Spots: After-Action with Aliens

A Web Serial by M.C.A. Hogarth

34. Slow Repairs.	36. Desperate Quarters.

35. After-Action with Aliens

Claws and Spots are passed through security and directed to the Testing Facility. Their arrival causes Samuel-Colt to rise.

Samuel-Colt, trilling an agitated rising-and-falling arpeggio. "Mother-soldier? You smell wrong. Are you injured?"

Spots, smiling. "Only slightly. I'll be fine, Samuel-Colt. You wanted to see me?"

Slower trill, soothed. "If the time is not inconvenient. We would like to discuss some footage we were given from your suit."

"Footage?"

Samuel-Colt brings it up on a wall-screen. "If you permit. We would like to ask your reasoning for some of your actions. We wish to refine the shield further."

Spots. "Oh! Sure. Of course."

Interrogative rising trill. "Here. What are you doing?"

Spots squints. "Oh, right, with Fang right in front of the fox-run. I'm shoving them back."

"You appear to be..." The Fiddler pauses, then mimes a jerk of the arm with another interrogative trill. "Flicking? What behavior did you expect?"

Spots. "I... don't know. I just wanted to push them away."

"Was there any significance to the violence of the motion?"

"I... guess I was just in a rush."

Claws. "Hey, go back a moment? Play it again." The Fiddler obliges. "You know... I think you wanted to throw it, Spots."

Spots and Samuel-Colt, the latter with rising arpeggio. "Throw it?"

"Not far." Claws looks around, heads for a target. "Shoving's like this." He pushes into the target, which wobbles. "You see me leanin' into it? You weren't there, look at the cam angle. You were leanin' back. But if you toss it and the shield slides out, just a fraction, then you get more of a snap going. Surprises them, springs 'em back more. All without you having to lean into it, which brings you closer to 'em."

Samuel-Colt, sharp note jumping. "Intriguing! Of course, the shield could not be thrown in a literal sense. But it could slide outward."

Spots. "What if you don't want it to?"

Samuel-Colt, slow sawing notes. "There would have to be a control to activate the movement. Perhaps gestural."

Claws, musing. "Just to make it loose. It could decide the angle of motion just from the motion of your arm, yeah?"

Samuel-Colt. "It could. Would this be sufficiently useful? It is a minor modification, but it would require significant training to use. We would have to retool the entire interface to allow fine control of the breadth, size, permeability and "looseness" of the shield."

Claws glances at Spots. "What do you think?"

Spots frowns. "Come at me?"

Claws. "Come at—oh, right." He steps toward her, deliberate. She twists, arm facing him and stops.

Spots. "I seem to act like it would work. That probably means if it was there, I'd use it. Does that mean we get the cutting edge flicking out? That could be nasty. Like being punched with a razor."

Claws. "I like that idea."

Spots. "Of course, none of it matters if we run out of power. Did they tell you about today, Samuel-Colt?"

"No, Mother-soldier?"

Spots turns to the interface. "Let me find the footage." She brings up the segment where she's using the shield as a wall.

Samuel-Colt, rising trill. "Mother-soldier! Brilliant!"

Claws, droll. "Brilliant until it used up her suit and left her runnin' round in her skivvies."

Samuel-Colt. "Yes, we imagine so. But it can be re-engineered, if we know you are planning to use it so. We were told not to expect you to use it often so we did not allocate much time to its design."

Claws, frowning. "Really?"

Samuel-Colt. "Yes. A... last resort, we were told. Soldiers are gun-users, so we designed appropriately. The shield technology is not old. A year, perhaps."

Spots, curious. "So why did you add it?"

Samuel-Colt. "Because it offers a defensive option."

Claws, chuckling. "Which we're turnin' into an offensive one."

Samuel-Colt, long rising trill. "Truly you are generalists in violence."

Claws. "What now?"

Samuel-Colt spreads his six arms. "All of you are exquisitely adaptable to the protection of yourselves and others. It is admirable, this trait."

Claws. "And you, not so much, is that it? That why we're doin' your fightin' for you?"

Spots. "Claws!"

Claws. "What, no answer for that?"

Samuel-Colt, one sharp note. "I would discuss such things with a peer. But you have not accepted that role."

"I haven't done what?"

Spots, quiet. "The arm, Claws."

Claws. "Oh. Right." Pause. "Well, that's fair. There oughtta be consequences, right?"

Samuel-Colt. "And privileges, yes."

Claws. "But if Spots asked...."

Spots. "That would be cheating." Claws eyes her; her arms are folded. "It is. He's not just a source of information to be milked, Claws. He's the representative of an allied power. An alien one."

Claws glances at Samuel-Colt. "Guess that's so."

Samuel-Colt indicates the the screen with a low drone. "Shall we continue our technology review?"

Claws. "Hell yeah!" Cracks his knuckles. "Designin' my own weapons tech? Hell yeah!"

34. Slow Repairs.	36. Desperate Quarters.