Kren of the Mitchegai Read online

  Kren of the Mitchegai

  Leo Frankowski and

  Dave Grossman

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2004 by Leo Frankowski and Dave Grossman

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1403

  Riverdale, NY 10471

  www.baen.com

  ISBN: 0-7434-7182-2

  Cover art by Gary Ruddell

  First printing, March 2004

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Frankowski, Leo, 1943-

  Kren of the Mitchegai / Leo Frankowski, Dave Grossman.

  p. cm.

  "A Baen Books original"—T.p. verso.

  ISBN 0-7434-7182-2 (hardcover)

  1. Life on other planets--Fiction. 2. Space colonies--Fiction. 3. Carnivora--Fiction. I. Grossman, Dave. II. Title.

  PS3556.R347K74 2004

  813'.54--dc22

  2003027414

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  Production by Windhaven Press, Auburn, NH

  Printed in the United States of America

  Baen Books by Leo Frankowski

  A Boy and His Tank

  The War with Earth (with Dave Grossman)

  Kren of the Mitchegai (with Dave Grossman)

  The Two-Space War (with Dave Grossman)

  The Fata Morgana

  Conrad's Time Machine

  Prologue

  DEDICATION

  This one is again dedicated to my lovely wife, Marina, and to her father, Vasili Ivanovich, for making the roof fit on my castle.

  —Leo Frankowski

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank my most excellent partner, Lt. Colonel Dave Grossman, for all his encouragement and enthusiasm.

  Richard T. Bolgeo, Bruce R. Quayle, Ed Dunnigan, Mike Hubble, Mike Thelen, and Rodger Olsen all made many valuable suggestions and did yeoman service at proofreading.

  And special thanks go to Dave's Ever Perfect Lieutenant, Susan, in the hope that she will someday stop calling me "Sir."

  —Leo

  I want to take this opportunity to offer my sincere thanks and appreciation, first and foremost, to Leo Frankowski, a wise and experienced science fiction writer who has helped me to enter into the world of SF. Leo has been one of my heroes as a writer, but now he is a hero and a friend as a person. Hooah!

  —Dave

  CHAPTER ONE

  Mickolai's Homecoming

  New Yugoslavia, 2205 a.d.

  It had been one hell of a battle. More than half of my men had been killed. Not just casualties. Killed. In armored space warfare, nonfatal injuries are very rare.

  The enemy had been defeated, but we had not really accomplished our objective. We had been ordered to capture the Solar Station that was maintaining the continued expansion of Human Space. Instead, we had been forced to completely destroy it.

  Now, something else would have to be built to take over that job. Something very expensive.

  When what was left of my battalion got home, there wasn't anyone waiting for us. Military receiver stations aren't set up to handle crowds; the few operable transmitters on Earth's wrecked Solar Station took four days to get those of us who had survived back home, and that's a long time to keep a brass band going. Anyway, all we really wanted was a long sleep in a real bed. The parades and awards could come later.

  The War With Earth was over, and the good guys, those of us from the colonies, had won. My unit was the only one to take really serious casualties; I was the commander, and so somehow in the public imagination that made me a hero. A strange way of looking at things, praising the guy who had done his job the worst, but it has always been that way. Maybe the psychology of it all is that, "If it cost us that much, it must have been important."

  I left orders that all of my men, mostly Gurkha mercenaries, were to go on R & R for an indefinite period. They could do whatever they wanted to do, provided that they kept in touch.

  For myself, all I wanted was to go home to my wife.

  When the elevator got me from my garage up to my apartment, I found my Kasia standing there wearing nothing but a glorious smile. She was on maternity leave, and three months pregnant, but it didn't show, except that she looked even more beautiful than ever.

  "You lived," she said. "Thank you."

  She kissed me, and the war, the deaths, and all of the ugliness was somehow worth it. I picked her up, stepped back into the elevator, and then carried her over the threshold once more, just as when we had first been married, and the other times when I had come home victorious.

  She squealed in her usual way, and I said, "Family traditions must be upheld, once per victory!"

  And then, I carried her to the bedroom.

  After a wonderful night, we rolled out of bed at the crack of noon, and we went to the kitchen looking for something to eat.

  Our servants, military combat drones decorated to look like medieval knights, and operated by the artificial intelligences in our tanks, had anticipated us. They had a fine spread set out for us. We had everything from smoked salmon that I had caught on our honeymoon to delicately fried crêpes suzette. And lots of good coffee from New Macedonia.

  I said, "So, love. I assume that you have heard about all that I've been up to?"

  "Yes, the news has been full of it, and the new movie that your tank, Agnieshka, put together, has been out for a week now. Good God, what a bloody mess!"

  "It was that. Nobody expected what we were going to run into. But tell me about you. What's been happening? Your investments go well?"

  "Oh, yes, we're richer than ever," she said. "But for the last week, I've mostly been working with your Gurkhas."

  "My Gurkhas didn't start coming home until three days ago, and they're not all here yet."

  "But their wives and families and all of their friends who want to enlist have been arriving in droves! If the statistical projections have anything to do with reality, you will have an army of over a hundred and twenty thousand men within the month. That's if none of the women decide to sign up, too!"

  "Hoy! Well, we need the troops, and maybe now they'll make me a real general," I said.

  "They'd damn well better! But finding a place for everyone has been something of a problem. Half of the new ones are living in that gold-plated castle that you built, but nobody wanted. The rest are scattered all over the place."

  "Well, you and our metal ladies can work it out. If you can't, talk to Professor Cee, my Combat Control Computer. He's got more electronic brains than anybody else I know of."

  "Meaning that you don't want to get involved," she said.

  "Right. The duty of a general is to look at the big picture, and let the details be handled by staff officers like my loving wife. Right now, the big picture involves rest and recuperation for the battalion, and most especially for the commanding officer, which obviously necessitates going back to bed with you!"

  "Go to bed if you want to, but do it alone. Right now, this staff officer has work to do."

  "Delegate it!" I shouted, as she left the room.

  Somehow, being a general does not put you in command of your wife, even when she does work for you.

  INTERLUDE ONE

  Agnieshka's Bow

  THE RIGELLIAN INSTITUTE OF ARCHEOLOGY,

  EARTH, 3783 a.d.

&
nbsp; Sir Percival stepped up to the podium of the filled-to-capacity auditorium, and wagged his tail respectfully to the attentive audience.

  "Before we get to the performance that I am sure that you are all anxious to see, I have a very short and pleasant announcement to make! I have this on the very best possible authority! Rupert, the person who found the ancient tank on an ice moon, and who used its computer records to compile these amazing histories of our beloved forebears, the humans, has been placed on the Queen's Birthday List! Henceforth, you may address him as 'Sir Rupert!' "

  The crowd applauded and barked enthusiastically, even though this enlargement had been expected by everyone for weeks.

  "And now, I give you Sir Rupert!"

  Rupert took Sir Percival's place at the podium as the crowd continued in its polite clapping and barking.

  "Thank you, my friends, thank you!" When the applause died down, Sir Rupert continued, "I, too, have a pleasant announcement to make, as well as an introduction of my own. I'm sure that most of you are aware that the museum here has had a military social drone on display for over a hundred years. It has been immobile all that time, since we have lacked the technology to repair it. But Agnieshka, the artificial intelligence in the Mark XX tank that I managed to recover, was quite familiar with this model of drone, and indeed had a small hand in designing it. Under her direction, the drone has now been repaired, and I would now like to present it to you, along with Agnieshka herself, who is 'wearing' it!"

  Again, the crowd started to applaud politely, but as Agnieshka came in a side door and stepped up onto the stage, they became silent. At first a few, and then soon everyone in the audience, slid off of their chairs, and sat on the floor with their forepaws on the ground and their arms straight. It was the dog's ancient gesture of respect.

  Agnieshka said, "Please, get back in your chairs! I know that I look like a human, but I'm really just an intelligent machine! We machines loved and respected the humans as much as your people do. The artificial intelligences were humanity's second great friends, but you Canines were the first. For at least ten thousand years, long before selective breeding and genetic modification made you into intelligent, bipedal beings with hands, you were humanity's friends, their guards, and their workmates. We machines were developed much later. Therefore, it is fitting that I should make obeisance to you."

  Agnieshka's drone made a deep bow to the audience.

  They stood, and applauded her, in the human fashion.

  "Thank you!" Agnieshka said, "I hope that your people and mine can become good friends. We can be very useful to each other. I believe that it is likely that I can help you revive certain of the sciences and technologies that have been lost on this planet, and that there are other vital things that we can do together as well. But for now, let's get on with the presentation that Sir Rupert and I have put together. We will be starting with a study of our universal enemy, the Mitchegai."

  The audience sat down, but again applauded.

  CHAPTER TWO

  FROM CAPTURED HISTORY TAPES,

  FILE 1846583A ca. 1832 a.d.

  Formal Dining with the Mitchegai

  The reader will please note that all numbers mentioned herein in the Mitchegai sections are in the duodecimal system.

  For the benefit of the casual reader, I mention that a thousand in base twelve is 1728 in base ten, a million in base twelve is just under three million in base ten, and a billion in base twelve is over five billion in base ten.

  Also, please note that all weights, measurements, and time periods mentioned are only the crudest of approximations.

  For a complete listing of all Mitchegai weights and measures, see Appendix L of the accompanying Mitchegai Academic Text.

  All numbers in the Human sections are in decimal, and all measures are in the metric system.

  —Sir Rupert of the Rigellian Museum

  She was four feet tall, she was bright green, and she stank.

  Four feet was a very acceptable height for a five-year-old, nameless Mitchegai. All of her age mates were exactly the same size, since the Mitchegai have very little genetic diversity. Like the others, she still had relatively useless hands and arms hanging from her stooped-over body, which was counterbalanced by a heavy tail and propelled by two powerful legs. A human child might think that she was a baby Tyrannosaurus rex, except that she had a flat-fronted, vegetarian mouth.

  Hers were not the pointed teeth of a carnivore, but the squared-off incisors and flattened molars of a plant eater. Like all herbivores everywhere, she had spent most of her short life grazing on plants. Unlike those on non-Mitchegai worlds, she ate only one species of plant, since there was only one species permitted on a world owned by the Mitchegai. All others had been eradicated in the distant, mystical past, millions of years ago, for Mitchegai have very long histories. Her meat-eating teeth would grow in later, if she was lucky, but as it happened, she was not.

  Being bright green was marginally useful, since her thin skin contained the local equivalent to chlorophyll and was capable of manufacturing a small amount of the nutrients that her active body needed. Indeed, being cold blooded, with a very low basal metabolism, she could almost survive without food, simply by lying quietly in the sun. This expedient was rarely necessary on a world ruled by the far more intelligent adults.

  Her odor was caused by never having taken a bath, save when she was out in a rainstorm, but even this was no great disadvantage. The Mitchegai have almost no sense of smell. They don't need one. The olfactory sense is used largely to discriminate among various foods, and the Mitchegai diet is extremely limited. Their food never spoils because it is always eaten live, or as nearly so as possible.

  Even adult Mitchegai never deliberately bathe, although the wealthy take steam baths. This is not so much to get clean, as for the pleasure of overheating their cold-blooded bodies without exertion.

  She had no idea of who her parents were, and this was quite normal. Biological parentage is of no interest to the Mitchegai. Adult females lay eggs the size of sand grains almost continuously, which fall on the ground and are forgotten. Adult males are surrounded by an unnoticeable fine mist of aerosol sperm. Unnoticeable, that is, to a human. To the Mitchegai, a heavy concentration of adult males in a closed room is annoying, and because of this most of the second and third highest ranks prefer to be female. There is no other difference between the sexes, but the Mitchegai don't care. They have a love life comparable to that of Earthly oysters. Love, marriage, and parental concern are not for them.

  Neither was long life, for this particular youngster. She was released from her pen into a huge, grassy arena and looked about, frightened at first. Fear soon passed, birdlike, for her small brain could not entertain a single thought for long. She started to graze, and hardly noticed when a seven-foot-tall adult vaulted into the enclosed space. The cheering crowd did not bother her. Even the sight of the adult's hands, with six clawed fingers arranged in a rosette, left her unmoved. She had seen adults before, from a distance. She had even seen them eat other juveniles on the open plains, but they had never eaten her. She was unconcerned.

  Superficially, the anatomy of the adult Mitchegai has much in common with that of a human being. Both species have two legs, two arms, two eyes, and two ears, although the Mitchegai lack the external ear of a human. The brain, nose, mouth, and most of the sensory apparatus is located in a head at the top of a spinal column.

  Internally, the differences are large, and on the whole, the Mitchegai are better engineered. This is largely due to the three million years of selective breeding that they have undergone. Human beings have a basic structure more suited to a horizontal, four-legged creature, than to an upright, two-legged one.

  The five-year-old was to be an unnecessary meal for Duke Kren, who was well fed, but she was a traditional one. The duke was looking forward to his feast, since it was to be the last his body would ever ingest. He didn't know, couldn't know, that his intended prey was his own biologic
al daughter. And had he known, he wouldn't have cared in the least.

  The seats surrounding the arena were filled with nine gross, two dozen and one of the duke's trusted battle generals, all who were left on the planet. There were two thousand three gross and six of his master builders, and as many of his high officers, body guards and other functionaries as could find room. All of these numbers were in base twelve, of course, for since they have six claws on each hand, the Mitchegai naturally developed a duodecimal numbering system.

  On the Stand of High Honor were his six best generals, resting in the stupor that always follows a recent, large meal, as were eleven of his finest master builders who were being similarly honored this day. At least, they were the best that would be staying on the planet. All of his very best subordinates were in space, training for the mission to come.

  Those on the stand had made their kills and had already eaten. Duke Kren's was the dozen and sixth preparatory meal of this Day of Honor.

  The great minds of the Krenbold were here to witness Duke Kren's transition, and he owed them a good show. He sprinted lightly on his long, webbed toes, three on each foot, not counting the heel spur, to his placid daughter.

  He gave the girl the usual two sets of slashes with his claws, one across the back and the other across the breast, for to harm the legs would cripple the prey and spoil the sport.

  The juvenal cried out in her pain, leaped high and ran as the crowd cheered their leader's prowess. Duke Kren held up his bloody foreclaws, acknowledging the praise of his subordinates and allowing his daughter a sporting head start.

  Applause among the Mitchegai was the hollow sound caused by beating the left hand on the chest. Had anyone wished to express disapproval, they would have made the higher-pitched sound of their right hand striking the buttock, but no one here was that foolish.