TKG08 WE WILL BUILD Rel 01 (20 page)

“Not only her, but John or Eric or Dan or Ecaterina or Gabrielle or my team and now, for you.”

Cheryl Lynn closed her eyes and Pete noticed one small tear making its way down her cheek.

TQB Base, Colorado - USA

Kevin and Lance looked over the digital map of the emplacements surrounding the base with Stephanie, the new head of the Engineering group.
 
Stephanie was big, bold and boisterous which almost succeeded in hiding the treasure-chest of knowledge she possessed.

Kevin had found that out early and had used her expertise to great effect.

She was very much a woman though, and it was distracting Kevin.
 
Now he had a taste of what Lance must have gone through with Patricia, at some level.
 
Stephanie was of African American and Japanese descent and Kevin was trying to focus on her engineering abilities, not her other attributes, and it was becoming a stone-cold bitch to accomplish.

His data on the three possible replacements had been restricted, except for their skill sets.
 
Bethany Anne had provided him candidates with the exact skills he had requested, but she said she wanted to go to another country to find candidates with those skills.

Fluent in Japanese, Stephanie was considered ‘hafu’ or half-blood in Japan. Stephanie had decided to stop trying to beat her head against Japan’s homogeneity and had opted to work for a company in New Zealand instead. That company had contracts with the military, allowing her to produce an impressive resume.
 
Her job in Wellington was where Frank and ADAM had found her.

When Stephanie had gone for the interview, she had been surprised to find a beautiful young woman was obviously in charge of the meeting.
 
A young looking man, that the woman had slipped and called ‘dad’ a couple of times, seemed to be the one with the field knowledge.

She thought that Lance was some kind of ‘really’ close friend, until another man had joined them some ten minutes later, and DAMN! He was a looker.
 
She was considering what a nice package he made, until Bethany Anne kissed him after the two men had shaken hands.
 
It wasn’t a chaste kiss, but it wasn’t inappropriate for a meeting either, and it sent a message that this man was taken.

Some women have all the damned luck, she thought.

During the interview, Bethany Anne fired questions at Stephanie which were significantly out of the norm.
 
It was almost like Bethany Anne was testing on the fly and using the out of the box questions for her follow-up questions.
 
Michael - as he was introduced - didn’t say much, but would ask an odd question from time to time, almost like he had his own agenda.
 

All of Michael’s questions had to do with ethics, morality and various dilemmas one might find themselves facing.
 
Right before it was time for coffee and dessert, he begged off and Bethany Anne told him she would catch up with him later if that was ok.

By his smile, Stephanie figure, it was
better
than ok

Stephanie did grin to herself.
 
She wasn’t used to being upstaged, and now she understood why some women could be snippy to her.
 
Right now, she wanted to be snippy with Bethany Anne, who had only been generous and gracious to Stephanie this whole evening.

Well, she had to focus on what would absolutely sell her. That was her qualifications in engineering, and her history of engineering wizardry.
 
Her efforts to prove her qualifications were proving to be a cold bitch, too.
 

It was almost like Bethany Anne had an engineering testing group inside her head throwing questions at her.
 
Pretty soon, the challenge of answering those questions focused her attention, and she forgot all about anything else but the challenges. It became a competition to see if she could engineer her way out of the hypothetical situations thrown at her.

Bethany Anne would pose a question. Then Stephanie would request details about the landscape or other resources she would have available. On most occasions, Lance would answer those questions.
 
By dessert, she knew two things: the first was that she was mentally exhausted! This had been unlike any other interview she had ever attended, and she had been to some very challenging interviews in Japan.
 
The second was that she ended up wanting - no needing - to impress the hell out of Bethany Anne.

Stephanie had always wanted to work for a woman, and she desperately wanted this woman to be the one.

A little while after Michael left, they ordered dessert and spent another hour just chatting. This provided the opportunity for Stephanie to ask her own questions.
 
It was at this time Stephanie learned that Lance was responsible for overseeing a portfolio of more than a thousand companies.

That was the first bomb-shell.
 
The second was that Bethany Anne owned all of them.

She really, really wanted to work for this woman.

They had already interviewed one man from Great Britain and still had another candidate to interview in India.

Two days later she received a call officially offering her the position.
 
She didn’t scream, she didn’t jump up and down or yell.
 
She simply turned, closed the door to her engineering office, and locked her door.
 
Then, she took two steps to her desk, sat in the chair, put her head on her desk and let the tears of joy pool underneath her eyes.

Someone wanted her brain and her skills.

Period.

Now, Kevin was asking for her opinion on base enhancements. She was having to use all of her experience, and a shit-load of creative genius, to provide solutions to those issues.
 
Considering that many of the issues Kevin had were similar to the questions she had answered during the interview, Stephanie was impressed. It was a pretty slick way to make sure she could handle the job. Give her the exact problems they wanted resolved and see if she could provide workable solutions.

Apparently, she could.

First,
they began by discussing layered defenses for targeting human trespass, then motion activated cameras to help detect incoming drones.
Then, fast reaction teams would be put in place which Kevin said Bethany Anne would provide.

Those fast-reaction teams would be required to visually identify targets and cover any blind spots.
 
Kevin mentioned they would start running exercises to see if their own teams could penetrate the current defenses. They would use that data to make modifications where needed.

Stephanie agreed that time spent gathering data was seldom wasted.

Then, they considered a scenario of being overrun by civilians trying to acquire medical compounds that could only be found on the base.
 
She addressed the civilian issue and related how she wanted to channel people into smaller areas. Areas where it would be obvious that going forward would be a really bad idea.
 

Whether it was sonic noise projectors, glue guns, or something more devastating. She made sure that should anyone decide retreat was a better solution, they would always have the option. It’s never a good idea to make people choose between fighting or dying.

Then, they reviewed options for hiding medical support out in the fields for fast reaction times. Their own people would be the priority, then any of the attackers who might need assistance.

“After looking at the power output of the new emplacements, I believe we can effectively run twelve emplacements. Two here, two here, three more on this ridge, three covering this valley and two more on that side of the ridge.” Stephanie pointed to different areas of the base.
 
“Have you considered the sheer devastation those things are going to create?”

Kevin nodded slowly, “Yes. Unfortunately, they are going to make pulp out of any human and depending on the charge, they can go through armored units as well.
 
They will be our last resort, but we should have advanced warning if anything bigger is coming.”

“Why?”
 
Stephanie asked curiously, “Do you have people on the inside?”

“No, well not any people anyway.
 
We have access to strategic communication networks where orders would flow.
 
It isn’t a hundred percent, but it’s good enough we feel confident we will have some notice. How are we going to maintain command and control of our emplacements?” Kevin asked.

“We’ll use transceivers routed through the Etheric. Those will connect to AGILITY and allow us complete command from the base.”

“Is there any way to override those things?” Kevin pressed.

“Are you asking if we can shut them down, or are you asking if someone else could gain control of them?” Stephanie asked.

“Well,” Kevin started scratching under his chin while looking at the digital display, “I am concerned they could be hacked by somebody.”

Stephanie laughed, “I don’t think anyone is going to be able to hack AGILITY at this point.”
 

Stephanie had a previous meeting, or conference call if you will, with ADAM a couple of days back. It took her a while to realize she was talking with an artificial intelligence. She had been ‘read in’ by Bethany Anne and been part of an orientation like none she had ever experienced. Not only had the CEO of the company taken her into outer space, said CEO almost made her pee in her pants with fright at the same time. Now, she had a much better understanding of the capabilities and the goals of the group. Stephanie had been silly enough to ask why she was trusted with this information. It did not surprise her to find out that Michael had read her mind. At this point, after traveling to outer space and finding out the ‘big boss’ was a vampire, something as simple as telepathy was pretty easy to swallow.

Kevin grinned, “Yeah, I figured as much, but I didn’t want to get into another I.T. discussion with Tom about his new baby. He might superglue me to a chair so he can wax poetic all afternoon.”

Stephanie smirked, “Is that why you keep trying to miss him in the meetings?”

Kevin replied, “I am not trying to miss him, I am merely trying to keep my own personal schedule on track. My job is to run this base, not understand what’s caused Tom to have a woody that morning.” It took Kevin about three seconds before his brain caught up to his mouth. Once he realized what he had said, his cheeks turned beet red.

It only took Stephanie two seconds to start laughing so hard she could barely breathe.

Finally, Kevin began laughing as well, and he realized that Stephanie had become less ‘attractive female,’ and more ‘one of the people on his team,’ in his mind.
 
Just one of the people in his group whose job, in this particular case, was to make his area of responsibility secure.

—

John Grimes walked into the cafeteria and paused a moment to locate his cousin, who was seated in a corner. He waved at one of the security guys from the front gate, who nodded back to him, before John continued walking towards Cheryl Lynn.

He was within a couple of tables when she looked up and noticed him coming, and gave him her patented ‘cousin smile.’

Oh, shit!
he thought.
I’m going to catch it now.

She pointed to the chair across from her and said, “Why don’t you take a seat, dear cousin of mine?”

“Don’t mind if I do, Cheryl Lynn.” John smiled at her. His smile was interrupted when her eyes squinted and her mouth compressed together and he felt her kick him hard in the knee!

John clamped down on his teeth so he didn’t let out a rude exclamation. He said through clenched teeth, “I hope that was enough?”

Cheryl Lynn leaned forward, “Did I need to be passed around from person to person to get the point?”

John leaned back, still acting as if her kick was hurting him. He didn’t need to let her know that his body had already dealt with the pain. “If it helps your pride a little bit, I was subjected to ass-kicking’s all week long from Bethany Anne.”

“Good!” She exclaimed. Then her face became concerned, “Why was she kicking your ass?”

John leaned forward and put his elbows on the table, “Because she is an impatient sort of person and she wanted her assistant available, not on some wild goose chase.”

“Then why did you have me doing that? Is it that you felt I needed to find this out for myself?”

“That.” John pointed at her, “Is exactly what you needed to do. Don’t tell me if I had just told you ‘this is important,’ that it would be as meaningful to you as it is right now. Would it? Because if that’s the case, not only have I caused myself an unnecessary week of grief, but you’ve changed since we were kids.”