TKG08 WE WILL BUILD Rel 01 (34 page)

“Don’t forget full of trees, mud, few people and no infrastructure where we are.”
 
William added.

“Then why Paraguay?”

“Boss says it has two things we need.
 
First, Paraguay is not part of the Outer Space Treaty, second is all of that shit I just mentioned.
 
Her logic is if we want it nice, warm and comfy we should probably build this shit in a horrible location to test it out.”

“Then I would think under water is a good choice.”
 
He retorted.

“God, don’t say that out loud!”
 
William looked around in alarm.

“What? Why?” He followed suit and didn’t see anyone within a few hundred feet of them.

“You might give her ideas, that’s why!”
 
William replied.

“Wait, you said ‘she’, I thought Jeffrey was our boss.” Michael asked.

“He is, but everything, and I mean everything, eventually goes through Bethany Anne.”
 
William said.

“A real ball-buster?” Michael asked.

“Dude, I’ll give you this one chance because you are new. Every one of us you will be working with respect the hell out of that woman.
 
So, we joke a lot, but we absolutely do not make rude jokes about Bethany Anne.
 
Are we clear?”

Michael nodded.

“Ok.
 
I’ll answer that question because in a way she is.
 
It is not outside the realm of possibility she could tell us to pack our shit up and go up to the moon in 24 hours.”
 
William said.

“Ok, now you have to be shitting me!” Michael laughed.

“You’re right.” William grinned as Michael relaxed just a little, “She would probably give us 48 hours since you’re new.”

Once again, Michael couldn’t tell if William was joking or not.

William crushed his hope by adding, “No joking, so the faster we fix our problems, the faster we are going to be prepared for the eventuality that Bethany Anne is going to tell us to go up ahead of schedule, understand?”
 

Michael started to realize that he wasn’t in a normal corporation.
 
“Hey, you suggested I use something besides ‘Michael’.
 
Was the other Michael with Jeffrey the reason?”
 
William nodded his response. “He didn’t seem so bad.
 
He barely asked any questions.”

William turned to face Michael, “Let me give you some free advice.
 
That man is the scariest mother-fucker you have ever run into.
 
He is being ‘good’ right now because he is trying to be good and he’s got a hot girl-friend he is working hard to change for, I think.
 
But you never want to be in a cage with a tiger, no matter how tame you think they are.
 
I’d rather just slit my own throat than be on his shit list and I’d go with him anywhere.
 
Whatever you do, tell the truth, never say you will do something you won’t try to do, and for God’s sake, don’t be rude to the man.”

“Why?
 
Does he have a short temper?”
 

William looked like he was trying to figure out a way to explain a truth that was hard to believe. “Some of us believe you can put a polite face on a tiger, but the tiger is still a tiger down to his tail.
 
Especially the older they are and that man is the oldest of all.
 
He is literally death walking.”

“He looked like he could be in late twenties or early thirties.”

“What did his eyes look like?” William asked.
 

Michael considered that for a while before he answered, “Ancient, actually.”

William just nodded and changed the subject again.
 
“So, what can we call you until the renaming party?”
 

“You are really serious about this?”
 
Michael’s English accent started to get more pronounced.
 
Seeing William nod he shrugged, “I guess ‘Mr. Penn’ can work for now, at least there I have my initials in the name.”

“Ok, Master P it is and thanks.
 
We will tell you the story of Pendergrass later.
 
However, to make it up to you, I’ll get you involved in a Team BMW special event.”

“Ok?”
 
Michael wasn’t sure how Mr. Penn became Master P, but he wasn’t surprised a minute later when William shortened it again.

“So, P, what are your thoughts on gambling?”
 
William smiled like he was about to setup ‘P’ and Michael would walk right into it willingly.

Michael stood there for a moment before answering, “I’ve been known to make a wager before, I’m into speed so winning is in my blood.”

“Ok,” William continued, “So how about we bet that I can make your ass tighten up so fast from a speed run you wouldn’t be able to push a BB out?”

Ok, now William had P’s complete attention. “A little crude I’d say, but I’m down with speed. I can’t possibly see how you would prove anything.”

William started walking back towards the lair.
 
“Come with me.
 
And the how is we will setup a gauge to tell how hard you are gripping and how tightly you are squeezing it.”
 
William made sure P was with him and listening, “Then, I’m going to make your orientation a little test to see if you become ‘little p’ or ‘big P’ for the next week.”

“And if I don’t want to take you up on your bet?”
 

William smiled, “Then the hazing name begins with ‘yellow’!”

Bugger me, Michael thought, I walked right into that!

--

By the end of the week, ‘little p’ was focused on getting the boxes to connect in the middle of a torrential rain and eighty mile-an-hour winds.
 
“Gott Verdammt!”
 
He had starting using the team’s curse words as his own. He and his team were watching the video monitors intently.
 
Bethany Anne had arrived a few days back with them in Paraguay and asked why the hell were they checking the boxes for connection out in the rain?
 
Were they going to be outside on the moon?
 
P hung his head, then jumped on the phone with William and worked out a new design for video to help align the containers properly to make a larger base.
 

Bethany Anne hadn’t been around long, but she was exactly the force of nature that William had claimed she was.
 

His already long days went into overdrive and everyone got the feeling their schedules were going to be shortened.
 
Penn had screwed up a connection two days ago and had then engineered a modified connector. This would allow for some slop when first connecting but then facilitate alignment as the two units got closer together.

Finally, they felt the ‘chunk’ of the seal in the master control module.
 
When Bethany Anne left, the whole team got together and ‘TOTFM’, (threw out the fucking manual). Then decided it was all test it right or die from then on.
 
They pulled out the connected modules and refitted them with the new connectors William sent them.
 
Afterward, they moved every container at least a hundred feet from each other.

Then, they would move the master command module in the center and start moving all of the additional containers into place allowing the specially programmed computer hookups to finish their connections.
 
One person in each team would be in the box to see if they could ‘feel’ any glitches that didn’t show up on any of their sensors.
 

At one point, they had a noise that Kris mentioned. They checked the connector and found it had suffered from some mud getting into the grooves.

Bobcat came down and focused on the safety of the crew as they pushed forward. He stopped them one time and forced everyone to take ten hours of downtime.

Penn came over to Bobcat who was watching the speed as the seven containers were being tested. “Hey,” Penn asked, “I think we need another test.”

Bobcat looked up, “Me too, all the way until Bethany Anne won’t give us the time.”

Penn shook his head, “Not what I’m talking about.
 
I’m thinking we need to do this on the south pole.”

“Just everyone takes a container and go?” Bobcat asked.

“Pretty much.
 
Wait until it’s dark and we go.
 
If we can do this down there, it will test if we have contraction problems due to freezing temperatures.”

Bobcat scratched his chin, “That seems solid. What about under water?”

“We have the new suits to test outside in space, but I’d rather just try that up above rather than in atmosphere.”

Bobcat nodded, “Ok, that’s what Bethany Anne wanted the whole time. Let’s pull everyone together and see if we can think of anything to make sure we are prepared for a bad result.
 
Also, extra Pods in case we need to Evac someone to a doctor, quickly.”

Bobcat smiled over to Penn, “Alright Big P, let’s make this happen!”

Michael smiled to himself as he turned to call out to his group. He just got upgraded!

Dan’s Office - QBS Polarus, Mediterranean

>>Bethany Anne?<<

Yes, ADAM.

>>I’ve been running tests and reviewing the files of the different countries on their efforts to plan for attacking and defending their cyber-assets.<<

You found their war-gaming plans?

>>Yes.
 
I found them to be very complete and surprisingly creative.
 
There are some plans I had not considered. <<

Such as?

>>The explosion of nuclear weapons to cause a massive EMP effect thus shutting down all electronic capabilities. <<

Not to mention the death and destruction of the people.
 
Fucking countries are all ready to blow each other up a million different ways.

>>I believe humans call it mutually assured destruction.<<

Yes, they do.
 
If any one country feels that they can incapacitate the other country sufficiently with ‘acceptable’ damages for their own side it becomes a command decision.
 
The worst choice is for the Islamist State to have this ability.

>>Because of their willingness to implement this solution?<<

Partially.
 
Part of it is they don’t have an infrastructure to incapacitate so no harm comes to them.
 
Can’t suffer from cyber-attacks if you have no computers in the first place.
 
The next reason, is unlike China, Russia or the US, the Islamist State is under the aegis of a deity to do what they need to do.
 
I’m pretty sure that the other countries do worry about their people and so they seek advantage through all means, but realize to truly destabilize the other countries is a bad solution.
 
The Islamist State doesn’t give a rat’s ass as they believe, incorrectly, their holy book says this is what they need to do to attain heaven.

>>What would you do to change it?<<

You mean if I had time on my side?
 
I’d probably become the ultimate assassin and start taking heads one at a time.
 
Those asses really piss me off.

“Bethany Anne?”
 
Dan said again.

“Sorry Dan, ADAM grabbed my attention.
 
Rude on my side.”
 
Bethany Anne replied.

“I hadn’t noticed much until your eyes dipped into the red for just a second.”
 
Dan said curiously, “What was that about?”

“Fucking terrorists.”
 
She shrugged, “I still don’t have my ‘mad’ out.
 
But that’s for another time, or maybe not again.
 
Tell me about this op.”

“Your group is setting up to go into a warehouse in lower Shanghai.
 
We have eyes on a large enough group and a positive match for Kimiko Kana. The five want to drop right on top of them and repel down the roof and into the windows from above as quickly as possible.”