Koban: Rise of the Kobani (18 page)

There were snickers from some of the spec ops, which Longstreet glared down individually. He didn’t like how the interrogation kept slipping away from the direction Colonel Trakenburg had preset. These people were not what he’d been expecting. He had never seen well-treated Krall captives, ever, not even the wrecks that had become collaborators for better treatment. These people were far too confident, and almost made sense.

“I don’t intend to have some kid pay for what your mouth promises, Greeves. How about you or Reynolds risk getting the crap kicked out of you by one of my men? That should tell me if you are full of shit or not.”

“Captain, I would try that, since I’m certainly stronger than any average man you have ever faced, but I don’t come close to their speed or strength, and even if I win, you would not be convinced it wasn’t a fluke. The same for the Sergeant, who is Second Generation, like I am.”

“What the hell do you keep going on about generations? Reynolds was on Poldark in the last year, and although he had a decent record, he was sure as hell no superman Krall killer.”

“I’m still not Captain,” Reynolds answered, “but I may come almost as close as your boys, even without the fancy black muscle suits you wear. If it will get things moving, I’ll risk a beating now to get you to test one of these youngsters. Frankly, you are exactly the trainers I hoped would teach them what they need, to go raiding into Krall Space.”

Longstreet made a face. “I see the suit talk has spread even to the masses. That was top secret two years ago.”

“It probably still is pretty secret on our side. We picked up one of your half dead casualties coming back from an ambush, and he had a bad plasma burn to his ribs. Damned near broke one of my team member’s leg when he went through a spasm. The suit obviously magnified his strength. He didn’t make it to a field hospital. Mumbled about running out of juice. It’s common knowledge you spec ops use drugs of some sort. I assumed that was what he meant. We never wrote it up so we wouldn’t have to tell anyone about it later.

“Rather than getting my ass kicked, how about I arm wrestle one of you, using my left arm which was regrown, against the left arm of one of your guys in a suit. I’ll probably lose, but it may prove a point.”

“Maverick, over here. Reynolds, step out of the group.” He pointed to a spot on the floor.

A burly man, shorter than Reynolds, but with massive shoulders and arms came over.

“Mav, hand me your weapon, just pull off the armored glove. When Reynolds is down flat, with me covering him, get down and face off, left arm against left.” He looked at the other captives, and then his other men. “Men, don’t watch the match, watch them.” He jabbed a finger at the captives.

The two men laid flat on the floor. It wasn’t the best way to arm wrestle, but neither man gained or gave up any advantage.

“Grip hands but don’t start until I say so.” He watched the two adjust their hands and grip, and spread their legs to increase their leverage advantage on the smooth floor.

“Ready?” Both men nodded as their grips tightened. “Go!”

The trooper he had called Maverick clearly went for the quick kill, and grunted as Reynolds’ arm started to yield and swing backwards. Then Sarge’s handgrip noticeably tightened and there was a cracking sound and Maverick’s face drew pinched. The two forearms swung back more vertical as the spec ops man lost his initial advantage. He tightened his jaw and shifted his right shoulder, and gradually started to force Reynolds arm back again. However, it was clear from the flushed face that Maverick was straining and looked to be in pain. Reynolds was under exertion, but it didn’t seem to be taking the same toll on him as for the other man, even as he gave ground. After almost two minutes, the eventual decision would clearly go to Maverick, as Reynolds, still not as red faced was slowly being forced down.

Showing only mild strain in his voice, Reynolds made an offer. “Maverick, I’m willing to yield if you are willing to let this end. I’m getting tired and we both know you’ll win shortly. I’ll get muscle fatigue but your suit will not.”

With a grunt, and a nod of agreement, the two men eased up and pulled their hands apart. The hands came apart seemingly with some reluctance, as if they couldn’t quite make them let go of their grip. Finally, their hands apart, Reynolds was rubbing his hand and arm to restore feeling as he pulled his legs around to sit cross-legged, facing his opponent.

“That was one hell of an effort Maverick. I could never have continued with a broken finger. You had me for sure despite that.”

The other man’s face had lost its redness, and he was gingerly rubbing his left hand. He actually grinned. “You cracked my little finger. Without the suit and painkillers, you would have had me. How in the hell did you develop a grip and arm like that? We need to develop a black glove to go with the suits if I ever have to arm wrestle anyone like you again.”

“Mav, are you saying he about matched your arm, even with your suit to help? He supposedly regrew that arm after his armor was blown open. It should be weaker.” Longstreet seemed impressed.

“Captain, without the suit and the drugs, I was beat from the start. I don’t know what a Second Generation is or what it even means, but we want what they have in our program if he’s typical.”

“Well, I obviously had some secret help too.” Reynolds told them cryptically. “However, I’m not at liberty to talk about it yet. Colonel Greeves here has beaten me at this game before, using tables and chairs instead of that awkward floor position.  I’m sure what we have to offer will come up soon in discussions. I might add, that had I been matched up against little Kally there, and she put in the maximum effort she could, I might well be having my left arm regrown again.”

Maverick and Longstreet both looked at the smallish-sized young girl skeptically.

Still without turning around, Thad renewed his offer. “Match Kally against any two of your men, although I won’t order her to allow herself to be injured if they start to get rough. I promise you that she could take them hand to hand, and using any hand weapon, even if she had never used it before. For your safety, I’d suggest hand to hand.

“This is not bragging, and some of our TGs have killed Krall in gunfights, beat them in knife fights, and dominated them in unarmed combat. However, they aren’t invincible. We have two reported dead out in those valleys towards that clanship. If you simply use fine radar mapping, you should see our people attacking that clanship. We stole their eight Dragons and sixteen plasma cannon carts after they unloaded them and parked them unguarded, confident that humans couldn’t use them. We also have four of their heavy armored transports. We are going to
take
that clanship because they will never leave us alone after they learn it is humans operating our ship. Its nickname is the Mark by the way, after the tattoo marks we wear, which allows us to operate the ship.”

They had agreed to leave off the word Koban, so that name could not lead back home if the Krall heard it used.

Longstreet made a decision. “This is all being recorded, and if I don’t prove to the watchers what you claim you can do, this will be a tough sell to convince them that you are actually fighting the Krall. I’m halfway there, but please ask one of your young men to do the honors. I can’t risk the allegation that my men held back because they were fighting a teenaged girl.

“Greeves, to make this simpler, the right side wall has no doors or tunnels, so I want you to lead your people over there and sit with your backs to the wall. I’ll post twenty armed men to watch you. If your youngsters prove as capable as you claim, I don’t know if I have enough people to guard you. I’d
never
try to hold twenty-two unarmed Krall with only thirty men.”

“Captain, we are not out to kill or hurt the people we need help from, to save ourselves from the Krall. We might beat ten times our weight in warriors, but not their entire species. We are too few.”

“Tell me about it.” The spec ops man said in sympathy.

Quickly, Longstreet pointed to two of his men, telling them to discard their weapons and scaled armor. They stood like black demons with rippled and bulging muscles, the exomuscle body sheaths coating them like a layer of ebony, from boots to neck. One man was about six feet two and had a powerful looking build. The other man was about six feet, leaner and faster looking. It was a smart choice, selecting men that represented two different type opponents, and probably different fighting styles.

Thad had two preferred choices from his group all along, both were TG1s, and Longstreet had ruled out Kally. It wasn’t that Thad lacked any confidence in Warren Brock, his other TG1, but little Kally would make for such a great contrast when she won. Warren was five feet ten inches, and looked like he weighed one hundred seventy pounds. That was deceptive, because the denser muscles and bones of their genetic enhancements added about twenty-five pounds of weight to his apparent build.

Warren removed his shoes and two calf knife sheaths. Longstreet had not said anything, but Thad had seen him look at them. He was likely waiting to see if Thad would make him remove them. It wasn’t necessary, and Warren knew he didn’t need them, even if the spec ops men had kept theirs. Warren wasn’t the best of the group at unarmed combat, but he’d had the Taps from those that were. His additional invisible advantage was his TG1 Mind Tap ability, if he found a chance to sense his opponents.

Unlike training, there were no floor pads here, only hard ferrocrete to break a fall. Warren walked smoothly and confidently out to meet his opponents. Just before he reached them, Thad called out. “Shake their hands first, Warren, and think about how you will start your attack or defense.”

That drew a short-lived frown from Longstreet, ending when the advice sounded so generic and innocuous. It was certainly
not
the latter. As they shook hands, Thad knew the two spec ops troops had also heard his advice. It was human nature, so their minds flickered over their own intended opening moves. This was done just as they shook hands with the TG1.

After the quick handshakes, all three backed away, forming a roughly equilateral triangle, perhaps ten feet per side. Warren, fully aware of why Thad had offered his advice when he did, looked Thad’s way and nodded in apparent gratitude, turning his eyes away from the larger opponent to his right. The instant reaction of the bigger of the two men was to move in towards his distracted opponent. He took two rapid short steps, as Warren was seemingly oblivious. He swung a leg sweep that would either knock the boy off balance if it connected with his right leg, or get him off the balls of his feet at a time that a follow up punch was aimed at Warren’s head.

Before even turning his head back around, Warren suddenly pushed off with the ball of his left foot in what was a deceptively weak looking move, and raised his right foot and leg just as the sweep passed a fraction of an inch below his foot. He drew his foot back halfway under his thigh. His entire body seemed to lift in an arc towards the larger man, propelled by what looked like a simple push-off using only his left foot.

Warren’s right knee pointed the way with his lower leg now tucked close under his thigh. The right foot suddenly snapped out in a blur, to connect the ball of the bare foot with the big man’s chin, and Warren’s right arm looped over, then under the incoming left-handed straight punch, pinning the man’s fist in his armpit. He placed his right hand under the big fellow’s elbow, hyperextending it as it bent backwards, practically lifting the man in the air when he lowered his right foot to the floor from the kick. Pivoting backwards to press down on the closed fist trapped under his armpit, Warren continued to lift at the elbow with his right hand as a fulcrum and rotated the arm slightly. His opponent was leaning or falling backwards from the chin kick. The elbow popped as it dislocated, and Warren instantly released the stunned man, glassy eyed from the stunning snap kick.

Warren then spun right, ducking under the injured man’s arm, and shoved the man forward, past his own body, using that momentum to push him into an opportunistic attack he expected from the opponent to his rear. The TG1 had known that the second man intended to allow him to get involved with the bigger man, and to attack him after he was so engaged.

Unfortunately, for the big man anyway, he absorbed a “friendly fire” kick in his ribs that had been intended for Warren’s left kidney.

The big man collapsed forward to the hard floor, his fall partly caught by his apologetic feeling kicker. That altruistic act for his teammate garnered him a bloody nose, as Warren snapped a back handed fist into said benefactor’s undefended proboscis, producing a satisfying
splat
sound as it broke. The intended sneak kidney kick annoyed Warren a little bit, because the heavy combat boot could have done real damage.

One down in about five seconds, Thad estimated. The other lighter man was blinking to clear his watering eyes, forced to be a mouth breather for now. Warren stepped over the still form of his first victim, walking towards the taller heavier built man as he backed away for a moment to recover. Warren’s hands were swinging easily at his sides, no defensive posturing whatsoever.

Showoff
, Thad thought.
Oh well, he can afford it with a slow opponent.

The bloody nose guy (neither man had been introduced by name), started jabs and upper cuts in a more traditional form of boxing as he backed away, and Warren walked onwards. Warren easily raised one hand or the other from his sides to smack the blows away in blurred movements, as he continued to walk forward into the onslaught of deflected punches,
he always appeared wide open to a punch.