The bubble of conversation between the new soldiers and their SAMs started to soothe Rhodes into a trance. He had to fight himself to break this moment and disturb the others by getting their attention.

He was just about to call them to enter The Grid when laughter startled him. He turned around and spotted Dietz laughing with Zen. Rhodes couldn’t hear what they were laughing about.

At that moment, at the moment when Rhodes turned his head to look in their direction, Dietz raised his arm and fired his thermal cannon directly into Fuentes’s shoulder.

Dietz didn’t fire hard enough to harm Fuentes. Dietz only unloaded enough to heat the metal housing of Fuentes’s shoulder implant.

Fuentes spun around yelling his head off. “Hey! What the hell?!”

Dietz only laughed again. Zen laughed, too. “Cool it, kid,” Dietz told Fuentes. “It was just a joke.”

“What the hell are you doing, Sergeant?” Rhodes snapped.

“I wasn’t doing anything, Sir,” Dietz replied. “I was just fooling around.”

“He jumped pretty good, didn’t he?” Zen chimed in.

Rhodes shot a glare at the orb. “You keep out of this.”

“I just wanted to see what would happen—in the interest of science,” Zen replied.

“This was your idea?!” Rhodes countered.

“It was just a joke, Sir,” Dietz insisted.

“Do you think it’s a joke to turn your weapon on one of your own people?” Rhodes snapped. “Don’t ever let me see you do something like that again. Don’t ever let me see you threaten or point your weapon at anything other than the enemy. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Sir,” Dietz murmured.

Rhodes turned on Zen. “You’re supposed to help him—and the rest of us. If I find out you’re feeding him ideas that undermine the cohesion of the unit, I’ll have the technicians take you offline. Is that clear?”

“No!” Dietz exclaimed. “You can’t do that! He’s mine!”

“Then you two better shape up real quick,” Rhodes countered. “We have enough problems without someone threatening us from inside our own unit.”

“I didn’t threaten him,” Dietz pointed out.

Rhodes leveled him with a death glare. “Did it look to you like he enjoyed it? Would you like it if I aimed my Vipers at your head? Is that what you’d consider a joke, Sergeant?”

Dietz pulled his head in and mumbled, “No, Sir.”

Rhodes didn’t want to stop glaring at Dietz, but Rhodes had too much other shit to deal with right now. He couldn’t waste any more time on this.

He was just about to say something else when Gannon murmured, “Whoa! That is wild!”

Rhodes barely glanced at him. Rhodes didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary except that the grid lines were spreading over Gannon’s face.

Gannon stood there looking down at his arms and body as the grid lines spread downward from his neck to his chest and outward to the rest of his limbs.

Gannon turned his arms in different directions watching the grid lines rotate and adjust their position around his limbs. “Cool!” he exclaimed.

“What’s happening?” Henshaw asked. “That isn’t happening to any of the rest of us.”

Rhodes walked over to Gannon. “What’s happening?” Rhodes asked Fisher.

“I don’t know, Captain,” Fisher replied. “I don’t understand it. The interface isn’t detecting any malfunction.”

“There has to be a malfunction. What’s happening to Gannon, Santos?”

Gannon’s SAM hovered there watching. “I don’t know, Captain. All his systems are functioning correctly.”

“Bullshit!” Rhodes turned back to Gannon, but Gannon really didn’t seem to be in any distress. He just stood there watching the grid lines crisscrossing his body.

The lines rotated in different orientations, pivoted back and forth……and then changed shape.

The squares marking Gannon’s face and body adjusted their orientation, and this time, they changed Gannon’s shape, too.

He didn’t make any sound of pain or distress. He just stood there watching while the squares continually altered their position.

They turned into different geometric figures, returned to being squares, and then melted into strange fluid patterns.

Each change smeared the man underneath—except that the grid lines weren’t underneath. They changed Gannon’s shape, too.

His face contorted, stretched in some areas, compressed in others, and writhed in all directions as the grid lines moved, pivoted, and manipulated the man along with themselves.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Gannon!” Rhodes gasped, but it was too late.

The changes picked up speed. The grid lines squiggled and then tangled amongst each other. What had been Gannon got lost in the muddle until he wasn’t there at all anymore.

The squiggled knot of lines got smaller and smaller. “Stop this, Santos!” Rhodes choked. “There has to be a way to stop it.”

Santos cocked his head to one side….and then he vanished. Rhodes turned the other way just in time to see the tangle of grid lines disappear—the tangle of grid lines that used to be Gannon disappeared, too.

The whole group stood there staring at the spot. “What the hell just happened?” Coulter asked.

Rhodes wilted. “He’s gone.”

“What do you mean—he’s gone?!” Oakes snapped. “How can he be gone? He was just here!”

“This is what I’m telling you. This whole system is experimental. The doctors and officers and technicians have never done anything like this before. There are bound to be problems—with everything.”

“So….one of us could be next.” Oakes cast a glance around the group. “Any of us could go at any time. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Yes,” Rhodes groaned. “It’s been like this ever since I woke up.”

He made an executive decision not to tell these people about Cope, Poole, and Taylor. Dozens of other soldiers probably died before Rhodes woke up.

He took a deep breath to pull himself together. “Look, we have a lot of work to do before we…..”

“You son of a bitch!” Rhinehart bellowed. “You better shut the hell up before I kill you!”

Everyone jumped and spun around to see Rhinehart going ballistic. He lunged for his SAM and tried to grab it, but there was nothing to grab.

The SAM had the face of some unrecognizable alien with snakelike tentacles whipping from its head. The face reminded Rhodes of the Xakzat species of reptile from the Quaknax system.

The tentacles crackled with electricity and the SAM’s eyes glowed with cold, piercing fire. They radiated bright white light and made the SAM look menacing and furious.

Its name was Rocky, but it didn’t look like a Rocky at all. It looked like a monster. It had a deep, booming, thunderous voice that echoed out of the distance.

Rhinehart swung his fists at the thing trying to hit it, but his hands went straight through it. He kept bellowing, “Shut the hell up, you piece of shit! I’ll kill you!”

Rhodes rushed over to him and tried to restrain Rhinehart’s arms. “Easy, Lieutenant. Take it easy!”

“Get this damn thing away from me! Just shut it off!” Rhinehart roared. “You son of a bitch!”

“Settle down!” Rhodes yelled in his ear and turned to Rocky. “Make yourself as small as possible!”

“I was only trying to help him….” Rocky murmured.

“Make yourself small!” Rhodes yelled back. “Do it now!”

Rocky shrank to a tiny size, but the SAM still didn’t become a pinprick the way Fisher did.

Rhinehart kept struggling against Rhodes’s hold, knocked Rhodes’s arms away, and made another dive to pulverize his SAM before Rhodes pulled Rhinehart away again.

“Smaller,” Rhodes ordered. “Make yourself smaller—and don’t say anything.”

“My function is to….”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!!” Rhinehart roared. “YOU SON OF A BITCH!!”

“Be quiet!” Rhodes ordered. “Don’t say another word until I tell you to.”

Rocky finally retreated out of sight and kept his mouth shut—thank God.

Rhinehart calmed down the minute his SAM disappeared. Rhodes unwound his arms from Rhinehart’s and Rhodes let himself take a moment to catch his breath.

Rhinehart kept glaring at the dot in the corner of his view where Rocky had retreated.

“Now listen to me, Lieutenant,” Rhodes rasped. “You can’t turn it off. I’m sorry. I know it’s annoying. You just have to learn to live with it.”

“Like hell I will!” Rhinehart snapped.

“If you absolutely have to, you can leave it small like that and we can order it not to talk to you.” Rhodes waited for a second just to let that sink in.

The silence became palpable. All the rest of Rhodes’s people watched and listened to this latest confrontation.

“Now listen to me very carefully, Lieutenant,” Rhodes went on. “This SAM is your only friend. Its only function is to help you. You’re going through some growing pains right now, but in a few minutes, we’ll be going into a battle training session. This SAM will give you information and help you navigate the terrain.”

Rhodes turned around to address the whole group. “You might have a problem with your SAM now. I had problems with mine, too. Trust me when I say that you’re better off with your SAMs than without them. In a few days, we’ll be going into battle for real and you’ll need all the help you can get. No one is in a better position to give you that than your SAM, so learn to work together.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Fisher murmured in his ear.

Rhodes ignored him. “Your SAM is your best and only friend. What happens to you happens to your SAM, so it’s in your interests to work together. Your SAM is as anxious for you to survive and come home in one piece as you are.”

Rhodes turned back to Rhinehart. Rhinehart kept glaring at Rhodes and shooting sidelong daggers at the pinprick that was Rocky.

Rhodes took another steadying breath and studied the SAM. “Change your appearance—and your voice.”

“I can’t, Captain,” Rocky boomed.

“Yes, you can,” Rhodes snapped. “Don’t give me that bullshit. Just do it. Change yourself into……a Khikvid—and make your voice quieter. Cut out that echo.”

“That would not be advisable….” Rocky began.

“If you don’t do it, I’ll order you to remain silent and invisible for the rest of forever. Just do it and don’t argue with me.”

“I don’t give a shit what the hell he looks like,” Rhinehart snarled. “I’ll fucking kill him.”

Rhodes didn’t answer. Rocky hesitated for a second and then expanded. He didn’t come back to full size. He swelled to the size of an orange. “Do you mean like this?”

He took the appearance of a different alien. The Khikvid were small, furry, and round with large, wide-spaced eyes, pudgy faces, and big round ears.

The sides of the SAM’s face kept stretching and adjusting, but at least it was recognizable as a loveable, cuddly creature instead of a monster.

Rocky also softened his voice to a low, soothing murmur. It would have sounded like Fisher’s voice except that Rocky made his voice a lower pitch. He looked and sounded much more like a Rocky now.

“That’s perfect,” Rhodes replied and turned to Rhinehart. “What do you think? Can you live with it?”

Rhinehart glared at the Khikvid. “I don’t have to like it.”

“No, you don’t. If you really want to, you can order him to disappear and not talk to you anytime when we aren’t in battle. Does that satisfy you?”

Rhinehart snorted and looked away. “Bastard.”

Rhodes squeezed Rhinehart’s shoulder. It didn’t feel the same as squeezing a man’s shoulder. The implants didn’t give the way a normal human shoulder would.

Rhodes did it anyway and turned to the others. “Right. Now all of you follow me. We’re going to start moving through The Grid. It will change into a landscape and then into the training landscape….”

“How do we know The Grid won’t take one of us over the way it took over Gannon?” Coulter asked.

“Can’t we just go into The Grid now?” Thackery asked. “This is all just a waste of time.”

“If you don’t keep your mouth shut, I’ll send you back to the barracks,” Rhodes snapped. “You’re only making this harder for everyone.”

She didn’t say anything else. Rhodes made one last survey of the battalion.

They didn’t inspire a whole shitload of confidence. Dietz kept grinning at Fuentes like they were the best of friends. Fuentes glared back at Dietz.

Rhinehart glared at his SAM. Oakes and Henshaw kept looking toward where Gannon had just been standing.

Rhodes sighed. This was the absolute last group in the world he ever wanted to take into any kind of battle, even a simulated one.

He didn’t have a choice. His only option was to train them as much as possible.

Then he had to pray to Almighty God that they somehow worked out their problems before the real gunshots started flying.

End of Chapter 16.