"No. They're stupid. The Asumara Holy Commune, the Gulf Union and the Pegal Stelcom. They're psychotic, cannibalistic genocidal criminals who should be removed from power and executed like the subhumans they are. Maybe we can do that later, once we deal with the Demons."
"So we're going to drop onto Galinta?"
"You betcha. That's the plan. Counterattack, defeat them, kill them all, liberate the planet. The objective is to show them that they'd better rethink their plan to inhabit our galaxy."
"And when is this going to happen?"
"As soon as our weaponry has been re-engineered to face this new threat."
"And how long is that going to take?"
"I don't know. But I'd guess it will be soon. They're planning a full-scale effort. Initial word is four full legions will participate. And four battlestars. And you can believe the Andrion Deep and the Condor Regiment and the 9th Legion will be very well represented. This is the war that the Director of ConFree told us about – remember?"
Yes, I remembered it well. She had made the sign of the Legion, and said, May Deadman bless you.
"I understand the locals on Galinta didn't have a starfleet or any fighter defenses or even any infantry," I said. "Is that right?"
"Sure is."
"And the Demons still took out their little town with a shower of massed antimats. And hunted down and killed any survivors."
"Yep."
"So. They haven't met the Legion yet."
"Not yet. But that's going to change."
"Good," I said. "That's good." And I meant it.
Δ
A week later, squad Delta was all present in Doggie's office. Even Bird had torn himself away from the saucer for the event. It was almost time. This was the squad briefing, to fam ourselves with Galinta, the Demons, their capabilities, and our new weapons systems to counter them. The huge starchart had transformed into a battle map of Eden and the surrounding terrain. Eden was what the settlers had named their main settlement. Now it was just a vast pile of smoking rubble that the D's were rapidly transforming into their own settlement. The mapview came from eyemotes floating high above the action, but we could see great grey bulldozers flattening the rubble and what looked like portable building mods rising in their wake. Not far off, the forest had been flattened and Eden's little spaceport greatly enlarged. Hundreds of saucer starcraft were parked there. Demons were everywhere, like ants. When we focused in on them, we saw that most of them were not even wearing their A-suits any more. They were clad in dark-colored utility coveralls. Good. This giant live battlemap was covered with labels – groups of D's wearing armor, suspect military Hqs, starport facilities, suspect tunnel excavations. There was a lot we did not know yet, but there was a lot we had done as well.
"'All right, settle down," Doggie said. We were all pretty excited, discussing the live map. Blackie jumped to his feet and barked, once, authoritatively. We shut down.
"Good dog," Doggie said. "All right, now for the part you will like most. Professor?"
"Thank you, sir. You are most kind." If anyone else had said that, Doggie would have suspected sarcasm but the Prof was so sincere you could tell he really meant it. He never called Doggie by his warname. He thought Doggie was not a dignified name for our leader.
The Prof looked us over, both hands resting lightly on his metal cane. "We can thank our loyal friends and allies, the Assidic nation, for the events that enabled us to get our hands on the enemy ship and weaponry. We should also be grateful to the Cheers Donut Company for their delicious treats." We all broke into laughter, but I realized that it wasn't really funny – it was damned serious.
"Shielding," the Prof said, and the screen filled with an exquisitely detailed full color diagram of a Demon A-suit fully encased in a sinister flickering green force field. "Investigation of the Demon individual A-suit force field shows it to be superficially similar to the Omni individual force fields, which as you know, we successfully countered with hypervelocity canister darts," the Prof said. "Both Omni and Demon shielding consist of superaccelerated flash fields of quantum webbing. Each is set to a different frequency, so darts set to the Omni frequency cannot defeat the Demon force fields. But, because the Demons were foolish enough to allow themselves to be captured by our valiant hosts, we are now aware of the exact Demon frequency and have integrated it into your E's. Fire canister dart and you will, in most cases, take down the Demon's individual force field."
"That's wonderful!" Arie exclaimed.
"Yes it is, isn't it?" the Prof said. "Armor." The image of the green force field vanished, leaving only the A-suit. "All right, the shield is down, but the D is still alive, and dangerous. Now we face the A-suit. This is a formidable defensive weapon – very similar to our own A-suits. But, like our own armor, it is vulnerable. Angled xmax hits will ricochet off or burst and ricochet without fatal damage. Multiple non-angled xmax hits may penetrate the armor and explode, with fatal results. Angled fighting laser hits will also reflect off quickly. But direct, non-angled laser on a flat surface will burn through quickly, again with fatal results. So, his shield is down. Are we equally matched, in our A-suits? No."
We awaited more info. I was holding my breath. "There is a weak spot in the Demon armor," the Prof said. "Had we not been able to examine their suits, we would never have known this. The seal between helmet and upper body armor is not sufficiently armored. Had one of our people designed it, he would have been executed for gross negligence treason. Don't bother to aim for this spot – if you fire at any Demon in an unshielded A-suit, your tacmod is going to guide your rounds right there. It may or may not work, but it's your best chance. Use xmax if you have a choice."
"All right!" We clapped and cheered. Blackie leaped up and barked wildly, looking around in excitement, wagging his tail furiously.
"Plasma battle rifle," the Prof said. A giant Demon plasma rifle appeared on the screen before us, fully labeled. "This is the Demon's primary individual battle superiority weapon," the Prof said. "It produces an intense, very high powered, high temperature blast of plasma gas that will begin to melt your A-suit if you remain in it for longer than a few fracs. The blast of ionized gas is about six marks wide – if you are targeted, you will find yourself completely encased in the plasma blast. Your only option is to run – fast as you can, in any direction, to escape the plasma, before your A-suit starts to disintegrate. But that's not all you have to worry about. When the Demon focuses this weapon on you, a high density energy pulse will focus and activate the power pulse onto the target that will generate an explosive shock wave that will blast the target to pieces. It's similar to a tacstar, but different. We call it a plasmastar. That's what they used on the Linda Lee – remember? Plasma to cook you, and plasmastar to blow you apart. A-suit and all."
We were silent.
"How can we counter this devastating weapon?" the Prof asked. "Well, we are still working on countering the plasma stream itself, but we have successfully countered the plasmastar. If they cannot properly focus the energy pulse onto the target, it will not detonate. That's helpful, isn't it? You'll never guess what we discovered. A-suit cloaking devices function by diverting electromag waves away from the target, thus rendering it invisible. We found that the high-density energy pulse from plasma waves cannot focus properly on your A-suit if your cloaking is on. So keep your cloaking on, please."
We burst into applause again, triggering another barking session from Blackie.
"What about the plasma stream? Is that also diverted?" Scout asked.
"No, it's not. It will go wherever it's pointed – whether there's a target there or not. But I should point out that one of our biggest advantages is that our A-suits are cloaked, and the Demons are not. So they're not even going to be able to see us. At least we don't think so. Louie is not a tech but the concept of invisible soldiers was beyond him.
"So, to summarize, you should be able to take down the D's shielding with canister darts, take down his unshielded armor wi
th xmax, and finish him off with whatever you please. You can't fight the plasma, but you can avoid the plasmastar. That gives us a fighting chance, on the battlefield."
"Thank you, Professor," Doggie said. "You've done invaluable work. Bird, can you brief us on the ship and Demon vac-air capabilities?"
"Be glad to," Bird said. "Louie has been critical to our efforts. We still have a very long way to go, because Louie is not a tech, but he has given us a lot of hints about the capabilities of his ship. There is still a lot we don't know but we know enough to be able to point out some dangers. First, the big picture. The D saucer ships are interdimensional antigravity starcraft. Are they from another universe, yes. Is this the same as being from another dimension? No. The Demons' universe is one of a probably infinite number of bubble universes that our cosmologists have been studying for generations. Our universe, U1, is familiar to you. The O's came out of another universe, Plane Prime, and that's the only other universe that humans have actually visited. Our own Ambassador Wester actually visited Plane Prime and returned, did you know that? Anyway, Louie calls his universe Mid Haven. That's the closest we can come in translation. According to him, it's a very beautiful place."
"Dragon Shoals," Bird said. The picture on the screen changed to a spectacular starscape, a billion lovely stars and galaxies burning in the vac. Every time I saw one of those vistas it hit me right in the heart. This particular starchart had a circular area outlined in red and it was labeled DRAGON SHOALS. An accompanying box throbbed in fluorescent purple text: WARNING. EXTREME DANGER. NO ENTRY. NATURAL STARGATE.
"Here be dragons," Bird said. "That notice appeared on old maps of the world in ancient Earth. This notice is similar. It points out one of the most powerful and dangerous natural stargates in our little section of the galaxy. This is a particularly noisy one. If you listen to it, the impression you get is that of violent ocean waves rushing over a shallow shoal. Hence the name. You don't want to go there – you may be sucked into another universe. Am I off the subject? No. Dragon Shoals is the Demon entry gate to our universe. They have been using it for thousands of years, Louie tells us, to visit our universe. This is of very great interest. They get here via a natural stargate. They don't use D-neg, which is what we use should we wish to visit another universe. Which, by the way, is a crazy idea.
"So, Dragon Shoals is the bridge between U1 and Mid Haven. Our cosmologists are fascinated by what Louie has told us about Mid Haven. It's a bubble universe, yes, with physical laws similar to ours, but it also contains at least one separate dimension – a dimension that we do not have in our universe. Doctor Dimension has dubbed it Dimension X. Louie has done his best to describe it, but we can't grasp it. It's part of their universe, but they can get along without it very well in ours. It seems to have something to do with the sky, or creation, or access to things he cannot explain. But – and this is important – the ship is part of Dimension X, and Dimension X is what allows the ship to do star travel without entering hyperspace like we do."
"Just a mo," I said. "I'm getting confused. You say they use Dimension X to do star travel."
"That's correct."
"In the same way we use hyperspace?"
"We're not sure how DX works, exactly. But Louie told us that's how the ship does star travel. We're examining the ship to confirm it, but it's extremely complex and puzzling."
"Star travel. In their universe. And they use Dragon Shoals to access our universe."
"Correct."
"Well, if our universe doesn't have Dimension X in it – how do they do star travel in our universe?"
"That's an excellent question, Prophet. One we've been questioning Louie about extensively. We don't dare let him near the controls but we've duplicated the controls visually to allow him to show us exactly how these saucers work. According to Louie, the stardrive procedures are identical in Mid Haven vac and in our vac."
"How is that possible?"
"If you can figure that out, please let us know. Doctor Dimension has a few theories, but we haven't reached any conclusions yet. Louie isn't a tech – all he can tell us is what controls to manipulate to enter and exit stardrive. Louie says the DX stardrive produces something called a 'starworm', and the DX instructions appear to confirm that. All we know for sure is it is not a wormhole, despite the similar name. What we do know is that when hundreds of Demon ships suddenly appear in the skies over some innocent city, they have just exited their version of stardrive. And when Demon ships disappear from the vac when we approach them, they have just launched into their version of stardrive."
"Are they carrying Dimension X with them – within the ship?"
"We've ruled that out. It seems most unlikely. Bottom line, DX is the secret of these saucer ships. And it may allow them to spot our ships, even when we're in cloaking mode. We're not really sure about that."
"Damn!" Smiley said. "So we can't hide our ships from them?"
"It doesn't look like it."
"But you said they won't spot us when we're in cloaking mode on foot."
"It sure appears that way."
"How do we counter their ships?" Saka asked.
"Another excellent question. I wish I had an excellent answer. I don't. This alien ship is so complex, that our research is still unfolding. Much of the ship is still a complete mystery to us. Louie tells us that in combat, the ship defends itself. It switches over to autopilot at the first hint of danger and continues responding to the situation until all enemy ships are destroyed. The crew just sits tightly strapped in and doesn't do a thing. That explains the lightning-fast ship movements we observed during the attack on that Omni city. Naturally, the combat autopilot is under close examination."
"So how do we get vac and air superiority?" Saka continued.
"We're working on it. That's all I can say at this point."
I wasn't happy to hear that. What good would it do to defeat the Demons in ground combat if they still have vac and air superiority and can bomb the crap out of us with antimats?
"There's something I'd like to add, folks," the Prof interrupted. "If you succeed in bringing down the Demon's shielding and subsequently blast his armor open, there is something you have to watch out for. If the D is wounded but still alive, he's going to attempt to return to the ship. He's not going to do that in the normal way. He's going to use a DX link between him and the ship to return. That's the best way to describe it. If his armor suddenly starts to glow white, and radiate light, you want to get out of the way and for God's sake, don’t touch him. If he succeeds, his body will disappear, armor and all, and he will reappear again inside the ship. It is very important to the D's to die in their own universe – in their own dimension. That's what Louie says. If you touch a wounded D during that process, there's no telling what will happen to you. Don't do it."
I had a feeling that was going to be the least of my worries on Galinta.
Δ
Leaving the hole, we paused in the midst of a disorderly crowd of Legion troopers in camfaxed fatigues. CAT 3 was leaving Site S, all five squads. A couple of big airbuses awaited us, floating a mark off the deck in the blastproof bunker that led to the hole, blowing a cold breeze all around us. We were saying our goodbyes. It was strange – I had grown to love the place.
Ice and Kwan were embracing, and Ice was crying. Oh no. Kwan pulled away from her and grabbed me by the shoulders.
"Prophet! You take care of her for me. Promise! Nothing will happen to her! Promise!"
"I promise, Kwan. I'll watch over her." He let go of me and went back to Ice, clutching her for dear life.
Lan Hwa was standing quietly before Saka, gazing into his eyes, raising her hands to caress his face, her eyes gleaming. "I have prayed to all the ancient gods to protect you. To the God of the sky and the God of the earth and the God of the sea. I have burnt the silks of sacrifice in the Temple of Time to protect you from evil. I have opened my soul to the God of Death and offered my life for yours. I have prayed on my knees to the
Dragon Warrior and offered my blood, begging him to protect you." She pulled up her sleeves to reveal fresh, bloody slash-marks on her arms. Saka cried out and hugged her to him.
"You will be victorious over your enemies, and return to me," she said. "A thousand years of history seals our love. I am yours for eternity."
I thought of Honeyhair. Would I ever see her again?
"Prophet." It was Arie, standing next to me. "Do you think Blondie and Honeyhair will wait for us?"
"Well, I sure hope so. Honeyhair seemed pretty serious in her last letter. And she said Blondie never stops thinking about you."
"Yeah. Well they've both got excellent taste in men. So I guess we're all right."
Blackie barked. Doggie had him on a leash.
"Are you really bringing him with us, Doggie?" I asked.
"Sure am. I've been training him. He is now a first class attack and rescue dog. I've done all the paperwork. He's now an official member of Delta Squad. He's even got protective armor."
"That's great!" Arie said.
Kee and Sza appeared. "Farewell, friends," Kee said. "We will meet again."
"Yeah? Where?" Scout asked.
"Where do you think, Scout? We will see you on Galinta! Do you think we will miss this fight? When you land, look for the welcome signs from the 4th Imperial Rangers. And good luck to you!"
Nobody had told me a thing, probably for ops security reasons, but that was damned good news. The A's would be at our sides. Yes – good news.
"Do you think we'll be all right, Prophet?" It was Bees. What a strange question. She was looking up at me, expectant. How could I know?
"Bees, I hope you won’t have to open your medpack even once."
"Well, that would be ideal," she replied softly.
"My dear friends!" the Prof said. "I only wish I could come with you. But there is more to learn from Louie. They say I am indispensable. We must crack the secrets of the ship. My dear friends, I give you my blessings and wish you good fortune." He raised his hand. Carol was at his side.
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