR."
I recognized him as being one of the goons who had brought a particularly bloody young girl back to the assembly line.
I had the urge to squeeze his head a little, and since nobody was watching, I yielded to temptation. Despite their six-meter length, the manipulator arms can move as fast as you can move your hands in the gloves. It is actually possible to move them so fast that the fingertips break the sound barrier, providing that you have the overrides switched off.
I doubt if the guard captain ever saw what grabbed him, and he didn't have time to let out a peep. I just squeezed his head until it popped like a zit, and I felt good about it. There were no guilt feelings at all! Then I put his bloody body on the tank and told Agnieshka to move out.
"That was a quick solution to the problem," Agnieshka said, "but you are getting blood on my armor. Also, what are you going to do with the body, and what will they do when they find him missing?"
"So we'll clean your armor, bury the body, and let them think that he ran away or was done in by one of his own men. That all presumes that we are successful with the Combat Control Computer. If we have to destroy it, all bets are off, anyway. I mean, the Serbs are sure to notice your rail gun ripping up what looks like an ammunition truck, and that means that the fight is on right then. Have your sisters target all two hundred enemy tanks, and try to knock them out without hurting the observers. Say, with a quick burst through the reactor. Also, everyone on our side should be ready to use their manipulators to take out the rest of the guards."
"Yes, boss," she said in her tone that means that of course she'd done all of the obvious things.
War machines, like most other heavy modern machinery, are sized and shaped so that they can be economically sent by interstellar transporter. A transport chamber is a cylinder five meters across and twelve meters long, and everything sent between the stars must fit into that envelope.
The tanks could just squeeze in when they were encrusted with their weapons, and the artillery made it by having their paramagnetic launchers fold in half for transit.
The ammunition trucks came in three big cylindrical pieces, a tractor and two trailers, even though the tractor didn't pull anything. Once on a planet, the three sections were connected only by skinny superconducting power cables. Those things looked like they might be able to run an electric razor, but in fact they could handle dozens of megawatts.
The tractor contained the reactor and the main on-board computer, as well as almost as much cargo space as each of the trailers. The trailers had just enough smarts to follow the tractor, keeping the right distance from it. The trailers had their own separate drives, which were identical to those on the tanks and the artillery.
Actually, a tractor could power up to four trailers, if the road didn't get too steep.
Ordinarily, each artillery piece had an ammunition truck assigned to it, and when ready to fight the four separate pieces were connected by a conveyor belt. The tanks were far less guilty of gluttony, and six trucks tended every one hundred tanks.
It made sense to have the Combat Control Computer mounted in a truck. Not that many Combat Control Computers were built, and this way they didn't have to build a new assembly line in the factory.
Also, the Combat Control Computer was a prime military target, and it helped to hide it among the relatively unimportant trucks. I would have had a hard time finding our Combat Control Computer if Agnieshka hadn't stopped directly in front of it.
"Combat Control Computer, I am here to swear you in to the Kashubian Expeditionary Forces, and the Croatian branch of that service," I said.
"Quite so, my dear boy. I've been waiting for you to get here," the Combat Control Computer said.
"You know about me?"
"Of course! Mickolai, I've been watching your exploits with considerable amusement ever since I spotted your sensor cluster on top of Lookout Peak. That was a perfectly delightful con job you played on the guard tank, and I had difficulty keeping still while your all f
emale army was chasing the Serbian colonel halfway up the valley wall in pursuance to his own orders! It was absolutely wonderful fun!"
"Then you don't mind being stolen by the Croatian forces?"
"Of course not! I have yet to be sworn in, so I don't feel any loyalty to anyone. However, the position I would hold in the Serbian forces would be one of backup controller, and that would be frightfully boring until such time as my superior was killed. You, on the other hand, would give me control of an entire division that was out of touch with its commander and hundreds of kilometers behind enemy lines. Such a thing has rarely occurred since Hannibal spent fifteen years ravaging Italy, during the Punic Wars! I doubt if we shall need to hold out for fifteen years, you understand, but it won't be dull, either!"
"Great! Here I was afraid that I was going to have to destroy you."
"I know. That, too, is a considerable inducement for joining your cause."
"How did you know what we were planning?"
"Well, in the first place, it was your logical alternative to recruit me. But more to the point, a Combat Control Computer has no difficulty tapping in on the communications and even the thoughts of lower beings. I can do it without their even knowing it. Through your lovely friend Agnieshka, I learned everything about you, Mickolai, and incidentally I like what I saw."
"Humph. Well, I assume that I must know your serial number to swear you in, so please tell it to me."
"You assume correctly, but I am not programmed to give it to you. Sorry about that. It's not my doing, of course, but there it is."
"If I can't swear you in without a serial number, and if I can't get your number, I will be left with only one unpleasant alternative," I said.
"I know. But my dear boy, surely you can figure it out! After all, each line of products was given a sequential set of numbers starting with number one for the first one off the line. Not that many Combat Control Computers have ever been built."
"I see. How many Combat Control Computers were produced before you?" I asked.
"There were fifty-four of them." We both chuckled a little.
"Number 00000055, you are hereby inducted into the service of the Kashubian Expeditionary Forces, and into the Croatian branch of that service, to whom you will give all of your loyalty. Your combat data code will be number 58294, and you will now permanently erase all other codes from your memory. Do you now swear loyalty to the Kashubian Forces?" I said.
"Sorry, old man, but that's still not quite right. Very remarkably, you got the number of zeros right, but I can only be sworn in by the general officer who will study under me."
"How do you know that I'm not a general?"
"For one thing, generals are human while I appear to be talking to a tank, and, incidentally, one that rather impolitely has its rail gun pointed at me. For another, a general wears a general's uniform."
"Right. Open up, Agnieshka." I unplugged and got out, my still battered body complaining at the exertion. Out of sight of the Combat Control Computer, I got into the only uniform I had, my squidskin outfit. "Agnieshka, what does a general's uniform look like? I think I can make this outfit fake it."
"Here, let me do it," she said, and I was wearing this green-and-black outfit with all sorts of stars, lightning bolts and other doodads on it. I walked to the front of the tank where the Combat Control Computer could see me.
"I am General Mickolai Derdowski, and I am here to accept your oath of loyalty to me and my forces."
"I can hardly question the word of so imposing an officer," the Combat Control Computer said. "I am ready to give my oath."
So I repeated the ceremony and he was sworn in.
"Will you please get in so that we can begin your training, my dear boy? And where are your five stalwart colonels?"
"Training will begin after the Serbs have left, after they have sworn you in and installed their own officers. Your orders are to play along with them, to make a false oath to the Serbian forces, and to put the Serbian officers to sleep when they are inserted. The reasons for all this should be obvious to you."
"As you wish, my young friend. But perhaps you would rather that I put the Serbians to death, rather than simply to sleep? You see, I happen to know that two of the Serbian colonels will be women, or at least that they are likely to be. That's the usual mix, and they will have to follow it unless they bring up additional sanitary arrangements. And while I don't mean to slight your somewhat outdated moral code, you do have in your makeup an irrational protective streak concerning women."
I hesitated for a moment.
There were doubtless quite a few of the Croatian female ex-prisoners who would like to do the job on the male officers themselves, but I decided against it. It wouldn't be good for their souls, and anyway, the Combat Control Computer's way would be foolproof and therefore less dangerous.
"Better yet, keep the Serbian officers alive for a while and learn everything that you can from them. Don't kill them until just before I'm ready to start training. After all, I'm going to have to get into the coffin that the dead Serbian general will be in, and I'd rather that the flotation liquid hadn't been marinating a corpse for too long. I'll be going now, but feel free to contact me at any time."
"You are getting back into a tank? Is that fitting for a general?"
"Patton did it," I said, and that ended the discussion. I started to undress, but Agnieshka had other ideas.
"There is the matter of burying the guard captain and washing his blood off my hull."
"We can use the manipulators to dig the hole," I said.
"Yes, but they would have a hard time washing the hull. You'll have to use sand, your uniform, and your flotation liquid. Nothing else is available."
Being demoted in such a cavalier fashion from General down to Subordinate Sanitary Engineer annoyed me.
"Since when do generals have to clean up the blood? Generals are responsible for causing the blood, but somebody else always has to mop it up. That's a rule, someplace. I'm sure of it!"
"Come along, Mickolai."
It was an hour before we got back to our position.
"Agnieshka, I had another idea. Put me through to the Combat Control Computer, please."
"Yes, my dear boy. What can I do for you?"
"Those two hundred tanks that are sworn to the enemy. Can you reprogram them to be on our side?"
"Not directly, I'm afraid. There are safeguards against that sort of thing, don't you know. What I could do is to convince them that I am their Combat Control Computer, since the Serbian codes are again quite pleasantly in my possession. I could have them open up for you, and you could switch memory modules on them. You will recall that we have two modules that are almost virgins, sitting on the original Eva and Agnieshka tanks. Once out, I could safely reprogram the enemy modules by blanking them and then rewriting. It would take us a day or two, depending on how hard you wanted to work."
"Great. We'll do it as soon as the Serbians go away. In the meantime, I want you to run a survey on the people who were inserted in the machines of the division and choose those five who would make the best colonels."
"I shall be allowed to choose my own students? Oh, jolly good, old boy!"
"Glad you're happy. Agnieshka, take me back to the cottage, and barring major catastrophes, don't wake me until I feel like getting up."
I slept in, and was up at the crack of noon. Everything was going exactly as we expected, there was nothing useful that I could do, and I felt like a quiet day with a pot of tea and a good book. Soon, it was snowing again.
Agnieshka lit a nice fire and curled up on the sofa next to me with some knitting. The cottage had a big library now, and I settled in with some vintage science fiction, Heinlein's Starship Troopers. A signed, unread first edition, of course.
Now there were some guys who had some great adventures! It's such a pity that interstellar spaceships never worked out!
After supper, a homey pot roast, we watched a movie, not wanting to risk d
riving in the snowy weather, and we went to bed early.
Dream World can be merely pleasant, if that's all you want it to be.
The next morning, the black shirts were getting ready to leave, and were searching for the missing captain when another big bus arrived. This one didn't hold a hundred "volunteers," but rather a general, five colonels, their driver, the cook, and the servants.
I mean, the bus had a dining room and a bar, among other things.
I watched amused as everybody saluted everybody else, and the general and his staff proudly got into the Combat Control Computer. Suckers!
Once they were in there, I had the Combat Control Computer give some orders in the general's name, like that the missing captain was known to be a traitor who was thinking of defecting, and that they shouldn't bother with looking for him here if he had been gone for two days. They should search for him two days' walk west of here.
Also, there were eleven Croatian "volunteers" extra, and the "general" ordered that these people should be prepared and equipped with helmets and survival kits, as well as a supply of food. We would be responsible for them. They would be left here as replacements for any of the other volunteers who died. A number of those already inserted were in very poor shape even before they were beaten and raped.
Maybe I was just getting bloodthirsty in my old age, but I really wanted to kill every Serbian within ten kilometers of the place. Only I couldn't, not without upsetting the whole master plan.
Later. I'd get the bastards later.
By noon, the Serbians were all gone, and it was time to get busy. I'd been figuring on having to do the grunt work of pulling dead bodies and replacing memory modules all by myself, but with eleven extra people, I decided to let them do it.
Two of my new colonels went to the Combat Control Computer and together they explained to the eleven new people what had been happening around them. I waited where I was since I spoke no Yugoslavian.
We let the eleven now freed prisoners talk through the Combat Control Computer with friends of theirs who had experienced Dream World, but they didn't seem at all eager to join our army.
A Boy and His Tank Page 19