Chapter 16: Altered Fabrics

It took two weeks for the patent applications and article submissions to make it onto the radar of the major news organizations. It would have probably taken even longer if the McKesson Group hadn't sent out a press release announcing the formation of a joint venture with Proto-Tech industries to manufacture and sell fuel cells. Once it did, I was suddenly the center of a new kind of maelstrom, this time one made of publicity and notoriety. I was getting married in less than six weeks and my life was suddenly under a microscope.

I found myself sitting on television sets doing interviews. I did the Today show and the Tonight show, the Early Show and the Late Show. David Letterman was funny, Jay Leno was dying to know if he was going to be able to get a car with one of our fuel cells, Larry King was... old.

The major network and TV interview types quickly moved on to other things for the most part, at least until we actually began producing fuel cells, but there did exist that hard core contingent of people, ranging the entire spectrum from local TV and newspaper reporters to technology bloggers to the real hardcore conspiracy theorists. As far as their approaches and understanding went, the traditional news people and the bloggers were pretty much on the same track. It was considered highly amusing to us Legionnaires that the conspiracy theorists were actually closer to the truth.

The brief period of the public relations blitz was good for me in a way. It pulled me back into a more normal frame of reference. I was able to put aside the twin discoveries of healing and harm I'd found within myself during Borthun and Yela's rescue. I spent quite a bit of my quiet time exploring these two faces of myself. I leaned heavily on Eru for guidance, and he suggested I ask our warriors how they learned to deal with the emotion of battle and conflict. Chet and Cyrus were a revelation. They understood exactly what I had gone through.

Cyrus told me. "Unless you have been trained to be cannon fodder, You leave your emotions behind, so that when the battle is done you can return to them, and return to society still fit to function within it."

"Your instincts are good Dave." Chet told me. "You saw yourself getting emotional over the action you were involved in and were able to detach yourself as soon as you realized it."

It still took many hours of self inspection before I felt comfortable wearing this new side of me, but I found a place for that new me within myself and gave it room to be.

Borthun and Yela were adjusting to their new life, although slowly, and we were already planning on installing them as the caretakers at the Montecristo facility when it was ready for business. Their English was coming along, and as we had seen in the past when we accelerated things with our meditation/mental tricks, their ability to understand came faster than their ability to speak. In the meantime, Borthun had proved to be a treasure trove of old world construction and carpentry skills, and this had given Hoot and the boys cause to rethink the rest of their stable project.

Ginny and I had explored the joining that we had managed when we had healed Borthun. We found it difficult to repeat at first, but eventually, with much practice we had gotten to the point where we could slip in and out fairly quickly. It required a lot of Light energy to maintain though, I found myself pulling in waves of light far more frequently than I had for anything else I"d ever done. We also found it almost impossible to interact with people normally while we were merged. We hadn't really had a chance to use our incredible healing ability on anyone else yet, but we hadn't exactly gone out of our way looking for accident victims either. Still, I did have something I wanted to try.

Con had indeed completed the basic construction of the Montecristo Island base within a week as he had promised. It had taken the two of us two years to finish and furnish the house in the meadow, and I did not want to take such a leisurely pace with this one, so there were currently a swarm of McKesson clan folks doing all the fit and finish work. Con had assigned certain aspects to himself, mostly the power, computer, security and utility-related aspects, and knowing Con, we would get a few surprises thrown in for good measure.

We were taking our time with our Mediterranean observations. Once we were moved into the new facility, however, we intended to ramp things up. In the meantime, we had a wedding soon and another in the planning stages, throw Borthun and Yela's surprise addition into the mix, as well as the chaos surrounding the fuel cell technology roll out, and it had become a busy stretch for everyone. Chet and Cyrus kept us grounded and focused by taking the opportunity to enroll everyone in a series of mini 'boot camps'. The large area behind the Obsidian Project warehouse became our training ground - obstacle course included. We underwent a variety of two and three day sessions conducted by both Cyrus and Chet, along with the help of Evan Granholm, Whit Levine, Tony Herrera and Sylvia Porter, the members of the security team they'd recruited.

We were continually surprising the security team with our skill, rough as they seemed sometimes, but of course they didn't know that we were remembering skills that were a part of the memories Chet and Cyrus had shared with us.

Today I was surprising them by my absence.

Con had called this morning to say he was finally ready to show me one of the results of that 'Oh my!' he had issued back when I suggested the self-powered bracelets. I stopped by my bedroom in Meadow to slip into my Legion armor and let the staff know I might be late for lunch.

When I jumped into the Hall of Gifts, Constantine was sitting on a stool in front of yet another work bench. On the work bench were two packages.

"Good morning Con." I said as I walked toward him.

"Greetings Dave!" Con replied.

"Okay, here I am. What have you got for me?"

"Strip, and I"ll show you."

"Say what!!"

"I said strip. Get all your gear off." Con was grinning a mile wide by now. "Your bracelet too!"

"You're sense of humor not withstanding Con, I have my reservations, but okay." I said, and began to strip down.

Once I'd stripped completely, Con grabbed the first of his packages and threw it to me. "Here you go Dave, try these on for size."

Inside the package was a new set of the mesh undergarments. Mike called them our 'Legion Underoos', but everyone loved wearing them. As I slipped this new pair on I was gratified to discover they felt as comfortable as the originals, although the boxer style shorts had been replaced by a longer-legged style, more like bicycle shorts.

"Nice!" I said "What makes these better than the original set?"

"Patience, grasshopper!" Con replied with a laugh, throwing the second package to me. "Now this please."

The second package was a new set of Legion armor of course. I quickly slipped it on. Same fit, same look.

"Okay, Con, enlighten me."

"Very well. The first set of Legion armor, the Mark I version, was a passive system composed of a complex arrangement of nano-fiber composite structures which provided great protection from extremes of heat and cold, as well as chemical, and physical attack. It had serious limitations however. Primarily, it left the hands and head exposed, and it was a single-purpose device. It was armor."

"I might disagree about it serving only as armor. It also serves as a uniform, a unique identifier which distinguishes the Legion from those around them."

"While I do agree with your estimation of its usefulness in that regard, that was not a design element, so I did not mention it in discussing its design features." Con said.

"Okay, agreed. On to the Mark II suit that I'm wearing."

"Very well." Con pulled up a display which began cycling through screen after screen of technical data. While I stared at the information as it flashed before my eyes, he continued.

"The Mark II version is powered, using the same system of piggybacking power on the Light that I developed for the Cell Phones. The availability of power allows use of what I call 'Clever Fabric'. The nano composite material used in this suit is not strictly speaking, a fiber at all. It does arrange itself in fiber-like structures where appropriate, simply as a matter of design efficiency."

Con hopped off his stool, grabbed the two empty packages from the floor where I left them.

"Would you grab yourself a set of Earth clothes? Shirt, Pants, socks and shoes. I know you all are wearing your suit's undergarments pretty much full time, so don't bother with those."

I did, grabbing the clothes I'd taken off before coming here, which I"d left laying on the bed back on Meadow. I quickly had them in my hand.

"Put them on over the armor please." Con asked.

"Okay, now what?"

"Do you see the black band running around the left wrist of the Legion armor?"

"Of course."

"Grab it and think 'Off', in the same way the Legionnaires would grab their bracelets and think 'Home' to use them."

The instant I did this, the armor began to... writhe! on my skin, slowly pulling into itself until all that was left was what looked like a standard Legion bracelet on my wrist where I'd touched the black band.

"Wow!" I said. "Does 'On' do the reverse?" I asked.

"Try it." Con suggested.

<On!"> I thought, grabbing the bracelet. A long second later I was wearing my Legion armor. The shirt, pants, socks and shoes I had been wearing were nowhere to be seen, nor did I feel them beneath the armor.

"Wow!" I said again. This time with some feeling!

<Off!> I thought as I grabbed the black band on my left wrist again. Just as quickly, I was standing there once again in the clothes I'd been wearing.

"The suit will adapt itself to almost any sort of garment, but I would not recommend doing this while wearing heavy clothing and outerwear. The suit's ability to compensate for their presence is limited. The Mark III suit will not have this limitation, but the development time on that version will measure in years.

I spent the next two hours with Con learning all the features of the new armor, as well as assisting Con with the 'finishing touches' that only I could provide. Boy were we going to have fun showing this stuff off to the Legionnaires!

"Con, you amaze me as always. You my friend, have been working way too hard for way too long, and I am officially ordering you to take a break."

"A vacation? What will I do. Where will I go?"

"Good questions indeed. We've got a lunch date first. We're meeting Pete and Sarah for lunch today, and yes, it will evolve into business for a while, but after that, for you at least, perhaps its just a starting point for a few days of fun somewhere."

I had called Pete earlier in the week and apologized for not arranging to get together sooner, but with all the fuel cell announcement hoopla recently, he was very understanding. I had asked Pete if he and Sarah would meet me for lunch, and we had a reservation for noon today at the Green Horn Creek golf club's restaurant, 'The Double Eagle'. After a quick stop at the house on Meadow to change, I jumped Con and I to my Obsidian parking space, which was now inside the warehouse. Ostensibly, this was to keep the GTO out of the weather, but in reality of course it was so I could jump to it directly without fear of observation. As usual, the drive to Angel's Camp was quick, and we were soon being ushered to our table. Pete and Sarah were already there waiting. We all shook hands, and of course both already new Con. Our waiter was with us as we joined them asking for our drink orders.

It was iced teas all around, and with menus in our hands we spent the time in small talk while we made our decisions. Once the drinks were delivered and our food orders in, I made my offer.

"This is going to be a pretty simple meeting guys. I'm going to offer you both jobs with the Obsidian Project as members of our field research team. This team is composed of pretty much exactly who you might think it is, Fred, Chet, Arden, Mike, Alicia, Felicia, Cyrus, Constantine, Eru, Ginny and myself. I will offer you both exactly the same amount that everyone else in this team is getting, which does include a profit sharing plan. I will not tell you what kind of work this entails, nor will I share any other details until we have an agreement."