Chapter 4

            “Ah, there you are.  I see Pilot O’Shea has informed you of the hazards of metal.  Later on you will be given a flight suit that will further reduce any random fields about you, electrical or otherwise, but for this test, what you’re wearing should be fine.”

            Jenna walked over with a small gun-shaped device.  She placed it against his right arm and pulled the trigger.  Gavin felt a small sting and then a tingle that moved outward from his arm, to his chest and hand, and then out through his body.  It was the strangest sensation he had ever felt.

            “I have just injected nanites into your bloodstream.  They are small robots made of proteins that will travel your bloodstream.  They’ll break down in about 24 hours and exit the body normally, but while they are there, they serve a variety of functions, and mostly allow us to calibrate the system for control purposes.  They relay what brain impulses go where in your body allowing the main computer to build your nervous system map.  This map will be used to allow you total control over the robot.  Basically if Lamp A turns on, you move your right index finger, etc.”  Jenna explained while staring at the computer display.  The readout was counting up a percentage, and she looked up after a green ‘100%’ was displayed. 

            Behind Gavin, a whoosh of air sent a chill down his spine, it was cold and damp.  He turned and saw that the central column had lowered a pod, and it was open and waiting. 

            “Just climb in and make yourself comfortable.  The pod will seal automatically and you will fall into a false sleep.  You will see some mental images that will seem like you are hallucinating.  Just stay calm and focused.  It will be dark, so concentrate on ‘seeing’.  Then concentrate on ‘hearing’.  After that, you should be able to hear us, and we can walk you through the rest of the process.  Remember though; concentrate on the simple things first.  And above all, do not panic.”    

            “You have my word that if we see anything abnormal, we will terminate and pull you out,” Benton added.

            Gavin saw Cassie come out of the room as he started to climb into the pod.  He couldn’t decide whether she was angry or sad.  Her face was set with a strange expression. 

            The pod had a cushioned interior that molded to the contours of his body as he leaned back against it.  He heard a slight click, and the pod door closed, sealing shut.  He heard the hiss of air followed by the sound of the pod hatch locking into place.  Restraining pads extended from the pod hatch and secured him tightly into place while a meshed semi-circular plate extended above his head.

            “Can you hear me Gavin?” he heard Jenna say over the speaker behind his head.

            “Yes, I can hear you.”

            “Ok, here we go.  You are going to feel a little light-headed and you are going to want to fall asleep.  Don’t fall asleep.  Try to stay awake for as long as possible.”  Gavin heard a slight hissing noise, and the lights dimmed outside of the pod.

            “What are you doing, now?” Gavin asked.  There was no response. 

            “Hello?  Can you hear me?”  Something was definitely wrong here.  He tried to look out the window of the pod and was startled to find that the pod was gone.  He was standing in an ocean of mist with dark horizons.

            “Hello??  Dr. Mari!?  Can you hear me??  Hello!” Gavin was shouting, but there was still no response.

            Think, think.  They said not to panic.  They said to concentrate on the basics.  To’ see’ first.  Ok, try to see.  What do I see?  I see…mist.  How do I concentrate on seeing?  I’ve never thought about that before, it was just something I did.  Something I just do, no thought involved, no effort…wait, there is something outside of the mist.  What is that?  A wall…metal…a metal wall.  The wall in the hangar!  I can see!  The dark horizons slowly receded and he could see past the clearing mist.  The hangar bay was there, and he seemed to be standing up, but leaning backward at a slight incline – same as he was in the pod.  In front of him was the communications building, and he could see the light shining in from the large transparent doors.

            What’s next… to ‘hear’.  Concentrate on hearing.  Again, hearing doesn’t require any thought.  I just did it.  I can do that again, just like hearing.  No thought needed—

            “—avin, can you hear me?  Gavin?  Can you hear my voice Gavin?”  It was Jenna.  She was talking slowly and quietly, but the voice was detached, like it was coming through a speaker. 

            “Y-yes.  I can hear you Doctor,” Gavin replied.  He was startled to find that his voice was quite loud and echoed through the hangar.  Then he was startled that he could ‘hear’ inside the hangar.

            “Excellent work!  You made it!” she sounded truly relieved.

            Gavin heard another voice, Benton’s, still detached.  “That’s a new record Mr. St. Cloud.  45 minutes, 31 seconds, congratulations.  You beat Cassie’s record by about 10 minutes.”

            “45 minutes?  45 minutes for what?”

            “It’s been 45 minutes since you entered the pod.  The brain doesn’t register the passing of time while it’s reconnecting pathways like that.  You could say it is too busy for such a trivial notion as time.”

            “Ah.”

            “Now for the next steps.  We are going to take this one step at a time.  We will start with your hand.”    

Gavin immediately tried the same technique he had used for seeing and hearing.  He expected the hand to move, and knew it would move, without a doubt.  Even so, he was surprised when the hand twitched, and then lifted from the open restraint.  He could ‘feel’ the metallic components of the hand, and it was the oddest sensation he had ever felt.  Regardless, he had full control over the hand.  He pumped it a few times experimenting with the feel and power of the grip.

            “Impressive Gavin!” he heard Benton say over the speaker.  “Again, you’ve broken another record!  What was that, 5 seconds?” he said to someone on the other side of the speaker.

            “How’s he doing?” Benton asked as he entered the control room.  Gavin had been in the dive for near three hours learning how to control his new body.

            “Very impressive,” Jenna said.  “His readings are off the chart.  He’s learning at an unprecedented rate.  The system is still calculating the Rating, but it very well could be higher than Cassie’s.  Just looking at how quickly he is learning the new body, he has to be above an 8.0.”

            “Is that so?” Benton said in a pleasant voice.

            “Yes, take a look,” Jenna said pointing to the monitor.  A giant mechanized figure was walking the hangar deck.  It would change pace, run, tip-toe, crawl, whatever else Gavin could think to try.

            “Excellent.  I’d say he passed the first half.  Now for the hard part,” Benton said quietly.  “Pull him out of the dive.”

            It was weird.  He could feel himself breathing, in the back of his mind.  But at the same time, he knew that his current body didn’t need to breathe, or eat.  It only needed periodic maintenance.  In fact, he could feel the third joint cylinder in his ankle starting to grate.  Gavin made a mental note to ask somebody to check it later.

            “Gavin,” Jenna came over the speaker.  “Excellent work, but that is enough for today.  Go ahead and lean back against the mounting rack.”

            He walked over to the rack and leaned back against it.  He felt the clamps lock into sockets on his legs, back, shoulders and arms and he felt every bit of it.  It didn’t hurt, didn’t sting, only a small sensation, the feeling that it was ‘meant’ to do that, like your elbow is ‘meant’ to flex.

            “Very good.  I see you’ve become accustomed to your new body.  Now it is time for the hard part.  You need to come back to your original body.  You need to remember what your old body was like and concentrate.”

            Gavin wasn’t even listening to Jenna anymore.  His mind was one place, but he could still feel himself breathing.  He concentrated on his own breathing.  Concentrated on seeing…

            “Gavin can you hear me?” Jenna said with alarm.  He had stopped responding before she had started the recall system.  The D.C.C.P. did not leave all of the work to the Deus in returning to their own body.  It was built with systems to enhance, or suppress the brain’s signals to the body using the nanites.  The recall system basically just enhances the nervous system’s signals in the physical body, which is the opposite of their normal function, which is to suppress those same signals minimizing interference from the physical body for the pilot.  Normally, the Deus is lucent up until that system kicks in, but Gavin had gone quiet before it was activated.

“Start the recall system anyway Jenna, possible interference might be jamming the communication lines.  We’ll explain it to him later,” Benton ordered.

“What,” a voice came from behind them dulled and faint, “are you guys talking about?  I’m right here.  You can open the pod now.”

Jenna and Benton spun to see Gavin staring back at them from inside the pod.  They quickly moved to release him from the pod, and Gavin climbed out seemingly fine.

“How did you do that?” Jenna asked worry creasing her cute features beneath her glasses.

“Do what?  Come back?  I wasn’t supposed to come back yet?” Gavin asked confused and a little worried.

“No, how did you come back so soon?  We didn’t even start the recall system yet!” Jenna said exasperated.

“Oh…well….you said ‘concentrate’ and I remembered myself breathing.  I closed my eyes, and then opened them, and I was in the pod again.  Was that wrong?”

Benton chuckled a moment and then said, “Mr. St. Cloud, there was absolutely nothing wrong with that.  It’s just that,” he paused for a moment, “no one has ever been able to return from a dive unassisted before.  You’re the first.”

Gavin kind of choked and had to steady himself a moment feeling a little weak in the knees.  He hadn’t expected to be told that.  Jenna came over and lent her shoulder to him.

“Commander, I’m going to take him to Med-bay and make sure everything is all right with him.”

“Very well.  I’ll also let you show him to his new place,” Benton looked at Gavin.  “We have very nice accommodations here, Mr. St. Cloud.  I’m sure you will enjoy working here,” Benton held out his hand, “I would like to be the first to welcome you as the new Pilot of the Earth Defense Force Deus Unit.  We will discuss the details later.  For now, get some rest.”

“So how did it go?” Masters asked without looking up from the chess board as Benton entered his office.  Benton’s cat, “Mr. Freckles” sat in the opponent’s chair across from Masters staring intently at the pawn he had just moved.

“Exceedingly well.  We found a good one this time,” Benton answered as he hung up his coat not looking at the chess game.  “Queen to Bishop 4, checkmate.” 

Masters looked at the board, sighed, and then knocked over his king in disgust.  “Is there any game you’re not good at?”

“Always a first time for everything Frank.  Now, onto other business,” Benton said, his tone changing slightly.

“Them?”

“Yes.  We knew it had to happen sometime and sometime soon.  Even so, we were hoping for a little more time, but we just got these in from the Hubble – 2 days old, and OSEC’s ArcSat 4 picked these up a few hours ago.”  Benton pulled a manila envelope from his coat pocket before shooing the cat out of his seat and sitting down.  Inside were several photos of what appeared to be a dust field.

“What is it?”

“A fleet that came in using some FTL drive system.  Every speck of dust is a ship the size of Hawaii.”

“That’s not possible.  There has to be a million of them.”

“Six-hundred million, 34 thousand of them actually, plus or minus a thousand.  NASA is calling it a ‘migration fleet’.  Basically it’s their whole damned civilization.”

Masters looked up from the photos.  “They want us to fight this?”

“No.  They want us to protect the planet.  They are aware of our limitations, however.  Our orders are simply to repel any incursions from outside the atmosphere.”

“Easier said then done, sir.  We have four pilots and four machines.  Million to one odds are impossible.”

“High Command understands that too.  Admiral Viramonde says the belief is they will start small.  One or two incursions at a time, and that we can handle.”

“How do they know that?  What’s to stop them from just butchering us wholesale?”

“Simple.  We have nukes and they know it.  Our world is their prophesized Paradise, remember?  They will go to any lengths to keep us from ruining it.  So they will attempt to scare us into submission like they did the last time.  They seemingly aren’t expecting us to have recovered the Deus technology.”

“That makes sense.  But, what happens when they lose patience and decide to take us all out at once and recover what they can?”

“The hope is the mass-production units will be online by then.”

“Oh.  That’s reassuring.  Tell High Command ‘Thanks’ from me,” Masters said dryly.  “You know those things are months from being finished, maybe even years.”

“I’m aware of that.  We just have to hope we can string them along long enough to get the project completed.”

“And how are we going to do that?”

“One bridge at a time, Frank.  We’ll improvise.  ‘Play as we go’ kind of thing,” Benton said in an off-hand sort of way, his method of diverting the question.

“You and your games again Benton.  Fine.  So what do you want me to do?”

“I want you to step up Gavin’s training.  Give him tomorrow off, and then start in on him.  I want him ready to go in a week.”

“A week?  That’s a little harsh isn’t it?  I don’t think he’s the type to take kindly to ‘special’ treatment.”

Benton sighed and then looked at Masters, “I need the whole team up as soon as possible.  After this week they will be doing team training exercises.”

“Team exercises?  I think we can get Gavin up to speed without bringing in the rest of the team—“

“No.  There will be team exercises because Gavin will be leading the team.  You have one week to find and fine tune his specialties, and then the next week to get him set as Team Leader.  I fear we don’t have anymore time then that.  And you shouldn’t worry yourself with Gavin, he won’t be your hardest task, I’m afraid.”

“Cassie.”

“Yes,” Benton sighed again.  “She needs to grow up a little more.  I think Gavin can help her in that regard, but not if he’s below her in the pecking order.  Break it to her as an order, and we’ll see how it plays out.”

Masters smirked.  Everything was always a chess game to Benton.  Everything was a tactical positioning of a piece on the board.  Benton was very talented at the game, and that was why he was in charge of this particular project.  “Understood, orders from the top to be carried out and not questioned.”

“Exactly.  Hopefully she’ll understand later that this isn’t a game.  This is war, a war millennia in the making, and if we’re not careful, a war that will break us.  I’ll leave it to you Frank.”

“Yes sir.”

“If you have the time, do you want to start another game?” Benton asked hopefully motioning to the chess board.  Masters smiled his sarcastic grin.