Read AL:ICE-9 for Free Online

space, but for this meeting, all attendees occupied places at the perimeter, providing for a large open area in the middle. Once everyone settled in with food, with Jake in the front row, center position, Patti walked out into the open area.
    “I want to thank everyone for coming. As a matter of procedure, can everyone in the other locations hear and see me OK?”
    Jake was aware that all six active ALICE locations were participating, each set up exactly as they were, only seeing Patti in hologram instead of in person.
    With no dissention, Patti continued, “Most of you are familiar with the after action analysis we do when we have any significant combat activity. Some have even worked on a couple of these with me including patrol skirmishes where the locals have asked for assistance. This is nothing like any of that. We started that way, but the deeper we got into the last engagement with the NeHaw, the more questions we had. What we are about to cover is, in part fact, and in part conjecture.”
    After pausing to look around, Patti continued, “First of all, working backwards we all know Jake and the ALICEs whipped up some super radio bombs that kicked the NeHaw’s ass this last time, but not even Jake knew exactly why they worked. Even more to the point, we all had questions about how the original NeHaw crew died at first contact. There weren’t any super bombs used on them then?”
    “Next, at the end of the last engagement, we thought we knew where the NeHaw home world was, based on the reverse vector they used to transmit. That turned out instead to be home of one of the Races we just signed a treaty with, or so we think.”
    Milking the pause for all it was worth, Patti stared the room down before continuing, “And finally, why did the NeHaw send a battleship when every piece of evidence we had said that we should be seeing every ship from the adjacent sectors, the battleship was the longshot.”
    Jake glanced around the room at that point, noting his granddaughter may have a flair for the dramatic, but she had their attention.
    “Let’s start with the bombs. Jake, what gave you the idea for those?”
    Caught off guard, Jake quipped, “Sorry, I didn’t know this was group participation.”
    That brought a round of laughter and dropped the drama a notch or two.
    After Patti gave him a dirty look, he continued, “I noticed the speaker in the ceiling of an office I was working in, I then asked ALICE about it. No NeHaw ship was so equipped. From there she provided medical reports from the early dissections listing ruptured organs in the brains of the NeHaw corpses. The final link was in the early testing the NeHaw equipment, the researchers identified all the interactive consoles emitted Radio Frequency instead of Audio Frequency, or sound waves as we know them.”
    Jake took his own pause and then said, “We couldn’t nail down exactly what the right frequencies were so we created a multispectral device that we hoped would rupture those same organs.”
    Patti jumped in and offered at this point, “In our after action research, ALICE provided information associated with this same affects from earths past. Apparently, before the NeHaw attack, the world’s navies used sound wave equipment called sonar, to see underwater. Unfortunately these sound waves were so strong they would kill marine mammals, disrupting internal organs.”
    “I remember that!” Jake exclaimed, now positive that was what prompted his idea.
    “We were able to determine, that while the NeHaw do shield naturally occurring RF,” Patti continued, ignoring the outburst, “the magnitude of the explosions so close to the hull completely overpowered the shielding.”
    “But what about the first ship,” someone in the back asked, “there was nothing like that for them?”
    “I’m glad you asked that!” Patti replied, pointing to the speaker.
    That was so smooth, Jake was sure they were a plant!
    “What have we been discussing here?