Precursor Revenants (The Precursor Series Book 1)

by Cain Hopwood

  “Those top two fingers look different to the bottom ones,” said Jon. “They’ve got a vertical line on the tips.”

  “And they’d be positioned right over the top of the two slits on the pistol.”

  “Okay, let’s assume something comes out of his finger tips, slips down into the mechanism, and activates it. Can we make something similar? I want to test fire this thing.”

  Pascale looked at Jon. “Are you serious?”

  “Yes. Not in here obviously, but at the range, sure. Presumably our alien friend holds this gun when it goes off, so it can’t be that dangerous. Right?”

  The engineer gave a small shake of his head and turned back to the model with what Jon took to be disgust. With a couple of manipulations, he separated out the switch under the left hand side slit, and inspected its workings. “Well, if you’re crazy enough to fire this thing, I’d say you’d be able to do it with a thin blade through this slit.”

  “What about the other?”

  “Same, but it’s not a simple switch, it looks more like a selector.”

  Jon thought for a second. “Is there a safety?”

  Pascale spun the model, inspecting it closely. “These look like the only two obvious controls. Of course, there could be some kind of wireless based configuration. But the trigger mechanism is completely enclosed, it’s only accessible through this small slit, so there’s little chance of a bump triggering it. It probably doesn’t have a safety.”

  “Or it’s got something like the implant pairing our assault rifles have.”

  “Could be.” Pascale gave a non-committal twitch of his shoulder.

  “Okay, what about the rest of the pistol, can you make a guess about what it fires?”

  Pascale bit his bottom lip. “Projectiles, or possibly plasma. The closest thing to a magazine is this solid block of metal in the hilt. Then there’s this.” He pointed at a dense cluster of wire with tendrils reaching out to small nodules all along the barrel. “This looks like it powers the device, and it probably acts like a control unit. But until we fire it, we can’t know for sure.”

  Jon gave that some thought. Until he had a concrete idea of what the capabilities of this weapon were, and more importantly what its limitations could be, he couldn’t estimate what kind of force projection a rifle of this type would have. The colonel had specifically mentioned that any defense they’d be going up against would be using this weapon type. He just didn’t know enough to plan an operation. More importantly, he didn’t know how long he’d have to evaluate this pistol. Maybe a day, maybe less. It all depended on how long the colonel could keep the fact he had it from the brass in Washington.

  They had to fire it, and do it soon. “Pascale, how quick can you rig up something to fire this thing remotely?”

  “Not long, half an hour to redesign a regular wireless linear actuator, and ten minutes to bake it in the fabricator.”

  “Right, get on it. Make one for each slit.” Jon strode over to the scanner, retrieved the pistol and returned it to his pocket. “I’ll grab some sleep. I’ve got a feeling tomorrow will be a long day. Bring the actuators to the range at six a.m. I’ll get the XO to make sure we’re the only ones there.”

  “Sure. Hey, are you taking that thing with you?”

  “Well I’m not going to just leave it lying around. Who knows what orders or regulations the colonel broke to get it to us. Besides, for all we know, it’s the single most valuable piece of tech in human history.”

  “Good point, best to keep it close.”

  — 4 —

  As soon as the human colonel’s fragile little transport had left, Katona ordered the captain to return to the starship. And, to run the drives at full doing so. It would cause Spear’s crew discomfort, grav-plates could never completely counteract a ship’s immense acceleration, but they would just have to manage.

  In his many cycles of service with Stetlak conclave, Katona was yet to find a large ship that enjoyed completely smooth acceleration. The compensators could never quite match the directionality of the engines. The floor was always slightly out of kilter, even during light maneuvering.

  Katona had heard Gaudin hulls didn’t exhibit that quirk, and they apparently had several other advantages besides. But if his conclave could afford Gaudin equipment, he wouldn’t have had to sneak around here in a buffer zone looking for creative ways to solving Stetlak’s military problems.

  The Cochrae hulls he had been flying his whole career may not have been as refined and comfortable, but they took a pounding. And in battle that was what counted. Spear was the newest cruiser deployed from this starship, but even so, he relaxed when she throttled back and nosed into her bay.

  The com pod on his harness trilled, it was Spear’s captain. “Admiral, the bay doors are closed and Spear is secure. Alight as you wish. Spear stands ready.”

  Katona keyed the com pod with a claw. “Acknowledged.”

  He took a step back from the work table. Katona had been re-reviewing piles of flimsies, mostly reports from Marbel. They all needed reevaluation in light of the possibilities that the humans presented.

  He turned to his aide. “Transfer everything to the war room.”

  “Sir.”

  Katona made his way to Spear’s main hatch. It was open to the bay with two marines on duty, as regulations dictated. Katona was no green skin though. He didn’t need a burly guard to stop him walking out into what could be cold hard vacuum.

  He halted at the hatch. “Sergeant, what are the bay conditions?”

  “The bay is in vacuum sir, the drives are being serviced, gravity is off.”

  The admiral nodded an acknowledgement, engaged his harness clima-field, and stepped out the hatch. He floated for a moment to clear the entrance, and to get his bearings, then arrowed out across the cavernous bay with a deft claw on his harness’s impulse controls.

  Ten parsas of sled and transit tube travel saw him approaching the nexus chamber, deep in the heart of the starship. He egressed the final tube without breaking stride and, after clearing the guard, entered the centarch’s chamber via his usual executive entrance.

  The centarch’s chair was suspended high in the very center of the bowl like chamber. It presided over hundreds of operational stations. The whole chamber was known, sometimes affectionately to its denizens, as ‘the pit’.

  Katona proceeded along one of the executive walkways that led to the chair. He looked over the edge to see the vast majority of the stations empty. It was in stark contrast to Katona’s experience in operational, or fighting, starships. The pit should have been a seething mass of controllers at navigation, flight and combat stations. It was sobering to Katona, and a sign of how far Stetlak’s fortunes had fallen, to see a starship pit running with such a skeleton crew.

  It wasn’t often that he could come to his patron with good news, especially these last few cycles, so Katona raised his eyes from the pit below and strode purposefully along the walkway toward the centarch’s chair.

  Just before he reached the end of the walkway, the centarch spoke. “So things went well then Katona.”

  “You have a sharp nose patron. Yes, things went very well.”

  “You are back sooner than expected, we are still many watches from turnaround.”

  “I also anticipated it would take longer, but I motivated the humans as you suggested and they responded admirably. I spoke with a colonel from the North American Union nation state who has operated in environments similar to Marbel.”

  “This colonel, is he able to mobilize the forces we need?”

  “I believe so, although he does need to get sanction from his nation’s leaders.”

  “Is that going to be a problem?”

  “He did not believe so. I provided him with samples of the enticements we usually use during annexation. He accepted them.”

  “Excellent,” the centarch said with obvious relish. “I did not expect it would be this easy, you have done well.”

  “Th
ank you patron. Perhaps my desire to be back at Marbel motivated me. I am concerned about what may be happening in our absence.

  “Nothing is happening admiral, as nothing of any note has happened for ten spans.”

  Katona tried his best not to cower at the rebuke. The centarch’s ever present clima-field was, as usual, blocking Katona’s nose from picking up the normal subtleties present in Ka-Li conversation. But he knew from experience it was best to voice his concerns. “There is something else that bothers me patron.”

  “What?”

  “I am concerned about the risk we run being discovered interfering here.”

  “I will manage the risk admiral, you manage the outcome. Now, I assume you came back early for a reason?”

  “Yes. The human has opened my eyes to alternatives.”

  “Alternatives?”

  “Yes. Their weapons and fighting platforms are quite capable. So, while our original intention to equip the human soldiers and embed them as specialists in our own units is still sound, they could be just as effective deployed as is.”

  “Surely their weaponry is no match for ours?”

  “Ours? No. But they would be effective against the Marbelite rebels.”

  The centarch blinked slowly, deep in thought. “This would significantly ease their deployment with our forces and accelerate our schedule.”

  “Exactly, we can work with them as entire strategic units, and we won’t need to train them on our transport, weapons and command structure.”

  “It is a good plan. I see now why you returned early.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes. You will need to transport not just a few humans, but their land and air fighting platforms, support infrastructure and supplies, amongst other things.”

  Katona lowered his head. “As always patron, you are one step ahead of me. Spear’s pinnaces do not have the heavy lift capacity required. A transport has already been dispatched.”

  “Good work admiral. Keep me informed and notify me immediately of any delay,” the centarch said, dismissing Katona with a languid wave of his hand.

  Katona spun on his heel and strode off.

  — 5 —

  At five minutes to six, Jon pushed open the door to the Trenton pistol range and walked right into the middle of an angry argument. It was between the range officer and, as luck would have it, two of his own men.

  Murdoch, Jon’s best sniper, was stabbing his finger into the range officer’s chest like a rapier. “Look, you let that little frog engineer bastard in just now. What’s wrong with us?”

  “Nothing is wrong…”

  Murdoch was pushed aside by his shadow, Ingles. “Aye there’s naught wrong with us, so why can’t we come in. I’ve got a bet to settle with this antipodean piece of shit.”

  Jon could see that these two were a hair’s breadth away from being on report for harassment. He was sorely tempted to watch the two peanuts escalate the issue and let the range officer put them on report, it would teach them a lesson. But then he considered that he might have an actual and pressing need of their skills before long, so he stepped in.

  “Murdoch! Ingles! Front and center!”

  The two men spun to face him and snapped to attention. Then they recognized him and relaxed, but not by much.

  Jon didn’t give them a chance to draw breath. “What are you two doing down here at this god awful hour?”

  It was Murdoch who was brave enough to answer. “Settling a bet, sir.”

  “A bet? Didn’t the range officer explain that the range is closed?”

  “He did sir, but we saw him let that fro…”

  With a twitch of his head, and a raised finger, Jon stopped the beanpole Aussie in mid-sentence. Then he took two steps until his mouth was only inches from Murdoch’s ear and lowered his voice to a whisper. “You do realize that the range officer outranks both you idiots, you were one more poke in the chest away from a charge.”

  Jon took a step back, and by the expression on both men’s faces he could tell that they’d just realized how close they’d come to having yet another mark on their records. He was always pulling these two out of one minor pinch or another. But they paid him back where it counted. Jon considered it the price for having two of the most effective, and creative, soldiers in the regiment, assigned to his squad.

  “Get out of here you two, the range will be open at ten.”

  The two men disappeared through the door with a speed that only two highly trained, and highly motivated, commandos could manage.

  As the range door slammed behind him Jon took his first look at what Pascale was doing on the other side of the heavy glass separating them from the shooting range proper. The engineer had set up a pistol vice on one of the benches. But it was the rest of the equipment he had arranged around the vice that intrigued Jon.

  “What’s all this?” Jon said as he approached the bench.

  “Sensors, scanners, cameras. We are to evaluate this weapon’s capabilities right?”

  “That’s what the colonel instructed.”

  “For that you need to know its muzzle velocity, rate of fire and magazine capacity. Speaking of which, may I have the pistol?”

  Jon pulled the weapon out of his inner pocket and handed it over.

  Pascale held it like he’d been born with it in his hands, which caused Jon to double take given how tentative the engineer had been with it last night. Pascale held it up, cupped the base with his hand and a block of metal dropped out. He grinned like a small child with a sparkler. “I knew it! This is the ammunition.”

  Jon looked at what Pascale was brandishing. It was a solid metal block. “You mean the ammunition is in there?”

  “No, this is a single piece. This is the ammunition. I noticed it was solid when I fabricated a copy of the pistol in plastic last night. I needed it to check the actuators.”

  Jon smiled. “So that’s why you look so comfortable with it this morning.”

  “Yes. Anyway, I discovered that this piece comes out.” Pascale hefted the block. Then he pushed the block into the pistol’s base and it snicked into place.

  “How can a solid block be ammunition?”

  “I don’t know. But if it’s not ammo, what is it? It doesn’t connect to any of the other components.”

  Jon waved his hand at all the equipment set up on the bench. “So what’s all this for?”

  “Monitoring. Shall we test this thing?”

  “Lets.”

  Pascale grinned, then mounted the pistol in the vice. He took care to line the business end of the pistol up so it was pointing downrange where there was the usual human shaped paper target hanging.

  Then he took two small blocks of plastic looking like half melted dice and with a little adhesive, carefully attached them to the top of the pistol. Each one covered one of the two slits. With that done, he sighted down the top of the weapon and nodded. “We’re good to go.”

  “Okay, but let’s be safe and do it from out there, at least the first time.” Jon thumbed behind them out to the setup area behind the thick ballistic glass.

  “Good point.”

  Jon led the way back through the range airlock closing it behind Pascale. Pascale handed Jon a small block of metal with a rubber stud on top.

  “What’s this?” Jon asked.

  “Remote trigger, do you want to do the honors?”

  “Sure.” Jon put his thumb on the stud and pushed. At first there was no resistance, but then the stud became firmer. A sobering thought occurred, and he lifted his finger. “Hang on, is there anything important behind that far wall?”

  The engineer frowned. “I’m not sure.” He turned to the range officer who was standing just behind them vibrating with curiosity. “Barry, what’s behind the far ballistic rock wall?”

  “Just more rock, the ground is higher back there, and the wall cuts into the rise.”

  “Perfect,” said Jon. “Let’s see what this thing can do. Everyone ready?”

 
; He pushed down on the stud, felt the resistance again, looked closely at the pistol through the glass and squeezed.

  The Ka-Li pistol let out a high pitched scream. It sounded more like a turbine failing than a gun shot. Whatever it was, it was loud, louder than any pistol Jon had heard being fired.

  “Jesus,” said Pascale in a low scared voice.

  “Look at what it did to the target,” said the range officer in a scared voice.

  Only a few tattered shreds of paper were hanging where the target had been.

  “What does that thing fire?” Asked Jon.

  “Give me a moment and I’ll tell you,” said the engineer. He started working getting readings from the mass of equipment he’d set up. After a couple of minutes he gave a small smile. “So that’s what you are,” he muttered.

  “Well, don’t leave us hanging,” said Jon.

  Pascale’s head snapped up. “Sorry, this is fascinating stuff. It looks like this baby fires small needles. It must mill them off that block of metal on the fly. Check out these power flows.” He brought up a display showing the interior of the pistol. The nodules along the barrel, and near the metal block, were glowing brightly. He pointed at a nodule on the pistol’s barrel. “These must accelerate the needles, though how they’re milled is anyone’s guess because there’s no machinery of any kind in the hilt.”

  “Do you know the needles’ velocity?”

  “No, they didn’t register on the radar, must be too small. I’m hoping they’ll be visible on the high speed.” He handed Jon another actuator. “Let’s try another setting first though.”

  Jon took the second actuator and ran it through its full range of movement. He could feel three definite notches, presumably the pistol’s three different settings. While Pascale watched his instruments like a hawk, Jon cycled through each of the settings and fired at new targets. Then they reset and he ran each of the settings again. This time firing at ballistic gel targets instead.