Jethro Goes to War (Wandering Engineer Jethro's tale) (17 page)

“
The enemy is
on our right, on our left, behind us, and in front of us. They can't
get away this time,” the Major said shaking his head and
smiling.

“
Sir?”

“
Quote
attributed to the general. Korean war, circa 1950 I believe. There
are several different versions of it in the file though. I did get a
laugh at his crack about taking him to the brig to meet the real
marines. Or the one where he asked where a bayonet goes on a
flamethrower.”

“
Sounds like I
need to read up on him sir,” the gunny said amused.

“
You should.
I've linked a copy to you. In fact it's all over the corps net.
Highest decorated marine for a loooong time. He served in both world
wars, Korea, and in minor conflicts all over his career. The man was
a legend,” the Major shook his head. “Which makes his
boots hard to fill. And it gives the troops one hell of an example to
look up to.”

“
Which serves
the corps,” the gunny said nodding. “I believe there is a
section in the training syllabus about example marines and how they
lived up to the morals and values the corps teaches?”

“
Yes. This is
a pretty good way of introducing, or in this case reintroducing the
corps to that tradition,” the Major smiled slightly. “I've
got no problem with it. No problem at all.”

The gunny nodded,
taking a sip of coffee with the straw.

“
I've been
going over your proposal, the idea has merit,” the Major said
as he took a sip from his own cup. The gunny paused, eyes locking
onto the Major. He released the straw and sat back.

“
It wasn't a
formal proposal sir, I ah...”

“
You were
brainstorming. Firefly told me. Credit where credit is due gunny. The
Admiral suggested it as well.”

The gunny grimaced
at that last. “Any word?”

“
No,”
the Major sighed. “Destiny left on schedule. Have you briefed
the troops yet?”

“
No sir. I
wasn't sure what to do about it. He cut and ran. That's a bad example
for the troops,” the doberman growled, not sure about the
example it set to himself either.

“
Tactical
retreat. Or should I say strategic?” the Major asked cocking
his head. “Either way, yes it looks bad but he didn't have a
lot of choice. Had he stayed he would have had a lot of blood on his
conscience. More than he apparently was willing to have.”

“
He wouldn't
have pulled the trigger sir,” the gunny growled. “He
would have been clean.”

“
No, but he
had to avoid it if possible. I've met the man. If he could prevent a
loss of life he would go out of his way to do so. Protecting the
innocent is what he's about. What we're about for that matter,”
he grimaced. “It leaves us a hell of a mess to clean up
however,” he shook his head. The Admiral's orders were vague in
the extreme. They had hoped for something, anything to go off of. See
what he was planning. Apparently he hadn't planned anything.

“
The
committee?” the gunny growled. He'd heard about this conspiracy
committee in the senate and house. It was rumored even the governor
was a member. He'd love to get his paws on any one of them. Hell, all
of them.

“
That and
public opinion. Knox has already dug in. He was running it as
impartial but when he found out the committee messed with his people
and his net he dived in and did that op ed piece on the Port Admiral
and his kiddy addiction. He showed a time line of when the Admiral
was here, totally debunking the adult nut jobs who were claiming they
were abused by him as a child. Of course the real die hards wont
admit they were wrong of course.”

“
Of course,”
gunny Schultz snorted.

“
Knox did
okay. He ripped into the investigation committee for taking an
allegation without a shred of evidence at face value over a mountain
of video and testimonial evidence to the contrary. He even pointed
out that some on the investigation were implicated in the plot. For
some reason he's not popular in some circles,” the Major
chuckled at the gunny's expression. “Something about being
called a left wing liberal mouth piece. He even compared everything
the Port Admiral has done to the Admiral and it seems to have made an
impact.”

“
Hopefully a
positive one sir?”

“
Too early to
tell actually. I caught it this morning. Polls are still out,” 
the Major shrugged. “The committee's attempt to recall Destiny
shows that they are regretting their actions,” he said amused.

“
I hope we
have an opportunity to make them regret it permanently sir,”
Schultz growled in contempt.

“
We can't go
half cocked. Or at all in this case.”

“
Why not sir?
It is a clear case of terrorism. Under Federation law we can
prosecute.”

The Major sat back
rubbing his chin. “That hadn't occurred to me. Just the
splatter if we did get involved,” he shook his head thinking
hard. “We need to remain as apolitical as possible. But you're
right, the Admiral did call them terrorists several times. But we
can't come down on them, it will look like a military coup. This has
to be official.”

“
Which we
can't do when the politicians are the criminals and tying our hands
sir. The people we report to have to have some sort of... I don't
know. Some sort of responsibility, some sort of mechanism to keep
them in check, to take them out if they commit a crime. Especially
something of this magnitude.”

“
Agreed. But
right now we're on thin ice. The Admiral was hesitant about that, one
of the reasons he left I believe. I think he was concerned that since
we were just papering over the cracks if he dug in and tore the
system apart this early just to get at the bad apples we'd tear the
system apart permanently.”

The gunny grunted.
He shook his head after a moment of thought. “As bad as it
would be, it would be better in the long run sir. We can't let trash
like that stay in power,” he growled.

“
Something
we'll have to look into definitely,” the Major replied. “But
for now we'll keep a minimum profile. We've already dispatched our
own IG investigators to check the story. They confirmed the Admiral's
version point for point. Unfortunately the senate committee is
calling the report a white wash.”

“
Which of
course is causing problems, since they are claiming the recordings
are a misunderstanding,” the gunny grimaced. “I wonder if
this plays into the whole park thing?”

The Major tapped his
chin with one finger for a moment, thinking that bit over. “No,
I believe that started when someone saw what you did to the park
itself. That didn't go over well with the historical preservation
committee. I've been fielding their rather pungent e-mails for the
past couple of weeks,” the Major grimaced remembering a few
exchanges. It had felt like a live fire exercise.

“
Oh,”
the gunny looked a little sheepish. “It had to be done sir.
Wait until they see the crucible.”

“
Agreed. I
just wish we'd been able to do it on a planet,” the Major said
as he shook his head. “But back to your proposal, we've talked
about it, and it has merit. Definite potential. Not only for basic or
dirt side training, but for air ops training as well.”

“
Yes sir,”
the gunny said, nodding.

“
Your point
about offering services is a good idea as well. I wish we could have
sent this out before Destiny left, gotten the Admiral to sign off on
it. Maybe even had him lay the ground work for it.”

The gunny looked
thoughtful. He stirred his coffee for a moment as the Major drank. “I
believe the Admiral will find a way to lend a hand. That will lay
groundwork in itself sir,” he said.

“
Knowing him
and his reputation, quite possibly true,” the Major smiled. One
of the things those near the Admiral admired most about him was his
can do attitude and a willingness to dig in and do a job no matter
how hard or dirty it was. Which made his retreat all the more
perplexing for some. “I'll see if we can get a delegation out
on the next ship.”

“
I thought
Prometheus would be going sir?” the gunny asked. He'd heard
some nasty scuttlebutt going around about the ships in the yard. Work
had slowed, they had even started rumors of lay offs.

“
Unfortunately
we've got a problem there. We just started her construction when this
mess blew up in our faces. She's sidelined. Mothballed really. The
yard can build some of her, her structure and some of her
electronics, but her hyperdrive, power plants, and most of her
replicators we haven't made are out. Which pretty much makes working
on the rest of the ship a waste of time until we can get them in. The
entire ship is built around her replicators after all.”

“
Ah,”
the gunny frowned. “I didn't know,” he shook his head.

“
The Admiral
was planning on getting her replicators in when he got back. And I
believe he had dropped a few hints about going out with her. At least
for her first run. That way he could assess things himself and do any
unlocks.”

The gunny winced.
“Sometimes I think our ancestors should never have done that.
Those locks have been nothing but trouble. We'd be back to where they
had been if we...”

“
Or with
people like the committee in charge we'd have torn ourselves apart,”
the Major said interrupting. The gunny frowned and then shrugged.

“
True. Too
true sir,” he said softly.

 ...*...*...*...*...

The gunny watched as
Jefferson walked up and down the troops. Training was back to basics
as they got used to their abilities and shook off the nearly week
long rehab and implant training. He'd had it easy he realized. When
he'd gone under the knife for the first time they'd only had time for
basic implants and a little cleaning. Since he'd been in the body and
fender shop for the new parts Thornby had tossed in a full upgrade
matching his recruits. He hadn't realized there was much of a
difference beyond recovery time until he'd started to test himself.
Which was why they were going to train slow. The last thing he wanted
was a clumsy recruit accidentally killing someone.

“
You are all
clumsy half wits. Trust me on this. Even more than before.” He
walked over to the ring and caught a pugil stick Brenet tossed him.
“Your implants are going to take some getting used to. You've
been getting new muscle over the past couple of weeks, those
metafactors have been burning off excess fat and adding muscle. But
it screws up your balance. Now with the implants it's even worse
until you get the hang of it.”

“
Which is why
you're back to basics again,” the gunny growled. A few groaned
at that. “Don't worry, it won’t be for long,” he
growled again, making it sound more of an ominous threat than some
liked.

“
Some of you
like a certain idiot...” He walked through the ranks and
slammed into Chirby hard. “Did I tell you to fuck around with
your Wi-Fi recruit?”

The Veraxin
chattered in surprise. “Around the block, twenty laps move!”
the gunny snarled. The Veraxin bobbed in place then moved off to the
track going around the bay.

“
As I was
saying, you've got some implants the old marines didn't have. Higher
minds than I decided to give everyone the same package to make it
easier down the road. Since we're going to grow fast, we don't need
people out a lot getting upgrades. So yeah, each of you have Wi-Fi
and other do-dads your ancestors didn't have. That doesn't mean you
get the privilege to use them until I... TELL... YOU!” he
practically screamed the snarl at them. Jethro winced.

“
Don't go
fucking around till I or one of the other DI's give you permission.
You read?”

“
YES GUNNERY
SERGEANT SIR!”

“
Good.
Valenko, Sergei front and center. Let's see how badly you two furry
sumo wrestlers can do.” He motioned for them to enter the ring.
The bear did a few sumo wrestler stomps and then wiggled his fingers.
He passed on the ill fitting body armor.

“
Ready for
this?” Valenko asked as Sergei strapped on his body armor.

“
Sure. You're
going down, you know that?” Sergei said, testing his gloved
hands.

The gunny nodded to
the troops. They gathered around the circle. Some began to cheer one
or the other combatant on.

“
You think
so?”

“
I know so,”
the Liger said, slapping his chest with one fist. He held up a hand
and then caught the pugil stick. “Come on, I'm going to kick
your...”