“Well, believe it,” Jon said. “C’mon, Helen. You know me. I’m a kid trapped in a man’s body. I don’t know how anything is supposed to work. I know how it works in my head, and I just do it. I follow my head and my heart because I don’t know any other way. A yacht ride to Catalina… well, that seemed to be the way to do it.”
“Not with me, I guess, Jon,” Helen said. “Thank you. But I can’t go. I can’t do this. You and me, we have too many bouts under our belts. It would be hard for me to believe that this cruise would be anything else but a prelude to… heck, I don’t know. Throwing me overboard.”
“Helen, give me a chance,” Jon said. “I’ve finally realized that I’m happier with you, that I care about what you think and feel about me, that I want to be with you. I don’t know if there’s anyone else in your life right now, but I definitely know that I want to be in it. I…”
Helen shook her head to stop him. “I’m sorry, Jon. You’ve given me a lot to think about. I wish I could go with you. But I can’t. Good-bye.”
All sound seemed to evaporate as Jon watched Helen turn and walk down that wharf. The gentle throbbing of the twin diesels was gone, the soothing sounds of the violin, the soft creaking of nearby boats straining on their lines. The only thing he could hear were her quickly fading footsteps, walking out of his life for good.
Sacramento-Mather Jetport,
Rancho Cordova, California
Wednesday, 25 February 1998, 0717 FT
Jon Masters stepped into the middle of the largest hangar inside the security development center at the old alert facility. It was empty except for those looking on: Lieutenant Colonel Hal Briggs, Gunnery Sergeant Chris Wohl, and Dr Carlson Heinrich, Sky Masters, Inc.’s staff project medical consultant. Briggs and Wohl were dressed in their typical black battle-dress uniforms, each with sidearms, but the others were in business suits. Masters and Heinrich were both wearing wireless earset commlinks so they could talk with the test subject.
Briggs looked a little puzzled. “We still on for the test, guys?” he asked. “ISA wants a report yesterday. Where’s Patrick? This is his show, right?”
“We’re ready, Hal,” Jon said. “Patrick is standing by.” He folded his hands in front of him, suddenly looking like a schoolboy giving a talk about his summer vacation to his classmates.
“It is believed,” Masters began, “that gunpowder was invented by the Chinese in the seventh century A.D. When it was brought to Europe in the fourteenth century, it changed the face of an entire continent, an entire society. The first man-portable gun used in anger was used in the fourteenth century by Arabs in North Africa. It too changed the face of the entire planet-that first gunshot truly was ‘the shot heard round the world.’
“Despite all of the technological advances we’ve made in the past seven hundred years, the gun, and the tiny pieces of metal it propels, continues to change lives, change humankind. It is simple technology hundreds of years old, but still deadly, still lethal. When you think about it, it’s pretty frustrating: Our company builds all kinds of cool weapons technology, but the best-equipped soldier is usually killed by essentially the same weapon used by a nomadic guerrilla desert-fighter centuries ago.
“The soldier of the twentieth century may have better training, better education, and better equipment, but when it comes right down to it, the infantryman of the fourteenth century would probably immediately recognize him,” Masters went on. “Their tactics, their mind-set, their methods for attack, defense, cover, concealment, movement, and assessment all remain the same. All that, guys, changes right now. Colonel, Gunny: Meet the soldier of the twenty-first century.”
They heard a tiny woosh! of compressed gas echo inside the empty hangar-and then, as if out of nowhere, a figure appeared before them, dropping out of the air from the shadows in a corner of the hangar. The figure landed on its feet and bent into a crouched position, then slowly rose and stood silently before them.
It wore a simple dark gray bodysuit, resembling a diver’s three-mil wetsuit; a large, thick helmet; thick gauntlets and boots; and a thin, wide backpack. A helmet covered the entire face and head, molding smoothly out to the shoulders. It had a wide visor, with extensions over the visor containing other visual sensors that could slide into place over the eyes. The helmet appeared tightly sealed from the outside; a breathing apparatus was obviously necessary.
For a long moment, all of them stood and looked at the dark-clothed figure, saying not a word. The figure made one turn, showing itself from all sides, then stood quietly. “He looks like that dude from Sea Hunt,” Hal Briggs finally quipped, “except shorter and chubbier. Brigadier General McLanahan, I presume?”
Patrick nodded stiffly. “That’s right, Hal,” came an electronically enhanced voice.
“You sound like the voice coming through the clown’s head at the drive-up window of a fast-food joint,” Hal said with a grin.
On a secondary comm channel one that Briggs and Wohl could not hear, Patrick said, “Jon, I felt that power surge again when I landed.”
“Then I recommend we terminate the test,” Dr Heinrich responded immediately on the commlink. “The problem hasn’t been fixed.”
“Patrick?” Masters asked. “It’s your project, and you’re wearing the gear. What do you say?”
Patrick McLanahan hesitated, but only for a moment: “Let’s go on,” he said. “The shock wasn’t too bad, and I feel fine now.”
“I recommend against it,” Heinrich said.
“We’re on schedule and on budget right now,” Patrick snapped, his voice much more impatient, even agitated. “Any delays would be costly. We go on.”
“So how do you take a dump or a piss in that getup, Patrick?” Briggs asked.
“You finish the mission and go home,” Patrick responded flatly.
“Touchy, touchy,” Hal said. “I don’t mean to crack wise, guys, but it’s not exactly what we were expecting. How did you fly in here like that?”
“A short burst of air compressed at three thousand psi,” Jon replied proudly. “The soldier of the future doesn’t run or march into combat anymore-he jumps in. The soldier can jump about twenty to thirty feet vertically and a hundred and fifty feet horizontally. The power unit he wears can recharge the gas generators in about fifteen seconds.”
“It’d be fun to watch a squad of these dudes hopping into battle,” Briggs commented. “How long does the power unit last?”
“The specs you gave us called for durable man-portable power units to last a minimum of six hours-ours can last eight,” Jon Masters replied. “Ours can be recharged by any power source available-a twelve-volt car battery, a home electrical outlet, a commercial two-twenty line, an aircraft auxiliary-power unit, or even by solar photovoltaic cells mounted on the back. If all power is lost, just drop the backpack, and the suit becomes a standard combat-ready insulated suit and battle-ready helmet. Patrick?”
To demonstrate, Patrick reached up to hidden clips on his shoulders and unfastened the backpack power unit, then passed it around to Briggs and Wohl. It resembled an oval turtle shell, contoured to match the body; it was about an inch thick and weighed about twenty pounds. The helmet’s oxygen visor automatically dropped open when the power unit was detached. Patrick pressed a tiny switch under the left edge of his helmet, and the helmet unlocked and popped open; he took it off and let Briggs and Wohl look it over.
Briggs was interested in the design and features of the helmet but Chris Wohl was more interested in Patrick. He looked at him carefully and asked, “Hot in that getup, sir?”