Chapter 69

Thursday morning was somewhat frantic. I realized as I was laying out the things I would be packing that I needed golf clubs, as well as the associated accessories. I also needed real luggage. There was too much of the Corp in what I had.

A quick internet search suggested the nearest place for buying golf clubs was back in downtown Santa Rosa, and as for luggage, there was a California Luggage Company right next to the Santa Rosa Shopping Center. I could have almost spit on it from the Abercrombie & Fitch yesterday.

I was pissed at myself all the way into town for not having thought of this basic need yesterday. I zipped in and quickly bought a matching pair of Briggs & Riley Baseline bags; a folding garment bag and a wheeled cabin bag. I didn't like hard-sided bags and wanted something matching but not too large. These looked ideal and I left happy but wondering what else I was forgetting.

I'd been smart enough to bring the laptop with me and got a nice travel bag for it as well. How I hadn't thought of these things yesterday when being talked into buying a bag for my tennis gear was a mystery to me. Maybe I just had too damn much going on, but it seemed to be a recurring problem these days.

For golf clubs, I headed back to Play It Again Sports. It took me an hour and a half to find a set of clubs I liked that would fit my height and long arms, but when I was done, I was happy. Of course I bought a new bag for the set, balls, tees, shoes, the whole nine yards.

Back at the house I quickly filled the garment bag, glad that the dress shoes would fit in the bottom of it.

The tennis bag got all my tennis gear, white socks and all. That kept the cabin bag limited to 'regular' clothes, golf outfits and swim wear. My luggage purchase had included a matching toiletries bag that fit nicely into the cabin bag. I didn't remember ever having a nice set of luggage. We were never big on travel growing up. With the bags packed, or prepared for packing, I decided there was finally time for a little practice in the basement.

I put the suit on and Bud started complaining immediately. He complained about being left alone so long. He complained about not being able to work on the Mark II version of the suit without us. He complained about our being gone for so long on this trip with Kelli just when we were starting to make some serious progress.

"Bud!" I shouted.

"What?" he asked hesitantly.

"You know what the real problem is here, and you know what needs to be done to fix it, so either fix it, or shut up."

"We're working on it," he confessed. "There are ... issues."

"Fine, but if that is leaving you feeling frustrated, that's no reason to be taking it out on Harley and me. We don't have to put this suit back on you know."

"That wasn't part of the deal," he said after a lengthy silence, during which I tossed the baseball up and down, trying to grab it in midair.

"No it wasn't," I agreed. "But the deal didn't say anything about you throwing temper tantrums just because your 'grand plan' had a few flaws in it either, did it?"

"No," another lengthy pause. "I'm sorry."

"Apology accepted," Harley and I both said with my voice. "From both of us," I added, since Bud couldn't hear Harley anymore.

"The thing is, if Harley and I are going to be a super hero for 'you'; and we all understand that 'you' doesn't just mean you, Bud, then it will require more than just our being able to do our molecular telekinesis tricks. Speaking militarily, there are plenty of things needed to wage a campaign besides boots on the ground. Even good soldiers need good intelligence and good logistics, and that's at a minimum."

"Understood, of course, Cooper," Bud answered immediately this time. "We do have plans for implementing certain things to aid in this, but..."

"But," I interrupted. "Your people seem limited in the amount of actual physical action you can take on our behalf. Is that it?"

"Yes, that's it exactly. We will be able to offer more support in the future, but the recently realized flaws associated with my move into the suit mean we will have to delay that support."

"For how long?"

"That's a bit of an unknown until we work out a solution to the current problem."

"Understood, and Harley and I both sympathize," and really, we both did. We'd been soldiers during times of war. We understood that no plan of battle ever survived the campaign intact.

Enough had been said. Bud went quiet and I worked on catching the baseball a bit more. The progress was there, but it wasn't much. I was getting it to wobble in midair now and then. Problem was, the contact was so brief that I wasn't sure whether the wobble was from grabbing the ball or inadvertently grabbing air around it.