“What’s your assessment of what I did during the last battle?” Rhodes asked Fisher on the way down the corridor.

“I don’t understand the question, Captain.”

“What did you think of what I did? How do you think I handled it—apart from not listening to you or letting you warn me or give me information about things? I guess I’m asking about how I changed shape.”

“Ah! You’re referring to the Grid alterations you used to break through the pyramid’s defenses.”

“Are those alterations part of my programming—or whatever you call it?”

“You can alter your Grid projection any way you want to, Captain. I thought you understood that.”

Rhodes stopped in his tracks and turned to stare at Fisher. Fisher’s face hovered right there in front of Rhodes’s eyes. Rhodes didn’t have to turn anywhere because Fisher was always there.

“Are you saying….I can take any shape—any shape at all?”

“Of course, Captain. That’s what The Grid is for. It forms the fundamental layer structure of these simulated landscapes, but it will behave differently when you go into a real battle.”

“What happens then?”

“The Grid feeds you information about the landscape, the terrain, obstacles, and any objects or enemy positions within The Grid. The Grid always affects your projection, though. You control that.”

“So….I really can take any shape—even in a real battle?”

“Of course. That’s the purpose of The Grid. It’s much more useful to you than it is at creating these training landscapes.”

Rhodes set off walking again. This revelation added a whole new dimension for him to wrap his brain around.

“Getting back to my original question, what did you think of how I used The Grid last time?”

“You used it perfectly well,” Fisher replied. “You created useful shapes that adapted your weapons and movement style to each situation. If I had warned you about the Viper ports in time, you would have hit the target and achieved the objective.”

Rhodes already knew that. He should have let Fisher communicate with him during the training session. What was the point of carrying around this SAM if he didn’t let it help him?

They turned off into the same tiny training room. Rhodes didn’t wait around long enough to think of it as a padded cell for a lunatic mental patient.

He dropped into The Grid immediately, started walking, and then burst into a run.

Fisher stayed full-sized in the upper righthand corner of Rhodes’s view. The Grid shifted and they entered another alien planet landscape—a different one this time.

This one was another battle zone, but instead of a city with a pyramid in the distance, they found themselves in a dense jungle.

Aemon Legion Jackhammers went off all around Rhodes. Gunshots blasted through the trees, pelted trunks and branches, and nearly took Rhodes’s head off.

He fired his boosters to launch above the canopy where he could get clear of the conflict.

He wound up flying into another raging air battle between Legion Predators on one side and some alien drone fighter craft on the other.

Viper missiles pounded him from both sides and knocked him out of the air. He felt himself falling.

“Get back down on the jungle floor, Captain!” Fisher called over the noise.

“It’s a death trap down there! I can’t go down there!”

“None of the gunfire is lower than five feet off the ground! You can get beneath it and make your way to the objective from there. You should be safe!”

Rhodes didn’t argue. He sure as hell couldn’t stay up here.

He fired his boosters again, banked into a dive, and plunged for the canopy. His instincts took over again and his body stretched out into a long, narrow shape.

His arms morphed into short wings and his boosters fired directly behind him.

He smashed through the canopy flying full speed. He didn’t even try to slow down. He let his senses take over and the grid lines flowed into a different shape.

His grid lines morphed into the long, snaking coiled body of some boneless creature, swerved up level with the ground, and took off winding his way between the trees.

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Jackhammers pounded back and forth above his head, but he never stood up tall enough for any of the gunfire to hit him.

Fisher still hovered in front of Rhodes’s eyes. “Where’s the objective?!” Rhodes roared. “I don’t even know what the objective is!”

“It’s a pit in the ground two miles northeast of here!” Fisher rotated slightly to the side and the Grid landscape in front of Rhodes changed again.

The lines pivoted and shrank to show Rhodes a full overhead map of the surrounding countryside.

The Grid fed tons of data to Rhodes’s neural core. He read the landscape in the blink of an eye.

The Grid even highlighted enemy positions, craft, and ground troops he couldn’t see with his eyes.

A few tall, modular complexes dotted the terrain at different locations. The alien enemy occupied most of these fortified positions.

The Grid fed Rhodes more information than he would ever need about what kind of weaponry the aliens were using, how many pieces they had set up at which locations, and even the weapons’ targeting angles.

Legion platoons advanced through the jungle trying to surround the alien complexes. Dusters and Predators swooped overhead dropping breaker bombs on the structures. All those aircraft sent out Viper missiles to bombard the fortifications.

None of the Legion aircraft noticed the isolated pits Fisher mentioned. The Grid didn’t show them as anything more than holes in the ground.

“What is that?” Rhodes asked.

“The enemy is hiding a toxic weapons lab down there,” Fisher told him. “You have to drop a breaker bomb down that hole to destroy the lab.”

“I don’t have a breaker bomb.”

“That’s the objective. You have ten minutes before the lab becomes active. Then the aliens will release the toxin and kill every Legion soldier in The Grid, including you.”

Rhodes shuddered. How was he supposed to drop a breaker bomb down the pit when he didn’t have a breaker bomb?

That didn’t matter. He had ten minutes to cross two miles of battlefield. He would just have to worry about bombing the pit after he got there.

“I’ll need to refuel before I go out there,” Rhodes remarked.

“You don’t need to reload,” Fisher replied.

“What do you mean?”

“Your implants include a fusion generator that powers all your….”

“Okay, spare me the science lecture. So….I don’t need to reload anything? What about my Vipers?”

“You should always have a full complement no matter how many Vipers you fire. The generator replaces them after you release each one.”

“How long does it take to replace them?”

“It’s instantaneous.”

Rhodes didn’t ask the obvious question about how that was even scientifically possible. He didn’t have time for that right now.

He really didn’t care how some fusion generator instantaneously replaced Viper missiles as soon as they released. He had bigger things to worry about with everyone shooting at him.

He took off slithering faster than ever over the jungle floor. The Grid constantly pivoted and adjusted to give him a complete readout on the surrounding terrain, the aliens, their technology, and all the Legion positions.

The Grid showed him exactly where he was on the map. He was too far away from the pits and not making fast enough progress. He wouldn’t get there in time.

“This won’t work,” he told Fisher. “We need a new strategy.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Hold onto your shorts, pal. I have an idea, but it might get dicey.”

“I don’t know what that word means,” Fisher replied. “We only have five minutes left. What are you going to do? It has to be something quick.”

“I don’t have time to explain. Just hold onto something.”

Rhodes realized in that moment that Fisher didn’t have anything to hold onto, but it didn’t matter.

Rhodes rocketed out of the jungle flying at his top speed. He changed in an instant, blasted through the gunfire coming from both sides, and broke the canopy.

He altered his grid lines to take the shape of one of the alien fighter drones and flew straight into the Legion Predators’ gunfire.

“No, Captain!” Fisher roared, but Rhodes didn’t listen. He rotated in the Predators’ direction and opened fire with his scourge guns.

Two Predators were in the act of bombing the alien structures. At that moment, one Predator let loose its breaker bomb to pound the complex.

Rhodes changed shape again in a heartbeat, fired his boosters, and plunged for the building. He snatched the breaker bomb out of thin air.

“The bomb is set to blow in five seconds!” Fisher yelled. “Get it down the hole now!”

Rhodes couldn’t fly any faster, so he tilted toward the ground and let gravity take over. He plummeted for the open pit. He was flying too fast to stop.

“Two seconds!” Fisher roared.

Rhodes scrambled to come up with some shape that would save his own life—and Fisher’s.

The hole yawned in front of him. If he didn’t do something now, he might as well fly down that hole and let the bomb blow him up along with the alien lab.

At the last possible second before impact, the grid lines covering his limbs splayed outward as wide as they would go. He flattened himself into a thin, springy piece of fabric fifty feet across.

He hit the ground, covered the hole, and the breaker bomb ripped out of his grip. It dropped down the pit and the fabric bounced across the hole.

“Get out of the way!” Fisher yelled, and without asking permission, he did something to the fabric’s grid lines.

They collapsed in on themselves, converged into a ball, and Rhodes rolled clear onto the ground just as a colossal jet of fire exploded out of the hole.

Rhodes tumbled away wrapping his arms over his head. The explosion detonated twenty feet of soil around the hole. The eruption tossed him farther away from it. He somersaulted clear and pitched into the trees.

Rhodes picked himself up off the ground and looked around, but the landscape was already vanishing before his eyes. It turned black with just the grid lines in perfect squares all around him.

“I don’t detect any injuries, Captain,” Fisher murmured. “Congratulations on a successful training session.”

“Thanks,” Rhodes gasped. His heart wouldn’t stop racing. “Thanks for your help.”

“General Brewster is asking to see you as soon as you finish here. He wants to congratulate you, too.”

Rhodes groaned. “Does he have to?”

“Apparently so. This project is his brainchild.”

Rhodes snorted. “Why am I not surprised?”

Fisher cocked his head to study Rhodes. “Are you okay, Captain? You didn’t have any difficulty manipulating The Grid that time.”

Rhodes turned away. “Don’t tell the general that.”

“I can’t communicate with him.”

“I meant it figuratively. I don’t want him to think I’m enjoying this.”

“At least you aren’t in distress about it.”

“I mean I don’t want him to think I actually like this or that I changed my opinion about what he’s doing.”

Fisher inclined his head the other way. “Do you like it?”

Rhodes distracted himself by leaving The Grid and going back to the training room. “I guess the problem is I like it too much. It could become addictive if I’m not careful.”

End of Chapter 9.