right for the four-meter-high wooden fence surrounding the outdoor shooting range, crashing through it with ease, and just kept on running. Seconds later, just as Bolton made it through the access gate, Moore was crashing through the fence on the other side of the range, and he made it to the finish line well ahead of the FBI special agent.
“Waa-hoo!” Falcone shouted, as he ran through the decimated wooden fence. “Did you freakin’ see that? He didn’t even slow down! And I can’t believe he leaped on top of that hangar in one jump. That has to be ten meters high!”
“We’re going to have to repair those fences, sir,” was all Jennifer McCracken could say. Richter looked at Jefferson, who wore a stony expression—he imagined he could see a slight nod of approval, but couldn’t be sure.
“I suppose you’re going to say,” Kelsey DeLaine said as she joined Jason a few moments later, “that you intend that the way Sergeant Moore performed was the way you intend the CID units to act in the field, right, Major?”
“That’s exactly right, Kelsey,” Jason said. “These two guys just covered two kilometers through varied quasi-urban and open terrain in less than a minute. They’re better than Humvees, Kelsey—they can go over an obstacle as well as through or around it. And they can do the same with a three-hundred-kilo weapon pack on.”
Ari ran over to Doug Moore, yelling and jumping in celebration. “Great job, Doug!” she shouted happily. “Man, you were awesome!” She showed him how to dismount from the machine, helped him climb out, and gave him a big hug when he was back on the ground. “How do you feel, tiger?” she asked. He smiled, nodded…then turned away from her and promptly vomited on the ground. “That happens to everyone the first time in CID, Doug,” she said. “It’s like astronauts trying to walk after being in space—it feels too weird.” She gave the orders for the machine to stow itself, then put an arm around Moore’s waist and helped him back to the hangar, while Jefferson had a couple of soldiers carry CID Two back to the hangar.
Bolton took his machine back to the hangar, exited it with help from Richter, and folded it. “How did it feel, Carl?” Kelsey asked as Jason and Ari stowed it back in the Humvee.
“It’s fine—if you want to go crashing through walls all the time,” Bolton replied. He shook his head. “It works amazingly well, but it’s not suited to our needs, Kelsey.” Sergeant Major Jefferson walked over to them to listen in. “I think you know what I’m talking about, Sergeant Major,” Bolton went on, immediately including the army veteran in his review. “In some situations, it would be great having something like that leading the way. But if Chamberlain or Richter thinks we can form an entire unit of those things, he’s sadly mistaken.”
Jason and Ari heard their interchange and quickly went to join them after attaching the folded CID unit to its power and diagnostic umbilical in the Humvee. “It seems pretty effective to me, Carl,” Kelsey said. “Sergeant Major? Your thoughts?”
“It’s a bull in a china shop, ma’am,” Jefferson said flatly, giving Richter a suspicious glance. “I’ve been training Army Ranger and other Special Forces units for a decade and a half. There’s a reason why they don’t use stuff like this: it’s too cumbersome, too expensive, too unresponsive, and too difficult to support and maintain. Special-ops teams require maximum stealth, mobility, adaptability, and minimum support, hassle, and complexity. CID is everything special ops is not. As Agent Bolton said, it certainly is impressive; as a support device, it might be useful.”
“Useful?” Jason exclaimed. He shook his head, smiling in frustration. “CID is a revolutionary technology that makes its wearer powerful, nearly invincible, and as effective as a light armored or missile squad, and the best thing you can say about it is that it’s useful? C’mon, Sergeant Major, give me a break.”
“With all due respect, Major,” Jefferson shot back, “I was assigned to this task force by the White House and Pentagon to build a military team designed to travel around the country and around the world pursuing terrorists, not to test and evaluate new technology. We’ve already wasted half a morning playing with these toys…”
“Toys…?”
“…and I agree with Special Agents DeLaine and Bolton that we can be using our time more effectively if we concentrate on building a more conventional special-ops force, composed of highly skilled operators from both the FBI and military. Obviously the President’s National Security Adviser is enamored of your devices there, sir, but I don’t really think he expected us to build an entire unit around CID.”
“Then why did he place me in command of Task Force TALON?” Jason asked.
“He placed us in command, Major,” Kelsey said, making a point of using Richter’s rank similarly to Jefferson to make it obvious she was siding with the sergeant major. “Look, we’re supposed to get this unit up and running in a week and a half. Now we could spend the next three months studying how to use CID and another three months designing a training program for the field, or Sergeant Major Jefferson and I can work together with you to develop a standard special ops–capable unit and then as we go we can find ways to merge CID into our activities. It’ll just take too long if we try to do it the other way around.”
Jason looked over at Ari, who was still sitting with Moore as he tried to recover from his experience. She shrugged and turned her attention back to the Air Force sergeant. This was definitely turning into an “us-versus- them” scenario, Jason thought. He felt like arguing some more in an almost desperate attempt to try to make them realize what kind of power and capability he was placing in their hands—but it didn’t seem like it was going to work.
Richter shrugged. “Okay, guys,” he said. “We don’t have any experience organizing or leading special-ops or intelligence units; we’re just lowly engineers. I’ll do whatever I need to do to help the team.”
“Hey, Jason, let’s not have that ‘lowly’ stuff—everybody’s valuable on this team,” Kelsey said. Frankly, she didn’t really expect too much static from the eggheads, although she was ready to jump down Jason’s throat and shut him up quick if he did any more whining. She was surprised at the incredible capabilities of the CID units, but Jefferson was right—it would simply take too long to try to integrate those machines into an effective special-ops unit. They had work to do, and Richter was just not up to the task of organizing and training a light-quick-reaction fighting force. “If we start thinking like a team, we’ll start fighting like one. Right, Sergeant Major?”
“Absolutely, ma’am,” Jefferson responded smartly.
“Agreed, Jason?”
“Sure,” Jason said. “What should we do first?”
“Let’s put away the robots and grab some coffee,” Kelsey said. “Everybody, take ten and then meet at the conference room.” She grabbed Bolton’s and Jefferson’s arms and took them with her on the way back to the conference room.
“Looks like the Fee-Bee has taken charge here, Jason,” Ari observed.
The meeting was already underway by the time Jason and Ari arrived at the conference room. “Lieutenant McCracken,” Kelsey was asking, “I assume you have some basic Table of Organization and Equipment documents we can use to get us started?”
“Of course, ma’am,” McCracken responded.
“Explain how it’s organized if you would.”
“Yes, ma’am,” McCracken responded. “The basic organization of every Marine unit, from the smallest platoon to the largest division, is the same: a command element, a support element, and one or more operations elements. A platoon is usually composed of a command element, a support element, two machine gun or mortar squads, and two security squads. Each squad is composed of four to eight Marines; the command and support elements have roughly the same number, depending on the mission, making each platoon number between twenty-four and forty- eight Marines.”
“Very good,” Kelsey said. “That’s about the same setup for an FBI field unit, so we’re already on the same page. I move that we adopt that Marine infantry platoon TO&E for our first Task Force TALON field unit, have the sergeant major get the men and equipment out here ASAP, and start training right away. We can tweak it as we get more intelligence information about our target; I can see that we would need some specialized nuclear- chemical-biological weapon detection, decontamination, and neutralization equipment, for example. Any thoughts?”
“Just one—we don’t need any of that stuff,” Jason said. “Two full-up CID units on one, preferably two, Humvee platforms are all we need. In about a month I can have all our weapons packs out here and have two CIDs trained and ready to go. Give me a C-130 and I can deploy anywhere in the western hemisphere in two days.”
“We’ve been through this already, Major,” Kelsey said, the exasperation evident in her voice. “We’re very
