Flight of the Maita Supercollection 3: Solving Galactic Problems Collector's Edition (9 page)

If each one
carried a part of the master brain, they could all be put together
again to remake the original program. It would take one small chip
of special material from each of them or from any two or from any
number of combinations – and the old brain would live again!

Another Big
Mess

"How do we get
rid of that thing?" TR asked. "We have to get out of here. If we
can find the others of those things before they reach their
destinations it'll save us one hell of a lot of trouble and worry.
We can't chance leaving and hope it stays there and we can't really
expect the Flimts to be able to handle it. That thing has a lot of
experience already, and the Flimts have almost none. They aren't
warlike and never were to much of an extent.

"This is
turning into another big mess!"

"It'll get into
the lower currents and try to leave the planet from somewhere else,
but we have all of that covered with the satellites. It's mostly a
matter of when it makes its try. I think it'll time it in between
immediately and when it figures we'll expect it to try. I have no
idea when it would be, logically."

"We still can't
wait. We don't have any idea how many of them are out there
somewhere.

"This is gonna
be a humongus mess! I know it!"

"We don't know
there are ANY more. It's much too likely there are, based on the
psychology of that thing.

"We have one
advantage that's overwhelming, though. They were all the same basic
program, so we can predict pretty accurately what'll happen with
them. The same insanity is a part of all of the units.

"What I want to
do is to contact the fleet as soon as it's collected and start a
certain form of attack. They'll start ... well, it'll depend on how
many ships they have. We can get clever ourselves. If any of them
are on planets already, we'll have to figure a method of attack
tailored to that planet.

"I think the
instructions will be to build robots, assassinate key figures to
force the population to defend against terrorists while chasing off
any friends or allies the world has, then seize power when they're
weakened enough.

"Every world
will have different conditions, so they'll each need a separate
plan, but there will be basic parts that will be the same and....
Uh-oh! I think I know how to attack this one here, but we'll have
to move fast – before it starts looking for a way out.

"I want you to
figure how many very small pebbles it'll take to cover the entire
probable area down there with one pebble per ten square meters.
We'll make a holder-grid for dispersal and plan the maximum speed
that'll allow them to reach that level without vaporizing – and
you'll use a material that's very hard and heavy and with a high
melting point.

"Okay?"

"Sheee! How
small?" TR asked. "That's a lot of tonnage on a grid – and what the
hell was that `uh-oh' for?"

"It'll be in
space, where we can accelerate it slowly enough that inertia won't
be a problem on this end. Make each piece about five millimeters in
diameter. It won't see that and won't shield in the proper place to
be able to defend, I think."

"Do I get a
clue? What was the `uh-oh' for?"

"Sure! It isn't
riding on an inertialess gravity repulsion field. It has some sort
of floatation device, and that device is probably gas-filled. If we
hole it in a lot of small spots the gas'll leak out. It'll then be
forced to move out into orbit.

"The fusion
drive won't handle it for long in that atmosphere. It'll have to
come up or fall to where the pressure will crush it."

"So we're going
to shoot holes in its big fancy red balloon! Neat-O!

"It'll still
take about sixty four point seven seven five one tons of alloy,
give or take two grams. I can carry it on a screen grid. Carbon
powder in a force field will make the gravel seek equidistant
points along the gridlines, and I'll only have to circumference
it.

"We gonna do
it!"

I always get a
kick out of TR when it has a problem like this. It gets very
enthusiastic.

"Now tell me
what the hell that `uh-oh' was for or I'll laser-clean the dome
with you in it!" TR demanded.

"What if it's
landed on some planet with an evolving culture?"

"Uh-oh!"

It surprisingly
only took an hour and three quarters before we were ready to send
our barrage. We came in with TR in the center of the bubble of the
field, and the particles were beautifully focused to all strike
very close to the same instant everywhere, so the brain wouldn't
have warning to shield.

Then we waited.
TR figured the impact moment for each level, but we could see or
hear nothing, and TR wouldn't call the brain again, but would wait
until it either came up toward orbit or gave no indication at all,
which would mean it had already left the area, but our satellites
would definitely detect it if it came out anywhere.

"I'm getting
very weak radio signals," TR reported a while later. "It seems to
be digitalized ... some kind of instructions ... to servos! It's
sending servos to patch the holes!"

"Jam its
signals!" I cried. "Don't let it patch! Can you?"

"Not from here.
It can override at this range easily. There are four separate if
close frequencies, so I can assume we hit it in four spots, at
least. One thing I CAN do is trace the exact spot the signals are
coming from and can focus a laser right ... AH!"

TR fired a very
intense heat beam into the atmosphere. We then waited a little
while longer.

"It's almost to
the equator and is coming up fast toward one of our satellites," TR
said. "We'll be waiting. I think my little beam fried its servos
and maybe even the balloon. It should have thought to carry a
spare."

"TR, try to get
it to surrender," I suggested. "I think I can find where the other
copies were sent if I can read this one's programming. The leader
brain would've given them all areas to avoid in the future so as to
not start fighting among themselves before it was able to take over
from them.

"If we even
could find out definitely how many there are, it would help."

TR tried to
contact the brain and to get it to give it up, but to no avail. It
simply refused to respond other than to fire at our signal, which
we sent from a satellite by direct beam.

I have to say
it was accurate. It hit the satellite dead center from inside the
atmosphere.

"Play dead," I
suggested. "Let's get clever with it and let it think it damaged
you. It'll run as soon as it can, and you can finish it off.

"I can see it's
not programmed for surrender."

"But it IS
programmed for subterfuge. Incoming message."

"Empire ship!
This is Tb fourteen SP!" came over the speakers. "I wish to
negotiate! Maitan Empire ship! Tb fourteen SP wishes to
negotiate!"

"I'll just
ignore that crap line," TR told me. "It wants to negotiate itself
close enough to me to be able to use its biggest weapons, and
that's all. If we keep playing dead it might make a run for it.
Once it's out of that atmosphere I can get this over with and we
can start looking for others."

The call came
again, then again, rising toward the fringes of the atmosphere.
When it was barely visible it made the call a last time.

"Funny how good
ol' Tb fourteen's broadcasting from that thing coming up, but has
that tight light-beam com going down into the atmosphere," TR
noted. "The beam almost makes a plasma through that soup. I can see
it plain as anything."

"We're supposed
to shoot that drone with a transmitter down and think we've shot
down the brain.It keeps doing that. It's downright tiresome. It's
program isn't flexible enough for it to stop using the same ploy
over and over again."

"Uh-huh. It
also leaves us not ever knowing for sure we got the real brain. I
hope that one was the last one sent out."

"Yeah, only
fourteen of them in that case. It should be easy enough to figure
which stars the others were launched to."

We watched as
the radio drone came into orbit. TR moved out far enough that it
would be very difficult to see and we watched through the
satellite's sensors.

"I'd say it'll
try to come out fast in another spot," I said.

"I figure in a
straight line for one of the moons. Derwop would be my first guess.
It still has all the things the brain'll be looking for."

"I think we
should shoot down that drone any time now so it'll know we're still
here. That should make it move fast."

TR shot the
drone, which exploded in a bright orange ball of flame.

"It got one
strong radio pulse out," TR said. "Satellite six says its coming
out right on line for another moon, but that'll change. It'll go to
Derwop."

"I'd say it's
coming out of atmosphere right about now while the satellite's
watching what is, I sincerely hope, it's last cute drone," I
replied with a tired sigh. "How clever and how totally
predictable."

"Yeah. Now THAT
one is damned well big enough to have everything to get it across
space and even has a nice fusion generator working almost at
maximum.

"It's going
straight for Derwop."

"Let's go shoot
down the other drone. We can do it without taking a chance it's a
programmed brain in storage on that ship."

TR moved to
intercept the drone, shot it down, then went to Derwop where we
waited around the curve of the moon for almost an hour. "Here it
comes!" TR warned. "It's detected us somehow and has a shield
up.

"I put up all
of mine, too. We've been hit with surprises from that thing's
programmer before! Maita was almost destroyed by a cobalt
fusion/fission device, as well as several other surprises.

"I guess it'll
try some more of those."

Even with the
full shields we were rocked by a blast. "Cobalt activated fusion
and fission missile. That thing could crack a good-sized
planet.

"I think we
should let it land on Derwop if it will, but even it should know
that'll be pointless if we know it's there.

"Clever time
again.

"What do you
think it'll do now?"

"It'll try
everything it has in its little arsenal against us, because the one
sure thing in all of this is that only one of us will ever leave
this spot right here. We have to try to find a way to get through
those shields, too. It won't open them if it thinks we can react
fast enough to get through.

"Try random
sequence blasts to keep it guessing. It won't open the shields that
way, and we may be able to use the time to think of something."

I drew the
computer records to me and read all the things that had been used
on the brain before. Those things would be easy for it to defense,
because they would be very much what it learned. The only thing
that even might work would be the thing that got the last brain –
and we couldn't use that here because of those shields.

TR was
searching all its memories at the same time and all the records it
could find that even might hold an answer. Each minute we were held
at stalemate here was another minute for one of the other brains to
be approaching another planet.

The fleet would
be here soon, and I wanted to get busy doing something. If we could
defeat this thing in this system it would be by a method none of
those others would have a defense built in for and would be
something they couldn't defense, either.

"What'll get
through that shielding?" I asked. "It's mirrored, so it'll reflect
energy. I can see that.

"Will it also
stop all solid materials?"

"I was thinking
about bombarding with mass like Maita did the first one. It built
heat inside from compression of the impact on the field, but we
couldn't really hope to accomplish much that way. You got an
idea?"

"If there's a
way to make a very small hole in the shield I might. All I want to
do is to insert a small tube."

"I can send a
minifloater to make an interference hole in the shield, but it'll
be very small and won't hold for more than four point six
seconds.

"What could you
do with a hole ten millimeters across in four seconds?"

"If we insert a
gas or liquid inside of that shield and can force the brain to keep
the shield intact, what happens to the inserted materials?"

"Gas will
disperse to fill the vacuum around the ship and liquid will slowly
be attracted to the ship by mass attraction – but very slowly."

"Then the gas
would contact the ship more than the liquid in short time?"

"Yo!"

"Then I want a
platinum tank – or several of them if you can hole the shield in
more than one place. I want the ten millimeter tube of platinum out
the end of it with a quick-release valve. I also want hydrogen
fluoride gas compressed to a liquid in those tanks and enough water
to keep it as a liquid for just a short while.

"The pressure
of liquification will spew the liquified HF gas in there pretty
fast, and it'll attack the antennae broadcasting those shields. The
brain tried something on that order against Maita, but without
having to hole the shield. That indicates it doesn't know we're
platinum- coated and it would indicate its own ship isn't.
Right?"

"Yo! We'll
try!" TR replied, and I could hear the machines in the shop go into
sudden frenzied action. TR had enough fluorine in storage and
produced the HF gas while building the tanks. It also kept up a
purely random barrage against the brain's ship, causing it to keep
its shields up.

We were
chancing shields that would allow very limited light through, so as
to observe the mirror shield of the brain. We'd have to know
everything about the shield to be able to use our little trick on
it.