“As you can see the modular construction allows rooms to be built to varying sizes. Offices, residences, medical facilities.” Burton led them down the steel hallways, something all four of them were well used to. By now most military bases had extensive subterranean areas.

Burton would have made another small fortune with his polymer resin. If it wasn’t for the non compete clause in the contract he signed years ago. The old man always did plan ahead, he thought, a grain of admiration still remaining.

He sent Clara to change and led the men into a long corridor. Windowed rooms down one side, and his demonstrations prepared.

The wooden pedestal from upstairs looked out of place in the steel corridor. Not as much as the bowl of plump green apples it supported. “We grow them here, seed to fruit in less than six months thanks to our hydroponics bays.” He segmented an apple in front of them, letting the juice drip to the floor. He ate a piece himself first. “Our own breed, a little sweet for me, but not bad for appletini’s.” The mention of a flamboyant cocktail brought a shake of the heads that stopped with a crunch of fruit.

“We also have potatoes, carrots, and blood oranges. All nutrient enriched and able to be force grown under ultraviolet light.” Burton pressed the buzzer, cueing his staff to begin the demonstration.

Two technicians entered, leading a pig to a trough in the centre of the room. The top of the animal's skull had been surgically replaced with clear plastic. The brain exposed and the graphene tendrils covering it in a lattice. A simplified prototype device grafted into the pink flank.

“The most useful thing in the world is a pig. Meat, fertiliser, waste disposal. And of course these are genetically modified. Four kidneys allows them to serve as living dialysis machines. You could even transplant them, and transfuse the blood.” Fuck you old man, he thought, seeing the impressed faces around him.

Burton’s first breakthrough came from splicing spider genes into goats. This allowed him to harvest sizeable quantities of spider silk by refining the goat’s milk. When processed, the fibres could be woven into body armour that looked and felt like a cotton shirt. Due to a lifelong non compete clause in a contract signed by a starstruck and starving sixteen year old, only available to civilians. Any profit from sales to the military went to the old man. Burton knew the old man wouldn’t hesitate to unleash his overpriced legal team. They made Assaultrons seem cute.

“Of course the really interesting stuff,” Burton continued, trying not to let his clenched jaw and grinding teeth show. “Happens when we directly stimulate parts of the brain.” Burton nodded to the technicians and they accessed the prototype device.

“Using the pig-boy we can turn off the animal's hearing.” The technicians clapped, hit hammers against buckets. All without any reaction from the pig. The graphene nano filament secreted along its nerves at work. “Imagine soldiers able to block out the sound of shelling. Or the opposite, able to hear footsteps at a distance.” They seemed mildly intrigued. “Imagine a soldier that feels no pain.”

After a minor adjustment on the device, one of the technicians drew a high calibre revolver while the other covered his ears. The shots were so loud two faint pops escaped through the glass.

The four faces drew close to the window. Gawping as the pig snuffled through blocks of gelatinous protein. Unaware of the two bleeding holes in its flank. A moment later it slumped over dead. “We’ll have our butcher prepare a leg each to take home to the wives. Moving on.” Burton took the small laugh as a good sign.

Clara appeared, looking even better in skin tight blue. The zip undone the right amount. She nodded to Burton, confirming that she’d been briefed. Good girl, he thought, realising Clara was far sharper than she let on.

Burton made sure to walk by her side as they headed into a meeting room. Giving the men a view they’d like. They sat round a metal table. The grey man sat at a small table in the corner, normally reserved for the least powerful person in the room.

Burton checked he had everything ready under the table, then began. He pulled the chair out for Clara to sit while he opened the first case. “How are we feeling today Miss Clara? Sleep well?” She managed to look coy.

“Yes Mr Blake, very well.” Clara lied exceptionally well. Even Burton almost believed her. Despite knowing she’d been up all night looking after the handful of guests at The Grand.

“So you’re not tired?” Burton slipped the jet black headband over her blonde hair. Lining up the neural resonators. He held the clicker up and pressed it.

“No Mr Blake, not…” Clara yawned. “Excuse me gentl—” Her head slumped and Clara drifted off into a deep sleep. Burton saw the grey man take note of that.

“Nothing like well rested soldiers to give us the edge.” Burton slammed the second, longer case onto the table, waking Clara with a start. She regained her composure quickly.

“Miss Clara, do you know what this is?” Burton flicked open the catches on the polymer case, revealing a customised assault carbine from his own collection.

“A gun.” Clara’s correct answer brought a patronising chuckle from round the table.

“Care to elaborate?” Burton asked playfully, hiding his contempt for everyone but her.

“A big one.” She quipped. Burton smiled and pressed the clicker. Clara’s eyes closed, moving rapidly, lids fluttering. Then she opened them and spoke.

“It’s an M four A one. Five five six calibre, thirty round mag, eight hundred rounds a minute, six hundred metre range.” Clara looked unnerved, till Burton threw her a sly wink.

“An all American classic. Strip it please.” Burton watched the faces as Clara broke down the carbine like she’d done it a thousand times.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“The headband is reproducing a thought pattern, implanting the knowledge in her mind and muscles. This is a cheap parlour trick. The actual device will use subliminal signals to implant any skills we want. You want a sniper, done. We can promote a lower resting heart rate and greater visual acuity. You want a pilot, we can promote faster reactions. You want a brawler, we can promote muscle growth.” Clara dry fired the carbine, with a satisfying click.

Burton turned and took her hand, removing the headband. “And you didn’t even break a nail. Thank you Miss Clara.” He helped her up and out. She’d need a dose of the good stuff to brace for the migraine about to hit.

“By the time the subject is fifteen they’ll be fully integrated with the device. By the time they are twenty we’ll have some of the finest soldiers the world has ever seen. They will be our last line of defence against invasion.” Burton did his best impression of a general from a movie. Then reeled it back, knowing he had an ace in the hole. “And it will not be enough.”

Burton led them to his favourite place on earth. A dull and empty room, transformed by his genius into something wonderful. “No one has set foot in here for just over a year.” He yanked at the round handle, breaking the plastic seals and stepped in. Inside had been an empty square, spanning all three levels. Now a huge, rigid, translucent dome took up the space.

The humidity hit them all, like getting off a plane somewhere hot. Burton walked them along the soft damp earth and let them see his garden. Thin trees grew in topsoil. Two white Assaultrons raked and turned over the rich dirt. Another fed plump young pigs and bleating kid goats. While the final one plucked tomatoes from the vine. High above the simulated sun lamps looked almost real as they reached sunset.

“We started with dirt from a Mojave test site. Dry, irradiated, dead.” Burton hopped up casually onto the steel box that now served as a long work table. “We drop one of these.” He rapped on the hollow box. “The bots, incubators, seeds, oxygen candles, and the polymer dome inside. You could drop it from a mile up and the contents would be safe from the impact, protected by the earth we fill the boxes with.” The grey man looked right at him for the first time. He knows, Burton thought.

“Where’s Chuck?” Burton yelled, ignoring the numbers on the robots.

“Here I am Mr Blake!” An Assaultron clanked over, waving and speaking with a human voice.

“Chuck here is using our remote override. He controls everything, isn’t that right Chuck?” He brushed off the bot's shoulders.

“Sure is Mr Blake.” Chuck made the eye wateringly expensive piece of military hardware dance, like a robot.

“In combat, direct control over any bot on the market will turn our subjects into force multipliers. When the war is won, they will help rebuild.” Burton let them marvel at the shiny tech. Missing the real science.

“If you fill a coffee cup with dirt from your garden at home, they’ll be somewhere in the region of two hundred million microbial organisms in it. God’s littlest creatures.” Not God’s, Burton thought, mine.

“This stuff has triple that, all engineered to live off radiation. Modified extremophiles capable of surviving inside nuclear reactors or even a total vacuum. They clean and bring life to the ground. As that’s happening the bots put up the dome, it hardens under sunlight. We deploy oxygen candles. Rapid growing seeds are planted. The animals are incubated to term and reared on protein blocks. The animal waste and nutrient enriched soil fertilise the plants, acting as oxygen recyclers. In six months you have a closed eco system that can support eight men indefinitely. And that is from one box.” Burton slapped the box twice as he leapt from it. Silently begging the slow minds to spot what he left out. They didn’t.

Burton accessed the Vault systems, hoping they didn’t see his fingers moving. The simulated sunlight faded, leaving the dome dark. The only light coming from the bots. Within seconds the humidity vanished, replaced by cold air. Then a drop of condensed water fell from above. Followed by another and another, until it fell like rain.

Burton took great pleasure in explaining the nanoscopic ridges on the polycarbonate dome that forced gas into a liquid. The same principle that kept butterflies dry. He led his guests up and out, to a waiting limousine and a smiling Clara.

Burton drove himself back. Stopping at the nearby Red Rocket to fill up his silver speedster. He got a pack of the cheap cigarettes he still preferred put on his tab, and took the long way back to The Grand.

Inside the bar he found the top brass sitting round a table, in good spirits. Glancing over to four of Clara’s friends who Burton paid to be there. The grey man sat at the next table, smoking and reading the paper.

“You’ve got them.” Clara whispered from behind the bar. Handing him a bottle of Mckellan twenty five from the top shelf. “Give them the bill, and my friends will take the sting out of it.” She rested her hand on his. In that moment he realised that Clara might be the next former Mrs Blake.

“Gentlemen.” Burton showed them the bottle that cost triple digits per glass. Clara placed a tray of crystal tumblers down and promptly withdrew.

“Alright Blake, what’s it's going cost?” Higgins got to the point while Burton poured. He took a cocktail napkin from the tray and the pen from his pocket, savouring the moment. Burton wrote his price down and handed it to Higgins.

“And not a penny less.” Burton insisted. Higgins held the napkin so they all could see.

“Is this a joke?” Higgins asked, taking charge like the borderline sociopath Burton pegged him as.

“I never joke about the future of my country, Colonel. Just because I don’t wear a uniform doesn’t mean I’m not a patriot.” Burton meant every word. The idea that his genius would be property of someone else, that they would profit from it, repulsed him.

“Thank you gentlemen, perhaps you can take your drinks at the bar.” He speaks, Burton thought. The grey man interrupted them before they could bite. Higgins scowled, threw back his drink and left. The other three accepting the vivacious company at the bar.

“You put on a hell of a show, Blake.” The grey man sipped the fine, imported whisky. “Out of this world.” Shit, Burton thought. “That non compete must be iron clad.” How does he know that? “You know Mr. Hou—”

“Fuck the old man.” Burton regretted that instantly. A recording of that would be enough to trigger the old man. Might as well get my money’s worth.

“Let the great Robert House rot. I’m not too scared of germs to go outside. Matter of fact I plan on living out my days thirty four million miles from here. Not living for centuries trapped in a gaudy casino. I’ll build you the finest soldiers this world has ever seen. And when we wipe the commie scum off the face of the earth, they’ll make incredible astronauts and pioneers.” Burton could see it now. Rows of his domes looking out on Olympus Mons. People enhanced to survive the journey and reduced gravity. Statues of him and the name Blake on everything.

“You know Arcjet Systems is working on a new booster. I think they have a good chance at getting the Mars Shot contract.” The grey man smiled, offering Burton an expensive cigarette he declined. Opting for the cheap ones he’d smoked for years.

“And what do you think my chances are?” Burton asked the real power in the room. The grey man fished through his pocket, took out a single copper coin, and slid it across the table.