Jethro: First to Fight by Chris Hechtl

soon.”
    “Well, that's good to hear,” the former
DI said. “Though they'll probably have him on light duty or medical leave a bit
longer.”
    “Most likely. He's still bald.”
    “Well, some say bald is beautiful,” the
Gunny snorted.
    Jethro snorted back. It was a bit weird
hearing jokes coming from his former Drill Instructor. “Not on a Neo sir. Been
there, done that,” he said.
    Schultz just smiled ever so slightly.
Jethro shivered. The Doberman's ears flicked in humor once more. “Well, be that
as it is, I want you to get squared away and help where you can.”
    Jethro nodded. “Yes Gunny.”
    “And no heavy work with the right arm.
Let it heal damn it!” The Doberman growled. “I mean it!” he said, turning away.
    “Yes Gunny,” Jethro said, picking up the
bag and changing direction to the armorer's workshop. “This is going to be fun,
I wonder if I can get some time in with my suit?” he murmured to himself. He
instinctively picked up his pace, eager to find out.
    ...*...*...*...*...
    “Jump point defense... asteroid forts?
We'd have to tow them there,” Commander Logan said, thinking the idea over.
He'd thought about it a while ago, but discarded it. “Any ideas on getting
around the power and shield problem?”
    “The lance Corporal recommended talking
to her squad mate Ox. I have another idea, open it up to a competition. Drop
the idea into the forums with a reward. The engineering teams will be
interested in such a challenge even if the reward is, as they would say, 'tame
or lame'.”
    “An interesting idea.”
    “We could of course purpose build the
forts in the yard and then tow them out.”
    “True, impractical though, at least for
now. I like the idea of building the forts in asteroids. It's more economical.
It would help with our population too.”
    “You would give more people more room
for advancement outside a ship,” the AI responded.
    “That is definitely an incentive. Any
ideas on the incentives?”
    “Leave time, a promotion, a job
overseeing the effort, credit for the work, credits in an account... It is up
to you sir.”
    “Yes, yes it is. I like the idea of
leave time and a promotion to overseeing the work. Hmmm... let me think about
it a bit more,” he mused. “But it's definitely a good idea.”
    “Thank you sir.”
    “Keep them coming Commander, good work.
And pass on the same to the lance Corporal.”
    “I will sir, thank you.”
    ...*...*...*...*...
    Governor Walker heard about Destiny's
security breach and then about the shipment from admiral Irons. He was
instantly furious that he didn't get the shipment, whatever it was. He demanded
to know how it had been kept quiet from him for so long.
    “You answered your own question sir,”
the aide replied. “They slapped a classified label on the load. They used all
their own people and robots to transfer it. Our spies couldn't transmit the
information over the communications so we had to wait until one physically came
in on leave and told us so.”
    “Oh. That still doesn't excuse the
Captain!”
    “He's apparently not happy about what
went on. Someone sabotaging his ship...” Nelson the aide shrugged.
    Walker threw his hands up in the air. He
didn't have anything to do with that, but apparently the Captain didn't think
so. “He still should have turned the load in to us!”
    “He apparently thought differently sir.
Or it might have been someone or something else. From what our source said, the
load was protected by the admiral's AI. Anyone who got their hands on it that
wasn't navy and it would self destruct.”
    “So it would have been useless to us
anyway!” Enrique said, glaring at the governor.
    “No, it could have been leverage,”
Walker growled.
    Enrique shook his head vehemently no.
“If we had tried that Logan would have sent in the Marines after it.”
    “He wouldn't have dared!” the governor
growled, eyes flashing.
    “Don't bet on it. Hijacking a classified
military cargo?”
    “It