Read Online Posleen War: Sidestories The Tuloriad by John Ringo, Tom Kratman - Free Book Online
Authors: John Ringo, Tom Kratman
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armor of the god-like Goloswin,
He of the clever ways and the subtle mind,
Who assists now the Great Being in the running of
The clockwork timing of the universe.
—The Tuloriad, Na'agastenalooren
Anno Domini 2010
Himmit Ship Surreptitious Stalker, Diess System
It was a surreal scene. The Stalker was nearly wrapped in the battered hulks of a Posleen ghost fleet, the fleet having been towed into a position of stable orbit pending recovery and scrapping. On every side of the cargo compartment, the view screens showed images of battered and cracked hulls. Unlike the wrecks floating around the Earth, these ships neither glowed, nor sparked, nor burned, nor spilled out the dying husks of Posleen crew.
These wrecks were dead and had been for years. In human terms, this was a boneyard. Nonetheless, it was not an entirely dead boneyard. The anti-matter containment units were still active. Normally this should not have been true; anti-matter was simply too valuable to have been left ungathered. On the other hand, if you're the Darhel, the galaxy's lawyers, beaurocrats, and corporate sharks, and you've cornered the market on anti-matter, and suddenly there's just a vast quantity of anti-matter that threatens to undercut the entire galactic market, then you, too, might decide that a little visited corner of the Federation was just the place to dump that anti-matter for a while until you could figure out how to put it into the system without upsetting that system.
And the band of Tulo'stenaloor couldn't get at any of it.
Binastarion sat on his haunches, with his gruel bucket held in one hand. With the other, the kessentai rolled little balls of gruel, using a clawed thumb-cognate to flip the balls several feet into his maw. Binastarion was bored out of his mind; flipping food balls was about as interesting as it got.
If only I had my artificial sentience to talk to, the Kessenalt mentally sniffed.
And he had every right to be bored. The Stalker had been stuck in orbit about Diess IV for over a month, as humans measured time and had been en route for two months more. In all that time there had been nothing to do but stare at the screens, eat, flip food balls, and stare at the screens some more. Practice fighting was out; it was too likely to turn into a free for all. Fucking was out; as Tulo'stenaloor said, “Just what we need; a couple of hundred little damned, ravenous nestlings underfoot and no pen to keep them in. You want to wake up with nestlings gnawing on your reproductive members?” Besides, Kessentai didn't really care for screwing each other, as a general rule, feeling the practice was somewhat perverse.
“You thought of everything, did you, Indowy?” Tulo sneered. "Save us from the big, bad humans. Run their blockade. Take us to safety in the stars.
“Then forgot all about Posleen suitable space suits, didn't you?”
“Can't think of everything, Tulo?” Aelool answered, with a shrug. “Besides, your plight had me in something of a rush.”
“Why couldn't you?” Tulo'stenaloor asked, walking off in a huff and completely ignoring Aelool's counter-jab. This left the Indowy and Goloswin, the tinkerer, alone.
“How were we supposed to get to one of the wrecks to rebuild and restore it,” Goloswin asked, “without suits?”
“The Stalker can extrude a sort of metallic tunnel,” the Indowy answered, pointing at a view screen where a stubby, silvery-sheened cylinder protruded into space. “We not sure quite how it's done, but it can be done. And it's perfectly capable of linking itself to a Posleen air lock. Any airlock, actually; this metal has some very odd attributes. Unfortunately, we didn't realize that every ship here would be airless.”
“If I had the material, I'd bloody sew us a few suits,” the tinkerer said. “Unfortunately . . .”
“Unfortunately, we don't. I've sent for a courier to deliver us some, but—”
“But that's going to be a while,” Goloswin said. “Can't the
He of the clever ways and the subtle mind,
Who assists now the Great Being in the running of
The clockwork timing of the universe.
—The Tuloriad, Na'agastenalooren
Anno Domini 2010
Himmit Ship Surreptitious Stalker, Diess System
It was a surreal scene. The Stalker was nearly wrapped in the battered hulks of a Posleen ghost fleet, the fleet having been towed into a position of stable orbit pending recovery and scrapping. On every side of the cargo compartment, the view screens showed images of battered and cracked hulls. Unlike the wrecks floating around the Earth, these ships neither glowed, nor sparked, nor burned, nor spilled out the dying husks of Posleen crew.
These wrecks were dead and had been for years. In human terms, this was a boneyard. Nonetheless, it was not an entirely dead boneyard. The anti-matter containment units were still active. Normally this should not have been true; anti-matter was simply too valuable to have been left ungathered. On the other hand, if you're the Darhel, the galaxy's lawyers, beaurocrats, and corporate sharks, and you've cornered the market on anti-matter, and suddenly there's just a vast quantity of anti-matter that threatens to undercut the entire galactic market, then you, too, might decide that a little visited corner of the Federation was just the place to dump that anti-matter for a while until you could figure out how to put it into the system without upsetting that system.
And the band of Tulo'stenaloor couldn't get at any of it.
Binastarion sat on his haunches, with his gruel bucket held in one hand. With the other, the kessentai rolled little balls of gruel, using a clawed thumb-cognate to flip the balls several feet into his maw. Binastarion was bored out of his mind; flipping food balls was about as interesting as it got.
If only I had my artificial sentience to talk to, the Kessenalt mentally sniffed.
And he had every right to be bored. The Stalker had been stuck in orbit about Diess IV for over a month, as humans measured time and had been en route for two months more. In all that time there had been nothing to do but stare at the screens, eat, flip food balls, and stare at the screens some more. Practice fighting was out; it was too likely to turn into a free for all. Fucking was out; as Tulo'stenaloor said, “Just what we need; a couple of hundred little damned, ravenous nestlings underfoot and no pen to keep them in. You want to wake up with nestlings gnawing on your reproductive members?” Besides, Kessentai didn't really care for screwing each other, as a general rule, feeling the practice was somewhat perverse.
“You thought of everything, did you, Indowy?” Tulo sneered. "Save us from the big, bad humans. Run their blockade. Take us to safety in the stars.
“Then forgot all about Posleen suitable space suits, didn't you?”
“Can't think of everything, Tulo?” Aelool answered, with a shrug. “Besides, your plight had me in something of a rush.”
“Why couldn't you?” Tulo'stenaloor asked, walking off in a huff and completely ignoring Aelool's counter-jab. This left the Indowy and Goloswin, the tinkerer, alone.
“How were we supposed to get to one of the wrecks to rebuild and restore it,” Goloswin asked, “without suits?”
“The Stalker can extrude a sort of metallic tunnel,” the Indowy answered, pointing at a view screen where a stubby, silvery-sheened cylinder protruded into space. “We not sure quite how it's done, but it can be done. And it's perfectly capable of linking itself to a Posleen air lock. Any airlock, actually; this metal has some very odd attributes. Unfortunately, we didn't realize that every ship here would be airless.”
“If I had the material, I'd bloody sew us a few suits,” the tinkerer said. “Unfortunately . . .”
“Unfortunately, we don't. I've sent for a courier to deliver us some, but—”
“But that's going to be a while,” Goloswin said. “Can't the
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