Broken Soldier (Book One) (24 page)

Mike began, “Well now, I guess we don’t. But…”

Bambi jumped in. “General Kolbe, I can do that and
do it to a fair degree. There are limits to it, however. The
important thing for you to know is that I refuse to do that to
someone. Even if our new Major General Hurst ordered me to do it, I
would not. It’s a form of slavery and I won’t have any part of it.
Sometimes, you just have to trust people and you know that’s
true.”

Kolbe looked up at the high ceiling, and then
nodded. Then completely changing the topic, he said, “I have an
idea. It might be risky, but it will get us rolling a hell of a lot
faster than anything else I can think of, for now. We have to talk
with the leaders of a few countries and get their help.”

Jo asked, “Can they be trusted?”

Kolbe bubbled, “Hell no they can’t. But when they
realize that the entire human race could be wiped out, they’ll
think carefully before they screw it up. Also, we can sweeten the
deal for them.”

Mike looked surprised and puzzled. “How
General?’

“Well, first of all, why don’t you call me Max…all
three of you? It looks as though we’re going be working together
for a long time.”

“OK. Max. So, how do we sweeten the deal.”

“Isn’t it obvious, we offer them the upgrade.
They’re going to want to be able to communicate with us anyway and,
if I understand how it works, we can chat, without anyone knowing.
Also, I suspect that Bambi can listen in on them. If one of them
starts going off kilter, we can set then straight.”

Bambi asked, “General, how would you feel if you
discovered some organization, outside of your command, was
listening in on everything you said?”

He shook his head. “I see your point. I’d be mad as
hell and I would do whatever was necessary to prevent it.”

Mike offered, “Then we tell them up front that it’s
an unavoidable side effect of upgrading. Let them decide for
themselves whether or not to have it.”

Bambi explained, “Captain…sorry, General. The user
controls the comm upgrade. If they don’t want me to hear, then I
can’t. It’s the way the Saurans designed it. They are the most
cautious beings I know of. The comm can always be pinged, if
someone wishes to comm with them. But unless they have it set for
constant monitoring, I can’t force it on them.”

Jo joined in. “The problem is trust and trade.
Pardon me, that’s an old Thorian phrase. We were merchants once.
It’s in our nature. People will trust a little and trade a little.
As the experience proves to be beneficial to both sides, thrust
grows and so does trade.”

The old man, obviously tiring now, said, “I suppose
we could offer them something along the lines of medical
assistance. Clearly, this is something all of them would wish for
their respective countries. My original idea was to get certain
world leaders to provide us with access to wounded and aged
veterans. Couldn’t we set up a base on the moon or something, where
we could begin to build an army?”

Bambi shot that down. “Can’t do it on the moon. The
Saurans have beacons that would notice the activity there. It’s
just too close to Earth. But, we could set up a base in the
asteroids out around Jupiter. There are so many meteors and
asteroids that the beacons would read our coming and going as
normal for that area, as long as we vary the approaches we use.
And, it’s closer to Earth, so the round trip won’t be as long. But
it’s still risky.

Bambi gave them a warning. “There is something else
that you gentlemen should consider. When we upgrade someone, they
will have been genetically enhanced. From my studies of humanity, I
believe there are a lot of people on Earth who will be opposed to
that and they would have a point.

“The upgraded warriors would no longer be humans, as
you currently know them. We will be creating a new race of beings.
They will think faster, move faster and have a great deal more
strength. Interaction with Earth normal people will be awkward.

“Imagine this. We upgrade the President of the
United States and he feels so wonderful and virile that he rushes
into the bedroom to make love to his wife. In his excitement, he
kills her, because he hasn’t learned to control the strength he has
gained.

“If we upgrade these men, we owe it to their wives
to upgrade them as well. And, I suppose we should warn them about
making love to their mistresses. Are we going to offer to upgrade
them as well? I suggest we make it clear to them that it stops with
the leader and his wife.”

Kolbe was laughing hard. “Oh young lady, you are a
treasure. You are truly sentient and quite perceptive. But, you’ve
missed something here. These men aren’t going to agree to be
altered. They won’t trust us. Why should they? We have little to
show them that will prove everything we say is true and they
certainly aren’t going to risk losing their power to us. These men
already have as much power as they ever dreamed of, so we wouldn’t
be offering them as much as it might seem.

“I suspect they might agree to have a trusted
subordinate upgraded. Once a President or prime minister gets to
observe how well that works out, he might try it for himself. As
for mistresses, there are very few, or none. In this day and age,
it’s nigh on to impossible for a world leader to risk having an
affair. The media watches these guys too closely. If there is a
mistress lurking around, once we’ve explained that she could be
accidentally killed by the man, neither of them will risk it.”

Jo looked intently at the old man and suggested,
“Mike, I think we’ve worn him out for now. Let’s allow him to get
some rest, and then we’ll continue the discussion.”

Max didn’t put up a fight. “Thank you gentlemen. I
hate to admit it, but I am very weary.”

Bambi said, General Kolbe, I have been preparing new
quarters for you, just down the passageway. If you’ll climb back
into the wheelie, I’ll take you to your room.”

“Thank you, Bambi. I would appreciate that.”

Kolbe turned to Mike and Jo, saying, “Gentlemen,
once I’ve had some rest, we’ll begin building a kick-ass
organization. For now though, it’s thank you and good night.”

They watched Max leave to get some needed sleep, and
then they went to Mike’s quarters, where they talked for a few more
hours.

Chapter
14

Over the next few days, Al Benson, and then Wayne
Hurst were brought out of their med units, in sickbay. Mary would
need a longer stay, because of the severity of her burns.

Mike hugged his son and they cried, as they shared
their first real embrace in years. The tears were real and they
came in the form of relief for an end to the horror they had both
been through. Wayne was assured that Mary would come out of this
whole and in good shape, drawing another round of tears for them
both.

Mike told his son and Al Benson, “Gentlemen, we have
a lot to tell you and it’s a little bit complicated. You have met
my friend Jo. I’m going to have him explain the circumstances
surrounding your current status and provide you with some options,
which I ask you to consider thoroughly, before you make a
decision.”

As each of the two men were brought up to speed on
the situation, and had explained to them the concept of upgrading,
they were given time to relax and think about what had happened to
them.

The decision to upgrade was a serious consideration
for anyone. They had to face the reality of returning to Earth,
with new identities and without their memories, or stay and be
upgraded then join the crew as warriors.

Alphonso Benson accepted the prospect of joining
with surprising ease. As he said, “Damn, I haven’t had anything
going for me, since I had my foot blown off. I might as well go
back to soldiering. It was the last time I did anything worthwhile
and that was a long time ago.”

Wayne had to wait two more days, before he would
make a decision. After a great deal of hugging and tears and long
talks with Mike, he finally came to accept this tall powerful
looking man as his father, virtually reborn. He told Mike, “Dad, I
think what was done for you is great. But, as far as I’m concerned,
I’ll do whatever Mary thinks is best. I don’t want her to be alone
on Earth and I don’t want to be alone out here without her.”

His son put his hand up to his dad’s shoulder and
said, “Dad, is there any way for Mary and me to stay on this ship
with you and not be upgraded? There’s a lot we could do around
here.”

That thought had crossed Mike’s mind before. He had
discussed it with Jo and Bambi and they had come to the same
conclusion.

He told Wayne, “Son, I’m going to have Bambi explain
it to you.”

Bambi, be gentle with my son.

Of course sir. Under these circumstances, I would be
gentle with anyone.

She began, “Wayne, if I may call you that.”

He responded, “Sure, go right ahead.”

“Good. You father and I just had a brief discussion,
between our two minds. It took fifteen nanoseconds. In space,
things happen very slowly, or extremely quickly. Not being in the
loop of communication could cost lives and I mean all of the lives
on this ship.

“So much info is available to you, right this
second. Go on ask me anything, perhaps something about flying your
fighter, which is a piece of crap, by the way.”

“Hey, the F-18 is a great plane. When I’m flying in
it, it’s like I am the plane.”

Bambi kept her voice calm and professional, as she
told him, “Wayne, once you’re upgraded, you WOULD be the plane. I
can place sensors on the skin of it and you would feel every tiny
nuance, as it plowed through the air. You wouldn’t have to be told
by a computer that you were being scanned and locked onto by enemy
radar, you would feel it five seconds before the computer could
tell you. Would that five seconds make a difference?”

“Hell yes.”

“And what if you could also feel the frequency of
that radar and the precise strength of it and the exact location of
the device and the exact amount of time until the missile could be
fired at you and how long you had to take the appropriate action to
survive…all of that, in less than 1/100th of a second. And in the
next 1/100th of that same second, you sent out a warning to the
planes in your fight, sending them all of that same info.

“If every pilot has been upgraded, all of that info
would be analyzed in your mind, as well as thousands of other bits
and pieces of new data that changed every second. And at the same
time, you are keeping up with the bigger picture around you for a
thousand miles, every detail, including what’s happening beneath
the sea, on the ground, in the air and in space. Every piece of
that information is comprehended and analyzed by your new,
incredibly fast mind, in a single second.

“On board the Mother Ship, when meals are about to
be served, the crew will be pinged that it is time to eat. They
will use their brains to comm me, telling me what they want to eat.
In other words, each meal will be individually prepared for each
warrior and that process will take less then a second for me to
survey the entire crew.

“For those who have not been upgraded, I would need
to make a verbal announcement and they would need to tell me
individually what they wanted to eat. Imagine if we had two or
three hundred non-upgrades on board. Then consider how we would
need to handle communications, in a combat environment.”

Wayne held up his hands, pleading, “OK, OK, I get
it. If I opt to stay on board, I need to be upgraded and so would
Mary.”

Mike and Jo began to chat with Wayne, answering his
questions and letting him set the pace, at which he would grow into
the idea of being upgraded.

When the time came and Mary was back in her husbands
embrace, Wayne began to explain the situation to her. He had
insisted on talking with her alone at first. Once he reached the
point where he could bring in Mike, she began to cry. Mary hadn’t
seen Mike since Sherry had passed away and it was a shock to find
her father-in-law was now twenty five years old and six inches
taller.

She listened patiently and asked very intelligent
questions, some of which could only be answered by Bambi. Mary was
an engineer and her acumen and scientific queries led to several
insightful possibilities. Max and Jo were finally brought in and
she gazed at Jo in wonder, before launching a series of question at
him, about life in outer space.

Wayne insisted on allowing her to take as much time
as she wanted to make a decision. It didn’t take long. Her thoughts
were similar to Al Benson’s. If she couldn’t remain as the woman
she had been, she would stay out here with her husband and
contribute to the small but growing staff of the new Terran Space
Navy.

“Right now, I only have two questions. Can I still
have children, because I would love that? Also, what’s my rank? I
have a master’s degree and I’m working on my doctorate, so I would
like to be more than some damn shave tail Lieutenant.”

Mike kicked the first question to Bambi, who told
her. “Mrs. Hurst, you are able to produce children. But you must
realize the gestation period will not be a normal human cycle.”

Mary looked quite worried, as she asked, “Well how
long will it be?”

“I think about four months. You can choose the
gender and a variety of features like hair color, skin color,
height and eye color. It won’t be as painful as a human standard
birth, because I can help you by adjusting the nanites to handle
your discomfort. The baby will be born upgraded. He or she will not
be like a standard human. Growth will be a lot faster. Full
physical maturity will probably be reached in ten to twelve years.
As for mental maturity, I can’t be sure. I think perhaps
fundamental thinking acuity would be reached at four to six years.
All of this is speculation on my part, based on my genetic
knowledge of humans and my knowledge of alien reproductive
patterns.”