Gods of War (Jethro goes to war Book 5)

by Chris Hechtl

  Sprite checked the entry as Fletcher shook his head. Technically, the new Mars was correct, though he had rewritten the last statement. It was somehow fitting to her though so she ignored it.

  “Whatever floats your boat as some like to say. I think the kilt is a bit much,” Fletcher said dryly.

  “It is a Tunica with a Baltea,” Mars said haughtily.

  “Sure it is,” Fletcher said. “Nice legs,” he said, pretending to check out the A.I.'s lower limbs.

  “Behave,” Sprite replied reprovingly. “You obviously need time to integrate and introduce yourself to your partner. Happy Birthday,” she said with a nod.

  “Why thank you,” Mars replied with a return nod. “Point of clarification, do I hold the same rank as my organic partner?”

  “Currently no. That is up for discussion at the moment,” Sprite replied. The A.I. blinked at her as he grew hair and then morphed it into a martial cut. He even grew a beard, but kept it neat and clean. His helmet grew a red crest of simulated horse hair. “Don't go there. You were just born and never attended the academy. Nor have you had time in the various grades.”

  “Agreed,” Fletcher replied. “We'll discuss the issue with Admiral Irons. I understand Bast holds no rank at all,” he stated.

  “That is because they are inherited. It is a complicated problem. Unfortunately, we don't have the full dialog or history files on the Cadre, nor info on how the Justice Department handled this issue,” Sprite said, letting her emotional modulator stick a little exasperation and annoyance in her tone of voice. “Just another vacancy in or understanding that we have to find a way to fill. One among many,” she stated. “For the time being, you are to operate under the UCMJ and classify yourself as a warrant officer. Since you are technically a secret entity, you are not to interact or pull rank on other beings until we get the rank situation sorted out. Here are your access keys and security clearances,” she said, transmitting them to him in a burst. “When we know what your rank is, we will finalize that as well,” she said.

  “Understood,” Mars said as he morphed his Roman Galea into a Cadre style helmet but with the red crested plume on top. He put it on. His eyes shined reddish gold behind the visor. “I'm ready,” he said, then yawned. He then started to shrink.

  “You only think you are. Good luck,” Fletcher said as he withdrew.

  Sprite remained to watch the A.I. as he shrank down to the final form of a human toddler. The adult uniform didn't fit anymore. She snorted at the imagery. “Agreed,” Sprite said as she too withdrew.

  <)>^<)>/

  “Mars, eh?” Captain Lyon asked tiredly as he eyed the little guy on his HUD. He saw the figure blink, then he had to snort. “I think he looks like another figure from history, Marvin the Martian. So, I think I'll call him that.”

  “You don't get a say in it, sir,” Lieutenant Fletcher said as Admiral Irons fought a grin.

  Captain Lyon watched as the little figure glared owlishly at him from under the oversized crested helmet. “Oh, don't I? They've been picking these names but some need to be earned,” he pointed out. So, Marvin,” he said with a slight malicious smirk. “I think it's time we got to know each other.” He couldn't help but yawn. “After our nap,” he said.

  “Yes, sir. Mandatory downtime to integrate,” Lieutenant Fletcher stated.

  “Right,” Admiral Irons drawled as he patted the captain on the shoulder. “Good night, Josh, Marvin,” he said then snickered.

  “You are so not helping, sir,” Protector laughed, “but we did warn him.”

  “How so?” Admiral Irons asked as the nurse wheeled the gurney away.

  “He originally wanted Ares,” the A.I. stated. “Ares 2.0 to be precise. We tried to reason with him, but he's a tad stubborn like his host. He reasoned Ares was misunderstood. I think he wanted to reform the original name and the original's image. He eventually settled on Mars.”

  “Well, I think he'll learn to regret the name choice for a while,” the admiral smirked. “You don't happen to have an image of what he looks like now, do you?”

  Protector helpfully projected an image of the new A.I. on the holotable.

  “Marvin indeed,” Admiral Irons chuckled. “Where's my earth-shattering kaboom?” he said in a falsetto voice. Jethro couldn't help but chuckle at the admiral's antics.

  Protector looked at Lieutenant Fletcher and Commander Sprite. Commander Sprite rolled her virtual eyes and sent him a series of clips from an ancient cartoon.

  “Gotta love it,” Jethro said. “Teams have annoying team names too. You live up to them or never live them down. Curious how he'll handle it.”

  “He is stubborn and has pride. It will be tricky,” Commander Sprite cautioned.

  “Not a great combination to work with, but it will be up to the captain,” the warrant said. “And as he said, if Mars wants the full name he's going to have to earn it. That should be interesting,” he said.

  “An interesting psychological ploy,” Commander Sprite said with a nod. “We shall indeed see.”

  <)>^<)>/

  “I want to go shopping at some place other than the Commissary or BX,” Red whined, flicking her fluffy bush of a tail. Jethro grimaced but then nodded. He'd promised he'd spend time with her for the weekend, and since it was her day, she had a right to want to go someplace special. Given that it was close to her birthday and her grades had picked up, not to mention her chores, he decided to humor her.

  “Window shop you mean?” he asked, eying her. She flicked her ears and tail, then grabbed his handpaw and dragged him, or at least tried to drag him, out of his chair. A wrestling match ensued where he lifted her up off the ground.

  Finally, she gave in and stomped her foot when he set her back down. “You promised!”

  “Okay, okay,” he sighed heavily. He got up and then sent a signal to the base vehicle pool that he needed a vehicle. “We're staying local though,” he growled as he got an electronic day pass. “And don't think about filling up on fried bugs at that so-called restaurant you like,” he said. She flicked her ears but then gave him her best innocent expression. He snorted.

  <)>^<)>/

  “Nothing again. This is a … wait a minute,” Bob drawled. “Wait, wait, just a second. Yup, brown sedan, headed out the main gate with a black cat driving it. I can't see … now I can. Small passenger next to him in the passenger seat. We've got movement,” he said, sounding elated.

  “Tail them and I'll meet you when they stop,” Larry ordered. “I'm getting dressed now.”

  “I thought you were working?”

  “I swapped shifts,” Larry said.

  “Then how were you going to cover your shift?” Bob demanded as he walked to his motorcycle and started it up. He revved the engine, kicked the kickstand free, and then switched gears. He started off slow but then picked up speed as he let off the brake and twisted the accelerator.

  “Bob, don't tell me you are on your motorcycle. That thing is about as subtle as a sledgehammer,” Larry growled.

  “Okay, I won't tell you,” Bob quipped as he weaved in and out of traffic until he had the target in sight once more.

  <)>^<)>/

  Lil Red lived up to her reputation, dragging Jethro from one store to the next. It was hilarious seeing her try on adult human shoes. It would have been more fun if it had been brief. Unfortunately, he was finding out women had their own sense of time and had a whim of steel. And no amount of whining or griping was going to get him out of the situation he was in.

  She got her way with a few new pieces of clothes as well as her fried bugs. He stuck to a barbeque. She hated anything sticky so he'd given her cash and then they'd met outside and had eaten in the light afternoon breeze. He'd even dashed a bit of hot sauce on her bare shoulder, forcing her to lick it off, then grimace at the taste. “That is soo mean!” she scolded as her long tongue worked at the fur on her shoulder. “You know that stuff stains!” she complained as he chuckled. She glowered at him to at least stifle his unse
emly giggles then went back to the real work of cleaning herself.

  They went and watched a movie after that, then walked the mall for a fourth and fifth time before Red had had enough. She yawned and started to look for a place to curl up so he led her back to the car. In the parking lot, she ended up leaning against him so much that he scooped her up and carried her the rest of the way. By the time he got her to the car, she was out like a light and didn't even notice when he unlocked and opened the car, then set her down and buckled her in.

  <)>^<)>/

  “We're doing this,” Bob said firmly.

  “Bob, are you insane? We can't go off half-cocked!” Larry complained.

  “We're not waiting. Damn it, do you want to wait another month or more. Have him get deployed off world and have our time wasted? They don't pay us for wasting our time, just fulfilling the contract, remember? So, we do it.”

  “Bob, we're really going out on a limb here,” Larry warned.

  Bob snorted. “No, we're not. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission. We'll do a simple drive-by. He's in an unarmored vehicle. You swoop and squat, I'll pass him and air out his car. Easy peasy,” Bob said. “In and out. He's so distracted by being tired he won't know what hit him. I already checked the car; it's not armored. Basic piece of shit sedan.”

  Larry grimaced. When he didn't say anything for a full minute, Bob glared at him. “Well?” Bob demanded.

  “Okay, okay,” Larry sighed as he climbed into his truck. “We better move; he's already on his way home,” he warned.

  <)>^<)>/

  Bast had tapped into the mall's security system relatively easily. She'd done it before and had left a door for her to access. She didn't have a lot of spare processing power so she used the mall's system to run a bot to monitor Jethro's vehicle and Jethro himself.

  She'd been focused on Jethro and anyone in his proximity. But when she reviewed the bot's findings, it had noted twenty points in time when someone came near the vehicle and two when someone actually touched it.

  The first time chop showed a woman swinging her vehicle door too wide. It hit the door of the sedan, and then the woman checked for damage before she left her vehicle.

  The second was a bald human examining the vehicle. That was alarming. It could be a car thief though. She tapped into the car's Wi-Fi to punch a signal to the mall to track the bald male. She found him with a facial and body recognition and tracking bot. He went back to a truck and motorcycle parked on the edge of the parking lot.

  She reviewed Jethro's visual memory and noted the two had been near or watching them. But neither had set off a flag until that moment.

  She checked and noted that the duo had left after they had left.

  She made a report to ONI. Just as she sent it, the truck passed Jethro.

  “We've got company. Alert!” she said in Jethro's ears. She sent a jolt of adrenalin to his blood stream.

  <)>^<)>/

  Jethro roused to full alertness as the truck passed. When Bast passed on the warning, he instinctively looked around for a threat, then hunched down over the wheel. “Where?”

  “The truck in front and a motorcycle several cars back,” Bast warned, highlighting both. Traffic was light on the evening road. When the truck braked, Jethro braked as well easing into it instead of stomping on the brakes.

  “The motorcycle is accelerating! He is drawing a weapon from a holster!” Bast warned as Jethro checked his mirrors.

  “Frack,” Jethro said as he realized the bald human had something in his right hand and was trying to pull alongside of him.

  “Oh no, you didn't,” he said swerving suddenly. The swerve cut the motorcycle off.

  <)>^<)>/

  Bob had one moment to see the sudden flash of brown, then his bike hit the front fender and he went flying over the handlebars. He flipped end over end to hit the pavement under Larry's truck. Then the rear wheels of the deuce bounced over him, crushing him.

  <)>^<)>/

  Larry felt the bounce as he hit something. He had been checking his mirrors carefully so he'd seen Bob's approach and the sudden swerve that had thrown their plan off. “Frack!” he muttered as he let off the brake and popped the truck into a higher gear. The truck's transmission made a horrible grinding noise and the gears slipped. “Come on, not now, not now!” he said desperately as he lost speed.

  He felt the truck buck, then the engine revved up. His speed dropped as he ground the gears. A police vehicle that had seen the accident came tearing up opposite him. He swore and kept grinding the gears right up until he felt something pop in the engine. He looked up as all his engine readings went dead.

  “What the hell? Someone seriously doesn't like me!” he snarled as his truck sputtered to a halt.

  <)>^<)>/

  Jethro grinned as he climbed out of the sedan. Bast had sent a signal to the cop, and the cop had tripped his localized EMP to stop the truck. The sedan was also dead but that was a minor concern. He glanced over to the body and hoped and prayed Bast had been right.

  The cop looked at him, but he pointed to the truck and then hand-signed weapon. The cop who happened to be a Marine reservist nodded slowly and then went to the truck. “Driver, let me see your hands!” he snarled, one hand on his weapon as he cautiously approached the vehicle.

  <)>^<)>/

  Larry saw the cop approaching. He was tempted to shoot his way out; one flatfoot wasn't too much of a challenge after all. But then he noted the cat watching and then noted another police vehicle with its lights flashing come up and park behind him.

  He could bluff his way out, but since they were coming after him, he knew he was hosed. They'd sweat him to try to get whatever they could out of him. He'd heard the military had some nasty ways of making someone talk too. If they didn't kill him in the process, the Guild certainly would.

  That left only one option. “Frack,” he muttered as he pulled his right incisor cap off and then let a small cylinder fall onto his tongue. He bit down onto it and then swallowed.

  He instantly went into convulsions as the poisons did their job.

  <)>^<)>/

  The cop took one look in the cab of the truck, then eased the door open and then stepped aside as the body flopped out. He cuffed it anyway, just to be sure, and then checked for a pulse. He looked up and shook his head, then radioed it in.

  “This is getting old,” Jethro said as they waited for an NCIS agent to arrive to take his report and take custody of the scene.

  “This is why it is dangerous to be around those you love, especially your family,” Bast retorted.

  He nodded as he looked at Red. She'd slept through it all. He wasn't happy about that reminder though.

  <)>^<)>/

  An agent and two no-nonsense MPs arrived to pick them up. They transferred a sleeping Red to their vehicle and then cleared the scene. Jethro felt Bast transmit her report to the NCIS agent. He softly described what had happened several times as they rode back to base.

  When Jethro finally got home, he was wary of a trap. On edge he had Bast scan the entire premises for anything out of the ordinary. When she declared it all clear, he went in and found a dozing Red on the couch. He hugged the sleepy kitten, waking her. “Go to bed.”

  “What? What happened?”

  “Just needed a hug. Go to bed. You've got school in the morning.”

  “Okay, okay,” she said, looking over her shoulder to him. “Sheesh,” she grumbled but then yawned and went back to bed.

  <)>^<)>/

  Ox, Riley, and Gunny Z'v'll came up with new tech toys for the Cadre in-between fine tuning the suits and working on the stack of parts with the team. They included a proper jet pack, remote drones, heavy weapons, melee weapons like a monomolecular axe Ox favored, a new shield design, camo nets, and other battlefield tools and toys.

  Some of the ideas were their own; some came up from the team after watching some of the media files on armored combat. A few of the ideas came from the Lemnos files.
Ox and Riley fully intended to bring whatever they could over to the Marine and Army powered armor units to help them as well. Tungulria argued that the Cadre needed the edge, but Jethro waved him off. “Whatever helps our boys and girls survive, I'm all for it. Yes, we need an edge. We've got several,” he said, extending the monomolecular force blade Ox had installed in his left gauntlet in place of the laser that had been there. That idea had been pitched by Admiral Irons of all people.

  They even found the blueprints for an upgraded hyperspace pod for insertion from hyper directly to a planet. The Lemnos prototype was untested of course, but the fact that the notes said it was an upgrade on an existing design told the engineers that it had been done before. Done successfully Ox repeatedly said.

  There were no volunteers to try the insertion method however.

  “So, now what?”

  “According to the overall Cadre plan, we've now completed Phase I. The problem is, they haven't figured out the funding for Phase II and we've gone seriously over budget in a couple of places. Loosing Kim and Bernie also puts us two people down,” Jethro said. “Right now we can train and tinker until the brass figures out if they want to kick us into Phase II,” he said.

  “Phase II is?” Sylvia asked.

  “Phase II is where we start the permanent base while expanding the Cadre from our core group here,” Jethro said, indicating the group. “We'll also be live, so small teams who meet combat certification will be sent to hot spots to stomp them out,” he said.

  “Hot diggity! I am all for that,” Sylvia said flexing her armored hands.

  “Yeah, well, it's up in the air. We're an investment remember,” Jethro said with a shake of his head. “We are the core personnel to create new Cadre—the seed.”

  “Seeds need watering and room to grow,” Tungulria said.

  “True,” Jethro said. “And since there are so few of us, I'm all for exploring the ideas. We may not be able to build many of the parts out of our current budget, but any we find we can take up to a full blueprint phase. Possibly even a virtual model and virtually tested if we can swing it,” Jethro said.