Proving True: A Sonia MacTaggert Novel

by Robert Culp

  “One hour, sir,” DuQuois says. “She can be ready in an hour.” Oh, how I hate this bitch!

  STEALTH TRIAL

  An hour later, the First Officer, Mitra, Freddie, DuQuois and I are on the hangar deck. Two of my assistants brought the wraith armor from the workshop for the experiment. Mitra has some detection equipment. Freddie is in Strike Armor with a standard issue assault rifle with the general optic/Doppler sighting system and a holstered side arm. “Commander,” I ask the First Mate. “I’m concerned at the presence of the rifle, the wraith armor will not survive a strike from one of those rounds.” And by extension, neither would the person wearing it.

  “Have no fear, Miss MacTaggert,” he says. “Staff Sergeant Call will not engage you with the rifle, it is here only for the sighting system.”

  Freddie breaks open the rifle and removes the bolt assembly, “Here you go, Squats.” He hands the bolt to me and shows me the empty chamber of the rifle. He could lock in as many magazines as he wanted and the weapon wouldn’t fire. Unless he puts another bolt into it, it’s a very expensive flyswatter. I drop the bolt into a thigh cargo pocket after my assistants help me put the wraith armor on. The SoniArmor requires the operator to get naked before putting on the interior single-suit before donning the armor. I had the foresight to put on the undergarment in my stateroom.

  I make a quick visual check, all of the connectors are where they should be, power is flowing. “Wraith is ready for evaluation,” I tell them.

  I will never get used to the sight of the muzzle of an assault rifle being aimed at me. The barrel appears to be wide enough to stand upright in. “I have her,” Freddie says, looking at me through the sight. Thankfully, the way he’s holding it his hand is nowhere near the trigger. I know the rifle can’t hurt me. I know Freddie won’t hurt me. But it’s still disconcerting.

  “So do I,” Mitra reports, never looking away from her detection equipment.

  “Miss MacTaggert,” says the XO, “if you will go to the far end of the room, we will begin the evaluation. Chief DuQuois, you’re with me.” As I walk to the far end of the room, the XO and the Supervisor From The Lowest Level of All the Hells take up places to either side of the personnel door we used to enter the room. A screen has been erected for me to hide behind. I stand to one side of it.

  “I still have you, Mitra still has you,” Freddie tells me over the comLink. “The XO says get behind the screen and get ready.”

  I step behind the screen, “Freddie, tell the XO I’m in place please.”

  “Wilco, Squats.” There’s a lag for a few minutes while communication is relayed, the strike armor has a low volume public address system so the trooper doesn’t have to open his visor to communicate with people around him. I can hear, but not understand what Freddie says but at this distance I can’t hear what is said to him. “Sonia, power your system,” I hear him say over the comLink.

  The control unit is located on the inside of my left forearm. I press the button to direct the energy flow to the stealth grid. The outline of my arm gets distorted, fuzzy. “Power is applied,” I tell Freddie. “Indicators are normal I am now on listening silence.” I make the appropriate changes on my control unit, basically muting my microphone. At least I hope I do, I can’t see the controls clearly. Most who use a system like this don’t need to see what they’re doing, but for newbies like me, we may need to reconfigure the system. Because it's not only the controls on my forearm that are blurry; everything is blurry. It's like there are no solid, straight lines on the hangar deck anymore.

  I hear his static laden reply. “Roger, be advised you’re coming in very broken and distorted. Mitra says that’s to be expected.” That means the distortion field is working!

  There’s another delay while he relays my message. “Okay, Sonia, lights out.” The distortion to Freddie’s voice; given what’s happened usually I’m not surprised by it, but I wasn’t expecting it. The overhead lights go out, one by one, darkness starts at one end of the room and marches steadily across the flight deck. “Whenever you’re ready,” he says.

  Freddie knows where the blind is, to try to make things difficult for him I drop to my belly and crawl from the screen to one of the parked shuttles. I’m not cheating; no one told me I had to always be in line of sight. In my headset, I hear Freddie, “With the audio detectors I hear her moving, I don’t see anything, I got no shot.” I skirt around the shuttle and come back to their primary field of observation. Using the night vision system, I see Freddie and Mitra where I left them, Cmdr. Nimyitschi and DuQuois are standing beside the door.

  Mitra is concentrating on whatever piece of equipment she has, Freddie is kneeling, and his rifle moves from side to side as he scans the length of the room. “I thought I saw her,” he mumbles as the rifle swings towards me. What could he…the UV lamp! I stab the button turning off the ultraviolet lamp. “Clever girl, Squatter,” he mumbles. “Yes, I know you can hear me. Don’t worry, I won’t say, ‘Gotcha,’ until I have a kill shot lined up.” Without the assistance of the UV lamp, I’m as blacked out as they are. I switch over to the passive system like I should have to begin with. How could I be so stupid? I see Mitra, the XO and my boss, Freddie’s armor is the same temperature as the ambient air, and so he doesn’t stand out like the others. But the sighting system on his rifle does radiate some heat, so I can make a guess on where he is, too. While I do see them, I don’t see them clearly. The stealth system is fuzzing their silhouettes also. I sidestep to the other side of the deck as Freddie goes back to scanning for me. “No, sir,” I hear him say, “I’ve lost her. Mitra?” Whatever she says, I don’t know, as he doesn’t repeat it. But since the rifle doesn’t swing back my way, I don’t think she sees me either. I begin my slow approach to them. Initially, I was 500 meters from them; I’ve only taken a hundred off of that, so there’s still a long way to go. I do everything I can think of to make myself a difficult target. I walk a zigzag path. I use a rolling gait hoping to minimize the noise my feet make on the deck plating. Freddie has already said he can hear me. So I am in no hurry. I’m tempted to stay behind the parked shuttles, but I know the purpose of the exercise, so I cross between the rows—if the lights were on Freddie would see me—as often as feasible.

  Three hundred meters. “Squats, are you still on the flight deck?” Freddie asks.

  “You tell me,” I can’t help teasing him.

  Two hundred meters. “Mitra, are you tracking anything? Changes in air pressure or temperature?”

  One hundred meters and I cross back over to the starboard side, continuing to approach Freddie and Mitra.

  At fifty meters, I’m certain they can hear my heart and breathing, but he never moves the rifle in my direction. So I creep closer. At ten meters, a devilish idea takes root in my mind. I shouldn’t do it. It could easily compromise the success of this evaluation. I make a beeline for Mitra. She continues to stare at the monitor of her equipment. I’m going to pinch her. I was going to slap Freddie in the head but pinching Mitra will be more fun. I get closer, stepping between Mitra and Freddie, I reach out to pinch Mitra on her triceps when she surprises me. Her face doesn’t leave the monitor, but her arm is pointing right at my face and her index finger points straight at my nose. She has to know I’m here, but she hasn’t said a word. If the XO and the Bitch are wearing night vision systems they have to see what she’s doing. What gives? I turn from her and move towards the door and the XO. He’s safe, punking someone that high up the food chain is a career limiting move, I don’t care who you are. I consider punching The Bitch, but instead I just open the door.

  Commander Nimyitschi looks at the door and apparently sees no one there. “Evaluation is over,” the First Officer says. “Turn on the lights.” I quickly deactivate the cloak system while the lights begin to illuminate the room. He turns to me, “Miss MacTaggert, I am impressed,” he turns to Mitra and Freddie. “As for you two, I suppose you remember the agreement?”

  “Yes, sir.” They both say, neit
her is happy.

  “Miss MacTaggert, one more test if you please.” Now I see that he also has a headset on. “Please go stand behind the screen. When you get there, activate your device then return here, you may zig zag but stay in the corridor formed by the two rows of parked vehicles please.” If he had his own comLink, why was he relaying through Freddie?

  “Yes, sir.” I’m not sneaking, so I take a straight path. Once I’m behind the screen, I power up the stealth system. “I’m in place and stealthy, sir.”

  “Very well,” he says. “Staff Sergeant Call, you will engage Miss MacTaggert with your side arm, double or nothing.”

  “Sir,” he says. I wonder what that’s about. I’ll ask Freddie later.

  “Miss MacTaggert, begin phase two. Lights stay on!”

  Before I step out from behind the screen, I look at my arms and hands. I see the blurry outline, but not the gray of the armor. Through the distortion effect I see the deck plating. I step out from behind the barrier. I don’t have any active night vision on so I have no emitters. Hell, I don’t need them the lights are on! I can’t see them clearly, but I can see them. And I know Freddie is watching both sides of the screen. I choose a side and begin to walk towards them. Like before, I can hear Freddie talk to Mitra, but I can’t hear her talk to him. “Can you focus that thing?” He asks her. “I think she came out on the starboard side.” I did. Freddie raises his pistol. This is going to sting. I continue to zig zag towards them slowly. He waits for me to get to the hundred-meter line before he pulls the trigger. The round strikes me on my left side, just below the rib cage; spinning me around. It doesn’t penetrate, but I feel the impact.

  Knowing Freddie, I deactivate the system. “I’m hit,” I announce. I know I’ll get no points for taking another round. And I was right, that stung. A lot.

  “Excellent,” the First Officer says. “I’ll brief the Captain, Miss MacTaggert, go get checked out in Medical. I don’t want to hear any protestations; it’s protocol. The rest of you will be prepared for a more formal AAR at 1600. Sergeant Call, it appears you have gotten a reprieve. Any questions from anyone?”

  “Yes, sir,” Mitra says. “Do I…”

  “You did not win a reprieve, Miss VanSuel. You didn’t provide any indication or refinement data to assist in Call’s determination of a firing solution. Deal with it. We’re done here.” He turns and leaves. The favorite uncle just sent her to wash his house with her toothbrush or something.

  DuQuois speaks for the first time, and as I suspected it would be, it’s to yell at me. “Get that armor back to the workshop for post action review. Get yourself to Medical and when you finish there, get back to work.” And she leaves.

  Athena and my two assistants help me get out of the armor. Before I forget, I have to keep DuQuois from benefiting from my work. “Athena, I need you to write up another patent request please, the wraith armor.”

  “Of course, Sonia,” she says. “Processing. It will need to be sent via LR COM. I will have it ready to do so in 4.2 seconds. I have sent it to your casCom mailbox. You will have to use your permission code."

  “Thank you,” I say to her. I turn to one of my bestest buds. “Freddie,” I ask. “What did you get a reprieve from?”

  “KP,” he answers, getting out of his Strike Armor. “While you were walking downrange he bet me a week’s worth of KP that I couldn’t get a lock on you with the rifle. If I hadn’t gotten you with the pistol it would have been two.” KP, kitchen police, he would have been washing dishes, cleaning pipes or whatever other horrible tasks the cooks could dream up for him.

  “And you?” I ask Mitra.

  “Oh, I didn’t get so lucky,” she says as she breaks down her equipment. “I have to clean the latrines for the next week. I’m just happy it didn’t get doubled.” I start to argue with her. In some way, shape or form, she did detect me. I don’t know how yet, but I will find out.

  “Will it help if I offer to do your nails for that week?” I ask.

  “No,” she says with a sigh. “Unless you provide popcorn and ginger ale.”

  “Done,” I say. It’s important to take care of your friends. “But only if we start tonight, I insist, my place 2100. And it’s inhuman to serve ginger ale without bourbon. It simply isn’t done.” She nods. We all take our bundles and leave. I take the wraith armor myself, directing my minions to assist Freddie and Mitra with their loads.

  During the After Action Review, each of us takes turns rehashing what happened on the flight deck. I omit my attempt to pinch Mitra as well as her reaction. It wouldn’t do either of us any favors. But what really surprises me, is that she doesn’t mention it either. The First Officer has a yeoman on hand to take notes, the whole process takes less than an hour and we are summarily dismissed afterwards to go about our jobs.

  At a little after 2100, the chime on my door rings. I let Mitra in and point her towards the sofa. She reclines and with one hand mimes wiping sweat from her brow. Without a word, she kicks off her shoes and dips one hand into the popcorn bowl. I pop the cap from a ginger ale bottle, and opening the bottle of bourbon, pour a measure of booze into a tumbler, add a quantity of ginger ale and pour it into a second tumbler, which I then pour back to the first. After adding some ice, I hand it to her. “According to my great uncle Angus, that’s the best way to mix a drink.” After mixing one for myself, I say “Okay, Mitra,” I pick up a nail file and reach for her left hand, I can already see she has a lot of crud under her nails. “I’m not doing this because I feel like I need to apologize to you, after all I think you were set up. You helped design wraith to be undetectable, so to penalize you for not being able to find it isn’t fair. But in the lights out phase, I was about to pinch you on the arm and you stopped me cold without saying a word. How did you do that, and more importantly, why didn’t you rat me out to the First Mate?”

  “So, you were there,” she says around a mouthful of popcorn. “I didn’t say anything, because he would have wanted to know how I knew and I didn’t have any facts to lay out for him,” she says as she takes a sip of her drink. “Wow! This is good!”

  “So, the detector didn’t detect me?”

  “No, and you’re right, it was a fool’s errand. I was looking for things I knew I wouldn’t find and when I didn’t I just started scanning through the electromagnetic spectrum. I thought we had you when you turned on the UV lamps but that loud mouth Freddie clued you in on it.”

  I put down the file and pick up the cuticle trimmer. “But that doesn’t answer my question, how did you know I was there?”

  She sighs and says, “I really don’t know. I had a feeling. There was turbulence in the Source. And if you really want to know, I felt kind of silly pointing a finger to empty space because like I said, I wasn’t certain you were there. And that’s why I didn’t tell the XO.”

  “So, are you psionic?” I start trimming the cuticles on her right hand.

  “Are you making fun of me?” She asks warily as she moves her cocktail to her other hand.

  “Not at all,” I say hoping to assure her, “I’m as serious as a heart beat and as curious as a four month old kitten.”

  “Shra Kuhn,” she says. “I’m studying Shra Kuhn with Master Kreq, I have been for a few months now.”

  “Athena, my assistant, was telling me about that. She offered to enroll me, so now I’m going to take her up on it.” We sit and visit for another hour or so, and then Mitra leaves for her own stateroom.

  The following afternoon, I enter the gymnasium for my first Shra Kuhn class. Looking around for familiar faces, I wave at Mitra. She’s talking to a little man I presume to be the instructor. He’s a small fellow, about four and a half feet tall and doesn’t look like he could weigh more than ninety pounds soaking wet. Like Mitra, and everyone else in here except me, he’s wearing a simple white jacket with pants that come to just above his knees, a belt around his waist holds the jacket closed. I believe it’s called a gi but I’m not certain. I have seen similar cloth
ing in the movies and always thought the belts were different colors to distinguish rank. Everyone in here is wearing a white belt, but they are all soiled to different degrees. The short man’s is the darkest belt, essentially black but some of the exterior fibers are breaking down, showing the white ones inside. He is mostly bald, but the hair that he has is wispy, white, and gathered into a queue at the back of his head. Our eyes meet as I walk towards them. He has a friendly demeanor and gives me a very broad smile when Mitra points at me. He waves me over to them.

  “Master,” Mitra says, “this is Sonia MacTaggert, from the Engineering department. Sonia, this is Master Kreq, the Shra Kuhn instructor.”

  He bows deeply, I don’t know otherwise so I mimic him. He straightens up and offers me his hand. “What she isn’t telling you,” he says in a very pleasant baritone voice, “is that when I’m not wearing this,” he spreads his arms displaying his jacket, “I’m moving crates of consumables from cold storage to the kitchens. When the command group found out I was doing Shra Kuhn shrakas suddenly I’m teaching it a minimum of two days a week. Welcome, Sonia.”

  “Thank you, sir, uh, is that what I’m supposed to call you?”

  He smiles. “My first name is Arnold, ‘sir’ is fine with me. Traditionally, I would be addressed as ‘Master’ but I will answer to practically anything that isn’t overtly insulting. Have you decided to join us or do you want just to watch for today?”

  “I will watch today, sir,” I answer, “if that is okay with you.”

  “I would prefer you participate, but if you just want to observe, that’s fine,” he says pointing to starboard, “over by that wall, please.” I walk to the wall and start leaning against it, but to get more comfortable I slide down the wall and put my back against it as I sit on the floor. He steps to the front of the class and claps his hands. The rest of the class had been standing around in twos and threes either conversing or helping each other with techniques they had learned previously. When Master Kreq claps, they all stop talking and move into a formation. It’s then that I realize how many people are here. They are essentially a heavy platoon, four ranks of about twelve people each. They leave a double arm’s length on each side as well as in front as behind. I note that the people at the back have the newest gis and the cleanest belts while the people at the front have darker belts and their gis look like they have been washed and mended many times.