Stephen Berry - The Biofab War

"And," he continued before the Admiral could press him, "it's because of Bob-Professor McShane's experience with the mindslaves that we're here."

"Really?" drawled L'Guan, raising an eyebrow, unconvinced.

"As the… ah, 'brainstrips'"-Bob lingered distastefully over the word-"used my mind, Admiral, so, it seems did I use theirs." His voice had regained its vibrancy.

"In some way the melding of my mind with theirs lent me a heightened mental acuity. I saw new interrelations-new possibilities-things which escaped me before."

"Such as?"

"Such as this war is not over. Your fleet and my planet may yet be in grave danger."

"Specifics, please," demanded L'Guan tensely, eyes searching for clues in Bob's impassive face.

"Lying in your wondrous sick bay, Admiral, I kept going over the events of the past weeks. Especially the part played in them by humanity's benevolent savant, POCSYM Six."

McShane paused, hands patting his empty shirt pockets. D'Trelna passed the professor a cigar and lit it. Bob grunted his thanks. Puffing, he leaned back. " 'Essentia non suntmulti-plicanda praeter necessitatum,' Admiral," he continued expansively.

"We turned in the translators last week, Bob," reminded Zahava gently.

"Sorry. 'Fact need not be multiplied beyond necessity.' Or so said William of Ockham some time ago. We've taken his statement as one of the basic axioms of rationality-dubbed it 'Ockham's Razor.'"

"Fascinating, Mr. McShane," L'Guan said with mild sarcasm, his patience slipping. "But how does this apply-"

"POCSYM has weaved a tangled web of deceit. Rather than facts, he's multiplied lies beyond necessity. And like all liars, he's become ensnared in his own web. Listen to me." He held up a hand as L'Guan looked ready to interrupt.

"One. By his own account POCSYM was able to scan Implacable, identify her crew as K'Ronarin and place us aboard her in the vicinity of Mars. Yet this same entity was unable to detect one small shipload of aliens who then landed on Earth unopposed and established their base.

"Two. He's told us that the S'Cotar wanted very badly to capture Earth. Why? Not for the planet itself, but because of POCSYM. Yet, again by his own admission, POCSYM's only unusual ability is that of molecular transport-a capability the S'Cotar have through telekinesis. Why not just drop a planet-buster or biophage us?

"Three. POCSYM delayed coming to the aid of Implaca-ble's ground force. Why? Because, he assured us, his systems had been largely inactive for centuries. Systems which had not more than hours before transported us safely to Implacable-a complex operation surely requiring more than a few nonsom-nolent circuits.

"I'm sure you can each think of other examples-the raid on Nasqa, for example. But that's enough for me," McShane concluded, leaning back in his chair. "POCSYM's hiding something. And we'd better find out what before it kills us."

"Circumstantial evidence, Professor," said L'Guan after a moment, visibly relaxing. "POCSYM is very complex-almost human. And very, very old. You've got to expect inconsistencies."

"Inconsistencies certainly, sir," said D'Trelna, picking up the argument. "But not demonstrable falsehoods."

John couldn't recall Implacable's Captain ever being so well turned out, not even for the reception. His boots shone, his pants and shirt were clean and pressed, campaign ribbons, battlestars and two valor medals hung over and from his right breast pocket. He still wore the regulation long-barreled blaster, but the butt was inlaid with semiprecious stones and nestled in a gleaming black leather holster.

"'Demonstrable falsehoods'?" repeated the Admiral slowly, frowning.

"I've had Subcommander K'Raoda checking POCSYM's bonafides, sir, using Revenge's memory cells."

"And?"

"All references to the POCSYM series require special access codes-codes which may be in Archives but certainly aren't with the Fleet. K'Raoda reports that any attempt to bypass the authentication system would scrub the needed data."

"So?" The Admiral shrugged. "Naturally, information concerning a matter transport system would be guarded."

"Yes, sir. But the reference to POCSYM wasn't found under 'Matter Transport.'"

"Oh? Under what, then?"

'"Biofab."'

There was a long silence. Then the Admiral rose and walked to the armor-glass wall. He stood for a moment, hands clasped behind his back, looking out on a small part of his fleet and the blue world below. Starlight gleamed off the twin comets of his rank, set on his collar.

Turning back toward the table, his lips were pursed, his face thoughtful. "An intact Imperial transport system. A functioning-until recently-mindslaver dreadnought. And now a reference to biofabs. Why is it that we're suddenly, after all these centuries, confronted with every technological excess of the late Empire? Why in this one star system? Speculation, anyone?"

"What is a biofab?" asked John.

"Biofabs," L'Guan said, "were another marvel of the Empire-products of genetic engineering created by a rebel sector to aid its secession. The ultimate product of biological fabrication-hence the term-was a superman: long-lived, resilient, aggressive, each one a genius.

"The traitorous sector governor who created them formed these biofabs into elite shock troops-they'd have eaten our commandos alive-and had them crew her fleet. Can you guess the result?"

"They took over?" speculated the Israeli.

"With a vengeance." The Admiral nodded. "Sterilized half the planets in that sector. Biophaged them to eliminate the inferior species-us-cluttering them. There were exceptions, though. A small number of people were spared to serve the biofabs-as mindslaves.

"It took a decade and fleets of the Revenge class to exterminate that plague. As you might guess, there were and still are rather drastic penalties for performing biofab research."

He turned back to the others. "No speculation?"

"Not enough parts of the puzzle fit yet, Admiral," said John. "But K'Raoda has an unpleasant fact for you."

"As you're aware, sir," the young officer said, "POCSYM has stated that his main installation is beneath the Isle of Manhattan, under one of the largest Terran cities." He paused for effect. "Not true."

"What?! But I've been there. We all have!"

"You were in the central facility, sir," continued K'Raoda, unruffled. "You were not, as were none of us, beneath Manhattan. In fact, you weren't even on Terra."

The Admiral sat silently, beyond surprise.

"Recall, if you would, sir, that only POCSYM would normally know where we were if transported to an unfamiliar location. That's how the ruse is accomplished."

"Can you prove this, K'Raoda?"

"Yes, sir. Revenge has subterranean detectors far superior to our own. Analysis of the area below Manhattan revealed nothing but planetary crust all the way down to the magma."

"Then where is our faithful servant?" asked L'Guan.

"There." They followed where K'Raoda's finger pointed, through the armor glass, at the moon, just beginning its climb from behind the Earth's curve. "Grid eighty-one, Terran reference 'The Lake of Dreams.' Its interior is sensor-blanked by Imperial-grade technology. Analysis of the energy pattern protecting that area shows it to be a larger model of Revenge's shield-the matrixes are identical. Seems POCSYM doesn't want us to look at something."

"How do you know it's POCSYM?" challenged L'Guan.

"At the Captain's request, sir, I had POCSYM transport me back to his operations area, ostensibly to ensure that all of Implacable''s equipment had been returned to the ship. Actually, to try to trace where I was taken."

"Was this effort successful, Captain D'Trelna?"

"It was, Admiral. Using a low-powered snooperbeam, we followed an energy trace directly to a point in that lunar shield. The point breached for a nanosecond under the impetus of a surge."