Jethro Goes to War (Wandering Engineer Jethro's tale) (44 page)

“
Ah. Sounds
like a quote.”

“
Old movie
sir.”

“
Huh. That
reminds me. Get me a list of all these old war movies you've watched.
Any other things you can think of as well. I'm going to put that out
through the entire corps and navy. See what we can dig up. I'd like
to get ideas.”

“
Considering
the source?”

“
I'd take
anything at this date,” the Major said shaking his head. “We
can fix it later. But if it's interesting, pass it along. We can
learn from anything. And anything that's wrong we can point to it and
say it's wrong.”

“
Aye aye sir.”

“
Good. Now,
about my suit?” He turned looking to the armorer.

“
Sure sure,
let me go load the lockers,” the armorer said moving over to
the controls. “Okay it'll be thirty seconds.” He looked
up.

“
Perfect. I'll
be changing then,” the Major nodded. “Keep up the good
work people. I want this done ASAP.”

“
Yes sir,”
they said in unison.

“
Carry on,”
he nodded and went into the changing chamber.

...*...*...*...*...

Jethro ran down the
corridor and then paused. He turned back and forth. “Stuck
again?” Riley asked.

“
No working on
the sensors. I'm getting a shadow effect. IFF's are coming in clear
but I'm getting an echo with them too.”

“
All right.
I've logged it,” the armorer grunted. “Try the cloak
again.”

Jethro grunted and
then accessed the controls and sent the coded signal. It was supposed
to react to his natural instinct, when he initiated cloak through his
body the suit would interpret it and do it for itself. Unfortunately
they hadn't quite gotten the sensors up to be able to read his neural
system that well. Yet.

“
You're
flickering. There.” The gunny nodded as the suit faded out.
“Damn that's cool. Smart of Ox to think of using the drivers
for the ghillie suits for this.”

“
Yes. He saved
us a hell of a lot of work. Though it's not perfect. There are
issues,” Bobby said watching the suit through his HUD. He could
just make out the suit by the distortion around its edges. That was
better than the pixelating problem they had had the other day. “I
wonder if I can write a program to look for this...”

“
Probably.
Later though. There has got to be a way to fix that though,”
the gunny said standing behind them.

Bobby popped to
attention as he suddenly realized who was there. Riley just snorted.
“At ease kid,” he shook his head. “Still got them
scared spit-less I see,” he jerked his thumb to the programmer
next to him.

The gunny smiled a
closed lipped smile. “Good practice.”

“
Yeah right,”
the armorer snorted again. “Keep telling yourself that. You
said you’re working on a patch system?” he said turning
to the programmer.

“
Yes. I ah,
want to compile changes then hit the suit system in its down time.
That way we can do changes all at once and do roll backs if we need
to without doing stop and go hack and slash programming like we're
doing.”

“
Hence the
log,” the gunny said nodding. “You're using the
algorithms in the ghillie suits I heard?”

“
Yes sir. It's
not perfect though. I suspect someone in cadre or recon had a better
system and kept it under wraps.”

“
Probably,”
Riley snorted. “They always liked having an ace.”

“
We need a
better testing environment. Something for the system to show it's
true colors. See how fast it can adapt. How much power it takes.”

“
And the ship
isn't the place since the bulkheads are all uniform,” Riley
said shaking his head. “I get you. But we can't exactly do this
outside. I'm still not one hundred percent sure about her life
support and suit integrity. Something goes wrong and he's fried.”

“
We don't want
that. Besides, I want something dynamic. Like a planet. Exterior work
is dull grays and browns. Not enough of a challenge,” the gunny
replied.

“
Where are we
going to get a planet sir? Can we send him to Agnosta?” the
programmer asked.

“
You going to
go along for the ride?” the gunny asked Bobby, giving him a
look. The kid pointed to his chest in confusion, eyes wide.

Schultz shook his
head. “The Major nixed it anyway. The only ship going to
Agnosta in the next six months is the Clydesdale freighter seven
seven niner. He's right. I wouldn't chance that piece of equipment
with civilians. If it fell into the wrong hands...”

“
We'd have a
serious problem,” Riley nodded. “Not to mention out all
this hard work. So that's out,” he sighed. “Park deck?”

“
Which brings
us all sorts of other headaches. Political ones,” the gunny
grunted irritably. “We've been trying for two days. They want
an arm and a leg for a couple days of time.”

“
Even if he's
just standing around sir?” the armorer asked, sounding
exasperated. “We really just need a day. Maybe a single shift
or half shift could do it.”

“
We could
print out giant pictures. Or make a giant vid screen. Have him stand
in front of it and test it,” Bobby said nodding.

“
Good idea. Go
with that.”

“
Wont work
well. Light angle and color changes. Dynamic. Though a static could
get us closer I suppose,” Riley mumbled.

“
And then he
can take a stroll through the public park. Like oh, at the college,”
the Major said behind them. They turned to him, straightening as
training took over.

“
Busy
corridor,” he smiled as they shot to attention once more. “At
ease. I see it's working.” He squinted. “Or barely see. I
can just make out the edges.”

“
Yes sir,”
the gunny nodded, clearly annoyed he'd let his guard down enough for
the Major to sneak up on him. He needed to work on his situational
awareness. He should have at least noticed his scent.

“
A stroll in a
public park sir?” Riley asked.
“What do you say
corporal? You up for a walk?” the Major asked, pitching his
voice to include Jethro.

“
Sure, I mean
yes sir.” He decloaked and then grimaced. “I did not mean
to do that,” he sighed, frustrated.

“
Looks like
we've got a little more work to do before that stroll,” Bobby
sighed shaking his head. “I think I'll ask that centaurian
Veber if he can work on that and the coding of the fringe. I'm
wondering if there is something in the anti-alias algorithms we can
fine tune to get a better result,” he mused.

“
I want to
know just how far that suit can go. How much power it uses, how much
the cloak needs, and shields. How much punishment the systems can
take. Also how long he can remain shielded or cloaked.”

“
Yes sir.
We've got a graph but it's tentative. Shield and cloak use a lot of
juice. This is actually the secondary cloak. More of a back up. The
primary is something tied into the shields. It seems to bend light.
Possibly a phase shift, though I don't see how that is possible in
real time. We can't use it though, we don't have the right
algorithms,” Bobby replied absently. He grimaced and then shook
his head. “The shield is an order of magnitude over the cloak.
It's all connected with the incoming energy that has to be shed...”
Bobby got a faraway look.

“
Later. If I'm
up to it son,” the Major chuckled. “Since I never got
past counting with my fingers and toes, I'd say
way
later,”
he smiled shaking his head. “I just need to know the strengths
and weaknesses of the suit.”

“
Yes sir. We
actually haven't gotten to the shield yet sir. We've been working on
one system at a time,” Jethro said with a shrug.

“
If you get
stuck, move to another and do what you can. Try to get as much going
as possible. How are the others doing by the way?” He turned to
Riley.

“
We've got the
humans, chimp, and other two cats outfitted. Ox is overseeing it now.
He's good. Reliable,” Riley said.

“
I think we
found you an apprentice,” the Major said with a smile.

“
Maybe. But he
doesn't want to be nailed down to one specialty. Wants to see and
experience a lot more engineering. Can't say I blame the kid,”
Riley grimaced. “We were all young once.”

“
True,”
the gunny said with a snort.

“
He's the
last. Him and the Veraxin. I'm about half done building their suits.
I'm doing one side, having them test it out, and then mirroring the
other side. The good news is now we've got templates for others of
their species for later.”

“
Good,”
the Major nodded. “Carry on.”

...*...*...*...*...

“
I never got
to thank you for saving my brother,” Bobby said as they trooped
through the corridors to the college.

“
Glad we're
doing this in the night shift,” Riley muttered shooting glances
around, sure they were going to be busted at any moment. Jethro tried
hard not to laugh. Riley didn't realize that a group of marines, one
in power armor was one thing no one, not even station security was
going to fool with.

“
What were you
saying?” Jethro said as the lift door closed. He flexed his
fingers. The claws came out and then went back in. Everything moved
nicely. Smooth like glass, no snick or click like there was when they
first got them running. Perfect. Nothing to give away that they were
coming out until they tore into someone's flesh. He checked the
sensors. It was wild, he could see a full 360 degree bubble around
his body. Windows popped up in his mind when he focused on both front
and rear. Sometimes it felt like he was floating out of his body.
Above or around it. He could switch different views, different
sensors, overlay things. It was an incredibly heady experience.

“
I ah, wanted
to thank you for saving Danny. On the asteroid.”

“
Alpha
platoon? What about it? Oh you mean he was with Rigatoni's team?”
Jethro asked returning his attention to the programmer.

“
Yeah. He said
he was stuck in a crack. Literally. Hurt, broken, and out of air and
just about out of hope. You guys saved his ass.”

“
Actually that
was Hurranna and Senjix the cheetah. I just did the grunt work. They
went down after them risking life and limb.”

“
Oh. I'll have
to thank them as well.” They felt a jolt and then heard a
warning ding of approaching destination.

“
Okay, let’s
see how many people we piss off when we do this. Ready?” Jethro
smiled as he nodded politely to the slack jawed guard as the lift
doors opened. “Training exercise. Get used to it.” He
said moving off with the armorer and programmer in tow. Both men were
looking down at tablets in their hands, checking the software as it
began to cloak.

 ...*...*...*...*...

“
I'm getting a
peculiar rant from college security.” Matilda said with a
perplexed grimace. “Care to tell me what happened?”

“
We couldn't
get time in the other parks so I sent the recon suit to your area for
a quick stroll. No harm no foul,” the Major replied spreading
his hands apart.

“
Next time
keep me in the loop,” Matilda said shaking her head. “You've
got quite a few guys and gals trying to figure out that thing.”

“
Oh? Can you
send me their report and copy of the video footage? I'd like to have
the Intel shop have a go at it as well,” Logan said nodding to
them. “I'd like to see how this suit handles security.”

“
It's giving
Enrique the mother of all migraines,” Matilda snorted. “Which
is good. Don't let that thing off Firefly though.”

“
Oh?”

“
I've gotten
some scuttlebutt that some of the people in the latest crop of ROTC
grads are being picked over for some militia group someone is putting
together,” Matilda said frowning. “A few have dropped out
when they were promised an instant rank of commander or above. Stupid
fools. Surprised you didn't hear about it.”

“
I've been
getting hints here and there. Someone dropped a couple hints to some
of our supply clerks to lose equipment. They reported it to their
chain of command.”